Chapter 3

3: 3

The moment we touched down at Cresthaven Airport, a warm, damp wind hit my face.

There was honeysuckle in the air, mixed with the smell of hot pot.

My mother lifted her head and looked at the sky.

The southern sky was different from up north, a clearer blue, the clouds hanging low, close enough to touch.

"It's so warm here."

She said it as she pulled off her jacket and draped it over her arm.

I nodded.

"This place stays warm all year round."

The apartment we rented was on the edge of Cresthaven, an old complex, but clean, and that was what mattered.

I started at the law firm. Life was full and good.

After resting for a while, my mother found a domestic services company that suited her.

Her overseas résumé was strong, fluent in a foreign language, able to care for the elderly and mind children, able to cook both Western food and home cooking.

The head of the training department read her résumé and made her a training instructor.

That first month we were both slammed.

By day I combed through case files, drafted documents, ran to court with the attorney supervising me, and by night I came home so tired I dropped straight into sleep.

My mother could outlast me. Every day it was either hands-on training or fussing over her lesson plans.

On the weekend, she said she wanted skewers.

There was a barbecue stall in the alley downstairs, the skewers sizzling and dripping fat.

We ordered lamb skewers, chicken wings, grilled eggplant, and sat on low plastic stools to eat.

At the next table sat a few young people, drinking beer and playing drinking games, laughing loud enough to fill the whole alley.

Halfway through eating, my mother suddenly laughed.

"What's funny?"

"I was thinking about when you were little."

She set down her skewer.

"One summer, your grandmother took your uncle and his family to the beach. She didn't take us."

"Your dad came home from work and took the two of us to a roadside stall."

"You were five then, ate your skewers with sauce all over your face."

"Your dad kept wiping at it with a napkin and couldn't get it clean no matter how long he tried."

She was laughing, and then her voice changed.

"Your dad was still young back then. His hair hadn't gone gray yet."

I looked down and bit into a lamb skewer, and the chili powder caught in my throat.

We could have had a happy life. We really could have.

On the way home we passed a square where a group of older women were dancing.

My mother stopped to watch, and copied the moves along with them for a good ten minutes.

On the way back she said to me,

"You know, when I was little I wanted so badly to learn to dance."

"Your grandmother said dancing girls weren't decent girls, and wouldn't let me."

I laughed.

"It's not too late to dance now."

She nodded, thought about it.

"Maybe I'll sign up for a class."

A year later, we moved. Into the city center, bright windows, clean floors.

Because my mother's reputation had taken off.

One day she suddenly asked me, what if she tried opening a company that did high-end domestic services?

I laughed.

"Sure. Then I'll be your legal counsel."

We took out a startup loan, and on the day we registered, my mother looked at the photocopy of the business license.

"That's my name on it."

"That old apartment, the title was in my name too, mine alone. But I never lived in it a single day."

I took her hand.

"This time it will be different."

The company set up in a block of old office buildings, with a stand of banyan trees outside the window.

My mother arranged the office herself, bought green plants, brewed flower tea.

That night I was scrolling my social media feed and came across a post from my aunt Julia.

The photo was of my cousin Duke Summers picking out décor at a wedding planning company, with a caption that read:

"Some irresponsible relatives just brushed themselves off and ran, but our Duke has real backbone, he can pull off his own wedding on his own."

The next post was inspirational fluff my uncle had reshared, titled:

"When Siblings Aren't United, the Family Falls Apart."

My aunt had posted a long voice message in the family group chat.

The gist was that my mother was an ungrateful traitor, that she'd left her own dying mother behind and run off with the money.

I deleted both Julia and Nathan.

From now on I'd never see anything they posted, and when they came begging, they wouldn't be able to find me.

Down in the alley the barbecue stall was still busy, the smoke and warmth of it drifting up the stairwell.

My mother was in the living room watching a variety show, laughing out loud.

From tonight on, the leeches could fend for themselves.