Death by Food Truck by Joi Copeland

Author:Joi Copeland [Copeland, Joi; Hickey, Cynthia; Johnson, Linda Baten; Lilly, Teresa Ives]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781636095950
Publisher: Barbour Publishing, Inc.
Published: 2023-02-15T00:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER TWO

As a nurse, I’d worked the second shift, and my body battled the transition to the early hours as Tater’s food truck helper. I yawned as I riffled through my bag, checking for phone, keys, tissues, and lip balm. Before I closed my door, Nila Tran emerged from her unit across the landing. The two of us occupied identical apartments above the quilt shop on Main Street and shared the joint landing and staircase to the street level, but I’d never been in her place, and she hadn’t visited mine.

“Morning, Nila.”

“Shanice.” Her smile didn’t reach her eyes as she nodded to me, but they opened wide when she touched her neck. “My ngoai’s necklace.” She flung open her apartment door and hurried back inside.

Waiting for her to return, I peeked into the room. Her place looked as sterile as an operating theater. I’m neat but not a neat freak. Nila wasn’t the talkative type, but I felt uncomfortable with only name acknowledgments when we met. I hoped to see something within her apartment that might help me start a conversation. Fresh flowers graced the small dining table, and a framed map appeared to be the lone wall decoration.

Nila returned to the landing and fingered the carved wooden beads around her neck before shutting the door and inserting the key.

“I don’t bother with keys here in Birch Tree,” I said as we started down the stairs together.

“You should,” she said.

“I noticed you have a map on the wall.” I waited for her to respond.

“My country.”

“Vietnam, right? My grandpa and Lyman Ernst served there.”

“You call destroying my family’s village a service?” She punctuated her bitter remark with a derisive snort. “My grandparents lived in Quang Nam province along the coast. When they applied for asylum after losing everything, officials told them you sometimes must destroy a village to save it in war. Can you believe that?”

Determined to be pleasant, I persevered with a different topic. “I’ve noticed you always wear that necklace.”

Her fingers touched the individual beads as if saying a rosary. “It belonged to my ngoai. That’s our word for grandmother. She was wearing this necklace when she fled. She gave it to my mother, who passed it on to me. I can’t chat. I’m opening the quilt shop today.” Nila turned to the quilt store’s front door on Main Street.

So much for becoming better acquainted with my neighbor. The Tran family history with Birch Tree went back fifty years. Helen Randall’s mother, Sarah, became a peace advocate when her husband died in the early days of the twenty-year Vietnam War, leaving her a widow to raise baby Helen alone. Community members either lauded or loathed Sarah’s strong opinion about the war but admired the actions backing her stance. She offered to share her home with Vietnamese refugees in the resettlement program, and Nila’s grandparents lived with Sarah until they got on their feet and moved. When Nila returned to Birch Tree several years ago, Helen offered her a job and rented her the apartment over the quilt shop.

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