Emery Lee - Café Con Lychee

To my grandparents,

thank you for showing me how

beautiful love can be across cultural lines.

T hey say your life flashes before your eyes just before you die, but let me make something perfectly clearwhoevers in charge of that clip better not include a single fucking shot of Gabriel Moreno or Im pressing charges.

Its already bad enough having to look up at him from the soccer field, grass stains so deep into my clothes Ill have to spend the next week getting them out. Hes got that goofy grin on his face as he stammers out an apology like he doesnt run me over every other practice.

Actually, I think its more than that by now.

Im so sorry, Theo, he says, holding out a hand to me.

I reluctantly take it because I know Coach is watching and I dont want another fails to play nice with others report.

Thats just the way I am, Im afraidbad at school, bad at making friends, and really bad at playing nice with teammates who are quite possibly, singlehandedly, the reason our team hasnt won a single game in two years. Our motto is literally Undefeated at being defeated. And I dont know, I guess it was naive of me to think that we could turn things around, really take junior year by storm and maybe earn me a couple of bonus points on my college apps so my parents would be a little less disappointed in me. I guess todays disaster is the universe telling me to stop dreaming too big.

It wont happen again, Gabriel says.

Then we stare at each other with blank faces, because neither one of us believes that crap.

All right! Coach shouts, blowing his whistle. He really likes that whistle, like its the one thing that keeps him feeling powerful even as he wastes his time coaching the worst soccer team in history. Lets just start from the beginning, okay?

Coach likes me since Im the fastest kid on the team and one of three people who can actually aim, but sometimes I think he only sticks around because it makes him feel like less of a loser to see were even more useless than he is. What other reason could he have for coaching a soccer team that never wins and wasting all his afternoons trying to make it good? But maybe he just appreciates not having to go home to an empty house since he and his wife got divorced last year.

When five oclock finally rolls around, my back aches, either from the fall or carrying the weight of the entire team. Justin Cheng catches up with me on the way home.

The fortunate thing about living in a town thats barely ten square miles is that I live only about a mile from campus, so the walk isnt too bad. The real struggle is during winter, when the snow gets waist deep and you have to claw your way down the street. But considering its mid-September, I dont mind. Of course, the goal would be to live somewhere like New York, where walking is practical and I wouldnt get stuck seeing Gabriel Moreno everywhere.

The neighborhood is mostly what youd expect from white suburbia, and even though its rush hour, there are barely any cars on the road. We have to pass the one familiar roundabout to get back to the shop, and everyones doing their usual thing of stopping and waving people on before they go. My brother always drags me about how people wont be so nice if I ever get out of Vermont, but thats most of the charm. I wanna go somewhere people actually think like I do instead of all this picture-perfect greenery and maple creemees.

You took that hit like a champ, Justin says.

I shrug. Muscle memory.

Justin laughs like thats the funniest thing hes ever heard. Weve been friends since second grade. As the only two East Asian kids in our class, it just kind of made sense for us to hang out together. I give him the boba hookup, and he reminds me how lucky I am that my parents dont disown me for being a solid B-minus student. Symbology, or something.

When we get to the shop, I find Mom wiping down the front counter, her shoulders hunched. Its been like that for the past few weeksme walking in sometime around five to find the place emptier than the stands during one of our games and my mom scrubbing down the same sparkling stretch of counter. This time last year, there wouldve been at least a handful of customers standing in line to get a milk tea or something, but that was also before every ice cream, frozen yogurt, and doughnut shop started selling them too.

And that doesnt even touch on our issue with the Morenos. Other ethnic shops have popped up from time to time, but considering the town is so white that most of them dont even know what mung bean is, they always flop in a year or two. Our shop and the Morenos are the only two that have been able to stick it out, like maybe theyre just different enough that people are willing to stop by both, but that also means were in a constant game of tug-of-war to keep them from pulling too many customers away from us and taking us out altogether. Which is why, even if Gabriel wasnt the single biggest nuisance on the planet, Id still hate his guts.

Ah, Theo, Mom says, as if I dont get home at the same time every day, you can help me count tips.

Mom never asks me to do things. Its always you can do, like shes granting me the special privilege of being her servant.

Hey, Mrs. Mori, Justin says. Can you get me a taro bun and one of those cool sunset drinks?

I can already feel the tension rolling off Mom before she says, Whats a sunset drink?

Oh, its one of those teas with the cool colors, Justin says. Hold up, I got you.

He slips his phone out of his pocket, probably pulling up some Try Guys video or something. Finally, he holds the screen up to Moms face, and she raises her lip. What is that? Thats not tea. Looks like a lava lamp.

But everyones been posting pictures of them!

I lay a hand on Justins shoulder and say, Im gonna go count tips, before stepping behind the counter.

Justins voice floats back to me as he pleads his case, but he should know its not worth the breath. My parents are traditional. Well, as traditional as a Chinese and Japanese couple really can be, I guess. They only believe in brand names, they never buy them at full price, and most importantly, they dont follow trends. If its not carved into the stone of their recipe books, they wont make it. Except the boba thing, but I guess its that old Chinese nature to steal a drink from Taiwan and claim it as our own.

Inside the office, the door closes a little too loudly behind me, but at least it blocks out the argument thats bound to come from the counter. Justins gonna stand there begging for his weird rainbow drink, and Moms never gonna budge. Thats just the way they are.

Sliding into the desk chair, its pretty clear to me Im the most generous person in my family. I let Mom stick to her old Asian ways, I entertain Justins quirks, and I even call this space an office even if its really only a storage closet with a desk in it.

I pull out the little Spam tin safe Dad uses to store the tips from the day and start counting. Considering most of our customers are older Asian folk looking for the only authentic Asian pastries in town, we dont earn a whole lot in tips. Its fine, though, because Im always in charge of counting them, which means no one bats an eye when a dollar or two goes missing.