Waylaid by Ed Lin Page A

Aunty’s head sagged with disappointment and embarrassment. She touched a hand to her hair before stepping into the cab. Then they were gone.
    I went into the office and saw both my parents with their arms folded, standing behind the counter. Their faces were red from alcohol and from arguing.
    â€œWhat happened?” I asked.
    â€œNothing,” my father said.
    â€œThey had emergency,” my mother said.
    â€œCan I sleep in my room tonight?”
    â€œYes,” said my mother. “You clean up everything in Room 2 first.”
    â€œWhere did they go?”
    â€œThey all get in argument. Stupid argument.”
    â€œNot stupid argument. Serious argument,” said my father.
    â€œStupid,” said my mother.
    â€œI’m not going to say nothing if someone wants to say bad things about Chinese people. Mainland people are our countrymen! We support them.”
    â€œYou never even been to China, how you know them? How you know they won’t attack Taiwan?”
    I didn’t know what was more incredible — that my parents were arguing or that they were doing it in English in front of me.
    â€œI don’t have to go to China to know them! I worked with mainland people at my job.”
    â€œYou don’t have job anymore!”
    â€œMy job is fixing hotel!”
    â€œI never see you work!”
    â€œCome down to basement!”
    â€œYou don’t want be near me anymore.” My mother was crying. My father put his arm around her. That was where the English stopped.
    Thanksgiving weekend at the hotel was a depressing place to be. Commercials on television showed relatives coming together at a table set with pumpkin pie, cranberry sauce, mincemeat, and other things I’d only seen at the supermarket. Kitchens and dining rooms bustling with children and a playful golden retriever. A crackling fireplace. Brassy music. And lots of love. Heaps of it.
    All we had on Thanksgiving was a puny turkey. It sucked even more because instead of eating in front of the TV, I had to sit with my mother and father at the dining table. Cup-ring stains on the kitchen table in front of my father looked like the Olympics logo. The turkey was so dry, it crumbled like mummy meat as my father cut away at it. There was also rice, hot chili sauce, and string beans. Great.
    I mushed all the ingredients together in my bowl, and surprisingly it didn’t taste too bad. I used chopsticks, too, but I had to use a fork for the string beans. I was going to head to the fridge to grab a Briardale cola for myself when I heard the office door open. Then heavy footsteps. Two seconds later: BING! BING! BING!
    I swung open the office door and saw a man in a big puffy winter coat. A Yankees cap was pulled just over his eyebrows.
    â€œI need a room for a few hours,” he said in a gruff voice.
    â€œThat’s $20.”
    â€œC’mon, it’s Thanksgiving.”
    â€œIt’s always $20.”
    â€œAll right, I know how you Filipinos are,” he said, reaching for his wallet. “You know, we fought in your country. We protected your people. We drove the Spanish out. But business is always business with you.”
    He sighed as he pulled out a twenty. It was folded in half, and he placed it on the counter so it stood on its edge. That bill was standing straight and tall for the pride of America. Pilgrim’s pride. The fold went right through Andrew Jackson’s face.
    â€œYou have to fill out the registration card.”
    â€œI’m just here for a little while, come on!” A wave of nausea washed over me as the man’s beer-marinated breath blasted out.
    â€œJust put your name down.”
    â€œThat’s how it is, that’s how it always is. Fucking Filipinos. Shit.” He hesitated, thinking up a name, then scrawled it in. He turned the clipboard to me and tapped his handwriting. “You happy, kid? That do it for you?” I nodded