Chapter 190: Dinner With the Chengs; Laps of My Lap

Saturday, May 7, 2005 (Continued)

The Chengs had a western style table large enough for all two dozen of us to sit around. There wasn't any seating order imposed, so we could sit wherever we wanted. I quickly moved to an area of the table where I could observe the doors into the room, as I was worried about Tony turning into another Don Eaton. The seating developed into three groups: a third was Chinese, a third adult Americans, and a third was me, my sisters and girlfriends, all of whom wanted to sit next to me.

Things seemed informal, so I asked, "Lily, can we change seats during the dinner?"

"Sure. Dinner is for talking. Move around is good."

I announced that I'd start with Julia and Carol beside me, and the rest could have turns later, which created some lighthearted grumbles from the less well-trained girls, with Chloe exceeding "lighthearted grumbling" in the direction of "petulant".

I was tempted to say something like, "Just because you've got big tits doesn't give you the right to push my best friends away from me, Chloe," but thought I'd better not. I wanted to, but suspected Chloe was fragile tonight. She was somewhat clingy and trying hard (in her opinion) to ingratiate herself with me. Harsh words from me would probably result in too many tears (she'd cry, I'd miss my dinner, then I'd cry). With so much at stake, judging by the delicious smells, I resolved to be nice.

Lily supplied knives and forks to everybody that wanted them, which several people did. I declined.

Lily asked me, "You can use chopsticks?"

"Sure, no problem."

Mr. Cheng said something, while Lily translated as, "Father says maybe you were Chinese in an earlier life."

In my two immediately earlier lives I'd been Mark Andersons, but God knows what might have happened before that. I answered, "With the smell of this dinner, I'm planning to be Chinese in all my future lives."

Lily translated that, and it went down well with all the Chinese around the table.

[[In case you're interested, when humans die, they die. It's not an overly complicated process! No past lives, future lives, spirits wandering around, Pearly Gates, resurrection on Judgment Day, coming back as a cow, or ANY of the huge piles of crap that have been shoveled about the event. Can't say I was surprised to learn that, but I imagine some of you are. And, no, dying during déjà vu isn't a loophole any longer.]]

Soon food started flowing out of the kitchen and onto the table, carried by Mrs. Cheng, Grandmother, and two other Chinese women I'd never seen before. It seemed impolite to ask who they were (other than WONDERFUL people, for bringing me food), so I said nothing. I noticed there weren't enough seats for them, so I guessed they were helpers.

As soon as the first plate was put on the table, Lily rotated it around to me, saying, "Mark, chicken for you. Have some."

"Umm, shouldn't I wait for your mother and grandmother to sit down?"

"Food more important. You try."

Have I mentioned that the food smelled delicious and that I was hungry? I grabbed my chopsticks and tried a piece of what Lily was offering.

"Wow! This is fantastic!" I grabbed another piece quickly, before Lily passed the plate to anyone else.

In the time that'd taken me, several more plates had arrived, and the other Chinese were starting to help themselves and gesturing for everyone else to do so too. Table-wide conversation was drowned out by the noise of everyone starting to eat, offering plates to their neighbors, praising the food, etc.

Once there was a fair amount of food on the table, Mrs. Cheng and Grandmother sat down, and started loading their plates too. The Chinese set the tone for the dinner, and a very noisy tone it was. Yelling across the table, laughing loudly, passing plates of food around, etc., were all natural. I wasn't totally surprised, because I'd been in Chinese restaurants a few times, and seen some tables of Chinese people behaving similarly, but being in the middle of it was a new experience for me. [[The Chinese for "good restaurant" is literally "noisy restaurant". Their restaurants usually have hard surfaces on the floor, walls and ceiling to better reflect the sound of the social interactions that are their essential purpose. Thus noisy restaurants are considered happy and good ones.]]

Conversation was not my priority; food was, and it was AWESOME! Easily the best I have EVER had. I wasn't the only local to think that either; equivalent comments were being made over and over again.

Lily had pulled rank and had reserved a seat for herself next to Julia ("To tell Mark what each dish is.") From her position Lily many times pointed out individual dishes, lifted samples onto my plate, described what they were, etc. What they ALL were was VERY delicious. I was having a great time!

New dishes were pouring out of the kitchen all the time. Each plate was smaller than a normal dinner plate, so twenty five people could empty it with ease. The helpers were kept busy removing empty plates and replacing them with delicious, full ones; a process that met with my wholehearted approval. As Lily had promised, there were several chicken dishes, all of which were superb.

Julia soon decided that it was acceptable for her to sit on my lap. Lily quickly slid into the empty seat. Chopsticks are quite good in respect that I could have one hand around Julia and use the other to feed myself. I soon discovered a problem though, I could no longer lean close enough to the table to avoid dropping or dripping food onto my or Julia's good clothes.

Clearly I had to find a solution! I found a good one. I formed a max-sized (2 inch) NP-fingertip immediately under the food I was carrying to my mouth, so close that it was touching the food. I could make it almost perfectly flat on the top, so any drips remained with the food, so no one could see that it had dripped. The NP-'plate' also prevented me from dropping the food entirely, so my and Julia's clothes were safe. I had plenty of practice, as it takes a very huge number of chopstick-loads to fill me up, so I got very good at it. By moving the loads quickly to my mouth, it was impossible for anyone to see anything unusual (I couldn't, and I was looking for it). The only weird thing was the feeling of my closing my mouth on an NP-fingertip. I canceled it immediately, obviously, as it was in the way of my eating.

I'd been waiting for Julia to whisper 2.8 or 3.6 or some other number to me, being what she thought the value of the house was. All I needed was a single number, which she could've easily told me, but she said nothing. Initially food was more important, but once I'd had enough food to take the edge off my hunger, I took advantage of her sitting on my lap to whisper (quite a loud whisper, because dinner was very noisy), "What's the value of the house?"

"I can't give you a quick answer. It's more complicated than that."

I couldn't see how it could be the least bit complicated. When people sell a house, they set a price. It's a single number, so surely Julia could give me her estimate of what that single number would be if this house was put on the market. However, in the past whenever I've thought something was simple and Julia said it was complicated, I was invariably wrong. I consoled myself by eating some more food.

After several minutes, Julia gave up her seat to Ava. Ava weighs more than Julia (or to be fair to Ava, Julia weighs a lot less than anyone else), but my body has had plenty of practice at girls sitting on my lap and I don't find it difficult.

And so the dinner progressed.

We had a fantastic dinner. We were at the dinner table for FAR longer than we normally are at home, so there was plenty of time for lots of conversation, for all the girls to have turns with the favored seats to either side of me, and on my lap. It was easily the best meal I've ever had. It was so much better than any other meal I've experienced that there was no competition.

I'll mention a few less important (than the food) specific events that occurred during dinner:

^

Most importantly, everyone had a great time. The food was FANTASTIC (I'll probably keep saying that), the atmosphere was VERY relaxed and friendly, with a great deal of laughter and loud conversation. There was also a complete absence of formality, with people freely swapping seats, conversing in all directions, etc.

I came in for a fair amount of attention from the Chinese, with all of them visiting me at various times. Not saying anything substantial, really just to get an impression of me. Which was natural enough, as the dinner was meant to be in my honor. I never bothered trying to find out why, because I was pretty sure that I wouldn't understand it.

Lily's uncle and aunt had a little English, but not much, leaving Lily as the sole translator, so she was a very busy girl. She tried to spend as much time as she could looking after me, but providing translation services whenever any of the Chinese wanted to talk with any of my party took most of her time, as it happened many times during the meal. As often as not Lily was out of her seat, walking around the table to talk with others. I overheard enough of her conversations to know that I was often being talked about, for example, when Lily's mother was asking my mother questions about me.

As busy as she was, Lily still found occasions to sit on my lap. Shortly after she gained that seat on one of her short visits, there was a hubbub of excitement from the Chinese. It was easy to work out why, as they were all staring at my chopsticks. Lily had sat on my lap in the reverse orientation from the previous girls, so I'd swapped the chopsticks to my other hand and carried on eating (nothing was going to interfere with my eating! Especially because new dishes of previously un-sampled delicacies kept arriving). Presumably one of the Chinese folk had noticed my hand swap, and had alerted the others, so they were now all excited over my ambidexterity. I am TOTALLY ambidextrous, with not the slightest feeling of awkwardness on either side, so eating with the other hand was no a big deal for me, but it impressed them.

Several of them tried changing hands, laughing at the struggle and resultant mess. I came in for some more praise.

On another of Lily's brief lap visits - she tried to grab a few moments between my swapping between the other girls - Lily asked, "Julia say you no phone?"

"Yeah, I lost it a couple of days ago."

"I buy you new phone in Hong Kong."

"No need, thanks Lily. I need one soon. I'll buy it Monday."

Lily insisted, "I buy you Monday."

"Huh? I thought you said Hong Kong."

"Yes. I go Hong Kong tomorrow. Back school Tuesday. Give you phone Tuesday."

"You're going all the way to Hong Kong for two days?"

"Yes. I tell you before. After dinner Father say I serve you yes. I go doctor. Come back have," Lily looked around to make sure she couldn't be overheard, then said, "sex."

"You're going to a doctor in Hong Kong?"

"Yes. Hong Kong doctor better than American doctor..."

#3: <I doubt that very, very much! They'd give her seaweed and ground up grasshopper, then stick half a dozen pins into the back of her hand.>

#4: <So much for our not using rubbers with Lily. We're not going to trust Chinese contraceptives! Would you trust the contraceptives from the country with the largest population in the world? Haha.>

#2: <Damn. I wanted to fuck her without rubbers. It feels SO much better. Having to use rubbers makes the whole thing almost not worth the bother.>

" ... and Hong Kong phone better than American phone."

#3: <And I doubt that too. Hong Kong's a tiny country full of restaurants, souvenir stores and some high-rise finance buildings. That's what I've seen on TV. They're not going to have better phones than America! Anyway, we need to avoid specific models so it's better we get it. We can certainly afford to!>

"I need to choose my phone carefully, Lily. I have a list of specific models that I need to avoid."

"Give me list, I not buy."

"I have it at Julia's house."

"Email. I buy you VERY good phone! The best. Give you Tuesday."

#2: <I think we need help. Let's call for the big guns.>

I called out, "Julia! Can I borrow you please?"

Julia walked around to us. "Yes?"

"Apparently Lily's going to Hong Kong tomorrow and she's offered to buy me a new cellphone there. The trouble..."

"That's wonderful! When are you back, Lily?"

"Tuesday."

"You're going for just two days?"

"Yes. I see doctor for healthy for Mark."

"Will you have time to buy a phone?"

"Easy."

"That'd be fantastic! Thanks very much."

"I serve Mark very good."

"Yes indeed. VERY good!"

I butted in, "Julia, you forgot that there's a list of models I don't want to own."

"We'll email the list to Lily when we get home."

"Umm, it's not as simple as that. What if the model numbers are different in Hong Kong, or if they've got models we don't have here. We need to make sure we avoid any phone that has the software updating feature."

"If Dad's email doesn't already have that comment on it, we'll add it before we send it to Lily."

"But it'll be in English! They won't understand what it means."

"Lily, will it be a problem having our needs written in English?"

"If I don't know, I get someone to write in Chinese. Is easy."

Julia added to me, "When Lily brings the phone back, the first thing we'll do is look up its specs online. If it has the bad feature we'll give it back to Lily and I'll buy you one. It's worth waiting one more day for the chance to get a latest model from Hong Kong." Tuning to Lily, Julia said, "LATEST model, right?"

"Number one best phone for Mark!"

"Good girl. There you go, Mark; all settled."

"Ahh, I'm confused. Why is it that Lily can buy me a phone - in a foreign country! - but Prof can't buy me one from the local store?"

#2: <Uh oh. That's the "Mark is an imbecile" look. I thought it was a sensible question.>

#4: <So did I? I guess that means we're both imbeciles.>

"Dad has NO sense of style. I mean ABSOLUTELY none. He's great at many things, but NEVER let him anywhere near a decision that involves any sense of style. He's a mathematician, for goodness sake!"

"Hey, I resent that! Mathematicians are very smart people."

"Smart yes; stylish NO! I've been to his department's formal and informal dinners. If their socks match, they're having a good fashion day. Lily has a GREAT sense of style. You've seen the clothes she wears and that she's got great taste in cellphones. She's on her third phone this year, and they've all been gorgeous. She knows what she's doing when it comes to phones. We're talking about her bringing back a phone from Hong Kong, Mark. From HONG KONG!"

"I take it that Hong Kong phones are good?"

"You've seen the three phones Lily's had this year, so what do you think?"

"Ahh, I can't say I've noticed any of her phones."

"What? None of them?"

"Umm, no. I spend most of my time staring at girls' tits."

"Haha. Of course you do, silly me. I should have made allowances for that, haha. Lily's bringing you back the latest model phone from Hong Kong is wonderful. It'll put you months ahead of anyone else."

"And being months ahead is somehow important?"

"Absolutely! Almost no one will have the same phone as you, not for months."

Which I knew was somehow important. Don't ask me how or why, but it was. I was smart enough not to ask Julia for an explanation. She'd think I was still being stupid, and her explanation wouldn't make sense anyway. It wasn't as if I'd have done anything special to get the phone - merely have someone bring it back from Hong Kong for me - so how could that possibly make me impressive in any way?

Thanks to Carol's explanation about the fashion importance of phones, I was also smart enough not to say, "But it's only a phone, for goodness sake." I made a mental note to thank Carol for saving me from another "Mark's an imbecile" look.

I surrendered, "Thanks, Lily. I look forward to seeing the phone." Note that I said "seeing the phone." A guy who didn't understand girls to the enormous extent that I do would've said, "using the phone." I don't know much about girls, but I knew this was ALL about look. Not once had a single useful function of the phone been mentioned.

^-- Which reminded me, so I said, "By the way Julia, do I want a phone that has a camera?"

"Ideally, but it depends." Julia launched into a conversation with Lily about what style of phone would best suit me.

I feared I knew what the camera decision depended on: how it affected the style of the phone. I was too scared to confirm my fear. How can girls be so disconnected from reality that they'd choose to reduce the functionality of something they were buying merely to have it look better while it wasn't doing the full job they bought it for?

I listened to the intense style discussion for a few seconds, then had to excuse myself to go sit in the seat that Julia had come from.

#3: <I wonder how good Hong Kong doctors are? Because we were SURE wrong about cellphones!>

#4: <It's an issue, because we need to know that Lily is on real contraceptives, rather than powdered frog toenails.>

#2: <Do frogs have toenails?>

#4: <I think the issue here is the quality of Chinese contraceptives, rather than frog anatomy.>

#3: <I remember Lily saying she only had to wait three days after starting her pills. Julia said she would google it, but I can't remember Julia reporting back.>

#4: <Me neither. We can ask Julia later. But even if there are some pills that work after three days, we need to know that Lily is using them.>

#2: <Rather than powdered frog toenails. Yeah. We'll ask Julia about it later.>

^

Chloe eventually had a turn of sitting on my lap. I'd already decided to be nice to her, rather than risk upsetting the evening. Also because she'd been trying to be nice all evening, with "trying" being the key word. From the way I'd introduced her to Tony, she knew our relationship wasn't going well, so she'd been deliberately pleasant ever since, in a trying hard needy sort of way.

I put my spare arm around her waist, and cursed her attitude yet again. Ordinarily I would have liked to cop a few feels while she was so accessible. Nothing publicly obvious or embarrassing, but I could have easily hugged her, pressing her nearest breast into my chest, or I could have had my eating arm reach sideways in front of her ostensibly to reach for a dish, but really to press my arm into a breast. That sort of thing. But with her bra being made out of steel plating that was half an inch thick, there'd be no pleasure in it.

Chloe tried to jolly me along, excitedly telling me how wonderful the house was, the meal is, and my magic trick had been.

After a few minutes of pretty much one-sided conversation, Chloe asked me, "You don't seem very happy. What's the matter?"

What I wanted to say (REALLY wanted to say!) was something like, "How could you be so stupid as to deliberately piss me off by wearing a top that proves you're completely ignoring all the efforts Julia and I are going to, in our attempt to get your fucked-in-the-head attitude straightened out." I'd wanted to say that from the moment I'd first seen her this evening, but suspecting that it probably wasn't the wisest thing to say, I was searching for a good alternative, something I could say to her to let her know what I felt, without it being too negative. The trouble was that I couldn't think of anything positive to say about Chloe at the moment. When Chloe asked me her question, I suddenly had a brilliant idea.

"Chloe, have you noticed that the clothes I've worn to school for the last couple of weeks are different than what I wore before then?"

"Of course. You dress wonderfully now."

#4: <It's nice to know that our old style of dressing was held in such high regard.>

"Chloe, I HATE the way I dress these days. Do you seriously think I like parading around like a homosexual porn star! I'm a modest, unassuming, quiet guy. NOT the sort of guy that enjoys strutting around in transparent shirts, or shirts that are so cut off that they only cover the top half of my torso." Actually, I was getting used to dressing in my new style. I didn't enjoy it, but I could see that I'd eventually get to the stage where it wasn't so unpleasant. Obviously I'd never get to the stage where I wanted to buy such clothes for myself, but Julia was never going to let me do that anyway.

"Why do you dress that way then?"

"Because Julia makes me. Two weekends ago, Julia dragged me around menswear stores for the WHOLE day, making me try on clothes I wouldn't be seen dead in. I did it for several reasons: to make Julia happy, because she said it'd make me happier once I was over the embarrassment, because she said it was more honest if I showed people who I really was, and because she wanted me to face the world head-on rather than trying to hide myself from it. I agreed to dress the way I do at school because I had faith in Julia's judgment..."

#2: <And because we were scared to stand up to her, but I'll leave that out for the moment.>

" ... and I've learned that Julia was right. It's only been a couple of weeks, but already I can see that all her reasons were good ones. Julia knew what she was talking about when it came to me, and she knows what she's talking about when it comes to you too."

"Oh."

"Yes. This conversation is about you rather than me. Julia and I both know that you need to stop shrinking away from 50% of the people you meet, and the way to do that starts with your dressing less conservatively."

"Oh no, I can't. My parents don't let me have clothes like other girls."

From what Julia had told me about Chloe's mom, that was quite likely true, but there were still possibilities. "So when you've left home, undo a few buttons."

"My parents wouldn't like that."

"They'll never know. You need to start somewhere, and that's a very safe and easy way to do it."

"I couldn't. I don't feel comfortable doing things my parents wouldn't approve of. I'm a good girl, not some tramp that any boy could get pregnant or worse."

#3: <She's got a point. If she undid a couple of buttons, that'd immediately turn her into a "tramp that any boy could get pregnant or worse," whatever the hell, "or worse" means. She's a pain in the ass!>