Mr. Du was the only chef in our childcare for many years. He had a median height, a round face and a soft personality, and never got mad even though the kids could be very unreasonable at times. He did not seem busy as if he did not have much to do around the kitchen, which, of course, was not true for the only chef cooking three meals a day for the entire childcare of about forty kids at that time.
He had a cat in his kitchen that ate fish bones. I remember clearly one day after the dinner I was sent to the kitchen, bringing the fish bones to feed the cat. I had heard but never observed cats eat fish bones, and I believe that was the only time to have that kind of observation. As the cat gave its concentration to the food, using one corner of its mouth chewing solemnly with a slightly crunching sound, I clenched the empty bowl to my chest and watched horrifyingly as if a fish bone could be sent down to my own throat and stuck there, the pain which caused was not an old memory at all.
I asked Mr. Du without moving my eyes away, “Why does she eat fish bones? Could we feed her something else?”
“Don’t worry. She loves it,” he comforted me, grinning and, meanwhile giving me a small bowl of leftover rice to put by the fish bones, which had not got the cat’s attention at the time I left the kitchen.
A few years after I left for elementary school, he was transferred to the factory cafeteria where I saw him frequently, because my sister, brother and I ate lunch in mom’s office every school day and I was the one to buy lunch with mom. Each time I stepped up to his window where he served food, he would use the same familiar tone to talk to me, “Xiao Qingeeer, how are you today?” I would be beaming up at him like in the old time.
