Tiger Girl

by May-lee Chai

  “You give it all away?”

  “It won’t be fresh tomorrow.”

  “Bag everything up and call it ‘Day Old.’ Even the grocery stores do that. Put a fake high price on the bag, then write a cheaper price underneath. People will think it’s a bargain.”

  Uncle smiled wanly. “I’ll make more tonight.”

  He’d never been a very good businessman, even when he’d worked with us in the Palace in Nebraska. If it hadn’t been for Ma taking over, he’d never have turned a profit. If not for his old buddy Mr. Chhay paying off his loans, Uncle would have lost everything.

  I wondered how La Petite Pâtisserie was doing financially. As the sun was setting and dark shadows were seeping across the parking lot, there was nothing left but donut holes, and, finally, Uncle said it was time to close up. Anita took out the final half dozen and set them on paper doilies. “You have to try these, Nea,” she said. “But no peeking.”

  “But they’re all the same,” I argued.

  “Close your eyes and just taste one. Your Uncle’s secret recipe. Tastes different to everyone who tries them. That Mexican priest swears on his Bible they taste like the candy skulls he used to eat growing up, and to some of the bums your uncle feeds at the soup kitchen it tastes like their last home-cooked meal. To the gangbangers who drop by, it’s all adrenaline and buzz. They call these things ‘crack.’ ”

  “Great,” I said. “Like an R-rated version of Willie Wonka.”

  “Close your eyes,” Anita insisted. “Try one and tell me what you taste.”

  So I obliged.

  The dough was soft and chewy, the sugar rough like sand against my tongue. I chewed and chewed, but I couldn’t seem to break the donut hole down. It just grew more rubbery, like chewing gum, but without the flavor. I tried to swallow but the mound of dough clung to my teeth. Finally I snatched one of the doilies off the countertop and, turning away, spat out the remains as discreetly as possible.

  “Tastes like dust,” I gasped, nearly gagging.

  “Hmm,” Anita looked at me curiously, not as shocked or appalled as I would have imagined. “That’s what your uncle always says.”

  For her part, Anita plucked the remaining donut holes off the counter and popped them into her mouth. “Mmm, mmm,” she raved, closing her eyes as she chewed. She swallowed. “Cotton candy, theater popcorn, and a touch of anise.”

  I was too busy washing the dusty, dry taste away at the fountain, gulping down mouthful after mouthful of water, to answer.

  “Shall I stay and help you clean up?” Anita asked Uncle behind me.

  “No, it’s okay. Take some time off. My niece can help.”

  “All right, sugar,” she said. “I’ll see you tomorrow.” I turned just in time to see Anita leaning in close to Uncle, and at first I thought she was going to whisper something into his ear, but instead I could have sworn her lips grazed his cheek in a kiss.

  Embarrassed, I turned around quickly. I busied myself at the water fountain, pressing the cool metal button and watching the steady stream of water arc back into the basin as though it were the most fascinating thing on earth. I didn’t turn even as Anita called out to me, “ ’Bye, Nea. Sure is nice to meet you!”

  The door jangled open and then shut, and I watched Anita walking through the parking lot to her car. The sky was ablaze with pinks and reds, but the temperature was dropping rapidly. I could feel the cold seeping through the glass as the sunlight disappeared. Anita turned once at the end of the parking lot and waved enthusiastically. Composed now, I waved back.

  Uncle appeared not to have noticed that I had seen him and Anita. He waved a hand around the room casually. “I can sweep up later when I come back to make the next batch. We should go home now.”

  I nodded, but before we could leave, a half dozen souped-up cars roared into the parking lot. Engines growled and rap music boomed on the wind. Headlights flashed through the windows.

  “Uncle! Uncle!” I heard a young man’s voice call out in Khmer.

  We’re going to get robbed, I thought. I grabbed the phone, ready to call 911.

  “It’s okay,” Uncle said. “I know them.”

  I watched from the window while Uncle went toward a young man with baggy jeans, a long T-shirt, and tats up and down his arms and encircling his neck like vines trying to pull apart a temple god. The only things that didn’t fit with the young man’s wannabe thug image were his round, soft Buddha face and the Snugli baby sling dangling from his neck. Uncle said something to him, and the young man nodded, then looked back at the donut shop.

  I realized I was standing in the front window, lit up from behind like a display. I tried to duck out of view, but the young man waved at me in an exaggerated manner and gave me a thumbs-up.

  I narrowed my eyes at him.

  Unintimidated, the thug ran straight up toward the shop. “Hey!” he said, bounding in the front door. “Uncle says you’re his niece! You’re the one in college!”

  “So I guess we’re cousins,” I said.

  He laughed good-naturedly. “Welcome to Magic Donuts,” he said. “That’s what we call Uncle’s dope donuts. They’re so good, they’re bad.”

  “They’re crack,” I said. “I heard.”

  He laughed again, in a cheerful, good-natured kind of way. The baby in the sling around his neck stirred and began waving its fists in the air. “Uh-oh. The princess is waking up. I better go. I didn’t bring her bottle. See you tomorrow, Nea!”

  “You’re coming back?”

  “Oh, yeah. Uncle just hired me.” He flashed a white-toothed, horsey smile. “See ya!” Then he ran back outside and rejoined his friends.

  I watched from the window as the lowriders bumped their way out of the parking lot.

  Uncle came back in. “I’ll be ready to go in a minute. I just have to lock up the back.” I nodded and waited by the front door.

  Now that it was dark, the rest of the strip mall businesses were turning on their Christmas lights, such as they were. A few strings of colored lights across the grocery store window, a flashing outline of a reindeer at the Copy Circle. The employees of the tanning salon plugged a large stand-up Frosty the Snowman into their front window. I watched the red taillights and the white headlights rushing like two candy-cane rivers on the main street in front of the strip mall.

  This would be the first Christmas I wouldn’t spend with Ma and Sam and the twins since coming to America, and I felt a sudden pang of guilt for lying to Ma. And a little shiver of fear.

  I’d either made a very big mistake or I’d made the right decision. It was impossible to know.

  CHAPTER 5

  The Monk’s Cell

  Uncle lived in a modest one-bedroom apartment, nothing like the big house he and Auntie had first rented in Nebraska. Back then it seemed like Uncle was still trying to rebuild the life they’d lived before the war, the wealthy life that Auntie missed so much. The new austerity was glaring. The apartment was tidy and spare and mostly empty. I glanced around at the older-model TV with a blinking VCR on a shelf against the wall, the radio on the kitchen countertop, the sofa, the couple of chairs facing the patio that overlooked a palm tree and some geraniums in redwood planters. There were no photographs, but a bookshelf was stacked with paperbacks in four languages: Khmer, French, Chinese, and English. The English ones were mostly self-help, business-type books or genre novels—Westerns and a few mysteries, easy to read, something Uncle might use to improve his English. There was a framed print of Angkor Wat hanging above the bookshelf.

  The apartment was spare enough for a monk or some ascetic hermit.

  “I hope you’re not disappointed. It’s not what you’re used to. I don’t need a big place anymore. It’s just me,” Uncle said. He pointed to the pile of freshly folded sheets, topped by a towel and washcloth, on the arm of the sofa. “For you. And this folds out. Makes it into a bed.”

  “Thank you,” I said. “This is perfect. Much nicer than my dorm room.”

  I wa
sn’t lying to be polite. Uncle’s big old house had been a nightmare. Too expensive, the bills mounting each month. I used to lie awake in the bed I shared with Sourdi, trying to ignore the sound of Auntie and Uncle’s voices traveling through the walls like poltergeists. They’d argued about bills and debts and how noisy we were and whether it had been a good idea to invite us to live with them. Auntie argued it hadn’t been.

  I realized there was nothing of my birth mother’s in this apartment. Uncle must have moved here after Auntie died, I figured, and I felt a shiver of relief run up and down my spine. Then I felt guilty. But mostly I felt relieved.

  I set my backpack at the end of the sofa.

  “So you should settle in,” Uncle said. “My home is your home.” He gestured at the kitchenette with the humming Frigidaire in the corner. “There’s food. I went to the store this morning.”

  “I brought gifts from everybody,” I said quickly. Which was a lie. I had brought gifts from the university bookstore which I was going to claim were from everyone: Nebraska beef jerky, a paperweight of our mascot, a day planner for the new year.

  “No need, no need,” Uncle said, smiling distantly. He rubbed the back of his neck with one hand and looked out the window into the streetlights that glowed in the distance like giant irradiated lightning bugs. “I should get back to work.”

  “But we just left.”

  “I’m training new bakers. I help them at night. I’m sorry. I will show you around town this weekend.”

  “Uncle, you work too hard!”

  “No, no, it’s good,” he said. “I like to keep busy. You’ll be okay here alone?”

  “I’m fine. Can I help you? I’m not tired.”

  “Not tonight. You should rest. You traveled a long way.” He picked up his keys from where he’d placed them on the bookshelf by the door, grabbed a jacket from a hook on the wall, and let himself out.

  I sat in the semi-gloom on the edge of the sofa. I had half a mind to get up and take a cab back to the bus station, see how long till the next bus back to Omaha.

  I figured I was making Uncle uncomfortable since I was intruding on the new life he’d built for himself. There wasn’t a single thing in the apartment that remained of Auntie, or of Ma or of any of us. No family photos, not even the one black-and-white photo from the fancy studio in Phnom Penh that Auntie used to cling to. Nothing.

  I didn’t know what exactly I’d been hoping for from Uncle, but being left alone in a nearly bare room was not it. Yet he’d told that woman, Anita, that I was coming. She seemed to know who I was. Or at least who I was supposed to be. She’d called me “Nea.” She knew I went to college. She said Uncle was proud of me. That thug he’d just hired knew I went to college. So Uncle must have talked about me.

  I couldn’t figure Uncle out.

  I waited another ten minutes, just to make sure Uncle wasn’t going to change his mind and come back, and then I jumped up and began investigating the apartment. I searched his bedroom, but it was as spartan as the rest of the apartment. A queen-sized bed with a plain headboard, a few blankets, a dresser with his socks, underwear, and T-shirts folded neatly inside. A few pairs of pants, some shirts, and a couple of blazers hung in his closet.

  I wondered if he had a second house somewhere, a place he really lived that he wasn’t willing to show me. As I went through his medicine cabinet, I found prescriptions, but nothing exciting. Meds for hypertension, headaches, arthritis. Sudafed. Nicotine gum. Sensitive-gum toothpaste. One toothbrush. A comb with a gray hair winding through the teeth. Tweezers, nail clippers. Something for corns and heavy-duty foot cream. A bottle of Suave two-in-one shampoo and conditioner in the shower, along with a bar of white soap. A towel on the towel bar.

  I looked through the trash can under the sink—empty tube of Cankaid, some Kleenex, paper towels used to clean something. I looked through the fridge—a bag of salad greens, Chinese takeout in Styrofoam containers, apples, an orange, soda pop, and a carton of soy milk. The cabinets were almost bare: ramen, rice, Nescafé, tea, bouillon cubes, Campbell’s soup, powdered non-dairy creamer, soy sauce, but no fish sauce or even Sriracha. Maybe he had stomach trouble? Maybe he had a secret second family that I didn’t know about and he was going to their house? He hadn’t told me because he didn’t want Ma or Sourdi and Mr. Chhay to find out?

  Was he punishing himself for having survived after Auntie died?

  I went through the drawers in the kitchen—a cleaver, a couple of butter knives, forks, spoons, a package of disposable chopsticks, a can opener, more Sudafed, matchbooks, emergency candles, a potholder (burned on one edge), plastic wrap, twist ties, sandwich bags, loose rubber bands, a small ball of twine. Under the sink—another garbage can (empty), a box of bargain-brand trash bags, lots of pink plastic bags saved from the Asian grocery store near the donut shop, Comet, Ivory Liquid, a sponge, Mr. Fantastic spray, Lysol, Pinesol, and an unopened bag of sponges. At least he had plenty of cleaning supplies.

  I looked in the hall closet by the front door and stood on tiptoe and felt around on the top shelf and pulled down a green plastic bag of Pampers, half-empty. I wondered whose baby needed these diapers.

  I wondered if I should look under the mattress, feel if it had been carved out, see if something could be hidden within? Should I use the tool kit and pry open the electric sockets, see if anything was hidden in the walls? All Ma’s usual hiding places. But what would be hidden? Uncle’s savings? I didn’t want money. Our family photo from long, long ago?

  Something of Auntie’s?

  Something of mine?

  I sat on the sofa, the light from the ceiling lamp in the kitchen glowing like the reflection of the moon in a puddle, and wondered what I had gotten myself into.

  Late that night, I finally unfolded the sofa and made the bed with the sheets Uncle had left folded on the armrest. I wasn’t particularly sleepy, but I thought it was the polite thing to do.

  I lay in the dark, listening to a mixtape on my Walkman and watching the streetlamps cast shadows of tree limbs and the iron bars of the patio’s guardrail across the ceiling.

  The air still smelled of sugar and flour, and I realized groggily before I drifted off into a dream that I should have taken a shower while I had the apartment to myself.

  I woke to the sound of footsteps. I opened my eyes and saw a shadowy figure standing in the middle of the room. My heart jerked before I realized it was Uncle. He turned, and I closed my eyes quickly, my first reaction, and then waited for him to say something or move or do something. But he seemed to be standing still in the middle of the room, doing nothing. Or perhaps he was watching me.

  Finally, when I could stand it no longer, I fluttered my eyes open as though I were just awakening from a deep slumber, but the room was empty. No one was standing over me. Uncle was nowhere I could see. I sat up slowly and looked around myself at the dark shapes of the furniture, but I was the only person in the living room. Uncle’s bedroom door was closed. I couldn’t remember if I’d left it open or not. Quietly, I got up and tiptoed to the door. Leaning close, I listened with my ear cupped to the wood. From deep within, I could hear Uncle’s soft snores. He muttered to himself occasionally, an anxious but conversational tone, but I couldn’t make out any of the words. He might have been arguing or praying. I couldn’t even tell in which language he was dreaming anymore.

  CHAPTER 6

  The Knife Thrower

  The next morning Uncle made us breakfast—omelettes and toast. He must have stopped by the grocery store before coming home last night.

  “Just like a hotel,” he said grandly, a dish towel draped over his arm as he set my plate before me. “Voilà, Mademoiselle.” I giggled despite myself at his fancy manners.

  He sat across from me at the table and picked up his fork and knife. “So, do you like your university? You are the first member of our family in America to go to school.”

  “It’s okay,” I said.

  He nodded. “What is your major?”

/>   “I’m still undeclared.” I tried to think of a way to change the subject. “The donut shop is a lot of work for you.”

  “I know that university is very expensive in America. I will help you out, of course.”

  So that’s why he thinks I’m here? To make him pay for my college? I put my fork down. If he wanted to play games, I might as well forget about being polite and just confront him. Ask him why he didn’t tell me that he was really my father, not my uncle. I took a deep breath, and the dry, burnt feeling of toast crumbs coated the back of my throat. I coughed and coughed.

  Alarmed, Uncle poured a glass of water and offered it to me.

  Tears welled up in my eyes, and I took huge gasps of air, like a fish that had leaped too high and accidentally beached itself onto its river’s bank. I struggled not to panic. Finally, when I could stop coughing, I drank the glass of water, but my throat still felt as though it were coated in fiberglass.

  “Don’t worry. We shouldn’t talk of important things when we’re eating,” Uncle said. He took my plate.

  I gulped more water. “Sorry.”

  Uncle shook his head. “If you’re ready, we can go.”

  And so we headed back to the donut shop without my getting any closer to the truth.

  Anita was already at work. She was serving up donuts for a line of nurses in scrubs who were either on their way to work or possibly on their way home after a night shift.

  Miraculously, all the cases were filled with new pastries.

  The air smelled like sugar and coffee, with just a faint whiff of Anita’s cigarette smoke.