snailphobia

I agreed to get dinner with Isaac and his father, Alain, who is the most French-Frenchman in existence. I met Alain two months into dating Isaac, when he invited me to an all-day Lunar New Year bar crawl in Chinatown and failed to mention that his parents and entire family are in annual attendance. Despite living in the tri-state area for over 30 years, Alain still has a thick french accent. At Thanksgiving, I couldn’t understand a word he said. I later discovered that many of Isaac’s cousins don’t either. 

Alain and I have spoken very little in the two years that I have been dating Isaac. Generally, he leaves all of the social activity to his wife – the matriarch, breadwinner, and glue of the family. Isaac and his mother fill the air with discussion and bickering while Alain and I sit back and think about our own lives. Occasionally, while Isaac and Denise are fighting, we will make eye contact, smile and shake our heads with an unspoken bond of the neuroticism we have mutually agreed upon in our partners.

I arrived at Le Gigot in Greenwich Village at 7:59 PM. The last few times I have met with Isaac and his parents I was ten minutes late, so I made a point not to be. Alain enforced timeliness, so Isaac has never been late, except today, due to a “work emergency.”

Faire la bise is the French tradition of greeting with two kisses, one on each cheek. I am far too American or perhaps Asian to naturally grasp the logistics of la bise. The intricate rules: how close is too close to another’s cheek, if I am to really make the sound of a kiss, are both cheeks required or can I get away with one.

When I greet my cousins in Indonesia after not having seen them in ten years, we wave hello with a shy tight-lipped smile, barely making eye contact, figuratively still hiding behind our moms’ skirts. We meet for the first time, every time we see each other. When we were kids, they would point to something and say “pinjam?” which means “borrow?” during dinner. I would nod yes, not knowing what it meant, and they would eat the food right off my plate. I thought it was hysterical. Their blatant disregard of manners was comforting to me. Indonesians are very polite to elders, patrons and foreigners, but to family and friends –  direct and barbed. I find flowery manners exhausting but understand their necessity in society. I just wish it wasn’t my society.

At an East Village cafe this past Wednesday, while waiting for a latte, my neighbor CJ approaches. We smile at each other through a pane of glass. When he walks in, I make a faux-upset face and say “aww man, who let you in here?” while raising my hand for a high-five. I prefer this greeting. On our walk back to the apartment building, he gives me a piece of his croissant and we talk about martini shakers and the last date he went on. I wish I could talk to everyone this way.

I greet Alain his French way, my cheek about an inch and a half away from his each side and making no noises to be safe, despite the wind outside. Work has kept Isaac so busy these days, I say. I smile a lot when talking to give the impression that I’m bubbly. Alain says that we may as well sit. At 75, he can’t stand for a long period of time.

Alain hunches with both his hands clasped behind his back. He is already a large man and I know he used to be much taller because of his son’s height. He had Isaac in his 40s when he decided it was time to settle down. Before Isaac, he traveled the world. He has told me a few stories of his past lives, as a restauranteur, chef, art dealer, and soldier. He told me a story this past Mother’s Day in Connecticut about the time he transported elephants from Africa to the British Virgin Islands for an art collector he was doing real estate for.

“Shall we?” He holds one arm out for me to follow the hostess while he walks behind. It takes him longer to walk there so we slow down for him without making it obvious.

As we sit, I am unsure what to talk about. I have never spoken to him without his wife as our cultural intermediary. Plus, I am bad at talking to adults. All of my older relatives lived in Indonesia and were not fluent in English, the only language I knew. I have tried talking to Alain using polite conversation about the weather or work or drama between Isaac’s friends, the kind of superficial chatter that works on Chinese-American tiger moms. It doesn’t work on Alain. The man moves like an armored vehicle, slow and protected. Tough and unwavering. Mows through  traffic. Maybe he and I are more similar than we think, disinterested in traditional conventions, content with silence, hard to bond with.

I pay attention to my self-taught manners. I move the utensils to the side and place the napkin on my upper knee. I pass him the wine menu. I refrain from chugging water from the miniature glass and take several small sips. I discreetly check the time under the table.

Isaac texts:

8:03 PM

may be here another hour. you guys eat without me and ill join for a drink after?

8:04 PM

sorry sorry sorry i know

When the waitress comes around, Alain pronounces a wine that I do not recognize. I gesture “two” with my fingers and a short smile. I tell Alain that we may just want to order since Isaac is held up. He nods and looks over the menu. I ask if he minds ordering for us both as he knows French food the best. I joke that if we were at an Indonesian restaurant, he might still know the food best.

The waitress sets our glasses of red wine down for just a moment before I raise mine for its very own la bise with my lips. Alain orders food in French while I drink.

I excuse myself to the restroom so that I can reply to Isaac and scroll on Instagram for a few minutes on the toilet. I care what Isaac’s father thinks of me, but it’s hard to know how to act when Isaac doesn’t know either. Their relationship is practically non-existent. His parents’ marriage was Alain’s third, and his son wasn’t sure if he ever wanted kids. Aside from driving Isaac to swim practice and school, there wasn’t much they bonded or talked about. Maybe I’m evading accountability for being an overall awkward person. Isaac is better in social situations and generally a more joyous human being than I am. I wish he was here. 

I scroll past a college friend’s engagement photos and an ad for tinted lip balm. I thought about my own dad. I actually got along with my dad very well. Despite his absence from much of my childhood, we would talk over chai tea after school and on breaks home from college. I just never trusted him. I don’t speak to him anymore. I consider the possibility that my discomfort with Isaac’s dad has something to do with these feelings. Then I get up and flush with my boot.

When I sit back down at the table, Alain asks me a question about work which I happily answer in twice the amount of words I would usually use. Filling dead air, I talk about viewership declines on broadcast cable but all the new distribution deals we have with streaming partners. I talk about my latest job interviews and my future goals. I hope this is a little bit impressive to him, but I see him looking around, aloof. Maybe he doesn’t understand a word I’m saying with my accent either.

The smell of garlic and butter wafts through the air. I am excited for a moment until I see that our waitress has come with escargot on a special tray with six divots. Alain straightens his back curvature slightly, ready to eat a childhood favorite. I stare at the plate descending onto our table. At the same pace, my heart is dropping straight down into my stomach.

* * * *

Walking home from elementary school, I occasionally heard the crunch of a snail shell underneath my size four Vans slip-on. It was first the sound, then the slippery squish of the snail’s body that made me skid slightly. Sometimes it was a baby snail, trailing behind its mother. These were higher pitched.

I would scream ‘ew’ fifteen times in a row while my brother laughed at my discomfort. Alec was four years older and lived without remorse on just about everything. I could footnote some 2000’s New York Times article on how motion graphic first-person shooter games have contributed to the lack of empathy in violent young boys in their most developmental stages, but he actually grew up and turned out just fine. Responsible. Respectable, even. I would love him either way, probably.

While he was in middle school, Alec would walk me home from elementary school, from first to fourth grade. He attended the same school, Plaza Vista School K-8. I always imagined it was very embarrassing for him to have to wait for his little sister at the elementary side when all the big kids would walk to McDonalds or 7-Eleven after school. He never seemed to care what others were doing. Sometimes I would walk over to the middle school side and he would be waiting for me, playing basketball with this girl Gabriella Jones. They even let me play with them sometimes.

“Are you Alec’s sister? Here! You try.” Gabby said with a two-row smile.

I was very shy as a child. I nod.

“Like this!” She made a basket effortlessly and I catch the semi-deflated ball. I miss because I’m too short.

I visited that school during a college break. The basketball hoops were so low. I wish I could remember the exact moment the adults stopped talking to me like a child, to experience that gentle coddle one more time. As a child, I met Alec’s friends and teachers who talked to him like a person and talked to me like a baby. I was confused because our parents talked to us both exactly the same way, which was the same way they talked to each other, like adults.

Both of our parents worked full time. They left us alone in the 2-bedroom apartment for hours. We never had a babysitter or playdates at our house because no parent would agree to their child coming without adult supervision. To me and Alec, we were each other’s supervision and unspoken best friends. We were first-generation which meant that we were different, in between the cultures and rules of two places. We were smarter than American kids, more independent, and exempt from daycare (and certain child care laws). This was nothing to our mother who, as a 10 year old, would drive her family around Jakarta in a big van, sitting on a stack of phone books. Now that I think about it, we were probably just poor.

Alec had two priorities – making sure I made it home and walking through the door first so he could call dibs on the TV. He didn’t care if he crushed snails or their babies. He only cared about playing Grand Theft Auto on PS2.

One day he stepped on a snail by accident while looking at a house across the street. I shrieked, “Alec you killed it! Ew! Wipe your shoe!” He laughed maniacally in a pre-pubescent pitch, took off the shoe with the snail remains and chased me with it. I screamed and ran away from him, dropping my backpack somewhere along the way, in tears. 

I dreaded walking home on the days it would rain. The snails would come out of the meticulously manicured planters and bushes and follow us. I carefully walked around them with my roller backpack tightly behind me, slowly taking the narrow path around the snails, and then running to catch up with my brother who hardly looked back.

On the rainiest day of our California winter, we were just a couple streets away from home and Alec found the biggest snail yet, picked it up by its brown shell from the corner of the curb, and held it up to my face. This time, I pretended to be unbothered, even when he turned it to show me the bottom of its slug body – excruciating. The edges of its yellow-brown body were a shade of green, furling inwards, looking to suction onto something. Its antennas were an inch long and moving. I remained calm. Fear would only provoke his torment. 

I kept walking and advanced in front of him. Threatening his stake in the TV, I mentioned that Full House was on.

He wound up his arm and threw the snail as far as he possibly could over a fence into the neighboring baseball field. 

“I THINK I HEARD IT SPLAT!” Alec yells.

Relief. I waited on the porch for him and let him into the apartment first. I was never going to beat him inside in the first place – he was the one with the keys.

* * * *

I decide that declining to eat this escargot with Alain would paint me as weak, uncultured, and disrespectful. My long nails dig into my palms. The pain in my hands helps absorb the stress in my chest.

After watching him do the same, I prod one snail with a small fork, wriggle it out of the shell, and bring it to my mouth. I focus on the hostess standing in the corner and breathe out from my nose. I push through, finally placing it in my mouth, chewing with my back right molars.

My tongue meets a slimy and buttery outer layer. I begin to bite down into the soft and slippery thing. As soon as it bounces back against my teeth, my jaw locks in place. I look around  in feared paralysis. I cannot swallow. I cannot keep it in my mouth.

On the inside of my cheek, I feel the gelatinous ball of slug pulse. Pulse again. I must be hallucinating. It moves again, this time trying to unfurl itself. I cough out the uncooked snail onto my plate. I am clenching two corners of the table now and trembling, retching the garlic butter slime out of my mouth and throat. Alain is horrified. I do not care. I spit.

I look down at the remaining escargot in the special tray. The shells start moving, rotating positions in their designated circular pits. The zombie-escargot begins crawling out of each garlic butter shell, antennae first. They return to their plump snail form and squirm off the plate.

My chest tightens over a rapid heart rate. There is a high pitched screech in my ears. Alain looks at me with startled, furled brows and says muffled words that I cannot hear over the high pitched tone. The walls are stretched longways, the chandelier blurry. Alain’s face becomes scrambled, as though someone used a wet oil painting of him as a hand towel. 

A trail of snails move up the legs of the chair my legs are propped against. They touch my naked calf and slowly curve their slug bodies around both limbs. The snails feel cold and wet. 

I stood up, too quickly, knocking over my chair and shaking off my legs. Utensils and plates clatter. The snails multiply by the second, covering the table, crawling up the walls, under each chair. I look at the outline of Alain who is unable to dart out of his chair quickly because of his bad back. He is covered entirely in snails, fixed to his seat. They are all different shades of brown, all different sizes. They smell musky and earthy. 

Tables and patrons have become mounds of a thousand snails. I stumble backwards to get away from it all, but the floor is completely snail. I crush ten at a time with every step I take. I nearly slip, skidding on their gel texture. I run towards the door, or a rectangle shape that resembles a door, and go as fast as I can.

I reach Cornelia Street facing oncoming traffic. The fresh air sobers me until I realize the smell of damp asphalt. It must have rained while we were in the restaurant. When I look down at the rain-splotched sidewalk, I see a winding trail of slime from Le Gigot as a baby  snail meets the heel of my boot. I begin sprinting down Bleecker and briefly vomit in my mouth. I close my eyes, and swallow – I no longer hear any cars.

When I open my eyes, I see familiar palm and oak trees on a dark suburban street. As I run down the street with longer strides, almost prancing, I recognize rambutan fruits somehow growing from the oak trees. My grandma used to pick and peel these red prickly fruits for me in Jakarta. Slowing to a skip, in my elementary school yard, I see a jackfruit the size of a dog weighing down its tree branches. The same fruit my cousins and I chopped down as kids. The air is humid at almost 85 degrees at night. There is the nostalgic smoky smell in the air. In California, it signifies a beach bonfire. In Jakarta, it means someone is burning their trash. I love that smell. The pavement ahead is cracked and uneven, the buildings and trees loom over me, as though they were staring down at me as I find home.

In the distance, a little girl, no older than eight, in jeans and a blue zip up hoodie. She has one checkered shoe on and the other in her hand.

I call to her. She doesn’t react.

From the middle of the street, the girl hops on her single shoed foot to the curb of the sidewalk, spins backwards, and sits down.

“Are you okay?” I ask.

My breath slows down. The unsettling quiet soon became calming. My heart and stomach became weightless once again. I looked up at the moon which seemed much lower here than in New York. I walk closer to her. She looks like my whole family’s faces melted into one.

“Are you alone, sweetie? We don’t play in the streets alone, okay?” I instinctively use a maternal tone, even though she’s probably too old for that.

She scrapes the bottom of her shoe on the curb painted red. I take a seat next to her. Suddenly I learn exactly where I am. I am in a world where there is one universal language. Children drive cars. Parents don’t go to work. No one is lonely. Conversations no longer begin with a kiss or hello. Snails have gone extinct.

She smiles and shows me the bottom of her shoe. Clean.