Although touched by the peaceful scene, he still felt a lingering pain in his heart. The previous night he had again dreamed of his first love, Beina. In his sleep the two of them walked outside the campus of their old college. Moonlight filtered through the aspen grove and was shimmering on the snow grayed by thawing. For some reason, they quarreled again, and angrily she hurried away to the entrance of her dorm building. He shouted, "Beina, Beina, wait a second, let me explain!" She wouldn't listen and faded into the darkness of the doorway. His friend Danning appeared from behind a thick birch and dragged him away, saying, "She's not worth your love. Forget her. My friend, you must save yourself!" Somehow later Beina embraced him at a train station and wept wretchedly. After he woke up, he mused about her tears but couldn't guess why. He hoped her husband hadn't treated her too badly. She had looked colorless and must have been ill. Why had Danning Meng, the man who had studied physics at Brandeis and returned to Beijing two years ago, appeared in his dream? Nan was positive that Danning and Beina hadn't known each other at all. What a bizarre dream.
Peals of laughter came from outside and brought Nan back to his wife and son. He went on observing them, happy to see them in such buoyant spirits. He had just finished reading A House for Mr. Biswas and still vividly remembered the struggle the protagonist waged for having his own shelter in his own corner of land. He felt fortunate that he might achieve such a goal in just a few years. Though their mortgage was unpaid, he was on his way to becoming an independent man. His heart was filled with joy and gratitude. At long last he was hungry for making money, a lot of money, so that his family could live in peace and security.
With the back of his hand he touched his face, which wasn't hot today. Ever since the outset of the winter, he had often run a low fever. He had lived in cold climates all his life, and now in the mild Georgia winter his body was ready to resist cold, of which there wasn't any. Small wonder, bugs abounded here in the summertime. Any insects could easily survive a mild winter like this. Nan had noticed that a lot of roaches hibernated in the firewood left by Mr. Wolfe, stacked along their western steel fence. Just now as he talked with Gerald, Gerald had told him, "This snow's killing all them bugs. There'll be a bumpa peach crop nex' summa." If only there were more cold days like this one.
On such a crisp morning Nan felt energetic and clearheaded. He was in the mood for writing a poem about the scene in the backyard, about the joy and serenity of life, but he couldn't decide how to begin. He thought a good while about such a poem, which should start with a line like this: "Snow has been falling in the Southeast," but he didn't know how to proceed from there. In an hour or so he'd have to go to the restaurant, where there were chickens to cut up, flounder to clean, and spring rolls to wrap. It was always busy on Sundays, and he had to get everything ready before noon, the opening time. So he returned to his room and lay down on his bed to rest some more before setting out for work.
19
NOWADAYS Taotao no longer stayed at the restaurant after school. Their house was so close by that he could walk back and forth. If he was at home alone, Pingping would call to check on him. Sometimes she'd go back to see if he was doing his homework. Nan had bought him a cheap computer because Taotao said he would build one by himself eventually. The boy knew two older kids who had just assembled their own computers, and his parents agreed to buy the parts for him. Both Nan and his wife felt fortunate about the way things had worked out. They were eager to get rid of their debt, though Pingping insisted on keeping a tidy sum in the bank as a backup fund. The economy was still in recession despite the start of a slow recovery. She wanted to make certain that they could have enough money for the monthly payment even in a lean time. On average they managed to pay Mr. Wolfe $1,500 a month.
Luckily the Gold Wok continued thriving. To increase its food variety, Nan added steamed dumplings and several kinds of noodles, such as noodles sauteed with beef and snow peas, or with shiitake mushrooms, or with dried shrimp and scallops. The new offerings helped fetch more customers. Their Yangzhou Rice had become a favorite choice for lunch, loved by the Mexican workers at the construction site of an apartment complex off Lawrenceville Highway. Nan had been wondering how to make the restaurant more profitable, but it was too small to expand further. Yet there was an obvious way, namely to install a bar. Alcoholic beverages were lucrative, but neither Nan nor Pingping knew how to mix drinks. The Gold Wok did have a license for alcohol, yet to date it had offered only a few bottled beers and wines. For weeks the Wus had been wondering whether they should set up a bar, which meant they'd have to hire a barkeep. That would cost a lot.
When working in New York, Nan had heard a good deal about bars in Chinese restaurants. Many of them were tended by Caucasians, because most Asians couldn't communicate with customers well enough in English. ABCs, American-born Chinese, didn't take bartending as a real profession, so they wouldn't man bars. In a Chinese restaurant, all too often there was unspoken contention between the barman and the waitstaff. At some places the bars even offered appetizers, directly taking business away from the dining tables. It was commonplace that a barman often acted like a lord in a Chinese restaurant and was feared by waiters and waitresses, because he could create trouble for them by slightly altering the drinks ordered by their customers. If a complaint came up and their boss intervened, the barman could simply say he couldn't understand the English used by the waiter or waitress who had placed the order. Worse yet, it was almost impossible for the boss to follow the sales at the bar, so the barkeep could give favors freely to barflies, especially to young women, and some barmen even pocketed the money that was supposed to go to the cash registers. In short, a bar could be a bonanza but also a major bugbear.
Pingping didn't know what a bar would entail, so Nan explained everything to her. He even thought of finding a Chinese fellow, sending him to a bartending school in Atlanta and then hiring him afterward. But Pingping was adamantly against setting up a bar, which she said would throw their business out of kilter. Since physically the restaurant couldn't be expanded any more, there shouldn't be a bar that might destroy their peace of mind. What they needed most was a stable clientele, which didn't even have to be large. Nan agreed.
For months Nan had been working at least fourteen hours a day, sometimes without seeing the sun for a whole week, as he had to go to the Gold Wok early in the morning to get things ready. He'd slice beef, cut chickens, boil the bones to make stock, heat up a samovar for tea, chop broccoli and scallions, steam rice, deep-fry pork and chicken cubes. In the afternoons his legs often felt heavy and bloated; he'd sit down whenever he could, even when working at the wok, so as to avoid developing varicose veins. The restaurant had fully occupied his body and mind. Even at night he often dreamed of greeting customers and cooking their orders, his head full of the din of the kitchen while his limbs remained hot and sore as a result of the long working hours. His hands, always marked by nicks or burns or blisters, would throb a little whenever he woke up in the morning. Despite the hard work, despite his fatigue, he felt content and was determined to succeed. At long last life had become simple and clear to him, as if all the confusion and uncertainties had never befogged his mind.
One afternoon Pingping handed Nan a letter. "It's for you." "For me? From whom?"