As I gave the 911 operator the play-by-play of what was going on, Derek’s chest moved up and down ever so slightly on its own, and Ninang June was able to lean back and observe his condition.

The immediate danger now over, I tried to hang up, but the operator insisted on staying on the line until the ambulance showed up. I put her on speakerphone and laid my phone on the table, then looked around, taking in the shocked faces and heavy atmosphere filling the room. Luckily, it was an odd time of day and we were mostly empty, just the aunties and two other tables of our regulars.

I rushed over to the door and flipped the sign over to closed and locked the door. I took two steps before remembering the EMTs would need to get in, so I propped the door open and ran back to the kitchen to get my aunt and grandmother.

Tita Rosie shot out and headed straight toward Ninang June, who was still kneeling by Derek’s side. Before she could say anything, the wail of an ambulance siren filled the room and two EMTs burst in with a stretcher. Lola Flor stayed over by the other members of the Calendar Crew, who were no doubt filling her in on everything that had happened.

I was so focused on calming down the other customers that I wouldn’t have noticed the emergency workers hefting Derek onto the stretcher if I hadn’t heard him vomit as they rolled him out, Mr. Long following in their wake.

As the door swung shut, a heavy silence descended on the restaurant. My aunt stood stock-still, staring out the door long after the ambulance pulled away. Remembering the operator still on the line, I thanked her and hung up, pocketing my phone.

I looked around, not sure what to do. Comfort my aunt? Clean the table? Start ringing up the customers? My thoughts were broken when a child at table four started wailing, and my grandmother met my gaze across the room. With an imperceptible nod toward the table, she instructed me on what to do. I hustled back to the kitchen to prepare some salabat. The hot ginger tea would cure anything that ailed you, and I’d made a few modifications to boost the flavor and health profile.

I set the electric kettle and pulled out the jar of ginger, turmeric, honey, cayenne, and calamansi, the last ingredient adding a refreshing hit of citrus tang. While waiting for the water to boil, I filled mugs with a few spoonfuls of the ginger concoction and then topped them all off with the boiling water. I hefted the tray up to my shoulder and entered the dining room, where no one was speaking above a whisper.

My lola had set out plates of her homemade lengua de gato, the thin, crispy butter cookies matching well with my spicy-sweet brew. Everyone sat around sipping and munching, and I watched as the color returned to their cheeks and the tension left their bodies. Once the cups and plates were emptied, the customers all wiped the crumbs from their mouths and left money on the table, ignoring my aunt’s insistence that they didn’t have to pay. When she tried to hand the money back, everyone fled, leaving her standing with a fistful of cash and a bewildered expression on her face.

Finally, everyone was gone.

Well, everyone but the Calendar Crew.

“Lila, don’t you have anything stronger?” Ninang Mae pointed toward the counter with her lips, gesturing to the bottle of Tanduay Gold Rum we kept for “emergencies.” These emergencies were usually nothing more than an impromptu karaoke night, but for once I agreed with her and broke out the bottle.

I poured a generous shot in each mug except for my aunt’s. She’d seen enough of the problems that alcohol could cause to avoid drinking it herself, but she let us imbibe in her restaurant as long as we were never foolish enough to try to drive home drunk.

I gulped down my drink, welcoming the fire as it coursed down my throat and burned my stomach, bringing tears to my eyes. As I dabbed away at the moisture, the phone rang. I started toward it, but my aunt waved me away, picking it up herself.

“Hello? Mr. Long! How is . . .” She paused, listening to the man on the other end. “I see. Sir, I’m so sorry, I . . . What?” More silence as she listened. “Mr. Long, we had nothing to do with it! We—”

He must’ve hung up on her because she suddenly stopped talking and put the phone down. Lola Flor stood up, and so did I.

I reached out to her. “Tita Rosie? Are you OK?”

She hadn’t moved, hand still on the cradled phone. “Derek’s dead. He’s dead and . . . and the police are heading this way.”

“W-what? Why?”

She turned scared eyes toward me. “Mr. Long thinks we killed Derek.”

Chapter Four

My brain refused to process that comment into coherent speech, leaving me spluttering for a good minute. My grandmother was not so easily rocked.

“Diyos ko, that fool. He’s going to use this as an excuse to kick us out. He’s been trying to for months now.” Lola Flor shook her head, pursing her lips the way she did whenever she saw me tinkering around with her recipes. Such a simple gesture, but it managed to convey just how big of a disappointment she found you.

My godmothers were already gossiping about what they knew of Derek and his family.

“Did you know Derek was still living with his mother when she married Edwin Long two years ago?” Ninang Mae said.

“Of course! Nancy’s health has always been a problem. What was he going to do, leave her all alone in that big house? He may have been an entitled jacka . . . um, jerk, but he was always a good son,” Ninang June said, with a quick glance toward my aunt.

Ninang April straightened up, adopting her “high and mighty pose” as the other aunties liked to call it. “Well, we know that good children stay and take care of their parents, but Edwin Long didn’t agree. Told him he was there to take care of Nancy now, and Derek was an adult and needed to find his own place. Or start paying a larger portion of the mortgage.”

The Calendar Crew all made a tch noise with their lips, indicating their displeasure. Even Tita Rosie was frowning at this information. “That wasn’t even his house to make a decision like that. Poor Derek.”

I fought the urge to roll my eyes. “Poor Derek” was almost thirty years old. I didn’t find it all that unreasonable to have a grown adult start pulling their weight around the house or living on their own and said so.

That was a mistake.

All five wheeled around as one. I don’t know if you’ve ever been stared down by an elderly Asian woman, but It. Is. Terrifying. Don’t be fooled by the cute florals and jaunty visors—these women will end you, wielding nothing but their sharp tongues, bony elbows, and collapsible shopping carts.

“Lila, this is what’s wrong with your generation. All you care about is yourself—your dreams, your needs, your independence. What about your family?”

This was the talk I’d been avoiding for the past few months. Filipinos were all about family. My whole life I’d had the concept of “family first” drilled into my head, and it’s how I’d lived until I went away to college. It’s not that I disagreed with it, exactly. Even someone like me felt utang na loob, that impossible to quantify sense of indebtedness and gratitude, to the people who’d raised me. But where was that magical line between selfishness and independence? Between my family and myself?

“Ninang April, now isn’t the time for that.” I glanced over at Tita Rosie, whose usually lovely golden complexion looked pale and mottled. “Tita, you know Mr. Long better than I do. Was he just grieving and looking for someone to blame? Or do we need to talk to a lawyer?”

She didn’t answer at first, just fidgeted with the glasses that were almost always perched on top of her head and rarely on her face.

I walked over and put my hand on her arm. “Tita Rosie? Are you OK?”

She plonked her glasses on her nose and shook herself. “I’m fine, Lila, stop fussing. And I’m not sure. He sounded serious, but he’s wrong. Derek didn’t have any allergies, so it couldn’t have been my food. It couldn’t have been my food,” she repeated to herself.

Lola Flor cut in. “He was diabetic, though. And he died after eating our desserts. Maybe he wasn’t careful enough about his sugar. He looked a bit ill when we were talking to him.”

Remembering Derek’s pallor and the sweat dotting his forehead, I had to agree with her. “If it was because of his blood sugar, our desserts are not to blame. He knew what he was doing. Mr. Long can’t pin that on us.”

The Calendar Crew exchanged glances. “You obviously don’t know him very well. Isn’t Adeena’s brother a lawyer? Maybe you should call him, just in case.”