Twenty-Eight
TWENTY-EIGHT
VERA
Vera is very excited. First of all, her investigation is going so well. Already she’s crossed two suspects off her list. Anyone would be happy about that. She can’t wait to see the look on Officer Gray’s face when Vera finally identifies Marshall’s killer. She will have to sit Officer Gray down and go through her method step by step, just so the officer understands every brilliant move that Vera has made. Of course, crossing off Riki now means she is down to Julia and Oliver. The thought of either of them possibly being the killer saddens Vera, but no matter. She cannot let her emotions get in the way of her fine detective work. Did Sherlock Holmes ever let his affections cloud his judgment? Oh no, of course not. And neither will Vera Wong Zhuzhu. Of course, Officer Gray might require some food to assuage her, since she was so annoyed the last time they talked, on account of Vera failing to report the break-in. But she’ll get over it once Vera serves up the killer on a plate, Vera’s sure of it. Vera wonders if Officer Gray has made any headway with the investigation into the break-in, but unfortunately, she is unlikely to get any more information out of the officer. Not without her cooking up a storm for the department.
The other reason why Vera is excited is she’s finally getting to live out her dream as a Chinese mother: setting up two young people with each other. Okay, so neither of the two young people is her actual offspring, but since Tilly is so very disagreeable about any of her efforts to set him up with a nice girl, this is the next best thing. And maybe it’ll train her for when she sets Tilly up on a date. Also, by now, Vera cares about Sana and Riki as though they were her niece and nephew. Such bright young people, and they both have something in common: Marshall. Maybe their respective experiences with the hoodlum will be a bonding exercise. Oh yes, this is a good, auspicious match. Vera can already see Sana and Riki walking down the aisle. She’s going to make their kids call her Grandma, just like Emma does.
By the time Sana arrives at their spot, all the food is laid out beautifully on the picnic blanket. “Sit,” Vera orders. “Eat.”
She’s made a veritable feast yet again. And she is very proud of this one. It’s a bonanza of beach-friendly foods, none of them requiring cutlery. There are honey-glazed barbecued beef slices sandwiched in plump mantou buns with carrot and scallion relish. There are crispy fried egg rolls stuffed almost to bursting with shrimp and tofu. There are steamed dim sum: shao mai and salted egg custard buns and lap cheong rolls. One Tupperware is filled with neatly sliced watermelon and Korean pears to balance out all the meat. And to go along with all the food, there is a huge jug of iced poached pear tea with ginseng.
Nothing fills Vera with quite as much joy as watching loved ones eat her food. It’s one of the many things she misses about Jinlong and Tilly. When it was the three of them at home, she’d cook up a storm every day and watch as Jinlong and Tilly ate, and food always tasted so much better that way. Living alone, Vera finds that much of the joy of cooking has leached out of her, to the point where she mostly eats plain rice and simple sauteed vegetables for dinner. Why bother cooking elaborate meals for just one person?
But now she has so many people to cook for. Her days are filled to bursting and she’s constantly rushing here and there, and she can’t possibly be happier than this.
“Oh my god, this is so good,” Sana says, her mouth full with the beef bun. “God, Vera. You should open up a restaurant.”
Vera flaps a hand at her. “Aiya, what rubbish.” But she has to bite down really hard on her lower lip to keep from grinning. She looks pointedly at Riki, who’s chewing on an egg roll. “How is it?”
Riki tears his eyes away from Sana. “Huh? Oh, yeah, this is really good. As always, your cooking is amazing.”
Vera gives a satisfied grunt. Between the three of them, the food is soon demolished amid companionable chatter. When they’re done eating, Vera gets up and takes a stick out of the trolley. It’s a narrow bamboo pole about three feet high.
“What’s this for?” Sana says when Vera hands her the stick.
“It’s your new paintbrush.”
“What?” Sana gapes at her.
“Get up,” Vera says in her do not even think about refusing voice.
Sana does so, still looking confused.
Vera gestures at the beach. “The sand is your canvas. Nothing you draw will be permanent. So you don’t have to feel scare about making the mistake or drawing something bad. The sea erase all of it.”
Sana stares, wide-eyed, at the bamboo stick, then at Vera.
“You go and draw now,” Vera orders. “Riki and I tidy up and chat some more. Oh yes, Riki, I forget to tell you, Sana does not have a pot catch, she is artist. One of the many artist that Marshall swindle, and ever since then she cannot draw.” She turns to Sana, whose jaw is scraping the sand. “And, Sana, Riki is not a Buzzfeed reporter.” Vera pauses long enough to glower at Riki. “You make me so excited about that. I think to myself: Wow, he is reporter, he can do article about my teahouse!”
“I’m really sorry,” Riki says, not knowing whether he should be apologizing to Vera or to Sana.
“Anyway, Riki is programmer who is swindle by Marshall. So. There you go. Both of you are Marshall victim. Now, go draw. Go ,” Vera barks like an army general, and Sana jumps up, meerkat-like, and scampers away. Vera turns back to Riki, who’s still looking stunned. “Why are you sitting there like a frog? Help me tidy.”
Riki starts gathering up the Tupperware containers. “Sana’s really an artist?”
“Yes, very talented too. Her paintings are very good.” Vera is happy that this revelation has stunned Riki. He must be very pleasantly surprised by what a talent his future girlfriend is. But when she glances up at Riki, he doesn’t look at all happy. In fact, he looks like he’s about to cry. “What’s wrong?”
“I wrote a bot that helped Marshall scam people into overpaying for his NFTs. His NFTs were stolen art from various artists. I knew about it and I never—I just—I stayed quiet. And now you’re telling me that Sana is one of the artists he stole from, and because of him she hasn’t been able to paint. I was part of his whole shitty business.”
Vera isn’t sure that she’s following everything he’s saying. All of this technological jargon is so hard to follow. She waves at him. “Aiya, is not as bad as you think. You are both victims, yes?”
“Well, sure, but I’m not exactly innocent either. Sana is, though.” Riki sighs. “God, I’m a fucking asshole.”
“Tch, don’t be so drama!” Vera snaps. “Move past it. Put it behind you. Marshall is dead. You and Sana are healing after what he does to you. Maybe you do something slightly bad, so what? Now you learn from it. You have a better judgment now. Better morals, because you learn from your personal mistake. This what life is about, Riki. No one is perfect, making right decisions all the time. Only those who are so privileged can make right decision all the time. The rest of us, we have to struggle, keep afloat. Sometimes we do things we are not proud of. But now you know where your lines are. You are good boy, Riki. You have good heart. That is all that matters.” She smacks him firmly in the middle of his chest. “Good heart! You remember that.” Then she turns away and finishes putting away the containers in the trolley, satisfied that she has done her job very well indeed.
Sana ends up drawing for more than an hour, and by the time she’s done, Vera has grilled Riki about everything from what his favorite food is (something called terong balado, she will have to look it up on the Google so she can make it for him), what his mom’s favorite food is (grilled fish seasoned with sweet soy sauce, sensible woman), where he works (some startup doing something too complicated for their own good), what Adi wants to be when he grows up (a physicist), and so on. She wishes she could help ease some of Riki’s financial burden, but she can’t think of a way to do so, aside from maybe robbing Winifred’s silly bakery. But Winifred probably doesn’t have twenty-five thousand dollars lying around.
“That was amazing,” Sana says. Her hair is wind-blown and her cheeks are red from all the effort of carving the stick through moist sand. Riki gazes up at her with a tortured look that makes Vera roll her eyes. These young boys. Always with the drama.
Vera stands and squints into the distance, where Sana has been drawing. From here, she can’t tell what Sana has drawn, but she can see the whorls spread across the sand in fluid strokes. She smiles at Sana. “Good, you can draw. Tomorrow morning you will come here and draw some more. I will bring Emma. And more food, of course.”
For a moment, she thinks Sana might protest; young people always like to protest for the sake of protesting. But then a slow smile takes over Sana’s flushed face, and for the first time since Vera has met Sana, she looks young, the way she should at her age. It’s hope, Vera realizes, shining out of Sana’s eyes like two bright stars. The sight of it makes Vera’s heart swell. Sana will be okay. Then she glances at Riki and frowns, because he’s standing there looking sorry, no doubt still wallowing in his guilt. Well, no matter. Riki will be okay too. Vera will see to that.