I tossed AJ two bottles of ice-cold water. And he tossed one of them over to his cousin, Jun, who'd just dumped a batch of honey chicken out of a deep fryer basket.

"You two okay?" I asked, wiping my own sweaty brow. "You'll get a break in a few minutes."

Jun, the elder cousin of the two who'd lent us the truck, smiled and said, "Ego's a little bruised. We never raked it in like this."

I was surprised he still had jokes. Cause they'd been frying chicken and corn dogs—AJ in cap and sunglasses--from the moment Security removed the barricades at both ends of Main Street that morning.

Yep, our "Seoul Food" was the runaway hit of the First Annual Whitman Food Fest. We got all the long timers right away. They were always first in line for big events, given how few there used to be.

I mean, an old timey train with the big smokestack and all just brought out damned near the entire population, kids on shoulders and cameras ready to "witness history" passing by. Hell, a new McDonalds was big news when I was growing up.

So once a few long timers saw those crazy corn dogs, all the rest came swarming at us like those little black ants that get into the house every now and then out our way.

Wasn't what the fancy folk had in mind, of course. They'd used their media connects to brag about all the chichi chefs who'd moved to our little corner of the world.

Local and national media showed up hungry for those happy little "Small town with big names," features they tack on the end of news broadcasts.

Followed the swarm right up to our truck. Stayed in line, too. I mean, we were calling it "Seoul Food," right? To them it sounded like we were selling the kind of exotic street food you see on those Netflix shows.

A TV crew from the ABC affiliate in Phoenix asked if we'd be willing to come down and do one of those little cooking demostrations to show people how to make some corn dogs, too.

And we were red hot on Twitter, Threads, Tiktok and Instagram, too. A lot of people showed up after seeing us online, in fact—the slide and the French fry dog were big hits.

So, we would've been totally fricked if my aunts, uncles and cousins hadn't stepped up. And shout out to AJ's cousins, Jun and Hyung, too.

They'd renewed all their permits and licenses in case they wanted to get back out on the road or set up in front of the store weekends and holidays as the grandparents had suggested more than a few times.

And they signed up to run the kitchen with a little help from me and my fam. Though most of my family members would be back in Ahn's kitchen making that batter and all the sides.

Oh—we had Ronnie and Yoli, too. Those rascals hauled that somen slide down to us in a big truck, talking about, "It's our turn," bless their hearts.

All three of us stayed at Mama Sadie's that week, getting bossed around by Auntie Jennie. She was used to organizing huge outdoor and indoor church events.

She helped me set up a schedule to rotate all the family volunteers from the truck window to the somen room to Ahn's kitchen and back again in groups of three. While the "Seoul brothers," (our new nickname for AJ, Jun and Hyung), helped me learn how to run the truck kitchen.

So, it was me, AJ and Jun frying up that "Hallyu Honey Chicken," (plain, mild and hot) and four kinds of Korean corn dogs while Hyung was up front making "bingsu" and Bennie took orders.

That's this Korean shaved ice thing he studded with all kinds of candy, cookies, fruit and whatever else people chose from the menu. The ice was made of condensed milk that made it like a creamy sorbet—that made the foodies come running.

And that's how they saw Ronnie's somen slide across the sidewalk from the truck. The rocks looked so real that the Ahns wanted to display it like a fountain when it wasn't sliding somen.

In fact, Grandma Ahn was so in love with it that her eyes teared up—she insisted we teach her how to run it, too. Wouldn't let anybody else take that job. Sat there grinning from ear to ear as she sent the little clumps of somen down every few minutes. So cute.

We set up a reservation system for the slide—one party per hour from noon to 7 p.m. And the foodies booked it solid as soon as a few of the ones in the truck line caught a glimpse of our first test runs.

And man, the Seoul Brothers and I were exhausted by the time Jennie sent out Junior and Bam, uncles who'd worked Mama Sadie's kitchen, to take over the cooking while we took a little break.

There was a table full of food and snacks for volunteers in the store kitchen where the fam was mixing batters and cutting up the veggies and bingsu toppings and whatnot.

But AJ stopped dead in his tracks suddenly just as we walked through the double doors and said, "Listen to that." All reverent like there were monks in there cooking.

"What, the singing?" I asked.

He gaped at my nonchalance. "It's like a Kirk Franklin concert in here!"

The other two also seemed pretty gobsmacked. Exchanged smiles. Eyes sparkling.

So I said, "That's how we do in the Quarters. To make time pass, bless the food we're about to serve—I don't know, just to celebrate being alive, basically. Surviving here together for so long."

AJ asked, "Do you sing?"

With so much hope in his eyes I hated having to tell him the truth.

"Not like that, sorry. They're choir-baptized, these ones. But Mama Sadie never pushed me to join in on any of that. We went to church, but...well...that's a whole story we don't have time for today."

Aunt Bessie looked over from whatever she was seasoning in a big bowl at one of the tables. "Woman never got over your real mama dyin' the way she died. Said any God would kill a carfulla sweet young things hadn't never harmed nobody wasn't a God she wanted to be singin' about."

AJ's eyes saddened immediately, but Bessie shooed us toward the food table and said, "Y'all go make some plates and set down out back away from the smell o' cookin'."

Two young cousins, Renee and Paulette, made us these massive sandwiches from ham and beef that'd been oven roasted at home for all the volunteers. There was deviled egg potato salad and all kinds of good stuff to go with that, too. Cakes, pies—picnic fixin's.

And Yoli had made a big old pot of posole, too. With lime wedges and roasted green chilis and all the other fixin's on the counter next to it.

I had just taken a big spoonful of that when Bennie came running outside from the kitchen. Hissing, "People out ther talkin' about they need to inspect that fountain thing y'all got in there."

"What people?" AJ asked.

"County Health Department! Scared all them customers away—TV people, saw it, too. They in there with Jennie right now snoopin' around."

AJ leapt up but I raised a palm hoping he'd get past the knee jerk reaction to the reality of his being there without his cap and sunglasses on. There were some pretty "worldly" types out there—the media might suss him out, too. Or catch him on camera and get discovered by some K-pop stan who'd tweet up a storm...

So I said, "I'll just go see what's up, okay? This'll give you guys a little more break time."

Inside, there were two men dressed all "casual Friday." Meaning obviously on the job but trying not to look too "official."

And next to them were two festival committee women I recognized from meetings all the vendors had attended. One owned a café, the other, a French bakery.

They both gave me hesitant, "Is she going to go all ghetto on us?" looks. No doubt feeling a little uneasy surrounded by so many "brown" people—brown people holding knives and shit, too.

But one of the suits said, "They heard from some of the guests and a few vendors—"

"Heard?" I said. Sassy enough for the two women to flinch a little bit.

And the café owner—her little name tag said "Rae" on it—cautiously said, "The...chopsticks." Pincering her fingers to illustrate, I guess.

"When they grab the noodles out of the water and eat them, it's like double-dipping, right?" the other one, "Bailey" according to her tab, offered just as carefully.

"They use little plastic tongs to grab them," I said. "They only eat them with chopsticks."

"And the tongs are disposable?" one suit asked—they weren't wearing name tags.

"Plasticware, yes. Packaged. All the utensils are packaged and disposed of after each party leaves."

He thumb-typed something on his cell and then looked up at me again. "And the noodles they miss?"

"They're scooped up after each party leaves, too. So are all the leftover condiments."

"And discarded?"

"What are you—you think we send them back out again?"

The other suit quickly said, "We're not tryin'a insinuate anything, okay? But we're going to have to take a closer look before you re-open. Shouldn't take too long."

"So, you closed us down?" AJ asked. Fully capped and "shaded," behind me.

"We received a few calls on this tip line handles complaints about food events so's we can get on it quick. Before we get an outbreak of food poisoning or somethin'."

I put hands on hips. "Anonymous calls, right?"

Rae and Shayla started to turn a wee bit crimson in the face. But the suits hardened up.

The one who'd told us about the tip line said, "Listen, the sooner we get on this, the sooner you can get back to work, right? It's just a precaution."

The icy eyes told me we might not be back to work all that soon. If at all.

Those weren't "complaint" calls they'd received. They were more like "distress" calls.

And I kinda knew who'd made them, too.