Chapter Twenty-Three: Bảo

CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE BẢO

Chơi Ơi is the opposite of a traditional Việt restaurant. The restaurant name itself parodies “trời ơi,” an expression my mom likes to use when she’s annoyed at me or at my dad. But the name turns the exclamation into something more playful—literally, “Play!”

Inside, the restaurant, located just at the edge of Fountain Valley, has a high-vaulted ceiling and deep red walls brightened by lanterns. Columns are decorated with eye-catching nighttime cityscapes of what looks like Vietnamese cities, rendered from photos.

Linh had arrived a few minutes before me and was inspecting one of the photos. Of course.

“See something interesting?”

Linh jumps, then brushes back her hair sheepishly. The movement brings my attention to her hand, the one that I held.

“Didn’t think you’d make it,” I say, watching her closely.

We’d almost had to reschedule again, though, because things at work were getting busy for me and Linh. Lisa, the girl who’d seemed too nervous to work at a restaurant, had called out sick, so Linh had to pick up a shift. I also know the deadline for the Gold Keys was drawing closer and closer. In my texts to her, I wasn’t sure what to do or say to help—lethologica: the inability to find the right words—but being here seems to bring back some spark in her eyes.

She knows how I feel now. Ball’s in her court.

“Figured you needed me,” she answers simply. “Unless you already have another artist friend lined up.”

As the host shows us to our seats, I’m hoping her emphasis on “friend” isn’t purposeful.

I focus on the restaurant instead. According to the existing interviews I’d read online, the owner and executive chef Brian Lê had trained in Paris, then Italy, but as much as he loved European cuisine, he always considered Vietnamese his first love—thanks to his father, who’s a retired chef. So he came back to the States and opened up his restaurant, which has been reviewed by the New York Times and the Los Angeles Times, which praise his specialty: his bún bò Huế. Not for the first time, I wonder how Ali managed to be so persuasive that someone with this much notoriety and posh training had agreed to invite two high school students to taste his food.

But the moment Chef Lê bounds out of the kitchen into the dining room, it all makes sense. Maybe in his late thirties, he wears a worn ball cap backward and his chef’s jacket is opened to reveal a T-shirt that says, ALLOW ME TO EXPLAIN THROUGH INTERPRETIVE DANCE. And his wide grin—kind of like a kid who was told he could have as much candy as he wanted—coaxes a smile from us.

“What’s good, little ones?” He gathers each of us into a bear hug. “Glad you’re here. Brian Lê. Or Chef Lê.” Now he shakes our hands.

“My mom’s maiden name is Lê,” I say.

“Maybe we were related way back when, who knows.” He winks.

I like him. “Thanks for letting us stop by. Just tell us where we should sit. We won’t be in anyone’s way.”

“Sit?”

“Um yeah, we’re here to review your menu,” Linh says.

“Don’t you want a tour, too?”

We didn’t get a chance to walk around at any other restaurant. Do reviewers usually get this kind of access?

“Come on, let’s take you guys to the back where all the magic happens.” Without waiting for us, he turns and we stand helpless for a few beats until we follow him into his labyrinthine kitchen. It’s like Mẹ’s kitchen, only cleaner and probably more organized. And probably staffed with more people who are less apt to mess up.

So, not like our kitchen.

The cooks give us a quick look before focusing back on their dishes. One cook sprinkles chopped raw green onions over a platter of freshly cooked cá chiên, the snapper still sizzling from its quick fry in a sauté pan. Another guy uses a ladle the size of my hand to transfer bubbling broth into graphite-colored bowls. Even the cooked rice, which someone’s spooning into bowls, looks better than usual, gleaming under the restaurant’s expensive lights. I’m glad my parents aren’t here to see this.

Another chef yells, “Behind!” before passing us with a large pot smelling of pineapples—canh chua, most likely. Meanwhile, Chef Lê points to different cooks and their specialties. Picks up ingredients that he insists are totally “high-grade.” Narrowly crashes into his employees as they busily rush around, though it’s all done in odd synchronicity like they’re used to his chaotic energy.

Chef Lê stops before one large pot in particular. With a flourish, he lifts the lid and beckons us to lean in. “Smell that shit and tell me no one will want to eat it.” Seeing his expectant look, we do as we’re told.

“That smells—”

“—delicious.”

Linh and I lock eyes before releasing immediately.

Bún bò. An earthy, fatty broth, a powerful punch of citrus from lemongrass. It’s familiar. It’s home in one punch. Chef Lê shoots us a smile, likes seeing us confirm how good it smells and looks without us wasting words. Maybe he’s a bit smug about it.

“This is just a preview, of course. Wait until you taste everything.”

Somehow I wonder if he mistook us for someone else. Linh thinks the same, saying as much to him.

“Nope, I know who you are: Badass high school students.” He points to us with both index fingers. Me and Linh share another glance, nearly bursting out laughing. What a weird guy. “I was your age once upon a time. When I was in Paris and in Rome, I made things that cost even more than I could afford. I hated that. And sometimes the food wasn’t even good. If I can make any Việt kid your age happy and wanna come to this restaurant, then I guess I did my job.” He directs us back to where we came in. “Now that you got the tour, let’s get you back and you can taste all the magic that happens here. You and your girlfriend will love this.”

“She’s not—well—” I know I’m stammering.

“What if he’s my boyfriend and he’s just tagging along?” Linh says.

Chef Lê smiles again. “Oh, touché. She’s got some spice!”

“We’re partners,” I quickly clarify, saying anything so that Chef Lê doesn’t get the wrong idea and keep going with the joke, making things even more uncomfortable between me and Linh.

Back at the table in the center of the room—“Newly renovated! So you can experience everything,” Chef Lê says—Linh and I sit across from each other, absorbing the flurry around us.

“Settle down and food’s going to come out in a sec.”

I turn to Linh. “Did we even order?”

“Nope, but I don’t think we’re going to have a bad meal here,” Linh says.

A line of servers brings out the appetizers and immediately our table goes from empty to crowded. A good thing, since it makes me less aware of how I’m sitting, holding myself. How far away my hands are from hers and how weird it’d be if I reached for her again.

Turns out Linh and I have nothing to say to each other. For good reason.

The reason being we’re more preoccupied with the food that may or may not be better than my mom’s.

“If my parents were here…,” Linh begins to say into her bowl of bún bò Huế.

“They’d steal this recipe. Mine would do the same.”

“Sorry, this recipe is legit sealed,” says Chef Lê, who’d come back five minutes ago to check in on us but sat down as if he was part of the party. I guess this isn’t unusual for him because the servers set up a plate for him right away. “My dad would chase me out of California if it somehow leaked.”

I grin as I write down his quote. I’m already five pages in with my notes—most of the pages filled with details from the kitchen and atmosphere instead of the actual food. Linh has started some sketches of the appetizers and entrees. “Is your dad the cook in the family?”

“Yeah, Poppa Lê had a small place in Santa Monica about half the size of this place. I basically grew up there.”

“Our families have restaurants, too,” Linh offers.

“No surprise—you two have healthy appetites,” Chef Lê teases us.

“Where did the idea of opening up a restaurant come from?” I ask.

“Probably from my dad. Loved what he did with the place. He just wanted to make customers happy.” Chef Lê laughs, now with a faraway glint in his eyes. “I was always tagging around at his place and he’d yell at me because there was legit no space. My mom, though, she completely disagreed with me going into a culinary career. Even culinary school! It wasn’t exactly… stable, you know.”

Linh shifts in her seat, catching the message. Seems like a theme with Việt mothers.

“So when I told her I wanted to open a restaurant, she went off on me. I know she was worried then, but we said some stuff to each other. Lot of angry words.”

“What happened after?” Linh asks quietly.

“My mom didn’t talk to me for two years. But it’s not like we weren’t a part of each other’s lives. They lived just a few minutes away from me. I’d talk to my dad, who always updated me on my mom and what she was doing. Always. I mean, I knew what she’d bought for groceries because he’d tell me! It was the same thing for me. I bet my mom knew what I was up to each week.”

Chef Lê points at the entrance as if someone would make an appearance. “Then, the day after I got that Los Angeles Times review was the day my mom appeared at the door. My dad had dropped her off! He was tired of the fighting and called us the two most stubborn people he’d ever met.” He lets out a loud laugh. “And we made up, just like that. After that she was always showing up here, playing host but also correcting my chefs’ mistakes, correcting my recipes.”

“Two years,” Linh whispers in dismay.

Chef Lê nods knowingly. “We lost some time. I think about that all the time now that she’s gone.” He pauses. “It’s been six and a half months.”

That last bit shocks me—I didn’t come across that in any of the articles—and I put down my pencil. “I’m sorry,” I say, hearing Linh offer the same condolences. The sentence sounds so canned; something I’m not used to saying. I don’t know anyone who’s actually lost a parent. I’ve heard about it, but the concept seems so far away. So impossible.

“Do you think about her a lot?” I ask.

“Legit the other day. I was creating a recipe, something that I had as a little kid and only my mom could make it. I just wished I’d asked when she was alive. And then I just had a kid, too, so I’m wondering how to tell him about my mom. There’s still so much history that I don’t know. My dad casually mentioned the other day that he’d lost a sister when he was six and she was two. Seven siblings I knew about, but not his sister.…” Chef Lê trails off, looking back at the kitchen. “History, man. There’s a lot hidden.” Then he perks up, remembering where he is. “Anyway, I’m still glad we came back into each other’s lives. We had a good time together.”

A server comes by with a message for Chef Lê from the kitchen. He needs to go back, so he does, leaving me and Linh to ourselves again. A busboy stops by with his bin to clear the plates and we hand them over, too accustomed to doing it ourselves.

“He’s nice,” I tell Linh as she packs up her things.

“One of a kind.” She turns her notebook upside down, showing me her quick sketch of him, ball cap and T-shirt captured perfectly. Much like my notes, her focus is Chef Lê and his dynamic personality. “There’s a lot to unpack.”

“Right, his mom.”

“And going two years because she didn’t like what he was doing. That’s hard to even imagine.” She sighs loudly, shoving her colored pencils into her messenger bag. “That’s another reason I don’t ever see myself telling my mom the truth.”

Now that we don’t have any food to distract us, or Chef Lê to dominate the conversation, or anything else between us, the elephant in the room comes back, the reason for how hesitant we seem to be acting toward each other.

“Hey,” I say as gently as possible. “Can we talk?”

“We are.” All of her emotions have shut off.

“Linh, I mean about the other day.”

“I don’t think I can stay longer,” she says in apology. Her expression is twisted, like it’s physically hurting her being here. “Can we talk another time?”

“I know what you’re thinking.”

“Believe me, you don’t know half of it, Bảo,” she says firmly.

“Well, you can tell me, then. Because I’m here. I’m all ears. Even if you don’t want—” Us. My thoughts pause. What if I’d misread everything up until now? What if I thought she liked me because I liked her too much and Linh was being too nice to say something? Like how she was nice to Kelly even though she didn’t have time to volunteer? Like now, how she’s avoiding it so that she doesn’t reject me outright?

She’s barely looking at me. Maybe I’m closer to the truth than I thought I’d be.

“I can be here as a friend,” I finally say. “Really, no hard feelings.”

“Thank you,” she says with such relief that it hurts. “I’m sorry.” There is a painful pause as Linh pretends to check the table to make sure she hasn’t forgotten her belongings. I squeeze the back of my chair, fighting the urge to just say something—anything to make her look at me. Before I can think of anything, Linh says a quiet goodbye and leaves.

I exhale. So that’s it. She doesn’t feel what I feel.

I head to the front, thanking a Black woman with the name tag Saffron—which I had to look at twice; it was too perfect for someone in the business. The way she stands tall reminds me of my mom when she’s fired up and of Linh when she’s excited about light or some obscure painting that I wouldn’t know about unless she told me. I feel like I should fix my hair and anything else on my body that’s out of place.

“Brian made the best food for you tonight. Usually it’s not this good,” she jokes, her French accent apparent.

“Hey, do you want to keep your job?” Chef Lê says, emerging from behind a divider, wiping his hands on a hand towel.

“That’s not for you to decide,” she retorts, “since I own half the place.”

This doesn’t faze him and now he merely sports a smile. “Mr. Nguyễn, meet my partner and wife.”

“Partner but his boss,” she playfully chastises him. “Oh, and also his wife.”

“Yeah, yeah. Anyway, Saff, this boy here, he’s going to be big one day. I can feel it. He’s like Anthony Bourdain, rest in peace.”

I blink at his unexpected compliment. This is what it means when someone gushes, I guess. “Thanks.”

“You made me think, you know. Not a lot of people know how to do that,” Chef Lê says, looking serious.

I brush the back of my neck. “I was just asking questions.”

“That’s the best type of interview. You gave me room to just talk.” He claps me on the shoulder, and I sway from the weight of it. “Come back anytime. You and Linh. I saw some of what she’s sketching. She seems great, too.”

“She is.”

“But she’s really not your girlfriend?” He makes a show of looking over his shoulder. “Or, I’m sorry, you’re not really her boyfriend?”

“No, she isn’t.”

“Yooo,” he says with a slow-forming smirk, “you like her, don’t you?”

Saffron elbows him. “Bry! Stop teasing him.”

“It’s complicated.”

Chef Lê just laughs. “Good luck, man.”

I’m home on time, so that’s not why she’s calling for me. Shit, did I leave the toilet seat up again? I take the steps slowly, trying to figure out what I must have done wrong. Running through me, though, something I can’t ignore, is an urge to sit down and just write. Because Chef Lê is more interesting than I thought he’d be. Because I’d rather get lost in writing than think about the failed attempt to talk to Linh about us… about her rejection.

Mẹ, just showered, stands in front of the bathroom sink. She leans toward the mirror—her mirror counterpart looks at me. A Vietnamese ballad spills out from her bedroom. Ba must be at the restaurant still.

“Here,” she says, and hands the tweezers over. “I need you to pull out a white hair.”

My mom likes to complain that she has so many because of me. I guess I probably shouldn’t tell her it’s because she’s just old.

Sighing, I take the tweezers from her, agreeing to a task that I’ve been subjugated to since I was old enough to hold these things and also since my mom spotted her first one back when I was in sixth grade. I’m not the only one, though. Việt’s had to do this too.

“Where?”

“Nè.”She holds it up and I squint. Got one. “Did you finish your project?”

“Yep.”

“Good.” I feel her gaze through the mirror. “You are out a lot these days.” I accidentally pull out a black hair. “Ah, mày làm gì vậy?”

“Sorry.” I do it more gently. “The newspaper keeps me busy.”

“Con still writing reviews.”

“I am, yeah.” I’m not sure why but Chef Lê comes into mind again, about his early struggles with his mom. Two years. I wonder if me and my mom can ever stop talking for that long. And who would instigate it? “There’s this guy I met on my assignment. Brian Lê.”

“Vietnamese. What does he do?” she asks almost immediately.

“He’s the executive chef and owner. He’s pretty young.”

“It is hard,” she answers sagely. “But impressive for his age.”

“He was talking about his parents and the things he wanted to ask them.”

“Oh?”

“His mother died in the past few months.”

Mẹ clicks her tongue. “Tội quá.” Poor guy.

“Yeah, and he mentioned not knowing everything he could have known about her while she was alive.” I thread my fingers through her hair, rechecking my work. “Why don’t you talk about Vietnam more?”

“I do! I talk about it all the time.” She looks at me directly through the mirror.

“Yeah, I know, but more specific things. I know where you lived, what my grandparents did. That you escaped at night. But that’s more like an overview. Why don’t you tell me the smaller things?”

“Because you don’t ask. But the things I do tell you, you always say, ‘Oh, I don’t want to hear it, I don’t have time, Mẹ, I heard you say this already.’” She mimics what she thinks I sound like.

“My voice can’t go that high,” I say grudgingly. I have said those things, though.

“I am your mother, so I don’t have to tell you anything most of the time. Some matters are too adult for you,” Mẹ starts to say in a familiar There’s no use arguing voice.

“Okay.”

“But, if you do want to know more, Mẹ will try to answer you. But my memory isn’t so good anymore and things are just from so long ago. Mẹ wonder if the past should stay in the past.”

“Maybe, but maybe not.” Silence eases in as I concentrate on her hair.

“All of this writing business is making you different.” Our eyes meet in the mirror again. She tilts her head, regarding me like she would with a recipe that was missing one crucial ingredient.

“Good different?”

“Maybe. You seem less weak.”

I refrain from rolling my eyes. “Thanks.”

“What is making con write?”

I don’t expect that kind of question from Mẹ, so I wonder if it’s a mistranslation. “Like, why am I writing?”

“Yes.”

“I don’t know. I’ll get a good grade, I guess.” Even my answer, said out loud, doesn’t sit right in my head. I couldn’t care less about the actual journalism class and getting good grades and all that. But I have to admit, I feel more and more solid when I have a pen in hand. When there’s an article that needs fixing and it’s up to me to make everything sound right. I did that for Steve and Ernie. I did it for myself.

Linh had said I’d find something to be passionate about. What if she’s right?

“Who is right?”

Oops, I’d said that last line out loud. My mom gazes expectantly at me.

“Mẹ,” I begin. “Weren’t you saying earlier in the year that you wanted me to find something? Be more motivated?”

“Con want to be a writer?”

In my mind’s eye, far into the future, I’m seeing myself in a newsroom, a big one. In some big city. I see nights working under desk lamps. Ink staining my shirt cuffs, eyes tight and bleary from unrest. I see words flowing from my fingertips.

“I’m thinking about it.”

“Writing is hard. Con might not find a job.” Mẹ, always blunt.

“I know.”

“You might need to live in our basement.”

“What—I won’t.”

“You can if you will need to.”

“It’s all cement.”

“We will work on renovating it. Just for you.”

“So much confidence,” I mutter.

Mẹ pats my hand, holding the tweezers. “Mẹ saying the basement is yours if you need it. You can stay as long as you want.”

I imagine thirty-five-year-old me, journalist, writer, or whatever, living in the dungeons of our basement. Maybe some people would be okay staying with family, but I don’t think that’s for me. As I look back at my mom, I see her contented smile, and the corners of my mouth tilt up. All that nagging she’s done over the years finally paid off, she’s likely thinking. And now she can worry less, have less gray hairs.

I wince at the idea of her satisfaction swiftly turning to anger once she realizes who’s been a part of this change inside me. Linh’s apologetic face appears suddenly. I’m sorry.

I say nothing more and continue to scout for the rest of Mẹ’s rebellious hair strands.