DARK BLISS (Dangerous Games,) (4 page)

We sped down the highway.
The traffic thinned. Shadows began to fall and headlights appeared. I clung to Rock, plastered against his leather jacket, the roar of the motorcycle and rush of the wind loud in my ears. My mind drafted and I went into a kind of daze. I woke to a grumble in my stomach. It had been hours since our hasty lunch. There were lights on the horizon, another town. The lights grew until thousands were visible. Rock pointed at a sign as we flashed past: Ciudad Flores.

It wasn’t a big city but it
was
a city, not a mere town. I dreamed of lying in a tub of hot, soapy water. Rock cruised the streets until we came to a two-story brick building painted lime green. A restaurant was housed in the bottom floor. “Cocina China de García” announced a red neon sign. He parked the bike and we got off. “Hungry?” he asked.

“Famished!”

He smiled. “You’ll like this place.” It was the first time I’d seen him smile, a big lopsided grin that made me curious. He seemed to be anticipating something besides a good meal. But when we reached the entrance, I could see it was dark. A sign hung on the door:
Cerrado
. “They’re closed,” I groaned.

Rock ho
wever rapped loudly on the glass. We waited a moment and he rapped again. A short, frowning woman somewhere in early middle age appeared on the other side. She shook her head emphatically and I could hear her voice through the glass. I didn’t understand the words but her import was obvious. Go away.

Rock dug a cigarette
lighter from his pocket and lit it near his face. The woman’s expression changed from irritation to sudden delight. A moment later, the door swung open and she beckoned us inside. “Miguel!” she cried, hugging him.
“De dónde vienes?”
She called to the back in what I took for Spanish and was quickly joined by a short man who echoed her pleasure. He and Rock embraced, pounding each other on the back. I could hear more voices in the restaurant as others came to the door. In a moment Rock was practically smothered by children of various ages and sizes. A boy in his late teens pumped his right hand while a younger one pumped his left. Two girls of grade school age each hugged a leg while one in early adolescence leaped on him like a monkey, arms on his neck and legs wrapped around his torso.

I was stunned. I’d never doubted that Rock had friends but if I’d been asked to describe them I suppose I would have
pictured two or three dour ex-soldiers like himself. Seeing him enveloped in the warmth of a solidly middle-class family was a revelation.

Rock’s voice rose above the childish hubbub.
“
Todo el mundo, este es mi amiga Rory.”
The woman turned to me with a friendly smile and took my hand in both of hers. “
Bienvenido, Rory! Habla usted español
?”

“Tha
nk you! I’m sorry but I don’t speak Spanish.”

“Then we will speak English,” she responded in a voice with no trace of accent. She turned to the children and spoke sternly in a high, fluttery language that, whatever it was, was
certainly not Spanish.

The kids immediately calmed down and the girl reluctantly climbed off Rock.
They all turned politely toward me and I saw five smiling faces topped by jet black hair. Their coloring was off for a Mexican family and like their parents, they were on the short side. Mexicans with strong Indian blood are often short but also inclined to stockiness. This family was uniformly thin.

Then I noticed their eyes.
“You’re Chinese!” I exclaimed.

As one, the entire family put their hands together and bowed. They rose, the kids all
grinning, and I could see that the gesture was part courtesy and part family humor at what must have been typical surprise. “Not
completely
Chinese, honorable young lady,” said the man with a smile. “Welcome to Casa García.”

“Rory, these are my old friends
Art and Min García,” said Rock. I shook hands with the man and woman and then with each of the children as Rock introduced them. The oldest son, with muscles that looked enhanced by weightlifting, was “Arturo Zang Wei.” The next oldest, a skinny boy in his mid-teens with glasses, was “Ricardo Wang Xiu.” Two identical girls of grade school age were the twins, “Maria Li Na” and “Rosa Liu Yang.”

“And this beauty,” said Rock, hand on the shoulder of the middle schooler who’d swarmed on
him earlier, “is Frieda Li Li.”

“No!” she exclaimed
fiercely. “My name’s not Frieda.”

“It was the last time I was here,”
he said in puzzlement.

“I’m Tiffany now but you can call me Tiff.”

Min rolled her eyes but Art only chuckled. “She’s going through a sort of identity crisis at the moment.”

“It’s not a crisis! I’m Tiffany.”

“Quién es?”
said a high, quavering voice from the back.
“Quién está aquí?
” The family parted and a tiny old woman with a bun of silver hair appeared. At sight of each other, she and Rock beamed in delight.

“S
eñora García!”

“Miguelito!”

I knew enough Spanish to recognize that she was calling him “little Miguel.” Rock’s friendship with the Garcías obviously went far back, to a time before anyone called him “Rock.” He bent and embraced her, planting a kiss on the cheek she offered him, then turned to me.
“Señora, esta es mi amiga, Rory.”

She smiled
and extended a frail hand.
“Tengo el placer de conocerte, Rory.”

I took it in mine. “
Very pleased to meet you, Señora
.
”

“
Have you eaten? asked Min.

“Matter of fact, no,” replied Rock.

“Perfect timing!” said Art. “We’re just sitting down. Frieda-Tiffany, set two more places.”

A
round table at the very back of the restaurant was crowded with steaming dishes. Rock and I sat across from each other, he flanked by the two teenage boys and I between the twins. Art sat between his mother and wife and Frieda-Tiff sat next to Min, though she spent half her time on her feet, serving or fetching things from the kitchen or cutting food for the twins. Poor Tiff, I thought, middle child but eldest daughter. None of the perks of seniority and all the burdens of being Mama’s helper. It was a position I knew well. Small wonder she wanted to shuck a plain-Jane moniker like Frieda for a sparkly American one.

“I’m amazed to find a Chinese restaurant outside Mexico City,” I said.

“
Everybody
likes Chinese food,” said Art. “We get a lot of regional trade. People think nothing of driving a hundred miles for Min’s cooking.”

“
García’s Cocina has a reputation,” said Min. “It’s been here sixty-five years.”

“
Sixty-five years!”

“His
grandmother and her husband started it,” said Rock. “My granddad was a trucker. I spent summers in Mexico, kept him company on more than one trip. Wherever he was going, he always made sure to stop here going out and coming back. Art and I are practically the same age. He was always around, waiting tables or in the kitchen. We took to each other.”

“
Thick as thieves,” grinned Art.

“W
hen I was in college I worked here every summer. We spent our free time drinking beer and chasing girls.”

“
You
may have chased girls,” said Min tartly. “Art
had
a girl, I believe.”

“Yeah,” said Rock hastily. “
I
chased girls. That’s what I meant.”

“I bet.” She dug an elbow into her husband, who was trying not to laugh, and turned to me. “You have to taste our new dish. Frieda, go get more
chimáles
.”

The girl pretended not to hear. Min sighed. “
Please, Tiffany.” The child sprang up and darted into the kitchen.

“What’s a
chimále
?”

“We serve all the standard fare,” said
Art. “Sweet and sour pork, kung pao chicken, all that, but we’re branching out. Americans like yourself want a little dining adventure, so we’re experimenting with fusion food.”

Fri
eda appeared with a plate of what looked like tamales. “Chimáles!” she announced dramatically.

I t
ook one and cut a slice. “Delicious!” I exclaimed when I bit into it. “Tastes like…”

“
Donald Duck!” said Tiff, which made the twins protest loudly.

“Don’t tease your sisters,” Min told her.

“Donald is the name of their pet duck,” Art explained.

“It’s duck stewed in bamboo shoots with ginger and a few other spices,” said Min. We also make
them with barbecued pork.”

“And next week
,” said Art, “we’re introducing a dish called Mandarin Orange Ahi Tuna Tartar with Guacamole.”

“
Loco! Completamente loco,”
muttered Señora García.

Art smiled and shrugged. “Mama
believes in sticking to the tried and true. Mama, we’re not dropping anything from the menu, but we’ve got to keep up with the times.”

“
Humph
,” she snorted.

You could see
Art and Min loved cooking almost as much as they loved their family. The entire time they talked, dishes were being passed back and forth: a large platter of white rice, plates piled with roast chicken, bok choy and carrots, bowls of savory soup, all washed down with small cups of hot tea, constantly filled by Tiffany.

Some families let the conversation lag when the meal is served. Not the
Garcías. With five children, there was no shortage of chatter. We learned that last week Arturo Jr. had scored two goals for his school’s soccer team. Ricardo had just finished
A Hundred Years of Solitude
and, as an aspiring writer, intended to read everything Gabriel García Marquez had written. Maria was taking ballet lessons and leapt from her chair to demonstrate poses until her mother told her to finish her dinner. Rosa, who was learning piano, had just mastered Mozart’s
Variaciones sobre Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star
. Would we like to hear her play it after dinner?

“We certainly would!” I said. “And maybe Maria can dance it.”

“It doesn’t have a dance,” said Rosa, not happy at sharing the limelight with her sister.

“She can improvise one.”

“Sí, I can improvise!” Rosa told her twin. “What’s improvise?” she said, turning to me.

“It means make it up on the spot.”

“And I can sing it,” said Tiffany. “I’m going to be a singer,” she told me gravely.

“That’s wonderful! And when you come to my city, I’ll be sure to
go to your concert.”

“You will?”

“I certainly will.”

“Where do you live?”

“Right now I live in a town called Boston.”

"Dónde está eso?"
asked Rosa.

“Use English,” instructed Mi
n. “Rory doesn’t speak Spanish.”

“Where’s
Boston?”

Before I could answer, I was peppered with more questions.

“What kind of a name is Rory?” asked Maria.

“Do you
roar
?” joked Ricardo.

“Are you Rock’s girlfriend?” asked Tiffany.

“Basta, basta. Deja que la mujer a comer,”
instructed Min and though I didn’t understand the words, once again I got the import. The children’s attention shifted to Rock, whom they clearly regarded as a dashing, devilish, unofficial uncle. Between bites he regaled them with an account of a motorcycle race in Mexico City. To my continuing surprise, this man of short, blunt sentences was an excellent storyteller. He did sound effects and humorous impressions and his voice turned low and intense as he described the end of the race, where he lost by a whisker to the three-time champion, a German named Gunther. He pronounced the name with a sinister accent,
Gooon-THER
, conjuring up the image of a sneering Nazi with a monocle and artificial hand. I suspected this last part was embellished for his audience, which punctuated the story with whoops and giggles.

Dinner over,
Min and Tiff cleared the table while the twins took me to a stairway behind the kitchen that led to the family’s living quarters, a charming combination of Oriental and Hispanic décor. “Are there a lot of Chinese in Mexico?” I asked the girls.

“Yes,” said Rosa. “Lots of us.”

“Millions!” said Maria.

Arturo Jr. laughed as he emerged from the stairway. “Hardly that many.
A lot of Chinese came to the States to help build the railroads. Quite a few drifted across the border. That was the first wave. The second came in the nineteen twenties when Mexico encouraged immigration to help populate the north part of the country. That’s when Great-Grandma’s family came over.”