By Yimi Lu

“It’s boiling,” Peter whispers across the table, his voice almost covered by the steam between us. The hotpot is a Yuanyang pot, half spicy and half bone broth, and it is always the spicy side that boils first. “You can start dipping your meat.” He nods and lowers his first slice of beef. Once, before we got married, he would smile and wait for the broth side to bubble. We liked to dip our first slices together, holding them up in the air to touch like a toast. That little ceremony is long gone. Now he has already eaten two slices before I start with mine. 

We finish the first slices, then drop in daikon cubes, corn, and tofu. “Do you want any in the spicy soup?” I ask. Peter shakes his head. He is too lazy to explain, or maybe he knows I already know, that vegetables cooked in chili oil lose their taste. The mild broth is now crowded, vegetables bumping into each other like commuters on a train, and I stir them with my chopsticks.

“Do you know Rebecca is going to marry soon?” Peter asks suddenly. “Oh, I saw her Instagram story.” He doesn’t finish. We both know her, yet neither of us has much more to say. Talking about her is only to fill the silence between us.

The spicy side is boiling again. The broth is calm as a lake. Peter drops more meat, as if the half-sentence had never been spoken. I look at the broth instead and ask if he wants to add meatballs. He hesitates, then says he’ll add soup first. I remind him not too much. “Sure, sure,” he mutters, his eyes fixed on the pot.

I watch him pour filtered water into the spicy broth. Is it too much? I wonder, but I hold back. He stops on his own. The broth settles for a while, then he drops the meatballs in. They sink into the red, and I think it might be too crowded, but I let it be. The silence falls between us, replacing the sound of the boiling pot. So I ask, “Did Rebecca start a wedding registry?”

“Ugh, I don’t know.” He scrolls his phone, frowning at the vanished post. I want to tell him not to worry, but I also don’t know what counts as worry between us anymore. Whatever we used to share, worry is no longer one of them.

“Ah, it’s boiling again.” The spicy side suddenly bubbles so hard that it spills over into the broth. Peter stands quickly and tries to scoop it out with a spoon. But it is too late. The broth turns red. I put my chopsticks down. I cannot eat anymore.

*   *   *

Yimi Lu writes about people who don’t say what they mean, in the cadence of Chinese accent. Born in Shanghai, she now pretends to settle in Northern California. She builds code by day and disassembles herself by night to see what remains. Find her at https://www.yimiwriting.com/