Buddha Baby (19 page)

She and her brother never talked about what they did. Lindsey herself hadn't thought about it for a long time. The Ahchucks probably never knew it was they who had vandalized their home, and perhaps Mr. Ahchuck, like Mr. Owyang, had calmly cleaned it up without blaming anyone.

The Ahchucks, so kind and gracious, had been an easy target. Lindsey was only nine and didn't understand her emotions or the reason behind why she did what she did. But feeling conflicted about being Chinese and retaliating against other Chinese people was a lot easier than blaming her tormentors. As illogical as it seemed, even after the neighborhood boys had vandalized her house, in the weeks that followed, she still wanted them to like her family and perhaps come over for sandwiches as if nothing had ever happened.

That was the thing about fitting in. Being a kid and wanting desperately to be liked, she didn't focus on other people's motivations or prejudices. It was just easier to doubt herself.

Looking back now, she realized she was more willing to accept the possibility of her own family being deserving of derision than the idea that any white person was actually wrong. Had years of watching
The Brady Bunch
warped her brain that much? Even though she had never informed anyone, including the neighbor boys, of what she and her brother had done to the Ahchucks' house, at the time she thought that having thrown the shit proved she could be prejudiced against Chinese people better than anyone, and didn't that mean white people could trust her better now?

Suddenly Lindsey was jarred out of her reverie by a wave of guilt. She'd always known the Ahchucks hadn't done anything to deserve what she and Kevin had done, and now that she reflected on the incident, she was full of regret.

She felt thoroughly rotten. This evening her whole family would be going to the Ahchucks home, and how could she look anybody in the eye knowing what she had done? As she showered and dressed, she wondered if she should apologize to someone tonight, or even mention it at all.

Just then, the telephone rang.

"Hello?" she answered.

"Hey, Cutie. It's me."

She dropped her voice to a whisper and said, "Do you need me to FedEx you some Slim Jims?"

"No." Michael sighed. "I'd probably never see them, anyway. They'd be confiscated. It's like a gulag with Pilates here."

"When can you come home?" she said.

Michael lowered his voice so she could barely hear him. "I'm still digging up dirt for the expose. Not only do they heat their supposedly raw food higher than a hundred and eighteen degrees, but their mesclun mix includes shoots from carnivorous plants."

"So?"

"Well if you don't eat meat, but you're eating plants that ate meat, by association, you ain't no vegetarian. The good news is that it's a huge story. The bad news is I'm going to be here at least another two weeks."

Lindsey was crestfallen. "That long?"

Just then, her Call Waiting beeped. "Hold on a second," she said to Michael, then clicked over. It was her brother. He snapped, "Where the hell are you? We're all waiting at the Ahchucks. People have already started eating."

"Okay, I'm coming," she said to Kevin, then clicked back over to Michael.

"Are you sure you can't sneak out of there any earlier?" she asked.

"I'll try. But don't think I'm having any fun down here. It's all quinoa and compost tea. Oh, damn, here they come. Gotta go. Love you, Baby."

She hung up the phone and finished getting dressed.

Arriving at the Ahchucks, she approached the house with its elegant, tiled roof and immaculately landscaped garden. She admired the leafy trees that lined the walkway and the branches of the Japanese maple that formed a canopy over the deck. Paper lanterns illuminated the perimeter of the house as well as the elegant red umbrellas that decorated the spacious courtyard. She walked up the slate pathway and passed a trickling waterfall with a Buddha statue. At the end of the winding path bordered with lavender and rosemary, Lindsey cringed as she passed through the front door she had once splattered with milk and dog feces.

Once inside, she was impressed by the beautiful antiques and simple yet luxe decor she had once thought embarrassing. As party guests mingled in the main house and some others gathered in the garden, Lindsey looked for her family and found them outside at one of the round tables decorated with fresh crimson peonies and lucky bamboo stalks.

She said hello to everybody and sat down. Yun Yun was sitting primly in one of the folding chairs slipcovered in red cotton, looking fairly innocent. As Lindsey removed her coat and pulled a chair out, she caught sight of her grandmother knocking her knuckle against the side of Yeh Yeh's head. She scowled, "Why you wear same old overcoat here? Embarrass me!"

"Big party. Twenty tables," her mom said.

"Shall we?" Kevin got up and headed for the buffet.

"I'll get plates for you two," Lindsey's dad said to Yun Yun and Yeh Yeh. He and Lindsey's mom got up and joined the line.

Lindsey sprang from the table and sidled up to her brother.

"Kevin," she whispered. "Do you remember what we did?"

"What?" he said, and Lindsey reminded him of their terrible deed.

"Don't talk about that
here
," he admonished her.

"Do you think we should apologize to someone?"

"Are you crazy? Just forget about it. It's best to pretend it didn't happen."

They reached the front of the line and servers began piling fried chicken wings, roasted pork, and a smattering of seafood items on their plates.

"But it
did
happen," she said, jogging to keep up with her brother. She stumbled a little as her heel caught in a divet on the lawn.

Kevin shushed her, and as they returned to their table Lindsey didn't have a chance to bring it up again. Mr. and Mrs. Ahchuck, Janice, her husband, and the rest of their entourage arrived to thank them for coming and to offer a champagne toast.

"
Ai-ya
! Thirty-five years! Congratulations!"

"Happy anniversary!"

Everyone yelled in celebration, except for Yun Yun, who stuck her index fingers in her ears as Yeh Yeh just sat very still and nodded. "Congratulation," he mumbled, but no one was paying attention to him.

Removing her fingers from her ears, Yun Yun said, "Where's Mabel Ahchuck? She's the only reason I came here. Where is she?"

Looking around, Lindsey's dad said, "I don't see her."

Everyone went back to eating and drinking, while Yun Yun reached over and yanked the sleeve of the host's tuxedo. "What's wrong with you? Don't bother to go pick up your mother? You lock Mabel in closet? What a terrible son!"

Mr. Ahchuck looked around, unsure of what to do. He laughed nervously, but before he could say anything, someone at the next table grabbed him and pulled him into the toasting crowd.

Lindsey's family settled down, while in the distance Lindsey spotted Uncle Elmore and Auntie Geraldine arriving through the front door.

Shortly thereafter, a commotion inside the house signaled the arrival of another guest, a particularly loud and obnoxious woman whose squeal was heard well into the garden. "Hel-lo, where are all the men?"

Lindsey turned and recognized Uncle Elmore's ex-wife, Dee.

"This ought to be good," Kevin cracked.

Auntie Dee was an extreme narcissist. If she suspected a man found her pretty she would unbutton the top button of her blouse and lean forward as she talked to him. If she felt at any time during their conversation that his eyes had strayed from her effulgence, she would scan the crowd for another specimen of manhood to pounce on. She was convinced that every man she saw wanted to sleep with her. It didn't matter who he was—her neighbor's son, the mailman, or an old guy driving by.

Her marriage to Uncle Elmore had been an exercise in cosmic retribution, seeing as how they were exactly the same. They both suffered from the same adult-onset illness, which Lindsey referred to as Electric Slide Disease. It flared up in the presence of any member of the opposite sex, hindering both Elmore and Dee with uncontrollable shakes and wandering eyes. After their wedding, they were both still on the make and ready to trip the lights fantastic at the drop of a satin hat. Too many disco songs over the years had thumped through their gray matter while under the influence of multiple tequila sunrises, and now they both had the "push, push in the bush" mentality 24/7.

According to Lindsey's mom, in the 1970s Auntie Dee had all the guys in Henry Africa's and Lord Jim's at her beck and call. She acted bored when they cruised her in her UFO jeans and her cowl-neck sweaters, but preened when they called her "foxy little mama." In high demand, she had guys chasing her down the street in their AMC Pacers while she zipped around in her Ford Mustang just like the one Farrah Fawcett drove on
Charlie's Angels
.

Uncle Elmore had fallen hard for Dee. He had been watching her in the local fern bars for several months, when they happened to meet at a costume party happy hour at El Torito one fateful Halloween. Elmore was dressed as Ponch from
CHiPS
. He flashed her his badge and she flashed him her crotch. The rest was history.

They had a huge wedding reception with a Chinese lion dance, and for a while enjoyed being married. But eventually their lives took on the tragic ennui of a Billy Joel ballad. Their simultaneous restlessness began to show at family events. At parties Auntie Dee danced with every man who wasn't her hus band, and once advised Lindsey, "Sleep around while you still can." Uncle Elmore sidled up to Kevin at holiday dinners and offered words of wisdom such as "Condoms are for chumps."

At Chinese banquets they began to air more and more of their dirty laundry while everyone else was left to stare at one another uncomfortably. Once when Lindsey spun the food on the lazy susan toward her uncle, Auntie Dee reached out and stopped her, chiming loudly, "Elmore can't eat spareribs. He's impotent." Later, when the rock cod was being served, Uncle Elmore commented, "None for me. I sleep with a cold, dead fish every night."

Now Kevin and Lindsey watched as Uncle Elmore and Auntie Dee eventually spotted each other and headed in opposite directions.

"How sad," Lindsey said to her brother, "They spent their youth doing the bump. Now they can't even stand to bump into each other."

Kevin nodded, then took off in search of hard liquor. Her parents got up to mingle with various people and Lindsey was soon left sitting alone with her grandparents. After a minute, Yun Yun began to cough, so Lindsey offered to get some water.

Near the buffet table she sidled up to her dad. Fueled by two glasses of champagne she felt loose enough to ask her dad something she might not have, had she been sober.

"Dad," she said, "How did Yun Yun and Yeh Yeh meet?"

Her dad shot her a surprised look. "How am I supposed to know?"

"Well, you are their son. Haven't you ever asked?"

Her dad stared into his paper plate. He studied his piece of cake, then said, "Oh, yeah?" His response made no sense. Another second passed and he said, "Want chocolate with raspberry or lemon with buttercream?"

After he sauntered off, Lindsey considered quizzing either

Uncle Elmore or Auntie Geraldine who, after all, were also Yeh Yeh and Yun Yun's children. However, when she spied Uncle Elmore drunkenly pissing against a cedar and Auntie Geraldine behind a jade plant scraping individual portions of cake one by one into a shopping bag, she changed her mind.

Leaving the courtyard, Lindsey wandered into the house and caught up with her mother near the bathroom. Inside, she sat on the toilet lid as her mom combed out her perm with an afro pick from her purse.

"Hey, Mom," she said, "do you know anything about Yeh Yeh and Yun Yun before Dad was born?"

"Not much. They've always been so quiet about things." Her mother paused to dab concealer below her eyes and went on, "Been driving me crazy ever since we first got married. No one wants to talk about anything, so I stopped asking. Why do you want to know?"

Lindsey looked at the floor despondently. "I dunno," she said softly. "I just think if's important to know our family history."

"Well, good luck." Despite her words, her mom wasn't the least bit encouraging. She drew a burgundy outline around her lips, shut her compact, then added, "Better leave it alone. Do you want people knowing about all the bad or embarrassing things you did?"

Her mom's words prompted her to think again about the dog-shit incident. Lindsey was certain her mom would be horrified if she knew, and she herself was too mortified to even think about it much longer. Maybe her brother was right. Maybe her mom was right. Maybe things should be left alone and not talked about. She understood that remembering could be embarrassing, even painful. But what if she couldn't forget?

Oh hell, she'd forgotten all about Yun Yun's water. Lindsey ran back to her family's table with a cup for her grandmother. As she held it out for Yun Yun to take, Yun Yun's face turned into a sneer and Lindsey realized she was holding out the cup with only one hand, instead of the Chinese way with two hands to show her grandmother proper respect. Yun Yun reached out with a slightly shaky hand to take the water and then sipped from the edge of the cup.

"
Ai-ya
! she said, tossing the cup down onto the table in disgust. "Why you bring me cold water? You want me freeze to death?"

Lindsey fumbled for the cup. She had forgotten the old Chinese lady preference for hot water.

"Sorry!" she yelped, then turned to flag down one of the caterers.

"Oh, forget it!" Yun Yun moaned. "Go ahead and just forget me."

Lindsey walked back to the buffet table with its silver samovars. She retrieved a cup of hot water, but when she returned to the table Yun Yun refused to drink it.

She got up and looked for either of her parents or her brother, but didn't see them anywhere. She found Uncle El-more and said, "Could you please tell everybody I'm leaving?"

"So soon? They're about to start the dancing," he hollered after her. "You're gonna miss the Electric Slide!"