The kare-kare place became a Wednesday ritual.
Not because we had formally agreed to it. Because the first Wednesday after the Andrada wedding Diego had appeared at my desk at noon and said: kare-kare? And I had said yes and we had gone and it had been good and the following Wednesday it had happened again without either of us bringing it up and by the third Wednesday it was simply a thing that happened on Wednesdays.
This Wednesday was the fourth.
The whole Estrella Co. team came this time, the way they had come to the first lunch that Chari had called, which meant the table was full and the conversation was loud and Gio had opinions about the preparation of kare-kare that he delivered with the specificity of someone who had been thinking about this for years.
"The oxtail," Gio said.
