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fussy handwriting on the paper sign that ran the length of the top of the front window: “La Petite Pâtisserie Khmère.”
    Inside, a tattooed woman of about forty with long auburn hair pulled beneath a hairnet was working behind the counter, boxing chocolate-sprinkled donuts for a woman and her two children. The tattoo on her forearm was a traditional Khmer design to ward off evil, a yantra depicting two tigers and the Sanskrit words for power and authority.
    When Sam had spent the summer in Des Moines at a Buddhist temple to gain merit, he had also gained a lot of new friends, boys from cities around the Midwest. Some of them had been in gangs. They had tattoos like this, too.
    Sam said it was cool, but Ma wouldn’t let him get one.
    I wondered why this white American woman had a yantra on her arm.
    We waited while she rang up the purchase on a large, old-fashioned cash register, the kind with a cashbox that openedwith the clang of a bell. “That’ll be five twenty-five, sugar,” she told the woman with the kids, and they thanked her and left.
    â€œHi, Anita,” Uncle said. “This is my niece.”
    â€œI’m Nea.” I held out my hand and waited while Anita wiped her hand on a dishtowel and then shook mine. She had a firm grip. She also had a tattoo of a naga snake with a fanned-out hood arching on the inside of her wrist.
    â€œI’ve heard so much about you. Your uncle is very proud of you. It’s nice to meet you finally,” she said. Then she put her hands together in a
sompeah
, the traditional Cambodian greeting, and bobbed her head.
    I didn’t know what to say. I wondered where she had learned such good manners, but didn’t dare ask, as I thought it might seem rude.
    â€œI’m just picking up the next load. I’ll take Nea along with me,” Uncle told Anita, and they disappeared into the kitchen.
    I waited in the front. The shop was less prosperous than I had imagined. There was a single booth, a refrigerated case that held a sparse selection of soda, a Formica counter top that circled in front of the pastry cases, and four swivel stools with cracked, brown vinyl seats. I almost felt sorry for Uncle. He’d never been good at business. I’d somehow assumed that his lack of acumen was due to his constant worries. When Auntie was alive, she was never healthy, always complaining about this or that pain, the side effects of her tranquilizers, about Ma and me. I looked into the empty parking lot, the asphalt colorless under the relentless sunlight. Now I wondered if perhaps running a business was just not his calling.
    Anita returned, laughing. She opened one of the pastry cases, pulled out a couple of perfect shell-like madeleines, and popped one into her mouth. “Mmm, mmm. Honey, you’ve had a long journey, must be feeling a little tired. How about a sugar fix?”
    I shook my head, but Anita insisted. “I’m sure there’s something to tickle your fancy.” She gestured for me to come behind the counter to see the cases up close.
    Every kind of pastry I’d ever imagined was crowded along the metal trays: first there were donuts—baked, plain, glazed, powdered, sprinkles, holes (chocolate and glazed), and jelly-filled—then jelly rolls, bear claws dusted with cinnamon and almonds, crisp palmières, éclairs drizzled with dark chocolate and oozing dollops of fresh custard, tiny fruit tarts with glazed berries like fresh kisses preserved in aspic, chocolate-dipped strawberries, crepes in the shapes of small animals, profiteroles made with dough so flaky I could almost taste the butter in the air, croissants, pastel
macarons
in Easter basket shades, and butter cookies drizzled with chocolate, crushed almonds, hardened caramel sauce, dark cocoa, and powdered sugar.
    â€œIf you’d come on a Wednesday, we’d have had mousse—strawberry and chocolate.” Anita popped a donut