Dinner with my darling family

I spent the rest of the afternoon getting embarrassed by Promised Consort Radahn, desperately trying to **** my mind off of the precarious situation I had found myself in. And it worked pretty well – by seven o’clock I was so engrossed that I hadn’t heard the front door open.

What I did hear however, was my stepmum’s voice shouting up from the kitchen and cutting through the boss music like a sword.

“LUKE!!!”

I sighed and turned off my PlayStation. Asking for ‘five more minutes’ didn’t usually go down well with her.

I came downstairs to find the whole happy family already making a start on dinner – my dad, stepmum and of course, Charley. I took my usual seat next to her, and she beamed at me. I flashed her a weak smile in response and set my attention on the large pot in the middle of the table, full of pork belly, tofu and kimchi – still steaming, with the spicy, salty and sour smells filling the air in the kitchen. I sighed happily, and with everyone else already set, I began to serve myself.

My dad spoke up first. “So, Luke. How was the exam?” Not wasting any time, as usual.

“Pretty good,” I replied.

“Pretty good? What went wrong?”

_My father, ladies and gentlemen. _Thirty years living in the UK and previously being married to an English woman had mellowed him out a little, but my dad was still pretty much the stereotypical Chinese immigrant parent to a tee – overbearing and obsessed with success, topped off with a splash of emotional detachment.

I sighed. “My mistake, Dad. What I meant to say was that it was the greatest performance in an examination of my life. I think a Nobel prize is in the cards.”

“Well, some sort of prize would be nice for once,” he harumphed, clearly not a fan of my sarcasm.

“Hey,” Mum chided. “He’s doing just fine.”

In the same way that Charley really did feel like my actual sister, my stepmum felt like my actual mum as well, which I guess is a little strange since my real mum was still around (with the word ‘around’ being applied very loosely).

But despite also being Asian (Korean, not Chinese though) my stepmum was kind of the counter to my dad’s disciplinarian parenting, being a second-generation immigrant born and raised in America.

Charley’s relationship with my dad also led the way for this, because her father passed away when she was very young. As such, she pretty much considered my dad hers too, which had been readily reciprocated given how she was pretty much my dad’s dream child. But regardless, their closeness had bled over into my own relationship with my stepmum.

“Right,” Charley added. “I know a couple of people from school who did law in the UK, and Luke is way smarter than any of them.”

While my mixed British and Chinese heritage had left me looking pretty dissimilar from both my parents, my stepmum and Charley essentially looked like the same person, thirty years apart. They also both still had an American accent from before they moved to London, though Charley’s was noticeably stronger because of her recent four years at Stanford.

“How about we leave the academics talks for now?” Mum asked. “It’s been a while since we’ve all been together. We should just appreciate that.”

Dad nodded. “On that, we can agree.”

“Speaking of,” Charley continued. “How would everyone feel about going away for a bit, as a family? I know we probably won’t be able to get anything this Summer on short notice, and I probably shouldn’t take days off so soon into starting at my new job, but how about later on in the year? Say … Octoberish? Southern Hemisphere?”

My dad glanced over at my stepmum, and she coughed. “We’d both love to, dear,” she said. “But Luke’s going to be away around then.”

I paused as I remembered. There actually was somewhat of a get out of jail free card to all this. “Yeah, I’m starting a year abroad in October. In Tokyo. I’ll be there until next Summer.”

“You’re kidding me!” Charley pouted. “I was so hoping we could hang out more now that I’m back.”

“It’s a real tragedy,” I sighed.

“Asshole.”

“Language,” Dad said absentmindedly.

“Luckily, hanging out with my ungrateful little brother isn’t in my plan, otherwise I don’t think I could let you go.”

“You have serious issues,” I said, shaking my head.

Charley snorted. “Says the grown adult with carpal tunnel from playing too much Minecraft.”

“Hey, that was like six years ago! And I don’t play Minecraft anymore.”

“Oh, only sophisticated video games for you now, is it?”

“Quit bickering, you two!” Mum exclaimed. “God, our first time together as a family in months and this is how you want to spend it?” I shrugged and made a show of glaring at Charley, who sat on the other side of the table sniggering.

“Finish your food,” Dad grumbled. “You can squabble like children on your own time.”