Chapter 24
CHAPTER 24
Jude and Jane
An early spring in Houston meant that the city had survived tornado season. No big storms had traveled up from the Gulf this year, and the foliage along Buffalo Bayou had peacefully transitioned from a grayish brown to a jade hue. The sidewalks along the water shined with bursts of bright yellows and greens. People lounged along the park in light jackets, holding hands, talking business, gossiping, or meeting up for the first time from a dating app, asking each other things that only transplants could ask each other. Spring was for strangers who wanted lovers. What kind of engineer are you? Have you been to the Space Center yet? What are you studying at Rice? Would you ever move back to California? As Jude walked through the park, his hands in his pockets, deep in thought, he passed by two people sitting on a bench, making their way through “The 36 Questions that Lead to Love.” They were still only at the beginning and Jude overheard the young woman, wearing her hair high up in a ponytail, sporting a nose ring, ask her date, “Question number four. What would constitute a ‘perfect’ day for you?”
“This day,” the guy responded, his cheeks flushed red. “This moment.”
Jude blanched from the cheesiness. The guy looked too eager to please, with his hair coiffed back with a mound of gel, and glasses too big for the bridge of his nose. The guy leaned in for a kiss, and the young woman welcomed it. Jude couldn’t decide if he wanted to vomit or throw himself into the bayou. He had gone through that list of questions as a joke on first dates, never really making it past the first few before giving up. He’d been especially afraid to reach question number twenty-four, and had always ended it early. It also probably explained why there were never any second dates.
How do you feel about your relationship with your mother?
Three seasons into their engagement, and Jude still hadn’t kissed Phoebe. Their wedding was in two months, and Jude had meandered through the year, picking out wedding plates, his suit, the seven courses at the banquet, gone cake testing, scheduled the lion dancers. He had dutifully done everything that was expected for the eldest son’s wedding. The first to get married in the family—yet, he still hadn’t heard from his father, whose silence ballooned his anxiety. As the days wore on, the fatigue of the inheritance game tugged at him.
Son, you should get married because I think it’ll help you find purpose. You lack any responsibilities and the desire to live outside yourself. Marriage is hard work, and you haven’t ever worked a day in your life. It’ll throw you into the trenches.
Also, maybe, stop clubbing so much. It’s bad for your health.
Duc’s words tumbled around in his mind. They haunted him for almost seven months now, seared into his memory. Was marriage the answer? Who was this really for, at the end of the day?
“Jude!” a familiar, demure voice called out, and it was Jude’s turn for his cheeks to turn red. That voice—he could recognize it anywhere in a crowd, in a foreign city, on a sidewalk, or in the airport. Phoebe.
He turned and saw Phoebe with a group of friends, scattered atop a picnic blanket, charcuterie board and all, red plastic cups fallen over, and everyone’s cheeks were flushed with excitement and inebriated yearning. Another marker of spring. “Come over! Join us!” she called out, her face overly relaxed from too much cheap red wine. The bitter tannins puckered her lips, her shoulders exposed from an off-shoulder blouse, and her hair tousled softly, strands sticking out all over, as if she’d just been struck by lightning. Yet, somehow, her big doe eyes managed to shimmer under the soft sun, even while under towering sycamores.
Jude couldn’t pinpoint exactly when he fell for her. The cordiality at first hadn’t lasted long. Yes, there was still a layer of mutual understanding between them about the upcoming marriage, but it had grown beyond that, a deeper friendship than Jude could ever have dreamt of. It seemed so easy to explain away to everyone around them that they were getting married for the money. She wanted the money to take care of her father in his old age and his medical bills, and Jude wanted the money to pursue his dreams—whatever those dreams looked like. But sometime in the past seven months, between the beginning stages of learning how to fish with Phoebe’s father, to her father bonding with Mr. Ng?—they had grown into a unit. Jude went out on the boat once a month with Mr. Ph?ong, and it turned into weekly Sunday family dinners with him, Phoebe, and Mr. Ph?ong, and sometimes if Mr. Ng? was in town, he’d join them. Somewhere along the way, Jude had broken out of orbit. He’d fallen in love. He didn’t need to ask her the thirty-six questions to lead him to love. He just wanted a do-over to ask her the one most important question that he had already fumbled the first time.
He wanted to ask her to marry him again, but this time, do it right.
But as Jude climbed up the small hill, one of the men next to Phoebe suddenly draped his arms over her, and pulled her into a warm embrace. He had dark sunglasses on, a mole on his left cheek, and wore a crisp white shirt. But even behind sunglasses, Jude could tell he was attractive. His cheekbones were high, brows thick, and even sitting down, he was tall. Disgustingly tall. His legs were never-ending, as if he were hiding stilts under his linen pants. The gold chain around his neck matched the one around Jude’s neck, yet somehow seemed more expensive, classier. The smile on Jude’s face disappeared quickly, and he put his defensive wall back up. Who the hell was this tool? And why did he get the feeling this guy was actually better than him?
“Judie.” Phoebe smiled brightly. She somehow was one of those people who when they smiled, their whole body smiled along with them. “What are you doing here? You never come out to this side of town.”
“Hey, Jude.” The long-legged guy stood up and stuck out his hand. “Oh my god, Hey Jude. Hey Jude . ‘Hey Jude.’ Get it? You must get that a lot. I’m Paul. Paul Xu. It’s nice to finally meet the infamous Jude Tr?n.”
Jude wanted to punch him, or maybe rip one of his long legs off him. Instead, he smiled painfully and shook Paul’s hand. His palm was firm, calloused, and somehow soft all at the same time. The man really was the whole package. Jude hated him.
Jude responded reluctantly, his mouth thinning, “No one has ever ever said or sung ‘Hey Jude’ before to me.”
“ And the man is funny,” Paul said, laughing. His grip turned tighter. Jude returned the pressure, squeezing back with all his might. “You got yourself a winner, Phoebe. The whole husband, all packaged up and ready to be delivered in five to eight business days. Are you going to change your last name now to Tr?n?”
“Oh shut up, Paul.” Another girl on the ground, whose cheeks were more red than everyone else’s, spoke up. “The whole town knows the marriage is fake. They’re both doing it for the money. At least we’re all getting seven courses out of it.”
“Hell, I’ll marry you,” another guy called out, chuckling. He was leaning back casually on an elbow, drinking deeply out of a red cup with the other hand. His smirk made Jude feel emptier inside somehow. “No need to marry Phoebe. Let’s split the pot, you and me.”
“Back of the line, James,” Paul said, finally letting go of the handshake and breaking eye contact. With a smug smile, he cast a look behind him to the whole group. “I call first dibs on marrying Jude.”
Everyone laughed around them, except Phoebe and Jude. The tips of Phoebe’s ears turned bright red, and soon the apples of her cheeks’ color matched.
“Honey, stop,” she said quietly, her voice strained. Jude could hear the anxiety. “I told you to stop making fun of it.”
Paul put both his hands up. “You know I’m just joking.”
“Honey?” Jude said out loud accidentally, his jaw dropping. “He’s a honey? Since when?”
“We just started seeing each other seriously,” Phoebe said defensively. “But I’ve known Paul since college. Besides, I thought it was okay to see other people? I mean, we never talked about it explicitly , but I mean, come on, Jude, this isn’t a real marriage. The first five minutes of when we met, you said you would never fall in love with me, and I wouldn’t fall in love with you. We’d go our own way after you get the money… right?”
Jude knew he looked like a fool. He had said all those words. He could feel all eyes on him, all of Phoebe and Paul’s friends, who looked effortlessly cool, sprawled out on a muted picnic blanket. Their eyes bore into him, clinging to his every word, as if waiting for him to slip up.
“You’re right, honey ,” Jude said, faking a laugh, quickly recovering. “I’ll see you this Sunday, yeah? Family dinner as usual with your father? To convince him we’re in love?”
“Stick to the plan, right, honey ?” Phoebe nodded, faking serious. Paul swooped back down and planted a loud, wet kiss on her right cheek. She giggled, distracted by Paul, distracted by the sunny day, distracted by happiness.
Jude wondered if Paul was the type of guy who if asked, “What would constitute a ‘perfect’ day for you?” would respond with “This day, this moment.” It somehow sounded even more cringey to Jude, imagining it through Paul’s eyes.
Jude said his goodbyes to no one in particular; he didn’t even wait to see if Phoebe responded. He just turned his back and walked down the hill. From behind, he could hear Phoebe giggling, her honeyed laughter piercing him. The farther Jude walked away from her, as her laughter became a distant memory, the more he began to wonder if he’d ever know what a perfect day, a perfect life, looked like. His father’s letter echoed and rang in his ear. Son, I look at you and wonder if you will ever find your joy. If there was one thing he agreed with his father on, it was this.
True joy seemed so improbable now.
He had learned to tune out the rumors his whole life, but something about the way Phoebe’s group of friends laughed at him, and not with him, reminded him of those same kids who snickered behind his back. As soon as Jude got back to his car, he started the engine, unsure of where to go next. He felt an inexplicable tug to find Duc, to find tangible proof that they were still family at the end of the day. His father had been silent for nearly a year now, and even Jude’s personal wedding invitation to Duc had gone unanswered. Why was his father ignoring him? Perhaps his silence was just another litmus test he had to pass, but Jude had grown tired. He was done with it all. As Jude took off, he saw Phoebe and Paul, in the distance, hand in hand, walking along the pathway. They were both red-faced, drunk with the intoxication of newly discovered love. That new car smell.
While he felt that with Phoebe, she never had that giddiness with him. He slammed the car wheel, frustrated. Why would Duc like her profile the most? He felt duped. Duped again by his father. The self-pity continued to fester in his mind as he asked himself again: Why would he like her profile the most? He tried his best to recall that morning again, nearly a year ago now, and how Mrs. V?ong said that Phoebe knew how to swim, and how his father liked that fact the most.
Duc had always been a strange father, an even stranger man, with his eccentricities and his diatribes that went nowhere. But the more Jude remembered more of what the old numerologist had said to him, the more Jude began to grow suspicious.
Why would his father be afraid of the ocean? Of the Gulf?
Dakao Plaza was deader than ever.
Jude pulled into the empty plaza and the familiarity of the nail salon supply store, the travel agency, the sketchy CPA’s office, and the refillable water store—it all came screaming back. He had purposely avoided this plaza for seven months, ever since Mr. Ng? read Duc’s inheritance scheme out loud and Jane had moved back to Houston. Their estrangement was loud and clear; they were both not to disturb each other during the year. Though Duc hadn’t responded to his wedding invitation, nor had Jane. And Jude didn’t know which one hurt more. The eldest son and the eldest daughter of two Vietnamese refugees—neither one born with a silver spoon. Jude and Jane, mortal enemies since birth. Stuck in a holding pattern of inherited trauma forever.
Jude tentatively got out of his car, and though the plaza itself was recognizable, he could barely recognize the original Duc’s Sandwiches storefront. It was a repulsive monstrosity. What had Jane done? He removed his sunglasses and took in the giant, bright pink neon sign, the gigantic tropical plants that had formed a tunnel into the shop. He walked through it and opened the door, the little bell going off.
Bác Cai, who had been fast asleep at the counter, shot right up. “Welcome, welcome!” the old woman exclaimed with a false cheer in her voice. “Don’t Duc with us, we’re the best bánh mì in town!”
Appalled, Jude took a beat to examine the store. The modernity of it was just a Band-Aid on the shop he had grown up in. The walls were lined with a bright floral print, there was a cheap gold finish to everything, and there was a random swing in the middle of the store. It was as if Jane had taken every single trend alive and mashed it all together. What made it all worse were the black-and-white photos of their parents, their childhood, the first years of the shop that painted a rosy American dream, that struggle can turn into a gold mine. Jude felt sick to his stomach. It was all a lie.
“Bác Cai?” he whispered. “What did she do to you? Did she force you to say that line? What did she do to this place? It’s hideous. It’s ghastly.”
Bác Cai recognized Jude instantly and threw her hands up in the air in delight. “My Jude! My Judie! I haven’t seen you in so long! Not in almost a year. Why haven’t you come to see me?” she exclaimed as she left the counter, her creaky knees only allowing her to shuffle slowly toward him. She had somehow aged faster. The bags under her eyes had drooped lower than when Jude had last seen her, and he could see the corners of Salonpas patches on her collarbone peeking out from her shirt. Guilt. Jude felt guilty for not stopping into the store to see Bác Cai. He leaned down and gave her a hug, inhaling the scent of Tiger Balm and mint. Jude didn’t want the hug to end. He held on tight, to the woman who raised him when his own mother couldn’t, to the woman who packed his lunches, who would sing to him in the back room during naptimes when his parents worked out front. He held on for as long as he could, longing for boyhood again, a time when he didn’t have to fend for himself, and he was just simply taken care of.
“She’s gone mad,” Bác Cai whispered in his ear as she finally pulled away. “I couldn’t say a word, I just went along with it.”
“It’s completely empty out there,” Jude said, scanning the store again. “Have there been a lot of customers since the remodel?”
Bác Cai shook her head slowly. “Everyone around here hates it.”
Part of Jude relished in his sister’s failure. Perhaps there was still a chance he could take it all. Perhaps he wasn’t such a fuckup after all, if even she couldn’t figure it out, either.
“Typical Jane,” he muttered. “She always overdoes it. She doesn’t understand how things work around here. She left , okay? She doesn’t know this city anymore. People here hate change.”
“What are you doing here—” Bác Cai began, before Jane appeared in the back, carrying a tower of boxes, obstructing her view.
“Bác Cai, is there someone here? Do we have a customer?” Jane asked, her voice muffled. “Welcome, welcome! Don’t Duc with us, we’re the best bánh mì in town!”
“Jane, please,” Jude groaned. “You need to find a new catchphrase. You sound absurd.”
At the sound of Jude’s voice, Jane dropped all the boxes, allowing them to tumble everywhere, and a burst of plastic utensils slid onto the ground. Huffing, she pointed accusingly at Bác Cai. “You let him in here? I told you he’s never allowed in here! He’s the enemy!”
“Shut up, Jane, just for once, and listen—” Jude shot back.
“Shut up ?” Jane snarled. “Why don’t you shut up and just go walk down the aisle and get married, and see how easy it is to run a business—”
The two immediately erupted into a blame game, falling back into their old ways. Their frustrations, their trauma, their estrangement, their pain—it all became too easy to turn on each other. It was so comfortable: Duc, Evelyn, the shop, the games, the wedding, the failure of it all, the strain, yet the necessity of family.
The bread hit Jude first. Then another one came at the side of Jane’s head. Then another bread came hurtling at them both, causing both to duck. From behind the counter, Bác Cai began listlessly throwing bread, carrots, cilantro, anything she could grab.
“Don’t waste it all!” Jane shrieked.
“Oh hush,” Bác Cai said. “No one’s coming in, and you know it. You both need to breathe. You’ve both immediately reverted back to being six years old again.”
Jane’s ears turned pink. “He started it!”
Jude sighed and stooped down to clean up the mess. “Look, I’m not trying to start World War Three here. I just came here to ask you to come with me to go somewhere. I think the both of us need to start asking questions about why Duc is doing this. I haven’t heard from Duc himself, have you?”
Jane shook her head slowly. “No. I haven’t. It’s been dead silent.”
“And Mr. Ng? is no help, he’s barely in town these days and refuses to reach out to Duc on our behalf, or if he has, he hasn’t relayed any messages,” Jude said. “Don’t you think it’s all strange?”
“Why? You think he’s dead? Like, dead dead?”
Jude smacked his sister over her head, just like old times. “No, you idiot, I think we’re being played like pawns again, just like when we were kids. We’re not seeing the bigger picture here. Come with me, I’m taking you to go see someone. Something’s been bothering me for a long time. We need answers. Now.”
Jude could see Jane’s mind going a mile a minute; he knew how conflicted she was. Years of resentment stood between them and a ceasefire, and family grudges were as thick as blood.
After a silence, Jane finally agreed.
“Fine,” she said reluctantly. “But you’re driving.” The two drew a temporary truce and left the shop together, for the first time in years finally in sync with each other.
“Remember, don’t Duc with us, we’re the best bánh mì in town!” Bác Cai shouted behind them.
As Bác Cai observed Jane get into Jude’s car from behind the window, she waited until they left the plaza before she pulled out her phone and dialed. She pressed her phone to her ear, impatient, until the other line picked up.
“Anh, I think they know,” she said without greeting who it was. “They’re starting to piece things together.”
She nodded vigorously, the other voice muffled, and continued on. “I mean, the shop really is very hideous, I don’t know how much longer I can do this.”