Photo by Alison Marras on Unsplash
by Christine H. Chen
Everyday finds me and Mrs. Yang rushing to get out of bed in the dark to prepare porridge with thousand-year-old eggs and fried devils’ bread for breakfast, sauteed scallops and shiitake mushrooms with cayenne pepper. She grinds ginger, I steam chicken with scallions, she cooks purple rice, I whip up a vermicelli salad with cherry tomatoes, shrimps and spinach for my husband, her only son. “Please stop being ridiculous” my husband says. He laughs, loosens his belt. We stand by his sides, zoomed on his every move, our eyes willing him to choose me over her, her over me. We sharpen chopsticks and toothpicks ready to battle for his heart.
Christine H. Chen’s fiction has appeared in SmokeLong Quarterly, Ghost Parachute, Wigleaf Top 50 Very Short Fictions, and elsewhere. Find her at www.christinehchen.com and @ChristineHChen1
