by Gwee Li Sui
The kids noisily demanded some cake. We carried it carefully to the table. I got a knife but, when I began slicing, heard an unexpected crunching noise as it encountered something hard. Ah! It was a glittering diamond ring.
Heavens! Wasn’t this the wedding ring I had given my wife several decades ago? How did it come to be embedded inside Yati’s cake?
The room grew silent. We were all completely shocked, standing there with our mouths wide open, staring helplessly at each other…
Ash and Mud
BY SIMON TAY
Ash
That morning when he walked to the car, it was covered in dust. All over, as if someone had carefully sprinkled talcum powder across the surface. He shook his head, ran a forefinger along the hood, brought the finger up close. A fine, white grey dust that smelt of nothing in particular. He rubbed the finger clean against his thumb, pointed the remote door control, and pressed the green button. All the doors opened with a pneumatic thump. Mei, his wife, got in, slightly awkward from the constraints of her black sheath skirt. Their grey BMW pulled out from the lot and went out of the automatic gate of the condo.
“Did you park near a construction site?”
“Last night? No.”
“Was somebody burning joss sticks?”
“I parked where I always park when I go to the club.”
“Yes, but was anyone burning paper or something?”
“No. There’s no one living around there. Just the carpark.”
“Covered lots or the open ones?”
“The open ones, near the pool.”
“So that’s where it happened.”
“What?”
“All this dust.”
“What dust?”
“Can’t you see it? Look.” He peered over the steering wheel and pointed at the windscreen and the bonnet. “It’s all over the car.”
“I don’t see it.”
“Here.” He stuck the finger out under Mei’s nose.
“What?”
She looked, briefly cross-eyed, but saw nothing. He brought his hand up to his own face, up close, as in “right under your nose”, but the finger had been rubbed clean. Then they were there, at her office.
When the car pulled up into the bay to let her out, he got out too and wiped a finger on the hood again to show her. The streak was clear this time and obvious.
“Better clean your hand.” That was all she said, nodding. She walked away, her high heels clacking against the tiled pavement, joining the stream of people, going into the tall grey building.
Five minutes later, he was at his office, in another grey building across the city. He parked on the second deck as he did always. He checked his gelled hair in the mirror and then took the briefcase from the backseat, ready for another day in the office. But the dust nagged.
He got out, tucked his Dunhill tie into his shirt so that it would not rub against the car, and began to wipe the car with a handful of tissues from the box in the glove compartment. Finished, he cleaned his spectacles and hands with another fresh tissue. He wiped his hands briskly against each other, used the auto-control to lock all the doors, and walked briskly off to the elevator lobby.
Others came from all ends of the carpark, men in their ties and office clothes, some with briefcases like him. They crowded around the elevator doors, waiting, not looking at anything or anyone in particular. The lift came, and they crammed in. The buttons for their different floors were pressed. The lift climbed, and they stood there, facing the doors. Not looking at each other, not waving or acknowledging anyone when, one by one, each left the cubicle of the elevator.
When he came into the office, he nodded good morning to his secretary, Jennie. He went in, opened the briefcase on his desk, and called out for her to set out the priorities for the day: calls to make and meetings, whether with clients or opposing counsel. Only when he sat down did Mark Tan realise his tie was still tucked into his shirt. He took it out, hoping that no one had noticed, and began work.
***
Mei called just after lunch.
“It’s volcanic ash.”
“What?”
“Volcanic ash. The dust on the car’s from that volcano that’s been acting up in the Philippines. The one that’s been in the newspapers. You know, Pinatubo, years ago? This is like that, but not so bad. It’s got nothing to do with me going to the club or where I parked.”
“The Philippines? Are you sure?”
“Everyone in the office says so. Susan says her car had the dust too, and she parked in a covered carpark all night. What do the people in your office say?”
“I haven’t had time to ask.”
“We went out for lunch, and lots of cars had it. Worse than ours, much worse. It’s ash. Definitely. Can you imagine? All the way from the Philippines?”
“Big explosion. Strong winds, I guess.”
“I’d better ask Amelia to take in all our wet clothes and put them in the drier. Otherwise they’ll pick up all the dust, hanging outside. I’d better ask her to mop too. Remind me, OK?”
Mei was very organised. She had carefully trained and supervised the maid since Amelia arrived. When she went through the things that had to be done at home, Mark knew that he was not expected to remind her of any of them. She just said them aloud like a list, reminding herself and her voice sounded tinny, faraway. He said “Yah” anyway.
Jennie came to his door, poked her head in, and said softly, “Mr. Chan on the phone for you.”
“Yah,” he said again, both into the phone and to Jennie who stood waiting door, leaning against the door frame. “I’ve got to go, Mei. Urgent call.” He said it and quickly put the phone down. It rang immediately. Efficient girl, that Jennie, he thought for a second.
***
Chan Tong Soon was a senior manager for the client in the Myanmar deal, a company that did properties, cement, heavy equipment, and even some manufacturing and car loans. Chan was years older, but Mark called him Tong Soon, and cases were referred directly to him, bypassing layers in between. Chan was Mark’s uncle’s golfing kaki, and Mark did not question the good fortune of connections and knowing people.
“Mark? Tong Soon here.”
“Hi, Tong Soon. Things OK?”
“Who calls his lawyer when things are OK?” the old man said, and Mark laughed.
“What’s up then? Another one of your officers does something stupid?”
“No, not today.” Mark laughed again, heartily.
“What is it, Tong Soon? You think I have nothing else to do but listen to your jokes?” he bantered.
“Yes.” Mark laughed again, even more heartily.
“I’m sending instructions to you to tie things up, before I transfer the file.”
“Transfer the file? To which officer? Look, Tong Soon, if I can say, this is a fairly difficult matter, and I’d prefer to deal with you directly. I think we’ve got a settlement and I’m drafting the papers. But it’s delicate and easier to get the right decisions if it’s you. Don’t give me some junior officer.”
“Well, it’s not to one of my officers, Mark. It’s the new Vice-President for the division, Richard Dowell. I’m being transferred.”
Chan Tong Soon did not say very much after that, and Mark did not laugh any more. He was moving to a dusty, cobwebbed graveyard for senior staff as soon as possible. Current matters would remain with Mark, but there was no guarantee about future projects that would arise – that was beyond his dwindling power. His task was just to hand things over smoothly.
Mark imagined the files stacked in neat rows with a memo on top and the plain mover’s boxes arriving at the department – so quiet that, even when it was cleaned, there was a sense of cobwebs and dust.
Keep in touch, he said. Mark said that he would. But, while the appointment book was open on the desk, he did not try to fix a date for even a drink. When he put down the phone, Mark remembered meeting Richard Dowell once or twice before when the American first was hired. He wou
ld have to call to congratulate him on the promotion, buy him lunch. Was he called Richard or Dick?
***
It was almost 7 p.m. He had marked up by hand all the pages where there might be some small remaining points of contention, and rushed these out to Jennie’s desk. She was coming in to see if the papers were ready, and they almost crashed into each other in the doorway. He thrust the papers into her hands, without a word. She walked to the scanner as fast as her tight, black skirt allowed her. He watched her tap in the numbers on the machine, then the white paper whir through the scanner and become digital bits and bytes – his own handwriting as well – and then imagined all that buzzing through the internet fibres, reappearing at the other lawyer’s office.
“Call them, Jennie. Just call them to make sure it’s been received and is clear. OK?”
“Yes, Mark.”
Jennie always called them, Mark knew, but she did not complain about his superfluous instruction. He would get like that when it was a rush job. He knew. She knew. After four years with him, after she moved from that small town in Malaysia, she should know him well enough and made silent accommodation for these traits. She called while he listened.
“They want to speak to you.”
“Damn, what for?” Mark said without worrying that the other side would hear, “OK, OK. Put them through. My office phone. Now.”
***
He had known Ramanathan for a long time, the lawyer on the other side, but they weren’t close. Their fathers had been colleagues. Once in a while, when he was a kid, Mark’s family would go to their house for curry dinners, two times a year or so until Mark’s father changed jobs and the families lost touch. The old house had a stunted coconut tree in the small front garden and Ramanathan’s father would climb a short ladder and cut a few coconuts down with his parang, hacking them open with two short blows and then pouring them out into tall glass tumblers, filled with ice: a perfect end to the meal.
Ramanathan was three years older than Mark and that seemed like a lot then. Since coming into practice, they had a few matters against each other. Ramanathan ran his own practice, acting mainly for South Asian businessmen. Some complained that he was difficult but Mark found him easy enough once there had been some small talk. The last time they met, a week before, Nathan had rattled on about his old man going to India and travelling around by train, before coming back to the question of the dispute over the hotel and leisure complex in Myanmar.
The two lawyers joked about their clients and managed to sort out some points of agreement even if Ramanathan’s side had the stronger case, which they both knew but did not admit. Now the document was to try to tie things up neatly and he was on the phone. What was the problem?
When Jennie put the call through, something in Ramanathan’s voice made Mark think that things were not going to be settled, that his clients had refused and there was going to be a fight. But, no, his clients were agreeable. An email would come through shortly to confirm the settlement in principle. Mark promised him lunch for giving in so easily but Ramanathan didn’t take up the jibe, banter.
“Anything wrong, Nathan? I hope you don’t mind me asking, but you sound a bit low. Too much work or something?”
“No.”
“Clients?”
“It’s my father. There was a train collision in India, and he’s dead.”
“Oh my God.”
“The cremation was on Tuesday. I just got back from India.”
“I’m sorry to hear that.”
That was really all Mark said and could say. Jennie was in the doorway tapping her watch to remind him about dinner with new clients from China, another rich meal with combs of sharks fin and scallops in their shells.
***
He was packing up when Jennie came back to her desk to file the document. He looked up.
“Mark? Sorry I know you are rushing.”
“Yes.”
“But can I go on urgent leave?”
“When? How long?”
“Next week? One week?”
“You know I’ve got two more deals that need work.”
“Sorry, Mark. I know we’re busy. But it is urgent.”
“Urgent leave?”
“Yah, one week’s urgent leave. Can?”
She sat down in the grey chair across from him. Her eyes were red and her mouth trembled slightly as she spoke. Her brother, studying in Canada, was in some sort of trouble. Her father and mother were flying out, and Jennie was needed to stay at home with her grandmother and younger sisters to cook and look after them all. Another secretary would cover for her in the office. And, if there was anything that could not be found, she could be called and, if necessary, come in for a while.
She said this all, but Mark could hardly hear her at points, and, when she mumbled on about her brother, something that sounded like “cocaine”, he was not sure and did not ask.
“Sure, I’ll manage. I understand.” He stood up abruptly.
“Thank you. Thank you, Mark.”
He was out of the door before she even got out of her chair.
“Got to run. Lock up, OK.”
***
He parked the car and switched off the engine. Mei too had a working dinner, and so it was just past 9:30 p.m. when he was back at her office, at the same spot where he had left her that morning. He got out and waited for her. He looked at the ash on the car.
He tried to remember the scenes in the newspapers and on TV when Pinatubo blew up: the spewing lava and choking clouds of ash and smoke, the ash that covered the houses and the fields, the hundreds and thousands of people travelling by bus, car, on foot, towards safety, to get away with whatever they could carry. But that was so long ago, so far away.
Then Mei was there, and they got into the car and began to drive off.
“How was your day?” she asked.
Perhaps someone else might have considered the fine, white powder that captured a young brother in an alien land the dust of cobwebs and files that would bury an older man’s remaining years at work or the fine ash of cremation scattered in a Hindu ceremony thousands of miles away, returning what was a man to the infinite air and land and sea.
But Mark just drove, and, if he thought about anything, it was about his sons in their apartment, done with dinner by now, having been fed by the maid, and hopefully in bed but probably still up watching cartoons.
They arrived. When he got out, Mark stood there for a while by the car as Mei gathered her things and closed her door. His finger traced a long line along the hood. He brought it up close under his nose. He rubbed his fingers, and all traces were gone. There was no smell and the ash did not stick.
A small tear formed his left eye. It burned. Then it welled and dropped with a small splash onto the car. For a while, it beaded there, the liquid held together by the car wax like a jewel on the layer of ash. Then it rolled off, leaving a thin streak across the dirty bonnet.
Mark sniffed. The burning sensation remained. He rubbed his eye, not with his hands, which must be dusty, but with the corner of his striped shirt. The small pain remained for a while longer. Then it was gone. It was nothing. His wife was standing there but she did not see his tear fall.
“I’d better ask Amelia to take in all our wet clothes,” Mei, walking a few feet ahead of him, began. “Then she will have to put them in the drier. Otherwise they’ll pick up all the dust, hanging outside. I’d better ask her to mop too. Remind me, OK?”
“Ask Amelia to wash the car,” he said as he walked to catch up with her.
“Nuisance, isn’t it?” she called out, not even turning around.
Mud
The glass of orange juice, mug of strong coffee, and bowl of bran and bananas on the breakfast table are set out every morning. Without special instruction. Without him asking for or even thinking about it. Now he does.
“Didn’t you tell her? We’re going to eat at the club. Didn’t you tell Amelia?”
“Oh, I forgot.” His
wife turns from the shoe cupboard by the door, her tennis shoes dropping to the polished marble floor with a little slap. “You didn’t remind me.”
“What do we do then?”
“What do you mean?”
“Should I eat this breakfast? That’s what I mean. If I do, it’ll make us late for our court. And it’ll fill me up. You know I can’t play after I’ve just eaten.”
“Leave it then.”
“But that would be a waste. You know I hate waste.”
“Yah.”
“My mother always taught me to finish everything on my plate, you see.”
“Yah.”
“She could eat it. Amelia could eat it.”
“No. She has her own breakfast. She doesn’t like bran and coffee.”
“What do you mean? What does she eat?”
“I don’t know. I only know that she doesn’t eat what we eat.”
“You mean she makes her own breakfast? Just for herself?”
She shrugs and turns away. He has a habit of asking questions and she does not always answer.
In March each year, when the schools are on term break, Mark Tan takes a week off. So it is that, on a Wednesday, they arrive at the club, for the kids to take a swimming class and for him to play tennis with his wife. The morning is bright and, after a night of constant rain, the air less humid. The club is quiet.
It is a good game. They run and knock the ball back and forth with good consistency for people who do not normally have much time to play. It reminds Mark of the days when they were still students. For that was how Mei and he met, when they played tennis for their different faculties. They were courting on the tennis court, he always liked to joke.
Back then, it was at the university sports complex, with plastic bags of drinks hanging from the fencing. Now, they play at the most prestigious and best appointed country club in Singapore, with the highest membership fees.
***
“Our investment is going to appreciate,” he says when they take a break between sets, sit at the benches, and drink ice lemon tea.