BONE

BONE

(Excerpts)

Chapter 1

We were a family of three girls.By Chinese standards, that wasn’t lucky.In Chinatown, everyone knew our story.Outsiders jerked their chins,looked at us, shook their heads.We heard things.

“A failed family.That Dulcie Fu[1].And you know which one： bold Leon.Nothing but daughters.”

Leon told us not to care what people said.“People talking.People jealous.” He waved a hand in the air.“Five sons don’t make one good daughter.”

I’m Leila， the oldest， Mah’s first， from before Leon.Ona came next and then Nina[2].First， Middle， and End Girl.Our order of birth marked us and came to tell more then our given names.

Here’s another bone for the gossipmongers.On vacation recently，visiting Nina in New York， I got married.I didn’t marry to a whim--don’t worry， I didn’t do a green-card number[3].Mason Louis was no stranger.We’d been together four， five years， and it was time.

Leon was the first person I wanted to tell, so I went looking for him in Chinatown.He’s not my real father, but he’s the one who’s been there for me.Like he always told me, it’s time that makes a family, not just blood.

Mah and Leon are still married, but after Ona jumped off the Nam,Leon moved out.It was a bad time.Too much happened on Salmon Alley.We don’t talk about it.Even the sewing ladies leave it alone.Anyway, it works out better that Mah and Leon don’t live in the same place.

When they’re not feuding about the past, Leon visits Mah, helps her with the Baby Store, so they see enough of each other.

Leon’s got a room at that old-man hotel on Clay Street， the San Fran[4].There’s a toilet and bath on each floor and the lobby’s used as a common room.No kitchen.I gave Leon a hot he liked have his meals either down the block at Uncle’s Cafe or over at the Universal Cafe.

Leon’s got the same room he had when he was a bachelor going out to sea every forty days.Our Grandpa Leong lived his last days at the San Fran, so it’s an important place for us.In this country, the San Fran is our family’s oldest place, our beginning place, our new China.The way I see it,Leon’s life’s kind of made a circle.

…

THE OVERPASS from the Holiday Inn to Portsmouth Square cast a broad shadow over the playground.Avoiding the beggars’ corner, where the pissy stench was strongest, I followed the sliver of sunlight along the east side, crowded with grandmothers and young children.

A group of old men stood at the base of the stairs, playing cards.The one holding his cards close had a thumb like a snake’s head; he stared at me, so I gave him a scowl.When I walked past the chess tables, more old guys turned, more stares.I never liked being the only girl on the upper level of the park.More than once, an old guy has come up and asked, “My room? Date?” It was just pathetic.

I heard a raucous laugh， a jeering curse， and then I recognized You Thin Toy’s phlegmy voice.“I eat your horse！”[5]

The men clustered close together at each table.They looked like scraps of dark remnant fabric.As I moved closer, the details became more distinct: tattered collars, missing buttons, safety-pinned seams, patch pockets full of fists.

You Thin Toy was buried four men deep， so I pushed into the crowd.He was my personal favorite of Leon’s fleabag friends.They met on the S.S.Lincoln[6]， coming over to America.Leon was fifteen， You Thin，eighteen， but their false papers gave them each a few extra years.On the long voyage， they coached each other on their paper histories： Leon was the fourth son of a farm worker in the Sacramento valley， his mother had bound feet[7]， her family was from Hoiping.You Thin was the second son of a shoe cobbler in San Francisco，” the family compound had ten rooms，the livestock consisted of an ox， two pigs， and many chickens.His older brother was a fishery worker in Monterey and his younger brother worked in San Francisco with their father.

After You Thin and Leon both passed the interrogation at Angel Island[8]， they slapped each other’s backs.Each called the other “Brother”and predicted the good life， “Hao sai gai！”[9] Leon asked one of the friendlier guards on the Island for a word to describe their blood brotherness.

“Cousin,” the guard said.

Maybe “cousin” was Leon’s first English word.

You Thin changed back to his real name as soon as he could， but Leon never did.Leon liked to repeat what he told You Thin： “In this country， paper is more precious than blood.[10]”

…

UP BROADWAY[11] I drove fast， made every light： Grant， Stockton，Powell.No stops， a straight shot through the tunnel； Mason would’ve been proud.Just before moving into the shadow that led us out of Chinatown，we passed the Edith Eaton school.I work there.Five days a week I pass this spot.

Next to the school is the Nam Ping Yuen, the last of the four housing projects built in Chinatown.Nam means south and ping yuen--if you want to get into it--is something like “peaceful gardens.” We call it the Nam.I’ve heard other names: The Last Ping.The Fourth Ping.For us, the Nam is a bad-luck place, a spooked spot.

My middle sister, Ona, jumped off the M floor of the Nam.The police said she was on downers.But I didn’t translate that for Mah or tell her everything else I heard, because by then I was all worn-out from dealing with death in two languages.I knew Ona was doing ludes, but I’d gone through a downer stage myself, so I didn’t worry.I was trying to break away from always being the Big Sister.And I really couldn’t blame her for doing all that stuff and keeping quiet.Those days, Mah and Leon were giving her a hard time for going out with Osvaldo.

After Ona jumped, Mah was real messed up.She didn’t think it was a thing to be gotten over.“Better a parent before a child, better a wife than a husband,” she cried.“Everything’s all turned around, all backward.” Mah wanted to live with it and so we all did for a while.We lived with the ghost,the guilt.But then it got too dark.

Like that, we all just snapped apart.For me, it was as if time broke down: Before and After Ona jumped.I didn’t want anything to be the same.I wanted a new life, as if to say that person then, that person that wasn’t able to save Ona, that person was not me.All of us took that trip, but we came back to ourselves, to our old ways.I had to believe that it’d been Ona’s choice.

Ona has become a kind of silence in our lives.We don’t talk about her.We don’t have anything more to say.

I always thought Nina had the best deal because she escaped the day-to-day of it: the every-single-moment.She got time away from the fright of it; and to me, that was being free.But on this trip to New York, I saw different, I saw that Nina still suffered.

…

EVERYTHING had an alert quality.Brisk wind， white light.I turned down Sacramento[12] and walked down the hill at a snap-quick pace toward Mah’s Baby Store.Mason was the one who started calling it the Baby Store， and the name just stuck.The old sign with the characters for “Herb Shop” still hangs precariously above the door.I’ve offered to take it down for Mah， but she’s said No every time.Mason thinks she wants to hide.

An old carousel pony with a gouged eye and chipped tail stands in front of the store like a guard looking out onto Grant Avenue.I tapped it as I walked past, my quick good-luck stroke.A string of bells jingled as I pushed through the double doors.

A bitter ginseng odor and a honey suckle balminess greeted me.Younger, more Americanized mothers complain that the baby clothes have absorbed these old world odors.They must complain about how old the place looks, too, with the custom-made drawers that line the wall from floor to ceiling, the factory lighting.Leon wanted to tear down the wall of mahogany drawers and build a new storage unit.But Mah doesn’t want him touching anything in her store, and I was glad, too, because I love the tuck-perfect fit of the drawers, and the tock! sound the brass handles make against the hard wood.

Mah was showing off her newest stock of jackets to a woman and her child.I gave a quick nod and went straight to the back, where the boxes were stacked two-high.The fluorescent lights glowed, commercial bright.

The woman tried to bargain the price down but Mah wouldn’t budge;she changed the subject.“Your girl is very pretty.How about I don’t charge tax?”

Hearing that gave me courage.Mah was in a generous, no-tax mood,and that gave me high hopes for some kind of big discount, too.I knew I’d be tongue-tied soon, so I tried to press my worry down by telling myself what Grandpa Leong used to tell me, that the best way to conquer Fear is to act.

Open the mouth and tell.

As soon as the woman and her child walked out the door, I went up to Mah and started out in Chinese, “I want to tell you something.”

Mah looked up, wide-eyed, expectant.

I switched to English, “Time was right, so Mason and I just went to City Hall.We got married there.”

Mah’s expression didn’t change.

“In New York,” I said.

No answer.

“You know I never liked banquets, all that noise and trouble.And such a waste of so much money.”

She still didn’t say anything.Suddenly I realized how quiet it was,and that we were completely alone in the store.I heard the hum of the lights.

“Mah?” I said.“Say something.”

She didn’t even look at me, she just walked away.She went to the back of the store and ripped open a box.I followed and watched her bend the flaps back and pull out armfuls of baby clothes.I waited.She started stacking little mounds.She smoothed out sleeves on top of sleeves, zipped zippers, and cupped the colored hoods, one into another.All around our feet were tangles of white hangers.

“Nina was my witness.” My voice was whispery, strange.

Mah grunted, a huumph sound that came out like a curse.My translation was: Disgust, anger.There’s power behind her sounds.Over the years I’ve listened and rendered her Chinese grunts into English words.

She threw the empty box on the floor and gave it a quick kick.

“Just like that.

Did it and didn’t tell.

Mother Who Raised You.

Years of work, years of worry.

Didn’t! Even! Tell!”

Chapter 2

THE DAY Mason and I flew into Kennedy[13]， Nina had just returned from a tour along the Yangtze.Mason knew I had family stuff to talk to her about so he went to Brooklyn to see some guys he knew from mechanic school.Nina was still on China time and she wanted to eat early.

When I suggested Chinatown, Nina said it was too depressing.“The food’s good,” she said, “but the life’s hard down there.I always feel like I should rush through a rice plate and then rush home to sew culottes or assemble radio parts or something.”

I agreed.At Chinatown places, you can only talk about the bare issues.In American restaurants, the atmosphere helps me forget.For my reunion with Nina, I wanted nice light, handsome waiters, service.I wanted to forget about Mah and Leon.

“I don’t want to eat guilt,” Nina said, “Let’s splurge.My treat.I made great tips this trip.Besides, I’ve had Chinese food for twenty-seven days.”

We were early and the restaurant wasn’t crowded.Our waiter was Spanish and he had that dark island tone Nina likes.I noticed him looking Nina up and down as we walked in.Nina saw, I’m sure, but it didn’t bother her.I watched her hold his look while she ordered two Johnnie Walkers.When he strutted off, she said, “Cute.”

“Tight ass.”

“The best.”

The place was called The Santa Fe and it was done in peach and cactus green.I looked down at the black plates on the pale tablecloth and thought, Ink.I felt strange.I didn’t know this tablecloth, this linen, these candles.Everything seemed foreign.It felt like we should be different people.But each time I looked up, she was the same.I knew her.She was my sister.We’d sat with chopsticks, mismatched bowls, braids, and braces,across the Formica tabletop.

Nina picked up her fork and pressed her thumb against if the sharp points.“I like three-pronged forks,” she said.“It’s funny, but you know I hardly ever use chopsticks anymore.At home I eat my rice on a plate, with a fork.I only used chopsticks to hold my hair up.” She laughed, tossed her head back.It was Leon’s laugh.“Now I have no use for them at all.”

I couldn’t help it; I rolled my eyes.Who did she think she was talking to, some rich matron lady cruising the Yantze?

No more braids.In Hong Kong this last trip, she’d cut her hair very short and it showed off her finely shaped head.

I asked if she remembered when Leon gave her a boy’s haircut.

Nina looked worried and she touched her head lightly.

“Do I look like that, now?”

“No, you look great.”

Her hair used to fall down wild to her waist.Nina had Mah’s hair:thick and dark and coarse, hair that braids like rope.Now Nina was all features, a brush of brow, long eyes, a slender neck.She looked more vulnerable.

Nina is reed thin and tall.She has a body that clothes look good on.Nina slips something on and it wraps her like skin.Fabric has pulse on her.

In high school, Chinese guys who liked Nina but were afraid to ask her out spread a rumor that she only went out with white guys.When Nina heard about it, she found out which guys and went up to each one of them and told them off.

Nina talked about China， how strange it felt to see only Chinese people.She liked Zhang， the national guide assigned to her group.He spoke Spanish.She was lucky， she said.Zhang was usually assigned to the European tours.She was the first overseas Chinese he’d met.He showed her around Canton[14]； he knew it well； he’d been there during the Cultural Revolution.She was impressed when he brought out his guitar and played Spanish flamenco[15] for the variety show.Nina said， “I like Zhang.He’s different.”

Everything struck me as strange: Nina saying Guangzhou, Shanghai,Xian, and Chengdu in the northern dialect, Nina in China, Nina with a Chinese guy.

I thought about our different worlds now: Nina had a whole map of China in her head; I had Chinatown, the Mission, the Tenderloin.

Going to China had helped Nina make up with Mah and Leon.When Nina passed through SFO[16] to pick up passengers on her first China trip，Mah and Leon had been too excited to hold on to the grudge.They wanted to go to the airport and see Nina as she changed planes.Mah and Leon and Nina had a reconciliation walking from Domestic to International.

“Are you thinking of marrying this Zhang guy to get him out?” I asked.

Nina said she wasn’t stupid and then she turned the question on me,“So, what’s your problem with marrying?”

I shrugged.“The banquets.I always hated them.”

Nina agreed.“All those people.”

We remembered feeling out of place at the huge Leong banquets.Leon and Mah, Ona, Nina, and I, we counted five, one hand, but seated around the banquet table, we barely made a half-circle.We looked for the cute guys, hoping one would be assigned to our table, but we always got the strays: an out-of-town relative, an old man, a white person.

I looked around the restaurant.The waiters were lighting candles.Our waiter brought the drinks.He stopped very close to Nina, seemed to breathe her in.When Nina turned her face toward him I saw the reddish highlights in her hair.We ordered, and the waiter moved off into the dark again.

My scotch tasted good.It reminded me of Leon， Johnnie Walker[17]， or Seagram 7[18]， that’s what they served at Chinese banquets.Nine courses and a bottle.Leon taught us how to drink it from the teacups， without ice.He drank his from a rice bowl， sipping it like hot soup.But by the end of the meal he took it like cool tea， in bold mouthfuls.Nina， Ona， and I， we sat watching， our teacups of scotch in our laps， his three giggly girls.

Relaxed, I thought there was a connection.Johnnie Walker then and Johnnie Walker now.I twirled the glass to make the ice tinkle.

We clinked glasses.Three times for good luck.I relaxed, felt better.

“What’s going on with you and Mason?”

“He wants to get married.”

“Isn’t it about time?”

“I guess.” I wasn’t in the mood to talk about it yet.

“Here’s to Johnnie Walker in shark’s fin soup,” I said.

“And squab dinners.”

“I Love Lucy[19].” I raised my glass， and said again， “To I Love Lucy，squab dinners， and brown bags.”

“To bones.”

“Bones，” I repeated.This was a funny that got sad， and knowing it， I kept laughing.I was surprised how much memory there was in one word.Pigeons.Only recently did I learn that the name for them was squab.Our name for them was pigeon--on a plate or flying over Portsmouth Square.A good meal at forty cents a bird.In line by dawn， we waited at the butcher’s，listening for the slow， churning motor of the trucks.We watched the live fish flushing out of the tanks into the garbage pails.We smelled the honeybrushed cha-sui buns[20].And when the white laundry truck turned into Wentworth Alley with its puffing trail of feathers， a stench of chicken waste and rotting food filled the alley.Old ladies squeezed in around the truck， reaching into the crates to tug out the plumpest pigeons.

Nina, Ona, and I picked the white ones, those with the most expressive eyes.Dove birds, we called them.We fed them leftover rice in water, and as long as they stayed plump, they were our pets, our baby dove birds.

But then one day we’d come home from school and find them cooked.Mah said they were special, a nutritious treat.She filled our bowls high with little pigeon parts: legs, breasts, and wings.She let us take our dinners out to the Front room to watch I Love Lucy.Mah opened up a brown bag for the bones.We leaned forward, balanced our bowls on our laps, and crossed our chopsticks in midair and laughed at Lucy.We called out, “Mah!Mah! Come watch! Watch Lucy cry!”

But Mah always sat alone in the kitchen sucking out the sweetness of the lesser part: the neck, the back, and the head.“Bones are sweeter than you know,” she always said.She came out to check the bag.“Clean the bones.” She shook it.“No waste.”

Chapter 4

The ginseng brew was as dark as two-day-old tea.

All day I’d been dealing with other people’s problems and now I didn’t feel like listening to how Leon never finished anything he started.Leon had heard at the Square that fluorescent lights were better than bulbs and he’d suggested them for the Baby Store.Enthusiastic, Mah went with him to Three Star Hardware and chose soft white over bright white.When Leon carried the ladder up from the basement and perched on the top rung to rewire the switches, she held the ladder steady.

Mason called it their first joint project because it was the friendliest thing they’d done together after Leon moved into the San Fran.

I was glad to see Leon escape into a project.After Ona died, Leon still talked up new ideas, but he hardly ever started anything.Working on the lights, Leon seemed almost his old self, not happy but preoccupied.I was hoping he’d see this project through to the end, but halfway through he told Mason that his concentration was gone, that something disconnected between his mind and his heart.

Then， the S.S.Independent docked and You Thin Toy drove up to the Baby Store with his overtime splurge： a dollar-green Impala[21].The two of them were off on a new project： hunting down bargains at the fleamarkets—Cow Palace， Alameda， Berkeley.

“All head and no tail，” Mah said.“Paat moong[22]，” she accused.It applied， it was true； Leon had become dreamy， lost.

I sipped.My shoulders felt tight, tense.I tried to relax them, but when I turned my head, it felt like someone was stabbing me in the back.Nothing new.For months, I’d had these pains.When they first came, I thought I’d strained my back at school lifting something or chasing kids on yard duty.

But it wasn’t that.It was more like in my head.It was being pulled back and forth between Mah and Mason.All that worry about Leon, his lights, his living alone at the San Fran.It was worrying about my new job and parking tickets and the crowds on Stockton Street and seeing Nina in New York.But right then it was mostly Mah’s being alone and Mason’s waiting for me.

I sipped again: a long bitter taste.And it was Ona.That’s the thing that was in my head.Everything went back to Ona.And beyond Ona there was the bad luck that Leon kept talking about.What made Ona do it.Like she had no choice.

Leon blamed himself.He had this crazy idea that our family’s bad luck started when he broke his promise to Grandpa Leong.Grandpa Leong was Leon’s father only on paper； he sponsored Leon’s entry into the country by claiming him as his own son.It cost Leon.Each time he told us，his eyes opened wide like he was hearing the price called out for the first time.“Five thousand American dollars.” Of more consequence was the promise to send Grandpa Leong’s bones back to China[23].Leon was away when Grandpa Leong died.Leon worried about the restless bones， and for years， whenever something went wrong—losing a job， losing the bid for the takeout joint， losing the Ong and Leong Laundry—Leon blamed the bones.But in the end the bones remained here.

Then Ona jumped and it was too late.The bones were lost， like Ona was lost.That’s why Leon shipped out on a cargo voyage.Cape Horn[24]was as far away as a ship could go.Forty days to the bottom of the world.

Chapter 5

After school, I drove over to Salmon Alley for Leon’s brick-colored suitcase—the one he arrived on Angel Island with—lugged the heavy thing down to my car, and went back to Mason’s place.

I knew the story.One hundred and nine times I’ve heard Leon tell it.How buying the name Leong was like buying a black-market passport.How he memorized another man’s history to pass the interrogation on Angel Island.And how later the government offered a deal： the confession program[25].How many of his Friends went for it： Wong Min Fat， Jimmy Lowe， Lee Hoy.The exchange： a confession of illegal entry bought you naturalization papers.But Leon didn’t trust the government； besides he never intended to stay.But fifty years later， here he was， caught in his own lie； the laws that excluded him now held him captive.

I lifted the suitcase up on to the kitchen table and opened it.The past came up: a moldy, water-damaged paper smell and a parchment texture.The letters were stacked by year and rubberbanded into decades.I only had to open the first few to know the story: “We Don’t Want You.”

A rejection from the army: unfit.

A job rejection: unskilled.

An apartment: unavailable.

My shoulders tightened and I thought about having a scotch.Leon had made up stories for us; so that we could laugh, so that we could understand the rejections.

The army wanted him but the war ended.

He had job skills and experience: welding, construction and electrical work, but no English.

The apartment was the right size but the wrong neighborhood.

Now, seeing the written reasons in a formal letter, the stories came back, without the humor, without hope.On paper Leon was not the hero.

Maybe Leon should have destroyed these papers.They held a truth about a Leon I wasn’t sure I wanted to know.Why did he keep every single letter of rejection? Letters saying “We don’t want you” were flat worthless to me.What use was knowing the jobs he didn’t get, the opportunities he lost? I sorted through the musty papers, the tattered scraps of yellowed notes, the photos.I kept going; I told myself that the right answer, like the right birthdate, had to be written down somewhere.

Leon kept things because he believed time mattered.Old made good.These letters gained value the way old coins did; they counted the way money counted.All the letters addressed to Leon should prove to the people at the social security office that this country was his place, too.Leon had paid; Leon had earned his rights.American dollars.American time.These letters marked his time and they marked his endurance.Leon was a paper son.

And this paper son saved every single scrap of paper.I remember his telling me about a tradition of honoring paper, how the oldtimers believed all writing was sacred.All letters, newspapers, and documents were collected and then burned in special temple, and the sacred ashes were discarded in a secret spot in the bay.

...

I started throwing everything back into the suitcase, I took handfuls of papers up and pitched them back into the suitcase; I wanted to get everything out of sight.That’s when I saw the photo of a young Leon, it was right there, Leon’s affidavit of identification.

The photograph attached hereto and made a part hereof is a recent photographic likeness of the aforementioned Lai-on Leong, Date of Birth:November 21, 1924, Port of Entry: San Francisco, is one and the same person as tepresentedlby the photograph attached to Certificate of Identity No.52728 showing his status as a citizen of the United States.

It would do, I put the document aside and went back to collecting the rest of the scattered sheets.I packed everything—letters, official documents, pictures, and old newspaper clippings—back into the suitcase,and slammed the old thing shut.I thought, Leon was right to save everything.For a paper son, paper is blood.

Mason says I’m too much like Leon: I keep everything too, and inside I never let go.I remember everything.

Mason’s right.I never forget.I’m the stepdaughter of a paper son and I’ve inherited this whole suitcase of lies.All of it is mine.All I have are those memories, and I want to remember them all.

Chapter 12

Luciano Ong blew into Chinatown like a thunderstorm.We loved looking at him in his embroidered shirts， his SunYat-sen[26] mustache.Nina liked his Ricky Ricardo[27] hair style.Big-boned， broad-backed， and loud-voiced， he was the tallest man in Portsmouth Square.A crowd always gathered around him to hear about his next big idea.He always had a plan to make big money， but he always seemed to need one more grand.He was always one man short.

Luciano was Leon’s kind of guy.Leon called Luciano Dai Cor[28]， Big Brother.He tried to impress him with all the Spanish words he’d learned on the ships： muchacha， maricón， calle， merengue[29].He boasted about having been to South America himself， Rio de Janeiro and Santiago and Cape Horn， even to the Chinatown in Lima.Hadn’t he given his last daughter a Spanish name， in honor of Columbus’s fleet[30]？ （Nina was horrified.） Leon wanted to be Luciano’s last man； he wanted to have the honor of giving him the grand that would make his big-money dreams come true.

Leon talked about Luc all the time.Every story he heard Luc tell at the Square he repeated for us at dinner.Luc tipped Paul Lim twenty dollars for parking his car.Luc bought snakeskin shoes at Florsheim[31].Luc had a gold Rolex[32].Soon Luc was going to buy a new Cadillac[33].

...

THE Ong & Leong laundry was on McAllister Street, on the seedy edge of Tenderloin.To get there, we took the number 30 Stockton bus downtown and then transferred to the 38 Geary and got off on Polk and walked two blocks past massage parlors and all-male strip joints, and the Mitchell Brothers’ famous theatre.The storefront had two small rooms: in front there was a long wooden counter worn smooth from use and an ancient cash register, a relic from the days when the place was a retail laundry, in back, a storage room and a kitchenette where Mah made lunch.A narrow staircase led to a basement that was as wide and as deep as the belly of a ship.The first time I went down there, I stood at the bottom of the stairs and watched Leon navigate through the gloom.One by one, he found the overhanging bulbs and pulled their strings and sent the lights swinging over each dusty machine.

Leon taught us how to twist the sheets like rope, so they wouldn’t knot up while washing, and how to lift them out of the machine without straining our backs.We used both arms to carry them to the extractor, a wild spinning contraption that whined like Dr.Joe’s drill.We learned to work the press, a two-girl job.Ona and I held opposite corners of the damp sheet and slipped the edges under the hot rollers.After the edges caught,we ran around to the other end where the sheet slid out, stiff and hot and dry.We folded them by the hotel-loads, corner touching corner, until each package was as tight and perfect as a new deck of cards.

It was hot down there.The humid air was chalky with starch and soap and bleach.The steam and chlorine odor clung to us.Once I smelled it on myself and was surprised with the clear memory of Leon coming home.

That summer, we were all on call for helping out at the laundry,which was almost all the time.I was taking education classes at San Francisco State University and working full time as a receptionist in the campus Career Center.

Ona took classes at City College and worked the five-to-ten evening shift at Chinatown Bazaar.Nina’d just graduated from Galileo High and hadn’t decided what she wanted to do yet, so she clocked in the most hours at the laundry and hated every minute of it.She said the only good thing about lifting the wet sheets was that her arms looked good in a tank top.

For Ona， Osvaldo was the best thing about Ong & Leong’s.I remember watching him once.He carried two fifty-pound sacks of laundry out to the van and he tossed them through the open door as if they were goose-down pillows.He had Luc’s broad back and Rosa’s golden skin.Her Spanish blood gave him the dark lashes and strong jaw of a pretty-boy actor.Ona said Osvaldo looked even better than Fu Sheng[34]， her favorite gung fu hero.

Soon she could time his deliveries.Somehow she could sense his presence upstairs.It was as though she could hear his footsteps above her,over the rumble of the washers.Then she wanted a Coke, or had to make a phone call or go to the bathroom or tell Mah something urgent.She’d stay up there for a half hour at a time—sometimes longer—talking to Osvaldo.When Nina complained that Ona wasn’t doing her share, Mah surprised us by saying, “Let her have her fun.” Leon let Ona go on deliveries with Osvaldo when it was slow.He called her Osvaldo’s assistant.When there was a rush order and they needed Ona to work that extra forty minutes it would have taken her to commute to her job, Leon asked Osvaldo to drive Ona to Chinatown Bazaar.

No one was surprised to see them together upstairs, sitting on top of a pile of laundry bags and holding hands.Mah made only one rule.She asked Ona to please not sit on his lap in the front of the store where anyone walking by could see.Ona did it anyway, but as a gesture to respect Mah’s wishes, she pushed the big rubber plant in front of the window.Leon started calling Osvaldo “son,” and Mah and Rosa giggled about being sisters.

Ong & Leong inherited the previous owners’ hotel clientele, but Luc took it on himself to drum up more business.He called himself the marketing manager, the outside man.He called Leon the plant manager.Leon was the inside man in charge of the whole washing operation.Mah told Leon to go with Luc to the hotels once in a while to learn the business end of things, which was her way of telling him to keep an eye on Luc, but Leon said he was too busy.Luc was the talker and Leon was the worker.Leon claimed he liked it that way.

When there was a lull, Ona and Nina and I always ran upstairs to sit in the light by the big front window.But not Leon.He liked it down there with his machines.The sound of all the washers going, the extractors spinning, the dryers hissing calmed him.Mah said it was as if he was in the engine room of his own ship.She took his dinner down to him, a big soup bowl piled high with rice and vegetables, and he’d walk around, his bowl balanced in his palm, listening to his machines.He knew every machine by its sound.He said that each motor had a different voice, and he could tell when one was getting tired, ready to break down.

All summer, one by one, they all did break down.Leon always got them working again somehow, but we worried, especially Mah.Would the dryers be hot enough? Would the extractors spin? Would we make the deadline?

THEN Ong & Leong’s went bust.We had no Warning.Luc kept the books; we never saw the summonses or the eviction notices or the unpaid utility bills.We found out one rainy Saturday morning in late November when we arrived and found the place padlocked shut.None of our keys worked.I held an umbrella over Leon as he called Luc from the corner phone booth, but there was no answer.Leon slammed the phone down so hard he cracked the earpiece.

We knew not to ask anything right then.I knew the money was gone.Leon and Luc had only shaken hands on the deal.There was no contract,no legal partnership.I blamed myself.I should have done more; I should have made them go to a lawyer to set the business up.But I hadn’t.Mah and Leon seemed so high on the idea, I didn’t want to bring in doubt.It was their business, and if they wanted to do things the Chinatown way, if they wanted to depend on old-world trust, I didn’t think it was my place to interfere.

Leon went looking for Luc, which was also the old-world way.He didn’t show for dinner.Midnight.Still no Leon.We didn’t say what we were all afraid of Ona wanted to call Osvaldo, but Mah wouldn’t let her.We sat together in the living room.We waited until two o’clock and then Mah told us to go to bed.

I lay in bed, trying not to fall asleep.

Mah’s hoarse voice scared me awake.“Why did it come to this? How could it come to this?”

We knew to stay in our rooms.We listened and the footsteps told us enough: Mah’s slippers slapping from bathroom to kitchen to bedroom and Leon’s heavy boots dragging down the hall.Their bedroom door shut and then we could only catch the high and low pitches of sound changing:screams and low groans and then a steady silence.

Leon stayed in his room for two days.Mah brought him his meals.She wanted to call a doctor, but Leon said, No.Mah went and found Rosa and flew into a fury.Rosa played innocent: she had no idea; she had no power over her husband, no knowledge of the details.So Mah fumed at us.

I told her, “Don’t think about it.It’s over now.”

Trust, the old-world way.We hadn’t been paid for the five months of work we’d put in, and all our savings were gone.I asked for a month’s advance pay from my job.Ona was paid in cash every Friday.Mah asked Mr.Ching for her old job, but he’d already hired another seamstress, so Mah went back to Tommie’s.

We didn’t talk about Leon’s bruised and swollen face or his limp.We left him alone and soon his sullenness spread through the apartment.Maybe our quiet was a way to express our own fear and sense of disbelief,of defeat.I’d had my own dreams for the laundry, that a successful business would bring Mah and Leon back together in a deeper way.Around then, a letter came from my father, wanting to make contact, a long-lost, rekindling letter, but there was too much happening for me to feel anything for someone as far away as Australia.I was getting close to Mason and I wanted my own life.I didn’t want to worry about Mah or Leon or anybody else.

Ona worried me in a way I couldn’t let go of.I always felt that she had the most to lose.She was too sensitive, too close to Leon.When she was little, she’d be weepy for days after Leon left on a voyage, and she’d wait for him, shadowy and pensive, counting off the days till he came home.Every time he lost a job, she went into a depression with him.When he got high on some scheme, she was drunk on it, too.Mah said she was like Leon that way: Ona had no skin.

I think Nina had the best attitude.Leon’s problems were his and Mah’s were hers, and she hated Chinatown and she was getting out.

Leon started coming and going at strange hours.He spent his days at the park, or with his buddies at the Universal or the Jackson Cafe.Evenings, he wandered around Waverly Place, visiting the chess clubs.He’d come home way after midnight, and then he always cooked up a snack.It confused my dreams to smell rice steaming with salted fish.

When Mah tried to talk to him, he turned on her, blaming her for everything.“Your fault.Women’s talk, sewing-lady gossip.”

I should have seen it coming: Leon turned on Ona, too.He told her to break up with Osvaldo.“I forbid you to see that mongrel boy.Crooked father, crooked son.”

Nina told Ona, “Just say whatever Leon needs to hear.Then you can do whatever you want.” I agreed but Ona refused to lie.She told Leon she loved Osvaldo.

Leon threatened to disown her.“You will no longer be my daughter, I will no longer be your father.”

What did he think, this was like a divorce? Just because he said something it would be true? But in a strange way, after those words came out of his mouth, it was all over.Forbidding Ona was like daring her.

Leon was relentless.His frustration went deeper than losing the laundry.He blamed himself for the humiliation.And every time he saw Osvaldo, he remembered his whole past, every job he got fired from, every business that failed.He hung up on Osvaldo, refused to let him into the house.He yelled at Ona every night all through dinner.The harder Leon pressed, the tighter Ona and Osvaldo became.

Once Leon blocked her at the door.He said, “I’m warning you! If you go, don’t bother coming back!”

That night, Leon did lock her out.So Ona spent the night at Osvaldo’s.Maybe that’s when she started to keep secrets.Maybe she figured the less any of us knew, the better.

Then the Ongs moved out to the Richmond district and Ona spent even more time there.We hardly saw her.I heard that it was Luc who put in the call that got Ona her job at The Traders.

I worried about her.Not only because she was Leon’s target, but also because she didn’t have an out.

The thing that stuck in my mind was what Ona told me about how she felt outside Chinatown.She never felt comfortable, even with the Chinese crowd that Osvaldo hung around with; she never felt like she fit in.

My out was Mason.Nina had a part-time job at Kentucky Fried Chicken on Bay, near Tower Records.

Mah told Leon that Ona would outgrow Osvaldo.I tried talking to him; Nina did, too.We even got Cousin to tell him to let up on Ona, but Leon turned on everyone.I started hoping that Leon would ship out: I thought a voyage might clear his head.

At work one day, I took a job call for a dishwasher at the University of San Francisco Medical Center.I took a chance and sent Leon.I figured,How can he fuck up a dishwashing interview?

But in my desperation to get Leon out of the house I didn’t even consider the obvious—they’d called a student employment office, they’d expect a student.

Leon came home in a rage.“They asked if I had experience!" He fumed, "Who doesn’t have experience washing dishes?”

But they offered Leon the job and it seemed to give him some balance.It calmed him, but I knew that would pass.

THE night everything finally blew up, I realized it had been inevitable,but all week I’d been too tired to see the warning signs; Ona had been with Osvaldo for three nights.Leon had some problem with his supervisor.I was beat from work and beat from staying out late with Mason.I came home glad that dinner was ready; all I wanted to do was eat and then go to bed.Leon came in just as we finished eating.Mah had put some dinner aside for him.She went to heat it up.

Then there was a knock and Onawas going down the hall and it was Osvaldo standing there, Osvaldo bending forward, Osvaldo kissing Ona.

It happened fast: Leon getting up and going down the shall after Ona.Ona rushing out the door and Leon following her.Then I ran after them and Mah’s scared voice was behind me, asking, “What’s happening?What’s happening?”

I stopped at the top of the stairs.I saw Leon yank the car door open and reach in, grabbing at Ona.Doors opened up and down the alley.Lights came on.

But Ona kept fighting him.She pushed and flung her arms, she hit him.Leon was yelling something in Chinese, but I couldn’t make out what.Mah started yelling, too; she tried to rush down, but I blocked her and told her, “No!” I didn’t want her hysteria to feed his.

Ona’s screams filled the entire alley.

Osvaldo yelled, “Leave her alone!”

But Leon wouldn’t acknowledge Osvaldo.He kept yelling at Ona,“You better listen to me, I’m warning you, if you want to be my daughter,you better listen.”

“Leave her alone,” Osvaldo shouted again.He got into the car; the engine turned over.

From the top of the stairs, I saw the neighbors back away from their windows, turn off their lights, shut their doors.The alley darkened, became very still.I could barely make out Leon’s shadow.Then Osvaldo’s headlights flashed on and flooded the alley for a second before sweeping away onto Pacific Avenue.It was only one swift moment of light, but it lasted long enough for me to see Leon looking after Ona as if he was watching everything he’d ever hoped for disappear.

Chapter 14

THAT night, Ona and Nina wanted to go to a social event at Cameron House, so they couldn’t make Leon’s welcome-home dinner; I think they both knew I wanted to talk to Leon about my father.

At Tao-Tao’s, Leon and Mah and Mason and I sat under my favorite Genthe photo of two little girls walking down an alley; they’re holding hands, looking back.I had other favorites: the grocer with the beckoning smile, the shoe cobbler, the balloon peddler.We ordered enough food to invite the spirits of the oldtimers to join us.The food came steaming:clams and oysters and lobster and fresh sea bass, salt-and-pepper prawns and crab with black beans.Our hands were busy, messy from cracking the shells.I let Leon eat his first bowl of rice in peace.

When Mah handed him his second bowl, I refilled his tea and asked him, “What did he look like? My father.You saw him, didn’t you?”

Leon put an oyster in his mouth.“Dark,” he said.

“Dark? Like how?” I asked.

“Like a coolie,” Mason said.

Leon said in English, “Hey, you know that word?”

“Sure.” Mason shrugged.

Leon grinned.“From the sun, like a dried plum.”

“I thought he was some big developer,” I said.“A man inside, behind a desk, you know?”

Mah muttered something as she cracked open a lobster claw.

“That’s people talking,” Leon said in Chinese.

I thought about it.“So, what’d you talk about?”

“Not much.I mentioned the situation here.”

Whenever Leon used Chinese, he sounded more serious.So I waited for him to say more.“Well? What exactly did you say?”

“I told him about your Mah and me.” Leon looked over at Mah, who was busy with a piece of crab.

“Well? What did he say?” I couldn’t stand it; Leon was so slow sometimes it killed me.I wanted more.I gave my chopsticks three hard taps on the tabletop.Mah looked up, scowling.

“Easy.” Mason put his hand on my leg.I sat back.He peeled a shrimp and put it on my plate, and popped the whole thing into my mouth.

“What about me? Did he ask about me?”

“Sure,” Leon said.“I told him that you’d finished school, stuff like chat.” He looked at Mah.

She gave him some fish.“Good piece,” she said.

I wasn’t satisfied.“How’d it end?”

“End?” He put the morsel in his mouth.“What else? Shook hands,said goodbye, long life, and good luck.”

I listened to us eating—Mah and Leon, Mason and me—the soft suck of rice in our mouths, the click of the chopsticks against the bowls.These sounds were comfortable, and for a moment, I was tempted to fall back into the easiness of being Mah’s, daughter, of letting her be my whole life.

When Mah and Leon were first married, I was always surprised when he came home from his voyages.I expected him to change at sea; I think I even expected him to come back as my father.But it was always Leon Leong, in his starched whites, his burnt-sugar tan, his S.S.Independent laundry sack full of presents.

I finally saw what Mason had been saying all along: Mah loved Leon.

LEON once told me that what we hold in our heart is what matters.

The heart never travels.

I believe in holding still.I believe that the secrets we hold in our hearts are our anchors, that even the unspoken between us is a measure of our every promise to the living and to the dead.And all our promises, like all our hopes, move us through life with the power of an ocean liner pushing through the sea.

All my things fit into the back of Mason’s cousin’s Volvo.The last thing I saw as Mason backed out of the alley was the old blue sign,#2—4—6 UPDAIRE.No one has ever corrected it; someone repaints it every year.Like the oldtimer’s photos, Leon’s papers, and Grandpa Leong’s lost bones, it reminded me to look back, to remember.

I was reassured.I knew what I held in my heart would guide me.So I wasn’t worried when I turned that corner, leaving the old blue sign,Salmon Alley, Mah and Leon—everything—backdaire.