Two weeks later Mai, now wrapped up in a red wool coat with a white hat and gloves, met Huỳnh Hồng Liên for tea. Chị Liên’s husband, a former major in the South Vietnamese army, wanted to open a restaurant, but once Chị Liên met Tippi Hedren while they were still in California, they decided they wanted to open a nail salon in Chicago.
“My husband will run the business, and I will manage the employees,” Chị Liên said. “Of course, it is just a temporary situation for us. We expect the North will release our money, which we could not bring out before we left. And once that happens . . .” She intentionally let her voice trail off.
She still called them the North, Mai noted. But the North were Communists and they now ran the country. She almost wished her luck getting her money out but decided it was wiser to defer to her potential new boss. “Of course,” Mai said. “I understand.”
Chị Liên sniffed, as if Mai’s submissive attitude was her due. She stirred her tea. “I understand you have experience in manicures?”
“I gave manicures in Vietnam. Women love them.”
“What is there to love?”
Mai sipped her tea. She remembered when the cousin’s friend at the Binh Tay market gave Mai her first manicure while she was pregnant. “We have such busy lives. Working jobs, caring for children and husband, keeping the house clean. A manicure is a special time for a woman. When I had my first one, I felt pampered. As if I had gone on a tiny vacation. And when it was done, I felt beautiful. Every woman deserves to feel that way.”
Chị Liên cocked her head, as if Mai was an odd species of animal she was examining. “I need someone to help me start the business. Run the shop. And bring in customers. If you are interested, we will pay you twenty-five percent of what we bring in.”
Mai shifted. “Twenty-five percent?”
The woman nodded.
“You want me to help you set up, run the shop, attract the customers. What will you be doing?”
“We are supplying the financing. And my husband will keep the books.”
“You want to hire me as your employee. Yet you want me to do the work of a partner. If that is the case, fifty percent is fair.”
Chị Liên put her teacup down and folded her hands in her lap. “Thirty-five percent. And that is my last offer.”
“Forty,” Mai countered. “In writing. For one year. We renegotiate after that.”
“You seem very sure of yourself.”
Mai smiled. “I have experience. My English is very good. And I am a hard worker.”
They found space in an Uptown strip mall just two blocks from Mai’s apartment. Major Hồng, or the Major, as he liked to be called, assembled a crew of workers who sanded the floor, painted the walls, fixed up the bathroom, and built shelves and two manicure stations. Mai printed flyers in Vietnamese, Chinese, and English. She persuaded Chị Liên to charge less than the other salons in the area, sure that more female clients—she suggested they call them “clients” rather than customers; it was more respectful—would try the salon if the price for a manicure was ten dollars or less. Of course, that was ten times more than it had been in Vietnam.
Mai recognized how much more expensive everything was in the U.S., but she didn’t know why. The Chapmans tried to explain that each penny of that ten dollars ended up paying for rent and utilities, supplies, wages for employees, and taxes, both federal and state. Whatever was left—and they should always try to have some left—was profit. Wasn’t that also the case in Vietnam, they asked?
Mai remembered negotiating top-dollar rates when she was a prostitute, but her price didn’t include these costs. She had never paid taxes and doubted most small businesses in Saigon did. Money changed hands differently in Vietnam, she said. “Overhead,” as the Chapmans called it, was a new concept. The Chapmans didn’t pursue the matter.
She and Chị Liên planned a festive grand-opening party during Tết 1976. Mai and Đêm Nguyệt distributed flyers all over the neighborhood as far east as Lake Michigan and as far west as Ashland Avenue. Mai cooked spring rolls and bánh xèo, a Vietnamese crepe. Chị Liên brought cookies and cake. They agreed to hold a raffle for five free manicures.
The crowd overflowed the shop. It seemed as if everyone in the Chicago Vietnamese community, which was expanding daily, came to the opening of the Lotus Nail Salon. Mai scribbled down appointments all afternoon; Chị Liên and the Major acted like Asian royalty, sauntering around the room and nodding graciously. Mai didn’t mind; she had created it. She knew it would succeed.
After a few weeks, word spread and the salon grew busy from the time it opened at ten am til it closed at six pm. Mai was the only staff on hand. The Major came in two or three afternoons a week to go over the books, he claimed, although when Mai saw him, he was usually behind a desk looking off into space, hands clasped behind his head. Chị Liên hardly came in at all.
Mai would walk Đêm Nguyệt to school, then get herself ready for work. She needed to be well groomed, her nails looking perfect, so that her clients were confident in her ability. She’d work all day, then temporarily close the salon while she picked him up and brought him back with her. Many times her clients brought their children, too, and they would play in the back of the shop. That gave Mai an idea to propose to Chị Liên at some point. At the end of the day, the Major would total up their receivables and take out some for overhead. Mai would get forty percent of what was left. She loved getting money every day.
Within a month, they had to hire a second manicurist. There were more than twenty applicants, most of them Vietnamese, because the girls only needed to learn a few phrases in English to get by. Most of their customers were Asian anyway. She chose a sweet young girl named Kim Hoa, after Hoa gave Mai a manicure and Mai was sure she knew what to do.
Đêm Nguyệt settled into school, just as Irene Chapman had promised, and learned English at an astonishing rate. He made friends easily, both Asian and American. Mai learned about Cub Scouts, sleepovers, birthday parties, and carpools. All of it took money. She was making it, but just barely, and was grateful that her rent was subsidized by Catholic Charities for the first year.
Mai thought back to the years of war, with its death, chaos, and uncertainty. She recalled the miserable years when she had nothing to sell but her body. She no longer recognized the young girl from a Mekong village who thought the world owed her its best. She wasn’t the same person. She thought, too, about Anh Vinh, who had saved her from whoring. And she thought about Sandy. He was the primary reason she’d lobbied to come to Chicago. The first man to whom she’d given herself completely. And now the Buddha was blessing her. It was time for Sandy to meet his son.