Goodbye Jerry (Part 3)

Hello Steemians! As promised, here’s my part 3 story.

From my previous post HERE, I mentioned that my boyfriend, Jerry (who is now my husband ❤️ ) and I opened our own Chippy shop in Liverpool, UK. The business was getting better and we hired another chef so we can start doing delivery too. We bought a car and Jerry was the one doing the delivery, where else I take care of taking in orders and make the orders ready. We also hired another part-time driver during peak hours.

The car which we bought in Liverpool

After about half a year, we expanded to open another shop near to the Goodison Park (Everton Football Stadium). Jerry’s sister was the one who manages the second shop. We went to Liverpool together, but she was staying in another area with her boyfriend. That shop was super busy whenever there’s a match going on as it was "swamped" by the super crazy Everton fans!

Just as we thought everything goes smoothly, something unexpected happened a few months later.

So, it was a Saturday evening.
Weekends were mostly quite a busy day for our Chippy because most families would gather for dinner. If they did not feel like cooking dinner, they would just call in and ask for a delivery. Most of the orders were banquets, which includes some starters, soups and quite a few meals in a banquet, and end with a very nice dessert, banana fritters (which is my favorite too!).

Source

We received quite a number of banquet orders that evening. Jerry went to the sister’s shop to help out on the food delivery, hence It was just me, the chef, and our part-time driver, Xiao Gao (a student from China from quite a wealthy family), preparing all the orders in the shop.

I was busy taking phone calls, serving the walked-in customers, frying the starters and packing the banquets at the same time. Suddenly, my phone rang. It was Jerry.

This was what he said over the phone:
“I was arrested by the Police. I’m in the police car, going to the police station now.”

He was detained in jail for a night (which was at the police station right opposite our shop!) and then he was transferred to the detention centre for a week. (For those who knows him personally, you can ask him about his experience next time when you bump into him. He said it was not a bad experience after all, lol!)

What actually happened was, his car’s tail light was broken and he did not notice that. The policeman stopped him while he was on his way to deliver the food to the customer, to remind him the car’s tail light was broken. They checked his ID after that and found out there’s some issue with his working visa. The working visa was applied when we were in the UK, and the policeman said it was not valid anymore.

He was going to be sent back to Malaysia!!! 😱

Source

That was the after story which I only got to know from him after he had been sent back to Malaysia 7 days later.

At that very moment, he only managed to talk to me for two sentences then he hangs up. I did not hear from him anymore until he’s back to Malaysia.

I was stunned for a minute after answering that call.
The driver, Xiao Gao noticed something was wrong and asked what happen. I told him Jerry was arrested by the police. He was surprised when he heard that and getting worried. (We were friends with Xiao Gao and we hang out with each other sometimes, so he knows us quite well)

He kept walking around in the shop and mumbling: Jerry was arrested by the Police, how could that be possible?

Source

While Xiao Gao was walking around the shop, worrying, I message the sister and told her what’s going on in short right after Jerry’s phone call, and continue to run in and out to complete my shop’s order. Running into the kitchen to help the chef to fried some rice (that’s the only thing I know how to do in the kitchen) after serving all the walked-in customers, and running out to the counter to pack the orders.

Xiao Gao then walked up to me, and ask:
“Chris, Jerry has been arrested by the police, what can we do?”

I look at him in the eye and said:
“Xiao Gao, do me a favor. Scrap everything off your mind now. What you can do now, is to help me to deliver these orders to our customers as soon as possible.”

He was stunned for a few seconds, then his expression changed and answered firmly:
“Ok. I know what to do.”

After I closed the shop, I contacted the sister and told her Jerry was arrested and he’s at the police station now, without knowing which police station and what’s his status. His sister then came over to check on me and discussed what can we do next.

So that was what happened.

My friends, who heard this story from me personally, asked: were you not worried when you heard that Jerry was arrested? How can you be so calm?

I said, of course I was worried, and in fact panic too.
Yet, I know clearly that I had to be responsible to fulfill my promise to my customers - they are waiting for us to send their dinner to them. I couldn’t let my emotions to take me over for something which I was not able to change.

So, I was literally left alone (his sister does not stay with me and she was managing the other shop) in the UK to take care of our Chippy. What happened after Jerry was sent back to Malaysia? Can I handle it alone? How long does the shop last?

Let me answer all that in Part 4! :)

Related Post:
My Part 1 Story: What I have been through in the UK when I was 19 years old
My Part 2 Story: I met the angels in the UK