Across the hall, Grace laughed as Andrew whispered something to her. It looked to Saina like they’d both stopped eating somewhere around the seventh course, which turned out to be a platter full of stewed chicken testicles. Their plates were piled with tidbits from all the subsequent dishes, which their tablemates insisted on serving them—the overflow was ignored, somehow, by the servers who whisked in with a score of new plates between every course, picking up the old ones and depositing them on a waiting tray. By the time the meal reached its halfway point, the tablecloth beneath Saina was smeared with the remains of a dozen courses that she’d dutifully consumed, but the plate in front of her was once again brand-new.
The unrelenting backslapping and good cheer in the room made it hard to concentrate on the man next to her as he bragged about his daughter, who was a brilliant pianist and wanted to go to Juilliard, and maybe Saina, whom he’d heard was an artist of some renown, might be able to make the necessary introductions? She should come to his house and listen to his daughter play for herself! And when she was there, maybe she could make them a painting, ha ha ha, that they would hang in their offices? She could paint all the beautiful things that this land produced! And maybe she knew people in America, she must know so many people in America since she was such an accomplished and respected young woman, maybe she knew someone in America who would want to open up a new market for sea urchin or small turtles, such delicacies, if only they were aware! Or did she instead have things that she could sell? Real estate in America was so cheap now, they’d all heard, and maybe she knew a reputable real estate agent, someone who wouldn’t cheat him—Not a Jew, ha ha ha, or maybe a Jew was better! Ha ha ha—who would point him towards a good investment property because he knew somebody who had tripled his cash on a condo in Las Vegas in just nine months!
These men wanted to consume everything. By the time they’d reached the fourteenth course, turtle soup, Saina wouldn’t have been shocked if they’d seasoned her with a dash of white pepper and eaten her. These men didn’t pluck politely from the small dishes set out before them—they picked up those dishes and shoveled the contents into their mouths, never able to get enough in a single bite. They gulped up each other’s talk in the same way, loud and eager, quick to rage and quicker to laugh. They wanted to dig into the ground and pull out all the roots, trawl the seas and scoop up anything formed of flesh, search the forests and the fields, and snatch creatures out of their burrows and knock birds down from their perches so that they could be plucked and skinned and seasoned and diced and trussed and steamed and broiled and roasted and stir-fried and served up at banquets designed to demonstrate the abundance of the land and their dominance over it.
Bizz-buzz. Bizz-buzz. Bizz-buzz. It took several rings before Saina realized that the odd noise breaking through the hum of Communist bonhomie was her own phone, which had somehow acquired a foreign accent. Heart slamming against her chest, she pulled it out, looked at the caller ID, and without letting herself think, stabbed at the green button.
“Hold on,” she said into the receiver, as she rose and walked double-time along the perimeter of the room, thankful that enough rounds of toasts had been drunk that her hosts were more focused on each other than on the Wangs. Dodging a waiter carrying yet another bottle of gao liang, she slipped out the door and leaned against a wall papered in a pink moiré.
“Hi.”
On the other side, Leo was silent.
“Um, hello?”
“Saina. Saina! I can’t believe you picked up. I rehearsed a message, but I didn’t really think about what to say if you actually picked up.”
“Well, you’d better say something.”
“Hi.”
“Hi.”
“Tell me about your dad first. Is he okay? Did he tell you what was going on?”
“Yeah—it’s too long to get into right now. He seems a little wrecked, but physically, at least, I think he’s okay. Or he’ll be okay.”
“Oh, that’s a relief. I’m glad. I’m really glad. Saina . . . ”
“Yes?”
“I want to make this right with you.”
“I . . . how?”
For a long minute, Leo was silent.
“You know, that first day we met, at Graham’s place, initially I thought you were just some pretty girl.”
She laughed. “This is a weird way to apologize to someone.”