. A

Hayley's Party Chapter One

Part A

"Tonight's the night...".

Please note this is Part A of a 3 part Chapter. The pace is fairly slow and there's no actual sex, although there is some foreplay. It very much sets the scene for Parts B and C though. I've split it into three parts because during the rewrite, it just got too long (it grew from 10k words to 45k words). There's a lot more background on Hayley here and it's rather different from the original Chapter One. Hope you enjoy... Chloe"

*****

"Ooh baby don't you hesitate cause

Tonight's the night

It's gonna be alright..."

The Emerald Garden Restaurant wasn't the only Chinese restaurant in town but it was the only one in town for dim sum if you were Chinese, Asian, or liked good dim sum. It wasn't bad. In fact, it was almost as good as dim sum in San Francisco where my cousins lived. The manager, Freddie Weng, was from Hong Kong via London (in the UK, that is, he'd immigrated to the US a long time ago). He'd imported his chef, Lǎo Zhū, from Taiwan. Old Zhū was good! I loved dim sum at the Emerald Garden.

I knew why Dad wanted to be there early, he'd invited some new clients along for brunch before they got down to business for the rest of the day. Some kind of hassle with a company sale or something from what he'd mentioned in passing! My Dad's an accountant, and a really good one. He used to work for one of the big international accounting firms in San Francisco before he decided to go for the quiet life and set up his own company out here well away from the big city. He did that back when I was a baby so I don't remember anything about that. But after visiting my cousins in San Francisco not too long ago, I could see why Dad wanted to leave!

Despite the move, Dad had old clients flying in to see him all the time. They came in from San Francsico, Hong Kong, China and South East Asia. Mostly Chinese but there were the odd gweilo clients as well. He had local clients as well, but that was more because he liked the town we lived in. My Dad did a lot of travelling. He was always flying out to visit those Chinese clients of his when they weren't flying in. They seemed pretty demanding. I'd met the odd client or group of clients at Dim Sum, Chinese businessmen mostly. Not like my Dad's local American clients at all.

Those Chinese guys were always nice to me though, more often than not they brought gifts along for me. I had a beautiful collection of Chinese designer label stuff - Uma Wang, Zhang Da, Qiu Hao, Nicole Zhang, Helen Lee. Anyhow, it sounded like this gweilo client Dad was meeting with today had a few problems with a company sale or transfer or something. Whatever! The technicalities were beyond me, although I do help my Dad with the routine bookkeeping stuff for his local clients. That's my part-time job when I'm not doing anything else, book keeping for my Dad, which I only mention now because it comes into this story a little later and I was talking about my Dad's business.

We walked into the Emerald Garden which, as always by ten in the morning on a weekend or a holiday, was getting just a bit full. The eternal quest by the local Asian population (and those gweilo's in the know) for good dim sum was in full swing. Old Freddie Weng (as opposed to his son, Young Freddie) saw us, beckoned to Dad, then waved us past the queue straight to a table. Needless to say, he was another client of my Dad's. The queue jumping always gets you a few looks. Disgruntled from the gweilo's; greetings from the Chinese we knew (all of them, there are just not that many Chinese or even Asians in general where I live, we all know each other).

Another aside: for Chinese, queue jumping is quite different than it is for gweilo's. If it happens, it's usually because of Guanxi. Connections. You owe someone a favor or they owe you. Or you do it because of respect for them or for someone they're connected with or maybe some other similar factor. It's pretty complicated but that's pretty much how it works, even for us second, third and fourth generation Chinese. Chinese understand it and know what's happening when you see queue jumping like that. Gweilo's, not so much but whatever, it's a Chinese thing. We all understand Guanxi in all its permutations and nobody, not even us third generation ABC's, bitches about it. Much!

My Dad's clients turned up a few minutes after we were seated. Dad saw them as they walked in. He stood up and waved, calling out loudly.

"Willie ... Hey Willie ... Over here."

I looked up to see a tall solid-looking white-haired gentleman who seemed to be in his late seventies waving back. He was with a slimly elegant old lady. They stopped and chatted with Freddie Weng though, smiling and shaking hands. The old lady hugged him for a long time before Freddie himself escorted them to our table. Now THAT was unusual, Freddie didn't normally hug people. He also usually left it to the two girls who worked the reception stand to take guests to their table. Although with my Dad's clients coming in from out of town he often made an exception to that rule.

One of the many nice things about Chinese restaurants is that they're not quiet and boring like gweilo restaurants. They're also not slummy like a lot of fast food outlets. They're family restaurants and they're noisy. Kids are welcome. They're crowded, with the tables packed close together. Everyone talks at the top of their voices. People call out to friends or to the waiters and waitresses. The staff yell at each other. Dishes get slammed on the table, the china gets slapped down fast and hard and not particularly carefully. When a table is vacated its crash crash crash as the dishes and utensils get cleared away, the tablecloth is whisked off, the table wiped down and everything gets reset for the next occupants in double quick time. It's almost deafening at times. If you're a gweilo and you haven't experienced it before it can be a bit of a culture shock.

That didn't seem to be the case with Dad's clients. Freddie led them through the throng down the aisle towards our table. Up close, Willie was even taller than I'd thought, well over 6 feet, solidly built and fit-looking with a smile that somehow came across as cheeky, if you can picture a guy of his advanced age as cheeky. He moved far more athletically than I would have expected for an old guy. His lady companion moved in much the same way, slim and exquisite as a ballet dancer. A rather elderly ballet dancer though. We all did the introduction thing as we sorted out seats. My Dad introduced Mom and me, following which Willie did the honors.

"Mrs. Chu, Hayley, I'm Willie Smith, my friend Modesty Burns."

Ms. Burns smiled at us. Although she seemed a very sweet old lady, there was something about her that intrigued me a little as she took the seat next to me. She radiated assurance, a calm confident grace that somehow reminded me of my equally elderly Tae Kwon Do instructor, Master Kim. Without even speaking she inspired respect. I found myself stiffening and bowing my head slightly as she looked at me. She smiled, inclining hers a little less. That was interesting, that she'd picked up on what a gweilo normally would never have noticed, let alone responded to.

"Please Hayley, do call me Modesty."

Her voice was gentle and clear with a slight English accent, the voice of someone twenty or thirty years younger. She and Willie ("call me Willie, Hayley, please, anything else makes me feel my real age...") started talking with my Mom and Dad. That left me alone to eat. I was hungry so I took charge of ordering dishes right away while the adults talked. Business issue? I ignored it. Boring!

Now if you're not used to it, the cacophony and sensory overload of dim sum can be overwhelming. So many moving carts! So many impatient servers asking you whether you want their dishes or not before you even know what they have to offer! The ever-present question gweilo's have of wait, is that pork, or shrimp, or some weird animal part that I'd kill myself rather than eat? If you're not Chinese and you haven't grown up with it you need the acumen of a Wall Street trader to make the right choices. I always told my gweilo friends that your best strategy is probably just to close your eyes and point unless you're lucky enough to grow up with a good friend such as myself (hint hint) who's an initiate of the fast-paced cult of dim sum.

Our elderly guests both displayed a great deal of familiarity with dim sum, and with chopsticks, so I kind of assumed they'd lived somewhere where they'd eaten it before. Hong Kong maybe? Their accents hinted at that possibility. Willie's definitely sounded English. Ms. Burns sounded almost English but was a little harder to place. She did chat with me a little as Willie and Dad got engrossed in whatever it was that was causing problems. I told her about growing up here, the kind of things we did, High School, going hiking in the mountains, camping, shooting, my martial arts school, my friends, all that stuff. Ms. Burns displayed rather more interest in Tae Kwon Do and Hapkido than I thought she would when I mentioned it in passing.

She glanced at Willie, then back towards me. "So you train in Tae Kwon Do, Hayley?"

I saw Willie turn, he was listening to.

"Yes Ms. Burns, and Hapkido." Calling her Modesty just seemed so disrespectful, not just because of her age. "I've been training in Tae Kwon Do since I was five, Hapkido for the last six years. I'm going to grade for my Black Belt in a few months, when Master Kim thinks I'm ready."

"Which style do you train in? Kukkiwon?" She was really interested.

Willie grinned at me. That grin looked way younger than he did. "I always preferred Gwon Gyoko myself."

Modesty laughed. "That's your Muay Thai background still coming through after all these years Willie. Now don't interrupt Hayley." She smiled at me. "When I first met Willie, he was competing professionally in Muay Thai fights."

Willie chuckled. "Okay okay Modesty. Ignore me Hayley, go on."

I grinned. Usually no-one I talked to except the rather older adult Tae Kwon Do students I trained with had any idea. It was so nice to find someone who understood. Some two I guess.

"Well, I started out learning Kukkiwon-style, but then I switched to Teukgong Moosooi six years ago. Master Kim thought I was good enough for it. I train Kukkiwon-style with the other students most nights, but Master Kim teaches me Teukgong Moosooi four times a week after the classes end for everyone else. And we do weapons training every second Saturday. It's pretty intense!" I wondered if they'd even heard of Teukgong Moosooi. It wasn't exactly a popular style. In fact I was the only student in the school that Master Kim taught it to.

Usually I just told people I trained in Tae Kwon Do and Hapkido. Trying to explain Teukgong Moosooi just got far too complicated. How do you explain something that's an amalgam of Hapkido (itself an amalgam of Tae Kwon Do, Jiu-jitsu, Aikido and a few other bits and pieces), Tae Kwon Do, techniques from the Chinese martial arts, Judo and Kyuk Too Ki (a kind of hybrid Korean kickboxing style in case you have no idea, which you probably don't...) as well as using nunchakau, knives, swords, staff, short staff and even firearms. It's almost impossible. And now I'd met two people who'd actually heard of it!

Ms. Burns' raised one eyebrow. "I'm impressed Hayley. I didn't expect to find a Teukgong Moosooi Master teaching out here. What's his background?"

Wow! She even pronounced it correctly! "Master Kim? He was a Teukgong Moosooi instructor in the South Korean Special Forces, he told me he decided to retire over here. Both his daughters married Americans and his son works in LA but he likes it better up here."

Master Kim and my Dad got on really well too but I didn't mention that. Dad would give me one of his killer looks if I did, I knew. My Dad was nice, but you didn't want to annoy him. Not at all! And for some reason he didn't like to ever have his friendship with Master Kim discussed. I had no idea why, Dad just told me it wasn't my business. When he said it like that, I knew right away he meant it. There were things my Dad kept close. Just like there were things I kept close. Tonight with Steve for example.

"Perhaps Willie and I could come by in a few weeks when we're back." She glanced at Willie and smiled. "Both of us are what you could call aficionados of the martial arts but perhaps a little rustier than we should be. It'd be good to get back into shape. And Willie, I think studying at a formal school rather than with Willie and I might be good for Andrew. Especially the weapons training!" She glanced at me then. "Does that include firearms training?"

I nodded. "Yes Ms. Burns. Handguns mostly. But Master Kim teaches me rifle and shotgun as well, I go to the range with him once a week. Dad insisted on that. We do a lot of drills."

I grinned at my Dad. He came with us when he could. He wasn't bad either, but not as good as me, nowhere near as fast or accurate, and I was almost up there with Master Kim now. After years of practice, I guess I should have been.

"Knives?" That was Willy asking.

I glanced sideways at Mom. She didn't approve of knives. "Yes, we do knife fighting."

Willie caught the look, looked thoughtful, then nodded. "We're getting a bit long in the tooth but you're right, it'd be good for the lad. It'd be good for us to Modesty." He grinned that youthful grin again. "I've been feeling rusty for too long!"

My expression didn't change but I wondered how you could get back into shape at their age? They were both in their seventies at a guess. Fit looking, but still, in their seventies. Ms. Burns seemed to sense my doubts. That serene smile appeared again. Willie looked at me, grinned, then laughed out loud.

"Looks can be deceiving Hayley."

"That'd be wonderful," I said. Then, curious, "who's Andrew?"

Willie's expression was rather more serious. "My grandson. My daughter, his Mom, passed away years ago when he was a kid. An accident. Her and her husband divorced when he was a baby, he never kept in touch." He sounded so matter of fact about it. My heart went out to him. "Andrew's a nice young lad if I say so myself, he wanted to move out here with us when Modesty and I told him we were thinking of coming over here to retire. He's in his last year at High School." He grinned then. "It'll be a bit of a change for him from his Boarding School in England."

Ms. Burns glanced at me. "He'll be in the same Grade as you then Hayley, perhaps you can meet him before he starts School, at least that way he'll know someone."

I smiled politely. "Of course Ms. Burns, just let my Dad know when you're back, I can introduce him to my friends as well."

I tore myself away to order more dim sum as one of the waitresses came down the aisle towards our table. Wendy! I've mentioned Wendy Weng briefly already. You remember, the only other Chinese girl in my year at High School. She was the same age as me but she'd finished High School at the end of last year. She belied the rule of outstanding Asian academic achievement. She wasn't at the other end of the bell curve though, more in the middle, but for Chinese, that's not so good.

However, she was the youngest of five children with three older brothers and an older sister. Her Dad wasn't too worried about her. I'd overheard him once chatting with my Dad. "Wendy, she's not too smart but she's good looking enough. She'll snag some wealthy guy for a husband and do fine." That seemed to be about the extent of Wendy's ambitions as far as I knew, unlike yours truly, who wanted to get into Medical School.

Rather drily, I'd thought to myself at the time that her Dad had been right. Wendy was certainly good looking (although not quite as good looking as yours truly in my ever so humble opinion). According to Barry, another friend of Joe and Steve's, she could suck water through a twenty foot hosepipe. Certainly my experience with Steve, limited as it was, had taught me that that was a skill that any guy would appreciate! From the comments I'd heard the guys make, it sounded like Wendy far surpassed me there. Barry would know for sure seeing as he'd dated her for a while but it wasn't like I was going to give him a chance to do a comparison. Wendy wasn't so smart academically, but she was smart enough that she was still a virgin. She'd hung on to the one thing a wealthy Chinese guy would demand in a wife.

And of course that thought reminded me of what I had planned for tonight with Steve!

"Hi Wendy." I waved as she came level with us, pushing a trolley loaded with Har gau, Chiu-chao fan guo, Siu mai and Cheong fan. That's steamed shrimp dumplings, steamed dumplings with pork, shrimp and peanuts, steamed pork and shrimp dumplings and rolled rice noodles stuffed with beef or pork or shrimp to you gweilo's. They're all totally yummy! I could eat them until I was as roly-poly as a baby panda. Dad did his duty by ordering three dishes of each. If he hadn't, I would've! I could eat all that by myself! It's the metabolism I tell you, I can eat like a horse and never gain weight. Running, Tae Kwon Do, working out with weights and swimming has nothing to do with it!

"Hi Hayley." We weren't what you'd call close friends, not like Claire and I, but we knew each other really well. We used to complain to each other about being the only Chinese girls in our grade at school and we criticized the gweilo girls' fashions. I shared her some of my Chinese designer stuff with her as well. "What's up?" She was busy placing the dishes my Dad had asked for on the table.

"Nothing much. Staying at Claire's tonight." I winked.

Wendy knew my parents and their rules; she'd covered for me once or twice herself. She also knew Claire's parents were away for the weekend, she was coming around to Claire's too. I knew she wouldn't say anything that'd get me in trouble. She wasn't academically smart but she was clued in on the things that counted for us girls. She understood our parents as well. I'd covered for her with her Mom and Dad a few times as well. Guanxi at work, banana-girl style.

She grinned. "Maybe I'll see you later then, I might drop round." She winked herself as she placed the last dish of Cheong fan on our table, yelling over her shoulder "coming, coming" to the next table who were getting impatient.

Oh yeah! More food! I left the adults to talk once again, filing "Andrew" on my To Do list. Ms. Burns turned towards us as I was finishing off the contents of the last dishes. Daan taat and Lai wong bau, my favorites! I loved those flakey egg-custard tarts and custard buns. So yummy! I had a dish of each to myself! I ate them all too!

"Hayley, I really was serious about coming along to Tae Kwon Do with Willie," she said. "If you could email or text me, I'll get in touch when we get back, we'd love to come along and do a bit of training. I'd really like to see about starting Andrew in on Teukgong Moosooi training as well."

"Yes of course Ms. Burns, I can give you a business card for Master Kim's school right now, let me write down the times I train." I was very polite. I wondered if Andrew was up to Teukgong Moosooi? I didn't train with anyone else that could train at that level, but looking at Willie and Ms. Burns, I thought perhaps he might indeed be up to it.

"Thank you so much Hayley, we'd both really appreciate that."

I smiled politely, rummaging for one of Master Kim's cards in my handbag, noting down the training times on the back. I wasn't quite sure how Master Kim would deal with a couple of old people in their seventies. I was sure he'd handle it though.

The drive home was fast, which was good because Mom and Dad were busy grilling me about what Wendy and I had talked about, and what we were planning tonight. They already knew I was sleeping over. Dad always wanted to know where I'd be and who with. As long as I told him, he was happy, as far as I know he never actually had ever checked up on me. He'd caught me out once when I was younger and I'd got such a scolding! The look on his face hadn't been angry though, it'd been worried. I never forgot that look, it frightened me more than the scolding. After that, I was always absolutely truthful with him about where I was going and who with. Just, not about what I was actually going to be doing but he never asked about that.