James is face-to-face with Brenda Wozicek.
The lamplight glows on her pale skin and the soft red yarn of her sweater. She has light eyes fringed with thick lashes, and a full red mouth. Her dark hair has a wide, vivid streak of a deep turquoise.
Alf squirms in James’s arms. His collar is, of course, missing, and with it his tag, shaped like a bone, with the Chaos’ home phone number. Now he jumps to the floor and cavorts around Brenda. He lets her scratch his ears; he pants, grinning, tongue rolling, frantic tail whipping his buttocks vigorously back and forth. James, still dazed, hears an echo of his father’s voice: “The tail is wagging the dog!”
Brenda stops scratching; Alf’s tail droops. Brenda hoists him up, and he lolls happily in her arms. “James, you’re soaked. Come in and dry off.”
James is arrested by the beauty of her heart-shaped face. Ming might call her small-town, might talk ironically about her dye and tattoos, but she is undeniably sexy.
“Take off your coat,” she says, nodding to the coatrack. “You’re shivering. You need to dry off. Put your wet shoes here.”
Now he’s stuck, shoeless, in her house. Struggling to breathe normally, conscious of his sodden jeans, and—could it be?—the tears in his eyes.
“Sweetie,” she says, “you’ve gotten so big.” James feels the blood rush into his cold cheeks. “Did you come looking for me?” Brenda speaks softly, with surprise, as if it would please her more than anything if that were true. For a moment he wants to say he did.
“Um, no,” he says. “Actually, I came looking for Alf. Dagou said he was here.” Alf and Brenda regard him quizzically. “Do you—I’m just wondering, does Alf come here a lot? You two seem super attached.”
“No, I just really love dogs.”
“How did he get here?”
“Maybe he’s got a girlfriend somewhere in the neighborhood.”
Like man, like dog. Embarrassed, James changes the subject. “This is a nice place. I like the way you’ve fixed it up.”
“Thanks!” She shrugs, pouting. “It’s put a dent in my credit cards.” James steals another look around him, half expecting the room to waver and dissolve in arrears, but the lamplight is as warm as ever.
Alf jumps down, trots purposefully into the other room, as if someone else is there. Brenda glances behind her. James watches the soft line of her throat. She tucks a curl behind her ear in a furtive, restless way that confuses and excites him. Her small ear glows against her dark hair. Her movements are graceful and deliberate, but there’s something unpredictable about her—not quite impatient, not rebellious, but wakeful and resistant.
“Dagou sent you here?”
“Um, yeah.” She’s frowning. “What’s wrong?”
“Nothing’s wrong,” Brenda says. “But I texted him to come and get Alf himself.”
At this moment, he’s startled to hear a light footstep from somewhere farther inside the house. Self-consciously, he pulls his gaze away from Brenda.
Katherine Corcoran is standing in the doorway, Alf at her side.
“Katherine.” James swallows hard, wishing for Dagou. “Why’re you here?”
Katherine smiles. “I could just as well ask you that.”
“Looking for Alf. Dagou said—” He stops, struck by the recognition that Brenda texted Dagou to come over right when Katherine was visiting. Had Brenda planned an accidental meet-up of herself, Katherine, and Dagou? Whatever her intentions, Dagou has, by sending James, made a narrow escape.
There it is, the elaborate setting, the luminous bright green jade on Katherine’s finger.
“How are you?” he stammers. “I didn’t know you would be in town. I thought—”
“I’ll be in Sioux City at my parents’ on the twenty-fifth, but of course I still came to visit. I’ve been coming to Haven during Christmastime for so many years.”
She knows he knows this; she stayed at their house, cooked in their kitchen. Katherine in an apron, learning from his mother how to wash the rice, how to let the oil get to just the right heat before throwing in the vegetables. She’s like an older sister to him. She even looks like his sister, with her dark hair and Asian features. She was adopted from a rural orphanage in Sichuan.
“Everyone here is family,” she says. “It’s so good to see you, James! How long has it been—since your high school graduation?”
Remembering Dagou’s fear of her smile, James has a sudden desire to run from the room.
Katherine gestures to Brenda, who nods graciously. “And Mary Wa has told me all about Brenda. It turns out we have so many things in common. We’ve been having a good talk—we’ve been planning the decorations for this year’s Christmas party!”
Brenda says, “James, what’s wrong with your hand?”
“That? Oh—it’s fine,” he says, trying to recall the origin of the scrape. It must have happened when he dropped his phone. He remembers the dismantled phone in his pocket and is anxious to go home. “Do you have a ziplock baggie and dry rice?”
“No. When I want rice, I get takeout from the restaurant.”
“I should go.”
“Hold on.”
Brenda leaves the room, Alf trotting behind her. She brings back ointment and a bandage. As she dabs on the ointment and applies the bandage, James can feel some tension or pain ease under her fingers. He sniffs her perfume—something woodsy, faintly sweet—and the combination of her touch, her nearness, and her scent is disorienting. Whereas Katherine is perfect, like an etching, Brenda’s beauty is multidimensional. Just being near her is making him uncomfortable. He can’t stare at her for one more minute, but he can’t stop staring.
“Come into the living room,” she says. James is led to the soft red sofa and lets himself sink into it.
Katherine leans toward him from a wing chair.
“James, help us with the party,” she says. “Your mom wants us to keep up the family traditions. She wants continuity. She told me all about the first party, the year the restaurant opened, before Dagou was born. All they could afford was noodles. They made eight different noodle dishes!”
Hers eyes are very dark, shining into his. He turns away, ashamed.
“I was thinking, this year, something special, in honor of your mother? We could decorate the restaurant with wreaths and fir branches? And red napkins and tablecloths, of course: everything red for good luck and longevity. A real Christmas tree? We can retire the fake one. We could make it all vegetarian, in her honor. Even though she won’t be there.”
“Vegetarian Christmas lamb,” says Brenda sweetly. “What do you think, James?”
“Yes, James,” echoes Katherine. “What would your mother like?”