Meliora - Extricate - 06

[lady_mab]

Jun Zhou

The hustle and bustle of the restaurant floats up through the floorboards and the thin carpeting, bringing with it a constant chatter of mashed up Mandarin and English. Pots and pans slam together in a soothing rhythm, and the smells are enough to make you hungry no matter how much you have already eaten.

I stand in the kitchen of my uncle's apartment, knife moving at a quick and steady pace as I cut up the carrots and cucumbers. Behind me, Uncle Bao works at the oven perfecting his new stuffed pastry.

My cousin Lily watches from across the kitchen island, chin propped in one hand as she occasionally reaches out to steal a vegetable. "You make so much food, meimei. No wonder you are so chubby."

I narrowly miss her hand with the knife when she reaches for another piece. Her hand immediately withdraws. "You eat so little, jiejie. No wonder you are so skinny."

Lily makes a face, and I mirror it back to her. Behind me, Uncle Bao huffs a laugh and nudges the oven shut.

"This isn't all for me," I say, scooping the vegetables up with the knife and depositing them into the mixing bowl. "I am making it for friends at school."

"Are you friends with an army?"

I shrug and wipe my hands off on the cloth slung over my shoulder. "High school boys. Same thing."

Lily laughs and spins off her stool. "Make me something next time. Feng-didi always says you make the best dumplings."

"Compared to him, yes."

She skips around the island to leave me a kiss on my cheek. "I’ll tell him you said that."

"He knows how awful his cooking is."

Uncle Bao accepts a kiss on the cheek as well. "Don't stay out too late. It’s a school night."

Lily sighs prettily and tosses her hair over her shoulder. "I'll study extra hard to make up for it," she says in English, her accent flawless, and snatches up her purse as she heads for the door. I know I shouldn't be jealous. She has been living in Eminence her whole life. But my English is so disjointed compared to hers, and even her Mandarin sounds better than mine.

I resume my progress, dumping the contents of the bowl into the wok and turning the heat on low. A dash of sesame seed oil, a bit of sugar and soy sauce, and I place the lid on top.

Uncle Bao takes my bowl for himself, and we continue our easy dance around the small kitchen. He shows me how to fold the dough for his pastries, and then makes me finish the batch while he starts on the filling.

I knead the dough as instructed, watching my knuckles create tiny indents in the pale surface before folding it down and starting all over again. This is why I came to Eminence: to learn how to cook. My father thought the best option would be his older brother, even if it meant traveling halfway around the world.

There are plenty of cooks at home in Chongqing. There are plenty of cooks from our own little town, but my father wanted me to "expand my horizons" and not be stuck in our tiny corner. I don't want to give up on this, especially when it took so much to get me here in the first place.

"Bao-bofu?"

He hums in response, but doesn't look up.

"What do you know about the shots that you have to get?"

This does make him pause, and he glances at me with a curious tilt to his brow. "That's a strange question to be asking. Are you in trouble at school for not getting your shot yet?"

I shake my head and try to distract myself with the dough. "I received an email that invited me to participate in this game called Meliora. One of the requirements is to go and get the shot every month instead of just once a year."

"Oh?"

"And I don't know why. I haven't really thought about it all that much, of course, I don't really think I want to participate. But it's a nagging thought at the back of my mind."

He moves to stand beside me, the movement calm and casual, but I can feel the curiosity rolling off of him. "Tell me about this game."

"Well..." I trail off, trying to remember the words that were used at the meeting and in the message. "He said something about learning the truth about the city, and about why we aren't able to leave."

Uncle Bao stops me with a hand on my shoulder, turning me away from the counter and the distraction that the dough provided. He's not much taller than I am, but there is something very imposing about his stature that compels you to look directly into his eyes. "And do you think there is something about this city that I do not know?"

My mouth opens to answer automatically, but the no gets stuck in the back of my throat and I can't work it free. "I don't know, Bao-bofu."

He continues to look at me, and I wonder what he sees. Beyond just his younger brother's daughter, beyond a girl with pink hair and purple contacts who was tired of being another pale, round face in a sea of so many. He knows a lot of people in the city, and I've caught snippets of conversations between the cooks and servers, the delivery boys and the dish washers.

Uncle Bao knows people, and he has contacts everywhere. For anything from where to purchase the best produce to news from around the world. More than what Eminence stations provides to us.

Sometimes I wonder just how much of his facade is the image that people of Eminence want to see -- the old Chinese man with his rough accent and his kind smile, running back alley deals out of his restaurant in 'Little Beijing' or whatever they might call this place. I've only been here for almost two months, and I know that he's considered a very important member of our community.

Aunties would give me sweets or small trinkets if I delivered food for him. Uncles ask me how he is doing and want to chat about how he always seems to win at cards. They all accept me so easily despite how new I am, and they all tell me how much they can't wait to come by and try my dishes next time.

And all of that is because I've come from Uncle Bao.

"Well then," he finally says, drawing back and releasing my shoulders. I can smell the oil starting to burn from the wok, know that I should go and mix it before it becomes too crispy. But I haven't been dismissed yet, so I remain right where I am. "Why not participate?"

This isn't the request that I had expected, though I'm not too sure I am even sure what I wanted him to say. That he would tell me not to and focus on school and my lessons. That he would perhaps give me the answers without having to work for them.

Instead, he tells me to go and partake in a game with a weak foundation in hopes of finding out something about this city.

"Do you think there is something about Eminence that I should know?" I ask and he tilts his head to the side in thought.

"I think there is lots that I do not know, because I do not have access to all the information that is out there." He waves a hand at the darkened sitting room beyond, indicating the restaurant, the district, the entire city. "I think that if there is a reason they are asking you to change a schedule that is so routine for the citizens of Eminence, that there must certainly be a very good reason behind it."

Somehow I doubt it, but didn't the Program Manager say that would be one of our first challenges? To figure out what was the point of the shot?

Uncle Bao turns back to his pastries, and with that, the charm is broken and my shoulders relax. "When do you have to decide if you want to participate or not?"

"Sunday. I need to have a team, too. One other Participant and someone called an Informant."

"Oh?" He's turned away from me, so I can't see his face. But I imagine the hint of a smirk and the arched brow he gets when he knows something I don't -- or pretends to know. "Do you know anyone else?"

I think of Jonas, who offered to form a team with me if I couldn't find anyone else. I wonder what his status is, if he's decided to pursue this mystery of his or not. "Not really..."

His hands move far quicker than mine did, with a sense of surety from practice, as he kneads the dough a few more times. His knobby fingers pull pieces free and start to form them on a baking sheet. "Keep your eyes open then. If you want to find information about the city, you have to work for it. Nothing will be given to you -- you must take it for yourself." His tone is clipped and bitter, and I wonder when he started to lose the accent to his Mandarin, when he started to have the more polished tones that are common in the larger, eastern cities. "I will support you as I can, but this first step is yours to take if you want to."

He says it in a way that means he would like me to. Because what I learn, he learns. And what he learns. the community learns.

"Okay, Bao-bofu," I say, trying not to feel like I'm resigning myself to the idea that I am participating on his behalf. "I'll do it."

The smile he gives me is filled with pride and a promise. I focus on that, and decide that if the Program Manager wants to present Meliora as a game, then I will accept the challenge to uncover what I can so that others can learn as well.

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