The Dim Sum Drama (Flash Fiction Part 5)

This is the 5th part of the story. The previous parts are here: 1, 2, 3, 4.

One of the employees of the coffee shop comes to the table to ask Babutai and the three strangers standing behind me if they want to order something. Babutai becomes strategically silent and looks at his admires with expectations. One of the strangers pulls out a ten dollar bill and asks the employee to bring something for her “prince”. It turns out that the three strangers are the members of the local “Good Mom Club”, which is going to host an annual party soon. Although Babutai’s wife Princess is not a member, they want to invite the couple to come anyway, hoping that Babutai will enliven the party with his stories of contemporary and historical significance.

After this is settled, Babutai continues his story of Bamboo Palace. When he is asked how he knows the restaurant and its owner so well, Babutai answers he knows things because he goes around to talk with people and shows interest in their life. With a cup of coffee in hand and a snack on a plate–a piece of Japanese curry bread made of rice–Babutai’s narration flows endlessly and effortlessly.

According to Babutai, there was a big fight in Bamboo Palace the day before, but not between Lau and Arjiang, the two father-in-laws. Lau and Arjiang came to Bamboo Palace to talk about Lau’s daughter Sandi and Arjiang’s son Tony’s marriage. Lau had, by the time, already realized that his objection to the matrimony was futile–the two young people had already been living together whether he acknowledged it or not. This made him very angry. In retaliation, he wanted to get compensated for “losing” his daughter. Arjiang, on the other hand, refused to acknowledge that Lau “lost” anything and chided Lau on his outdated idea of “selling his daughter”. Arjiang was no more up-to-date than Lau and pretty much as outdated in his worldview as Lau, but the modern notion of getting a daughter-in-law without having to pay for a bride price was very suitable to his sense of economy. He enjoyed his convenient modernization and quickly assumed an expedient attitude of moral superiority when talking with Lau. It was too much for Lau to bear. He not only had to give up on his claim to his daughter, relinquish a good cashier–albeit a sulky one–for his restaurant, and lose a good translator and document handler–albeit with regular spelling mistakes–for his paperwork, but he was also asked by his in-laws–who he had not acknowledged as relatives yet– to share the burden of the down payment for a small house in the vicinity for the young couple. His lost had been piling up. And one look at Arjiang, who was all smiling and grinning, Lau understood how much Arjiang had gained–a free daughter-in-law who would work for his family, bear children with his name, take care of them at home and at their business. The thought enraged Lau.

“I guess we are in an impasse right now.” Arjiang said at length, looking at his wife Meimei who’s sitting next to him.

Meimei suddenly had an idea, “where is Sister Chrysanthemum?”

Chrysanthemum is the name of Lau’s wife, who was busying in the kitchen at the time. There were about fifteen patrons in the restaurant at the time of the evening–the size of the dinner crowd has always been disappointing and that’s the nature of all Asian restaurants outside of New York City.

Lau stared at Arjiang and Meimei angrily and thought to himself, “who wants to be your sister? You’ve got all the advantage from this lousy marriage business and I got all the disadvantage. No wonder you are so eager to be our relatives. Calling my wife your sister will not make yourself endearing to me.”

After a pause to show his reluctance in reciprocation, Lau said, “my wife doesn’t take care of financial issues. She trusts all those things to me.”

“Oh, Brother Lau, you are so old fashioned. So you have a total control on the family purse string, but it is the 21st century now. Women have a say in important family issues.” Arjiang said and chuckled.

“Let’s get her. She would agree with me anyway.” Lau said OK. He wanted to ask a waiter to go to get his wife, but Meimei said, “don’t bother. I am going to the kitchen to get her.” Before Lau could stop her, she headed towards the kitchen.

Lau’s heart was on fire. He wanted to wring Arjiang’s neck and squeeze it until he was gasping for breath, or smash his face until all traces of his smugness were distorted into agony.

Still he kept his composure. When the two women came back from the kitchen, they walked arm in arm in deep conversation. Chrysanthemum had gone to visit her daughter and son-in-law, who were living with Arjiang and Meimei for the time being, regularly without Lau’s knowledge.

Lau disrupted the women’s chat and asked his wife, “you agree with me, right? We are so unhappy with the whole thing. Why do we want to pay for half of the down payment for the house when we don’t even agree with the marriage in the first place? Anyway, I want Sandi to be back right now. She has to work here. Without her, I am very much stressed out.”

“Oh, come on, Lau. Sandi is a big girl now. Let her go. She was so depressed when she worked here day in and day out. Nobody likes to work in a restaurant nowadays and she is certainly not going to stay here for long anyway. Remember, she is going to the community college in September. She wants to explore the world like other young people. I mean Tony makes her happy and she hasn’t been happy for a very long time.” Chrysanthemum said, “I mean we can afford half of the down payment for the little house and I don’t think it is an outrageous demand from our in-laws.”

“Yes, I guess it is three to one now. So case closed. Thank you, Chrysanthemum, for speaking your mind. So it is settled.” Arjiang said quickly. His happy grin grows bigger on his face, merging with his wrinkles.

“Of course not. This is a conspiracy. I don’t agree with it. And it is all because of you. You even dragged my wife to your team.” Lau stood up in a fury and directed his fierce eyes at Arjiang. Then he grabbed the empty plates, chopsticks, napkins on the table to throw at Arjiang. After that, he lifted a chair, which was not heavy at all, and threw it across the table at his opponent. The two women screamed and two waiters scrambled to try to stop Lau from grabbing another chair.

Just as Arjiang was extending his arms to lift a chair to defend himself, somebody ran out of kitchen and ran towards them with a kitchen cleaver knife.

With the help of two waiters, Lau calmed down. He looked at the person with a cleaver and said, “Chef Chow, what are you doing, wielding the knife like that?”

“I’ve had enough of your antics. I can’t stand this anymore.” Chef Chow yelled, “You are such a bully and for years I’ve been silent, but no more…”

“What? Chef Chow, what’s wrong with you? Are you out of your mind?” Lau cooled down and looked at Chow, obviously confused.

(To Be Continued Here)