“Date night at Tony Wang’s was supposed to be about egg rolls… until Sheila ordered kung pao chicken and a homicide. 🍜🔪😂
👉 Read Date Night Special: Kung Pao with a Side of Homicide now — a flash fiction bite you won’t forget.”
Kung Pao with a Side of Homicide
We were Ken and Barbie. Romeo and Juliet. Bogey and Bacall. Jack and Jackie.
We were—until the night I took Sheila to Tony Wang’s Beijing Palace.
You know how it works in a Chinese place: order three or four dishes, share the plates. Sheila wasn’t having it. I saw her in this kind of mood once before. That’s when she took a hammer to my car and made the hood look like it had a bad case of acne. She looked angrier tonight. The mood she was in made PMS look like a hot fudge sundae.
On the way over, I attempted to break through the iceberg she wrapped herself in, “Why don’t you want to share?”
“Because you eat too fast. Too much. When you moved in, thirty-two-inch waist. Now? Thirty-six. And your belly hangs over your belt. You got no stop signs for your mouth.”
“I do not eat too fast or too much. I’m still growing.” I said.
“I can hardly breathe when you’re on top of me. You ever hear of Weight Watchers?”
The next three miles were silence wrapped in tortilla filled with habanero peppers. I thought about turning around. I knew a wrong move would get me pepper sprayed. Instead, I turned into Tony Wang’s parking lot and grabbed a spot near the door. Wrong move. Sheila snarled that I lacked imagination—even in parking spaces.
“Maybe we shouldn’t go out. I can turn around and go home. You can make us a tofu wrap with Romaine lettuce,” I thought I was being cute.
“Tonight’s our date night and I don’t do tofu and I’m through cooking for you. When we get to Beijing Palace I’ll order. No fried food. Nothing with tons of garlic. I need a gas mask when you try to kiss me after one of your garlic frenzies. End of discussion,” Sheila said crossing her arms and staring out the passenger side window.
My mind raced trying to figure this out. Things were great last night. Things were great this morning. Whatever crawled into her brain crawled in after she went to work.
I probed, “How was your day?”
“Sheila mumbled something.”
“Something happen?” I asked.
“The genius here thinks something happened that made me snap,” Sheila said jerking a thumb my way.
I glanced at her to see who she was talking to. I thought we were alone in the car.
I found a parking spot further away from the door. I stopped the car halfway into the parking place. It’s rear end blocking any traffic that might want to scoot by. “I’m not moving the car until you tell me what is going on.”
She stared at me.
I threw my Hail Mary. My only other option was to ask her if this was her way of telling me we were breaking up.
Sheila unbuckled her seat belt and got out of the car. She looked over her shoulder at me, “I’ll meet you inside.”
A car behind me honked. I waved. The driver gave me a long angry honk. Maybe low blood sugar is going around.
When I caught up with Sheila, she was staring at the four page menu. I sat down and scooted my menu closer. I reached for her arm, “Are you going to tell me what set you off?”
Sheila took a deep breath. Then spoke slowly, “Let’s order and I’ll tell you the whole story. When I finish I’m going to ask you for a small favor and you have to promise me you’ll do it.”
“A small favor? It doesn’t sound small?” I said.
“I need you do some heavy lifting, “Sheila said squeezing my right bicep.
“Can we get three meals and share?” I asked.
Sheila rolled her eyes. “Yah, we can share.”
“Egg rolls too?” I hoped I wasn’t pushing my luck.
“Monday, you start the Mediterranean diet,” Sheila growled.
“I’m not Italian or Greek. That diet won’t work with my DNA,” I was proud of my logic.
The waiter came. I ordered for the two of us, “Egg rolls, sweet and sour sauce, spicy mustard, and numbers 18, 27, and 36.”
The waiter nodded. Five minutes later he was back with our egg rolls, a dish with four fortune cookies, and the bill. I didn’t say anything. Tony Wang encourages diners to eat fast so he can turn the tables.
I ate my two egg rolls. Sheila was delicately eating her first egg roll. I said, “You going to want the other egg roll?”
She pulled the egg roll closer to her. She looked at me, “You want my egg roll?”
I nodded.
“Then I want you to kill Jenny Swenson.”
Sheila took a bite of her first egg roll in a sexy sort of way. I didn’t know Jenny Swenson. “Who’s she?”
“It doesn’t matter I hate her. I want her dead.”
“You’re serious?”
“Yes.”
This was a side of Sheila I hadn’t previously seen.
“Well?”
“Sure, if I can have the rest of your kung pao chicken.”