Searching for Sylvie Lee

by Jean Kwok

  “Nowhere to stash the bodies, huh?” I say, and want to face-palm myself. That came out all wrong. Lukas freezes and I follow with a weak “Ha ha.”

  He doesn’t answer. A breeze gusts against my jacket as he steps outside with the bicycle. I squint my eyes against the brilliant, piercing sunlight. The clouds are swirling in unpredictable patterns within a vast Van Gogh sky.

  Lukas has brought a few tools with him and starts to lower the bike seat for me. The bicycle is covered with hand-painted white flowers. “Sylvie is taller than you are.”

  I realize that I’m supposed to ride on that thing. “Much more athletic too. Is this her bike?”

  “Borrowed from Estelle. But Sylvie will not mind. We can reset it for her easily.” A bit of the constant ache in my neck eases to hear his calm certainty that Sylvie will be back.

  “What do you think has happened to her?”

  His eyes dart away from mine. “I think something upset her and she wants time to consider everything.”

  Why is he not looking at me? Was he the one who upset her? “Really? You think she’s okay?”

  “Yes, I do.” His voice is so intense I wonder if he truly believes this or if he needs to be certain of Sylvie’s safety so much he’s convinced himself of it. Or maybe he’s a brilliant actor and he’s covering something up.

  I try to sound casual. “What could have upset her that much?”

  He shrugs and waves one hand at the main house.

  “Right,” I say. “Lots of options there.” Maybe Helena had accused Sylvie of stealing the jewelry and Sylvie had left. But why wouldn’t she have come home? In the pit of my stomach, my longing for my sister intensifies. Sylvie, where are you?

  Lukas has fixed the seat with quiet competence and now adjusts the handlebars. I notice that despite his apparent calm, his knuckles are white with tension.

  “C-couldn’t we just walk?”

  “No, it will be much easier for you on the bicycle.”

  Right. A few minutes later, I am wobbling on the treacherous pink bicycle, barely managing to stay upright. Which idiot said you never forget how to ride? Lukas didn’t even give me a helmet. But then I manage to find my balance and follow him into the brick street. I can tell he’s holding back for me because soon an old lady with a walker attached to the back of her bike zooms past us as if we were standing still. My bike sways as I fight the wind that threatens to blow me backward.

  “You are doing fine,” Lukas calls over his shoulder. “We are going to make a right at the next corner, and after that, it is straight along the River Vecht. Very easy.”

  I grunt, too stressed from concentrating on the bumpy road. There are a surprising number of people on bicycles for a Friday. Doesn’t anyone have to go to work here? A mom and her tiny child weave past me. He’s pedaling away on his own little bicycle without training wheels and is the only one wearing a helmet. She shoots me a sympathetic smile. Then comes a businessman in a charcoal suit, sitting bolt upright, speaking into his headset, elegant leather briefcase strapped to the back.

  I manage to make the turn onto the river road and take a moment to lift my head and look around. I can smell the water. The sparkling sky is admiring its own reflection on the surface of the rippling green waves where the rowboats and sailboats are docked, waiting to whisk their passengers away on an adventure. The tree-lined, small brick street merges with the sidewalk, only a different color and stone pattern distinguishing them, and I almost veer onto the walkway. I barely miss a young woman who leaps out of my way, uttering what must be a Dutch curse. I speed past old and new houses with pointed gables, none taller than three stories, which line both our side of the river and the opposite bank. It is completely foreign and almost unbearably charming at the same time.

  As we pass a little white church, its high bell tower chimes the hour. With the urgent peal of its bells behind us, we pass a bridge and pull up to a café nestled on the bank of the river. To our right, large rustic barrows filled with pink begonias, and to the left, potted shrubs guard a number of square wooden tables shaded by dark green parasols that read heineken. I spot Estelle sitting in a checkered sage-and-white chair with her eyes closed, sunlight caressing her upturned face. She is wearing some kind of blue blazer and there’s a clunky black bag on her lap. Despite the brisk breeze, a few other customers are seated at the outdoor tables.

  My legs almost crumple as I get off the bicycle and leave it at the rack. Give me a nice subway any day. Estelle smiles as we approach and stands to give Lukas another lush smack on the lips. Then she kisses me three times, alternating on each cheek, as everyone else seems to do in this country. “I am so glad you came! Did you remember to lock your bike, Amy?”

  Lukas tosses over my bike key and sits down beside her. “I did it for you.”

  Estelle pretends to tsk. “This is a very safe country. I have left my handbag with wallet inside in the basket of my bicycle by accident and come back after shopping to find that no one has taken it. Of course, that was a stupid thing to do. But if you leave a bike unlocked, watch out!”

  I have settled into the chair across from them. “Why is that?”

  Lukas shrugs. “Everyone has had so many bikes stolen themselves that if they see one unlocked, they feel it is fair game.”

  Estelle winks. “It turns into the wild west here. One minute and your bicycle will be gone.”

  I study them for a moment. The anger Estelle displayed at the airport when she asked Lukas if he had fought with Sylvie is gone. She hasn’t said anything about Sylvie. He must have already talked to her and somehow convinced her that he’s in the clear. Is that true or is Lukas just an incredible manipulator?

  When the waitress comes, Estelle suggests I order a koffie verkeerd, which she explains means coffee the wrong way around, so it’s more milk than coffee, and an uitsmijter, which has something to do with eggs and the Dutch cheese Gouda. She pronounces it like Houda.

  After she and Lukas place their orders, Estelle says, “So are you surviving that house?”

  I chuckle. What a relief to talk to someone normal again. “Barely. I mean, my cousin Helena means well, but . . .”

  “I know. And Lukas can be prickly too, especially these days.”

  Lukas throws his hands up. “Just talk about me like I am not here.”

  “Will do,” Estelle agrees, with a wink at me. “Well, it has been very hard for him, first with Grandma’s death and then the disappearance of Sylvie.” Her face turns serious. She wrinkles her forehead. “Though Grandma was not actually his grandmother by blood, right? That always confuses me.”

  “She was my grandmother and Sylvie’s too, but not Lukas’s. In Chinese, we often call a close older woman ‘Grandma.’ It’s a sign of respect and love.”

  “Well, Lukas was crazy about Grandma too.”

  “Fine.” Lukas stands. “I will go use the toilet so you can discuss me. When I come back, you will stop.” He gives Estelle an affectionate tug on her hair before he leaves, so I know he is not truly angry. This is my chance to get some information out of her.

  He passes the waitress, who is walking to our table with the drinks. She sets down a very small cup of coffee for Lukas. My koffie verkeerd is served with a little cookie. Estelle tells me it is a mini stroopwafel. Estelle’s Coca-Cola Light comes with a wedge of lemon and a long plastic stirrer.

  I ask, “Are Lukas and Sylvie close?”

  She pulls the stirrer out of her drink. A flat circular base with spikes is set perpendicular to the stem. “From the time we were little. They were always together.”

  I take a sip of my koffie verkeerd. It is creamy and delicious. “Why did you think they might have argued, then?”

  Her green eyes are startled. “I did not say that.”

  I set my jaw. “You asked him about it. At the airport.” I am not backing down anymore.

  Now she uses the base of the stirrer to mash the lemon into her cola, avoiding my gaze. “It is normal for two friend
s to fight sometimes, is it not?”

  I place my hand gently over her long, elegant fingers. They are cold and slightly clammy. “Estelle, please help me.” I stare at our hands so my tears won’t overflow.

  “Oh, Amy.” She is beside me then, hugging me tightly, her blazer rough against my cheek. I am pathetic. Even people who are practically strangers pity me. But still, I close my eyes and squeeze her back. She gives me a quick kiss on my temple and then sits back in her chair. “I truly believe Sylvie is all right.”

  Is that really true—oh please, Kuan Yin, goddess of mercy, let that be true—or has Lukas convinced her of this? I fan my eyes with my hand and put the stroopwafel in my mouth. It turns out to be a waffle made from two thin crispy layers of dough filled with sticky caramel syrup. I chew slowly as I compose myself.

  “We are a close friendship group,” Estelle is saying. “And sometimes things can get complicated. There can be misunderstandings. But believe me, none of us would ever hurt Sylvie in any way, and especially not Lukas.”

  I hear some sort of ching chong sound behind her and catch sight of two young guys and a pretty blond girl walking past us. One of the guys gives me a sly smile. It was him, I’m sure of it. Estelle whips her head around and gives him the finger. Good to know that some gestures work here too. He stops, angry, and takes a half step toward us, but the girl with him grabs his arm and pulls him away.

  “I am sorry. We have our problems here in the Netherlands too. There is stupidity everywhere and we are not used to having many foreigners here,” Estelle says. “This is Mother’s Day weekend and every idiot has returned to our village to see his mom.”

  My heart is pounding in my throat. I am used to this aggression back home, and had noticed some Dutch people staring at me curiously, but still hadn’t expected it here. “You’re so close to Amsterdam.”

  “The big cities are another story, but this is still a small village in many ways and it is very old and white. Some of these houses were built in the Middle Ages and it sometimes seems like the thinking is from then too. It was not easy for Sylvie and Lukas, being the only Asians in the area.”

  Poor Sylvie. She’d had to fight her entire life, just for being born as she was. “What do you mean?”

  Estelle takes a long sip of her cola, leaving a faint lipstick ring on the glass. “I remember some boys stole Lukas’s bike key and were throwing it back and forth as they insulted him.”

  A slow anger begins to burn in me. I am grinding my teeth. What morons. Had they done that to Sylvie too? “How?”

  “That he could not see out of those slits for eyes, his parents lived in a garbage heap . . . that kind of thing. But then Sylvie jumped one of them and took him down, and that unleashed Lukas. By then, I had gotten there as well so it turned into one big kicking, scratching, and punching fight.” Estelle’s smile is fond at the memory. I watch her with unfolding awe and gratitude. She had fought for Sylvie, by Sylvie’s side. What would it be like to be as fearless as the three of them? “It was great. We told the principal and they got into so much trouble.”

  I startle as Lukas speaks and slides into his seat. “But my mother also punished Sylvie because she said that Sylvie started it. She has always drawn Sylvie with black coal.”

  Perfect Sylvie, punished? And Ma, Pa, and I had had no idea what her life had been like. I want to march back to the house and smack Helena. I don’t know this sister being revealed to me, but I love her more fiercely than ever before. I finally ask the question that has bothered me since I landed. “Why does Helena dislike her so much?”

  Lukas rubs his hand over his forehead. When he faces me, he looks defeated. “I honestly do not know. Sylvie was such a good girl.”

  The waitress appears, arms laden with plates of food that smell heavenly. Despite my doubts, I feel brighter from Estelle’s reassurance and find my appetite has returned. My uitsmijter is an open-faced sandwich composed of three slices of thick white bread, sunny-side-up eggs, and a thin layer of ham and tomatoes, all smothered in melted Gouda cheese. Lukas has two krokets, breaded, deep-fried cylindrical rolls with a creamy meat ragout filling, served with mustard and white buns. I am a bit dubious about Estelle’s filet americain sandwich, which she tells me is a crunchy fresh-baked whole wheat baguette spread with raw minced beef and spices.

  As I tuck into my food, I say, “When I was little, she saved me from being kidnapped once.”

  “No,” breathes Estelle.

  Lukas pauses with his kroket halfway to his mouth. “What happened?”

  “I was four years old. Pa was home but he was busy fixing the lock on our front door, and I guess I must have decided I missed Ma and wanted to go find her by myself. When he went to grab some tools from another room, I left our apartment and toddled downstairs and out onto the sidewalk. Sylvie must have been only about eleven then, but she was the one who figured out I was missing. She flew off to find me before Pa even had his shoes on. When he finally caught up to us at the corner down the street from our place, Sylvie had put herself between me and a strange man. I was wearing this gold necklace with a carp pendant. He’d grabbed it when Sylvie pushed me away from him. He pulled it off my neck and ran. We never found out if he was only after the jewelry or if he’d wanted me too.” I shivered. I had nightmares for years about the sharp angles of that man’s face, how Sylvie pushed me behind her, how I’d clung to her, hiding my face in her familiar soft strands of hair. I’d wake crying and Sylvie would pull gently on my ears and nose, and recite the rhyme Ma had taught us, one of the few Chinese phrases I had managed to learn: “Pinch the ears, pinch the nose, wake up, wake up. Let Beautiful Jasmine be as brave as a grown woman.”

  “Was Sylvie hurt?” Lukas asks. He appears riveted by my story. I warm to him again. Maybe he truly does care for my sister.

  I shake my head. “Your food will get cold.”

  “You never replaced the necklace,” Estelle says, glancing at my unadorned neck.

  “Ma and Pa were afraid to. They didn’t want to make either one of us a target. The funny thing is, we wear gold or jade for protection, so maybe that necklace saved me from that man.” But I know the truth. Sylvie rescued me. And now it’s my turn to rescue her.

  I set my flapping napkin underneath my saucer to stop it from blowing away. I turn to Lukas again. “Can you tell me what Sylvie’s husband was doing here?”

  Lukas is smearing his kroket with mustard. “No idea.” Now he takes a big bite.

  I pinch my lips together. Okay, he is really irritating after all. I take a deep breath to calm myself. “Did Sylvie seem upset by it?”

  He scratches his head. “Kind of. I cannot say.”

  I roll my eyes at Estelle, and then leave to find the restroom. I cross the street to enter the café itself. I need a moment to adjust after the bright sunlight and see that the interior is cozy and warm, paneled with dark brown wood. As I pass, I stop to feel one of the prickly miniature embroidered rugs that are lying on the tables as placemats. I spot a waitress making a cappuccino behind the bar, so I ask her, “Where can I find the powder room?” When she blinks at me, I say, “The bathroom?”

  “Ah, the toilet. It is at the back, to the left.”

  I open the door to the tiny bathroom and am confronted with a statue of Buddha. He sits on a shelf behind the toilet.

  “I am so sorry you have to live here,” I say to him.

  When I return to the table, I tell Estelle and Lukas about what I have seen. “To a Chinese person, it’s very disrespectful because we believe the Buddha actually inhabits the statue when he comes to visit.”

  “Well, my brother has the Virgin Mary in his toilet,” Estelle says.

  “To the Dutch, it is just like a pretty plate or a carving of a yin-yang symbol or something.” Lukas sounds resigned.

  I say in a small voice, “Everything’s so different here. I-I don’t know why I came or how I could possibly help Sylvie. She’s always been the brave, competent one. I was planning to lea
ve in a few days.” I slump in my chair. “Stupid, right? A part of me thought that if I came here, she would show up and we could fly home together.” Because Sylvie would never let me be lost, alone, and afraid in a foreign country. For the first time, I wonder what it must have been like for her to be uprooted and move to the United States, to act as babysitter and mother to a two-year-old toddler when she was a child herself.

  The flesh on Lukas’s face sags. His eyes are rimmed with red. “Stay longer, Amy. Sylvie would want you to.”

  The thought of returning home without Sylvie makes me want to cry. “Will that be all right with your parents?”

  Estelle’s eyes flash. “No, do not think like that. Screw what everyone else thinks of you, screw what they want from you. You go out there and you do what you need to do, whatever that might be. People think being a pilot is glamorous, but when I used to fly cargo, a lot of times there was not even a toilet in the plane. The male pilots peed into a bottle, so I did too. You just do what is necessary—pee in a bottle if you need to.”

  We all laugh at this. Something inside me lightens for a moment and I stop feeling so alone. Lukas and Estelle love Sylvie too. Maybe everything will turn out all right.

  Estelle reaches across the table and gives my hand a warm squeeze. “Listen, Lukas and I need to visit my mother. He is helping her set up her new digital camera. But let me give you my number and if you ever need someone to talk to, you let me know.”

  I pass her my phone and watch as she stores her contact information. Then we leave the table and head toward the bicycle rack.

  Lukas rubs his eyes and I glance up at him, wondering if he could be brushing away a tear. There is pure anguish on his face, though I can’t decipher the reason for it. He drags his hands through his wild hair. “Can you make it home by yourself or shall I bike with you first?”

  “Oh no, it’s really simple. I’ll be fine.” I don’t want him to accompany me because I’m planning to walk the whole way. “We should ask for the bill.”

  Estelle waves a hand. “We took care of it when you were inside. Just get back safe and do not worry about Sylvie. I am sure she is all right.”