In only a second, a song began to play on the speakers and the globe spluttered into life, showing them the sweet babbling face of a bak gui infant. Richard slapped his knee and motioned that she should turn another dial. Immediately, the baby vanished, and they saw a bak gui newsman speaking from behind a table. Next, a bak gui lady encouraged them to purchase a refrigerator. Then, a ball game.
“Now you can have a movie theater right in our room.”
Foon Wah clapped her hands with delight.
But she stopped clapping when she saw Koon Lai in the corner, polishing his shoes, a disappointed look on his face. At that moment, she turned pink as dragon fruit.
“The television is a wonderful device,” she said aloud. “But a Chinese movie is still best to see in the theater.”
Richard couldn’t stand it—living with his bride, his father, and five other farting Chinese bachelors in a twelve-by-twelve storage room. Having to wait for a harmonious symphony of snores before she’d permit as much as a hand on her breast. And it wasn’t just lust. He felt uneasy when his wife and father read theMun Hey Weeklytogether and he was forced to admit he couldn’t read the headlines.
He and Foon Wah needed their own apartment. No more letting the regular customers doddle after meals, no more paying the dishwasher’s friends to help with side chores. And his father had to stop limping around the dining room—Richard could get the job done twice as fast.
“You should let me run the front,” Richard broached the subject in Toisanese one night after closing. “Your tendonitis has gotten worse. You can rest back there and take care of the accounts.”
“You’re going to run the dining room?”
“Make me a partner. I am yourfirstson.”
Having long waited for Richard to become serious about the business, Koon Lai gave his son the keys to the money box. They opened earlier in the afternoon, hired another chef, and jammed inadditional tables. Richard had never wanted to work in the restaurant, but so long as he was in charge, he could tolerate it.
Eventually, they’d made enough to rent a third-story walk-up in a tenement on Riverdale Avenue. When, four months later, Foon Wah reported she was pregnant, he decided they needed a house for their family-to-be. Following the lead of his friends from the Brownsville Boys Club, Richard looked in Sheepshead Bay and Gravesend.
“Too far from the restaurant,” Koon Lai insisted. “Beach house cost too much.”
“Doesn’t matter. I’ll get a VA loan.”
“No loan. We pay cash.”
Richard ignored his father, but his luck wouldn’t have it. Realtors would invite him to a house showing, but when he got there, he’d receive an apology—he’d just missed his chance. Or someone’s Aunt Tabatha had decided to move in. Or he must have had the address wrong.
After hearing Richard’s stories during dinner, Koon Lai poured himself a cup of cha.
“No one wants to sell to a Chinese,” he said.
Richard pounded the table so hard the china rattled.
“I’m an American navy vet!”
The others remained silent, chewing their tofu skins.
Another two months passed, and Foon Wah’s belly swelled, but Richard had still not found a proper home. Spring arrived, and Richard went to Herzl Street to get advice from his old friend, the decorated veteran Alan Friedman. Rebecca had moved away, but Alan and his wife Eva still lived with Alan’s parents.
“Have you considered Brownsville Houses?”
Alan nodded east, where the New York City Housing Authority was constructing apartments.
“You remember I was helping Milton write those letters to the city? Success. We asked for quality housing, housing affordable for aBrownsville family, and the city is delivering. They’re elevator apartments, Rich. They’ll have sinks and gas stoves, a bathroom for each family. Playgrounds, laundromats, programs for the kids—the whole works. If I didn’t make above the income limit, I’d apply myself.”
Richard was miffed that Alan would consider him poor enough to live in those public buildings. Then he thought of Steeplechase—that rascal from the Brownsville Boys Club. His real name was Jack Schmidt, but he had a grin so wide people called him Steeplechase after that creepy face on the Coney Island billboards. Jack had followed his uncle into real estate.
“Maybe I’ll ask Jack.”
“I wouldn’t get tangled up with Steeplechase.”
But Richard didn’t see what other option he had. A few days later, he found Jack Schmidt at the handball court. Schmidt made no mention of the NYCHA buildings. Instead, he threw his arm around Richard’s shoulders and led him down Amboy Street.
“I’ve got just the right place for you.”
