“There’s something you need to know: As a kid, I really do believe my father knows how to make it rain. I believe he’s the biggest, the strongest, the most magnificent man in the world. The only man in the world.
“So I’m five years old, and I’m with my father. Ba has to mail a package. I have no idea what’s in the package or who it’s going to, but I can sense it’s important. He announces to the clerk, ‘This is going to China.’
“She’s a tight-mouthed, prissy type, and I can tell right away she doesn’t like my father one bit. Most people don’t. For one thing, he’s bigger than the average Asian guy, and also he’s dark. I’m like him, too, big and dark; it’s Ming with the alabaster complexion; and my youngest brother, Snaggle, is ‘just right.’ But for another thing, Ba is crude. He’s checking out the clerk in a way I don’t understand because I’m six years old, but I now get that he’s undressing her. Considering her possibilities. She’s not young and she’s not pretty. But he’s an equal opportunity barbarian.
“She says, ‘Excuse me, but this package smells. Is this perishable?’ and I know—because I watched him sealing the box—that instead of using packing peanuts, he’s filled the empty spaces with dried mushrooms.
“Even at the time I wondered what else was in the box. Was it a gift? To whom? What did my mother think? Did she even know about this package?
“There’s a pause. She leans toward him just a little, in part, I suspect, because of his undeniable Oriental magnetism, and in part because she thinks he doesn’t know much English. And as she’s leaning forward, my father opens his mouth and says, in a carrying voice, right into her face, ‘None of your business.’
“She straightens up and says, ‘Excuse me, mister. Answer my question.’
“He says, ‘I told you, none of your business.’
“She says, ‘I’m getting the manager.’ Suddenly there’s this fat-faced guy staring over the counter. My father stares back. The crackle of hostility is hair-raising. I try not to listen. But even though I put my fingers in my ears and la-la-la, I can hear their angry exchange. At some point, my father begins to punctuate all of his sentences with ‘you,’ like, ‘Back off, you!’ I know I should stand by him, but I have started backpedaling, I edge away from the counter. I’m not the only person doing this. There’s another Chinese guy in line, Ken Fan—he’s turned away, staring out the window as if he’s memorizing the license plates of every car in the parking lot. Then Ken Fan sneaks out of the post office. Why? Because he’s embarrassed to witness this behavior from someone who looks like him.
“The manager yells, ‘I’m calling the police. Susan, call the police.’ And she picks up the phone.
“My dad takes his package off the counter. ‘William,’ he says—that’s me—‘we’re leaving.’
“That’s when I hesitate. I don’t want to follow him out. I want to pretend he’s not my father. He gets to the door and he can sense my pause, because he barks, in this deep-throated Mandarin, my name: ‘Dagou.’ You should know that all of us have dog nicknames, given by our parents: Big Dog, Second Dog, Third Dog. They must have wanted another kid, maybe a girl, who would have been ‘Little Dog.’” Dagou plays the same audio cue of a dog barking. “Humble nicknames mean we’re precious; our parents are protecting us from hubris, from malevolence. But like all nicknames, they also mean: You’re mine.
“I follow him trying to act like I’m not with him. He grabs my arm with the vise grip of someone who’s at the wok all day. On the sidewalk, he’s yelling, ‘You sniveling, disloyal coward! You should be ashamed of yourself! You’re my son and you stand by me!’
“I walk along, filled with shame.
“He yells, ‘If you hate me, then you hate yourself!’
“He yells, ‘Apologize to me! Coward, you owe me an apology!’
“I say nothing. I can’t speak.
“And right then, while I’m standing at the passenger side, he gets into the car and, quick as anything, locks my door! Then he starts the engine. Pulls away!
“And what do I do? I’m six years old. I don’t even know how to get home. In two seconds, I’m running through the parking lot, chasing the car. I catch up at the red light. I’m banging on the door, bawling and groveling and yelling, I apologize, I’m sorry, I’m sorry.”
Ming hears the unmistakable sound of Dagou taking a gulp of something. “And in today’s news … despite my six years of great work in the kitchen, six years of cooking the freshest, most subtle versions of sad-sack menu items—six years of bringing an authenticity to the food that he can appreciate!—my dad just gave me an ultimatum: ‘Apologize before the Christmas Party, or you’re fired.’
“He thinks I’m still a child, and he’s not wrong. I won’t be an adult, I won’t be able to live my life, until after he is dead.
Dagou lowers his voice. “Yeah, sometimes I lie awake thinking of the different ways that he could go. He could slip on the greasy kitchen floor and crack his head open. He could fall down the stairs. Or the best way, the easier way, would be for him to get locked into the freezer room. That room is older than he is, and totally not up to code. There’s no way to get out except with the key we keep on the inside wall. Say the key is missing. He’ll be locked inside, gone for good. Wouldn’t it be amazing? To wake up every day and know my life is my own.”
Ming snaps off the radio. He can no longer bear to listen. Does he hate the self-absorption, the woeful self-aggrandizement of Dagou’s performance? Has Dagou relayed a story that reminds Ming of his own humiliation by Leo? No, it’s something else. Ming is a child, standing by Winnie’s side, listening to the conversation of the community women. He’s watching his mother’s face. It’s not the only time he’s registered this particular distress. The pain of it, searing, infinitely private. He knows Winnie’s pain as he knows a first memory. To what other woman had his father planned to send the package? Sitting in his hotel room, years later—decades later—Ming clenches his hands.
DECEMBER 23
Passion
In the morning, Haven is buried in fourteen inches of new snow. Along the avenues crawl aging city plows, woolly mammoths making slow furrows in the glittering white. Into this sparkling, frigid tundra, James struggles alone, protected by a hood, face mask, puffy coat, gloves, and plastic bags pulled over his sneakers and taped at the ankles. After only a few blocks, his jeans are already soaked through and frozen stiffly at the knees.
Approaching the restaurant, James can hear the engine of Dagou’s small Toyota pickup with the plow attachment, rumbling from the parking lot. Snow has been pushed up so high the parking lot itself is hidden from view. Dagou, laboring within this fortress of white, can’t be seen. James slogs around the walled lot and into the driveway.
Dagou has gotten out of the Toyota and is using a big shovel to heap snow atop the high mounds. He works easily, lifting heaping shovelsful as if they’re nothing.
“Hey, Snaggle. You’re late.”