A Free Life Read Free

dishes and a soup and ordered all in the large size. He avoided the cheaper dishes on purpose, though he had no idea what "Moo Goo Gai Pan" and "Seafood and Tofu Casserole" tasted like. They sounded strange to him. The "Three Delicious Ingredient Soup" didn't make much sense either, but, unable to speak Cantonese and ashamed of asking what was in it, he just ordered it. He disliked these nebulous names. Why not call things what they were? The Chinese here just wanted everything to sound fancy and exotic.
    The waitress smirked, collected the menus, and left.
    "What's that?" Taotao asked his mother, pointing at half a side of roast pork hanging behind glass above a counter.
    " Golden pig," she answered.
    "And those?"
    "Roast ducks? Want some?"
    "Not now."
    " It tastes no good, too fatty," Nan said. Then he chuckled as he remembered that when Taotao was a baby, barely able to use a spoon, the boy had liked meat and seafood so much that he'd hog them at a meal and even declare, "I want to eat it all. I don't leave any for others."
    Nan looked around and saw a few people eating noodles and won-tons. The Cantonese ate lightly at lunch and wouldn't order so much food as he had. The air was rife with fried scallion and soy sauce. Nan usually liked those smells in a Chinese restaurant, but today the usual aromas somehow irritated his nose. Feeling that his hands were a little sticky, he got up and went to the restroom to wash them.
    On his way back to the table, he caught sight of the community newspaper, Asian Voice, stacked on a steel rack near the restaurant's side entrance. He picked up a copy. Sitting down, he opened the paper and saw a full page of photographs of some recent scenes from Beijing. One of them showed a naked soldier hanging, by a piece of iron wire, on the window frame of a burned bus, his feet dangling and still in boots. Beside him stood a rectangle of cardboard bearing two vertical lines of words, which read: "He killed five civilians and was caught when he ran out of bullets. He got his comeuppance!"
    The Wus' order came with plain rice. The steaming soup was made with slivers of chicken, shrimp, snow peas, and slices of bamboo shoot. Both dishes tasted good, though Taotao didn't like the squid in the casserole. He wanted more portabella mushroom, and his mother put several pieces on his plate. "Why don't we have big bowls?" he asked.
    " Here people use only small bowls for soup in a restaurant," Ping-ping answered.
    Gingerly he took a bite of a sliver of chicken as if afraid it was underdone. But soon he became more confident, chewing without hesitation.
    Halfway through lunch, Nan said to Taotao, showing him the photos in the newspaper, "Look here, all these are civilians slaughtered by the People's Liberation Army."
    "Put that away! He's eating," Pingping protested.
    " I just want him to see the truth. Well, Taotao, see how many people they butchered? Here are some bodies and bikes crushed by a tank."
    His wife begged, "Please let him finish lunch in peace." "Dad, isn't this an army uncle?" The boy pointed at the hanged soldier.
    "Yes. But he killed some civilians and got his punishment. Don't you think he deserved it?"
    Taotao was silent for a moment, staring at his plate, then mumbled, "No."
    "Why not?" Nan felt frustrated and thought his son was stubborn and hopeless. His bushy mustache bristled.
    "Even for that, people shouldn't kill each other," Taotao said in a small voice.
    Stupefied, Nan didn't know how to respond for a good while. His wide-spaced eyes gazed at his son as something stirred in his chest, which was so full that he lost his appetite. He managed to finish the food on his plate, then refilled his teacup.
    "Don't you want some more?" Pingping asked.
    "I've had enough," he sighed. Then his voice turned husky. "This boy is too good-natured and must never go back. He can't survive there. I don't know where I'll end up, but he must become an American. "
    "I'm glad you said that," she