Chapter 189: Dinner With the Chengs; Creating a Family Heirloom

Saturday, May 7, 2005 (Continued)

We parked in the drive behind all the other cars, got out and started walking toward the front door.

I commented to Julia, "This is a VERY nice looking house."

Julia answered, "After I've seen inside I'll give you my guess of what it's worth. That way you'll have an idea of how your place will compare."

Ava muttered, "Millions of dollars. I still can't get over it."

"Shh, here comes Lily."

Lily rushed up, but with Carol and Julia on my arms, there was no easy way for Lily to hug me. Lily stopped short, then said, "Welcome. You good, Mark?"

"Very good, thank you."

Ava giggled. As far as Ava was concerned, I was VERY, VERY good.

"We worry about you gone. Was trouble?"

"No, it wasn't trouble. I was researching an idea I had. It just took longer than I expected."

Ava giggled again, causing Lily to look at Ava wonderingly.

I added, "Ava knows what I was doing the last few days, and she knows your concern is unnecessary. Shall we go inside?"

Lily led the way to the living room. I was amazed by how wonderful the house was - it was easily the most beautiful house I'd been in. I'd been impressed by the Williams' house, but this was considerably better. Also very Chinese, although I'd never been in a Chinese family's house before, so my opinion probably didn't count for much. I just knew that there were lots of beautiful Chinese-looking things around the place.

Everyone else was in the living room. It was an impressively large living room. Although some people were standing in groups, there were easily enough chairs and sofas for all of us to sit. In addition to me and all my invitees (which totaled eighteen people), there was Lily, her father, an even older Chinese man [Lily's grandfather, I later learned], another Chinese couple and their son, who looked about the same ages as the Chengs [Lily's uncle and his family]. No sign of Mrs. Cheng, but I was delighted by the delicious smells she was presumably busy adding to. I headed toward Mr. Cheng.

"Hello sir. Thank you for inviting so many of us."

Lily had followed me. Her father looked to her, and she provided a quick translation into Chinese.

Mr. Cheng looked back at me and gave me a very heavily accented, "You welcome. Our honor. Please," Mr. Cheng indicated the elderly man who had risen to stand beside Mr. Cheng.

Lily provided, "This is my father's father. My grandfather. He and Grandmother are visiting."

I shook his hand while he spoke Chinese to me. Lily translated, "Grandfather and Grandmother has no English. He is very pleased to meet you."

I found it a weird feeling to talk with a guy who didn't understand what I was saying, but I told him I was pleased to meet him too.

I then introduced my sister Carol, and my two girlfriends: Julia and Ava.

Lily passed that on. (I'll stop following every sentence with a version of "Lily translated." You should have the idea by now.)

I was curious to see Mr. Cheng's reaction to my having two girlfriends, especially as his daughter wanted to be something sort of similar. Lily had said he'd be okay with it, but I was still interested. The way we were standing had Carol beside me, with Julia beside her and then Ava, so I couldn't put my arm around a "girlfriend", to reinforce that message, but I'd make sure I did so several times during the night.

He greeted the three girls without any untoward expression, just smiles.

I was then taken across the room a little, to be introduced to "Father's brother", his wife and their son. All of them spoke some English, especially Tony (the son, Lily's cousin). All the relatives lived in Hong Kong, and were visiting for a while.

After those introductions, Lily said, "I tell Grandmother and Mother you are here." She started walking toward the kitchen, judging by smells coming from that direction, so I eagerly followed. Lily stopped me, saying, "You wait."

I waited (Julia has me well trained to follow orders). It was probably wise not to let me into the kitchen, because I've been known to steal snacks sometimes.

Julia was standing next to me, so I quietly asked her, "What do you think the house is worth?" I was very impressed by it, and was extremely curious to know how my mansion would compare.

Julia laughed, adding, "Mark, I've got no idea how many bedrooms or bathrooms it's got, how modern the kitchen is, or any of its other features. I couldn't possibly guess yet."

"Oh. I just thought it looked very beautiful."

"You're not looking at the house; you're looking at the furnishings. Try to imagine every room as totally bare; completely empty of every single piece of furniture."

Which made sense, which unavoidably meant I'd been silly again. To change the subject, I said, "You mean the same way I like to imagine every girl I meet is totally bare?"

"Haha. As if! But you're getting the idea. I'll let you know when I've got an idea of a value."

We did a bit of socializing before I saw the three generations of Cheng women enter the room. My core group of three girls and I moved to greet the cooks, with a big, friendly smile on my face. It was nearly 7pm, so well after my usual dinnertime. I'd deliberately missed my mid-afternoon snack, and the smells were delicious, so there was a BIG smile on my face. I hoped there was a BIG quantity of food to put into my face.

We repeated the introductions, including me seeing how they reacted to the plural "girlfriends". They accepted it as if it was the most natural thing in the world.

I made a couple of very enthusiastic comments about how much I was looking forward to dinner, which the ladies seemed very happy to hear.

After the ladies left us, I said to my girls, "I feel a little embarrassed about not introducing the other three girls to everyone. I fear I'm slighting them. I might go spend some time with them. Is that okay with all of you?"

Of course it was, so I went to join Chloe, Alexis and Pat. I apologized to them for not introducing them as well, adding, "I didn't mean to slight any of you; it just seemed too awkward and imposing on our hosts' time to introduce so many people at once. I'll make sure I spend time with each of you this evening. Is that okay?"

They assured me it was, that I was a very nice guy to be so considerate, that they didn't mind and they understood that they had to take turns with me.

Then Julia walked up to announce, "Lily's going to take us for a tour of the house. Who wants to come?"

Every single one of the girls leaped to her feet and rushed off, leaving me alone. They'd all behaved as if they knew I wasn't going to come with them, and I knew such tours were generally female-only. That left me looking a bit silly all by myself, so I looked around, catching Mr. West's eye, so I wandered over to talk with Ava's parents.

Mr. West said, "We had an interesting talk with Alexis on the way over."

"Yes, I was sure you would. I saw her think about your little trap and decide to go, so I was sure she'd have something to say. She's not the sort of girl who hesitates to speak her mind."

"No, she's not. She enjoyed 'setting us straight, ' - her words. She was very blunt in her compliments about you."

"Umm. I'm not sure how to respond to that. Alexis and I just get along well. She's similar to Ava in some ways; a lot blunter, but equally unpretentious and honest, which I like very much..."

#3: <Add that she also likes sex as much as Ava does.>

#2: <Isn't that rubbing their faces in it too much?>

#3: <We're going to be having sex in Ava's bedroom tomorrow night. I doubt it's soundproofed and you know how loud Julia is. It's pointless us trying to pretend sex isn't going on. We know they know Ava is sexually active. Let's mention it and see how they react. If they react badly we can backpedal in the future.>

#2: <Okay. On your head be it.>

" ... They're both very honest about liking sex too. They don't try to use it as bait, or to obligate the guy, or any of that crap. It makes for much better relationships because we can talk about real stuff rather than play games all the time."

I'd been watching closely. They hadn't gotten angry. Their reaction was more discomfort than anything else. So I said, "I can see that talking about it is making you uncomfortable?"

Mrs. West answered, "We've gone from being used to hardly talking about it at all - maybe behind a closed door in a one-on-one conversation with Ava - to having a car ride in which one of our daughter's boyfriend's lovers set us straight that it was perfectly correct for you to have other lovers, as did the mother and father of another of your girlfriends not long before. We should be getting angry about it, but somehow we can't. Every other adult is so positive and accepting that we have no support for getting angry. It's very strange and uncomfortable."

"My mother sometimes has problems with the situation too. She agrees intellectually, but occasionally her mothering instincts automatically take her the other way. She corrects herself when she has a chance to think about it, but I can see that she still struggles. Vanessa and Prof are totally supportive though, as you saw. Even more than supportive, as they helped Julia persuade me into this in the first place."

"I bet you didn't need much persuading!" commented Mr. West, a little too bitterly for my liking.

I lied, but in a good cause, "Actually I did, but ignore that for a moment. I understand the sentiment behind your comment, but it's too much of an automatic reaction to be accurate in this case. You made a comment just before that I let slide, but it has more relevance now. Mrs. West referred to Vanessa and Prof as 'the mother and father of another of my girlfriends.' Let me remind you that Julia is also Ava's lover and girlfriend. Julia spends more time with Ava than I do, and that'll be much more so when I start doing many more college courses next school year.

^-- "Our three-way relationship is in full strength in every direction, so no one is better off than anyone else, and there's no taking advantage of or being taken advantage of. Remember that Julia talked me into this lifestyle, so I obviously didn't take advantage of her. Ava came along later, but she knew right from the beginning what she was being offered. Remember that we told you at the last dinner party that I gave Ava's phone number to Julia, and it was Julia that talked to Ava initially. One of the reasons I did that was so Ava couldn't possibly be under any misapprehensions about the importance of Julia in my life and relationships. Ava leaped at the chance to join Julia and me, so I can truthfully say that both girls didn't require any convincing at all, whereas it took Julia and her parents several days to convince me.

^-- "It's easy to understand why you made your, 'You didn't need much persuading' comment, but it and its implied criticism that I'm being selfish are wrong. Does your daughter behave as though I'm taking advantage of her? You saw that I had to pull the car over to the side of the street on the way here. That was because Ava was so joyous and excited that she couldn't stop hugging and kissing me, even though I was driving at the time, which isn't the action of someone who is not happy in her relationship. I agree this situation is unusual, and is easily misinterpreted as being to Ava's detriment, but once you get to know us you'll see how good it is for your daughter."

#1: <I'm impressed. That was VERY well argued.>

#2: <I'm quite proud of myself too. This topic has come up often enough that we've got plenty of experience at it, but I still thought I constructed it particularly well.>

#3: <I agree. Impressively cogent and kind.>

Mrs. West answered, "We have to agree that Ava's very happy, and some of your other points are good ones, but it's still hard to see how it can be good for Ava that you have so many girlfriends. That has to reduce the time you have available for Ava."

"Sure, but it gives her heaps of quality time with Julia, and also with Carol too as Julia and Carol spend a lot of time together. If I monopolized Ava's time, she wouldn't have those times. In total, Ava is considerably better off, especially because she's going to need a lot of emotional support later, which Julia and especially Carol will be much better at giving her than any teenage boy would.

^-- "There's another reason you might find weird, but it's surprisingly important. My having multiple girlfriends is teaching me things that I can quickly use to treat Ava better. You know I'm very smart, so I learn very quickly. I'll admit that it's hellishly hard to understand girls, but to the extent that any guy can, I'm learning about them quickly. I imagine that you have an impression of me as a guy who has had a great deal of experience with girls. Am I right?"

Mr. West answered, "My impression is that all the young girls here are your lovers, so I would say that makes you very experienced."

"I lost my virginity one month and six days ago, appropriately enough on April Fools' Day, because I was a total fool about girls before then." I could see the Wests were both surprised. I made it even stronger, "That was with Julia, of course, the VERY first girlfriend I've ever had, so I truly knew nothing at that time. Julia didn't talk me into having sex with another girl until April, 21. So I've been gaining experience with other girls for just over two weeks now. I can see by the surprised looks on your faces that you take my point about how fast I learn, especially with Julia and her family helping me. I would have been a terrible boyfriend for Ava six weeks ago, but because of the experience and understanding I'm gaining, I'm pretty good at making her happy now, and I should continue to get better week by week, as I gain more experience and understanding.

^-- "I could give you more reasons, but I think we should probably postpone the rest of this conversation until tomorrow's dinner. What do you think?"

Mr. West said, "Alexis was insistent that literally half the girls at your school want to be your girlfriend. You've gone from never having had a girlfriend a month ago, to what we see today, in just a month?"

"In a month and six days, yes. I'm not joking when I make sure those six days are included. At the rate I learn, six days is a useful period, especially because I've had an ENORMOUS amount of help from Julia and her family. They've pushed me into all sorts of educational situations, saved me from many blunders and pointed out many lessons. That, combined with my learning so quickly - you know I'm due to finish my bachelor's degree next year - means I'm learning about girls quickly.

^-- "That's why you think Prof's and Vanessa's behaviors are so strange. They understand how unusual I am, and they behave in a way appropriate to my uniqueness. But because you don't understand that yet, their and my behaviors seem weird to you.

^-- "Or maybe I just made all that up to justify my having sex with your daughter and lots of other girls. I'll leave that for you to decide, haha. I really think we should save this until tomorrow, when we can talk about it more easily. This dinner is meant to be in my honor - for reasons which are too Chinese for me to understand - but I think I should probably circulate."

They didn't object, so I left them. I had no real need to circulate; the girls were still gone, leaving an assortment of parents, The Boys and their girlfriends, and some Chinese who spoke little English. Circulating was just a good excuse to leave the Wests at what seemed like a good stopping point. I was proud of how good I was getting at justifying my having sex with lots of girls. I'd probably oversold myself, but I'd soon be telling them that I'd earned $6.7 million in the last few days. I was pretty sure that'd impress the socks off them. They were accountants, after all.

I chatted with The Boys and their girlfriends for a few minutes. Nothing of any consequence, so I'll skip reporting it here.

Lily returned with her entourage of young girls. They headed for me, which was fine with me. I didn't have to ask them what they thought of the place; they were gushing nonstop to each other as they crossed the room toward me.

When they arrived, I maneuvered myself so I had an arm around Alexis' and Pat's waists. Both thought that was a very welcome development. I had decided to be a little cold toward Chloe. Not badly, but enough to let her know that she had to try harder to please me, including wearing much better tops! I had been intending to undo some of her buttons this evening. Not to any immodest degree, but enough to make the point that I wanted her to start behaving like a sensible person. After lunch at school she'd immediately done her buttons up, but she would have had no excuse to do so here, as no one was going to leer at her. But once again she'd frustrated my making any progress with her, and it annoyed me. I could see that Chloe was very conscious that I was hugging the other girls but not her, but there was nothing she could do about it.

Lily asked me, "Everything okay?"

"Great, thank you."

"I show mothers," Lily looked toward the three mothers I'd invited, "house now?"

"Absolutely. Maybe Sophia and Ashley too." I indicated who they were, in case Lily hadn't caught their names. "I'm sure they're dying to see it."

Perhaps not the best sentence to say to someone who spoke poor English, but Lily seemed to understand it well enough. She left to gather her next tour group, who were very easily gathered, I noticed.

The girls around me started enthusing about the house again. Chloe seemed particularly envious, but that might have been me reacting too much to Julia's statement about Chloe being poor. I noticed that Chloe's outfit seemed a little worn, but that might have been me being pissed off at it.

The girls all raved for another couple of minutes. Clearly the house was superior to all of theirs, and had made a big impact on them, which made me even more interested in finding out what it was worth. I was sure Julia must have a value by now, but I guessed she didn't want to say it or talk real estate stuff with the girls around me.

Tony (Lily's cousin) approached. He asked me, "You have many girlfriends?"

I was momentarily tempted to say, "American girls are easy," but quickly reconsidered. The girls wouldn't appreciate it, and there was no need to tease Tony either, as his attitude seemed polite and interested, unlike if this question had come from some of the guys at school. They would've followed it with complaints about me being 'unfair' and likely a demand that I gave them some of 'my' girls. Tony was fine though. He was Chinese, and the only Chinese girl I'd taken was his cousin Lily. That left him with about six hundred million Chinese females to choose from, which should be enough.

I answered politely, "Yes. I introduced you to Julia and Ava before. They are my most important girlfriends." I removed my hand from Alexis' waist momentarily, to use as a pointing device. "Carol and Donna over there are my two sisters. Alexis and Pat here are my casual girlfriends." Tony looked a little puzzled. I guessed at the cause, and explained, "Casual means sometimes. Alexis and Pat are sometimes my girlfriends, like tonight, but I spend most of my time with Julia and Ava. Do you understand?"

"Yes."

I'd been internally debating what to say about Chloe. I chose, "And this is Chloe. She wants to be my girlfriend. I'd like her to be, but she's not trying hard enough." Chloe's face fell further than I'd intended, so I quickly added, "Which is a pity, because she's a very nice girl."

That helped a little. In the bathroom she'd overheard me say that she was a "lovely girl". Now she was merely "very nice". Soon my description would be "nice", and I had a fear that not long after that she'd be "a disappointing waste."

Tony asked, "Hong Kong girls very unhappy if boyfriend has more girlfriends. Your girlfriends not angry?"

It was more fun (for me) to make them answer, so I deflected the question by looking around at them, asking "Girls, you wanna take that?"

Alexis was the first the answer, confidently saying, "I'm happy to get whatever piece of Mark that I can, haha."

I tried to frown at her, but I couldn't stop it turning into a smile.

Pat and Chloe (especially Chloe) were uncomfortable at having to answer. Pat said, "I'd like to spend more time with Mark, but it's okay."

Chloe looked at the floor and mumbled something. I had the feeling her comment had been self-pitying, so I didn't bother asking her to repeat it more clearly. Nor did anyone else.

Tony looked toward Julia and Ava. Julia said, "Our happiness doesn't come from what we want, but from what Mark wants. If Mark is happy with twenty girlfriends, then we are happy. If Mark is happy with no girlfriends, then we are happy."

Julia would NOT be happy if I had no girlfriends, but neither would I, so I guess our happinesses are in sync. With Julia's dedication to me, her explanation was truly accurate, plus it had the added bonus of putting the other girls in their place.

Tony said, "You good girlfriend."

Julia corrected him, "WE," pointing a finger back and forth from Ava to herself, "are good girlfriends."

Tony looked at me, "Only two girlfriends?"

#2: <I somehow think we shouldn't mention Carol, but what about Lily; does she count?>

#3: <We don't want to cause any family trouble. Plus isn't official permission from her parents meant to come after this dinner, so formally Lily isn't included yet.>

I answered, "So far."

"How many you want?"

I shrugged, adding, "It's very hard to find good girlfriends. I want everyone to be happy, but it's hard to find girls who can share happily."

Tony chuckled, "Yes, VERY hard, haha. Same in Hong Kong. Same everywhere." He gave me a small nod of the head then wandered chuckling back to his family.

Pat asked Julia and Ava, "Do you really believe Mark is that much your boss?"