‘I’ll manage. Don’t worry.’
‘Ma asked about you. She’s very worried. I see it in her eyes. She misses you. You take care, Kow Kia. Take care of yourself. Okay? If … if anything, anything,’ Lily’s eyes are reddening, ‘you phone me. Call me. You understand? Call me no matter how late, you call.’
Numbed and pained, he nods.
‘Ma knows you can’t manage by yourself. A nun, Sister…aiyah! I forgot her name. This sister from the Good Shepherd Convent visited Ma in prison. And Ma told her about you. This sister told Ma she will help you. Take you to a home where … where they will take care of you. So, tomorrow or next week, if that sister or some other persons come…’
Lily looks as though she’s going to cry.
‘If the sister comes or if other people come, you open the door and let them in. Okay? Don’t say no. Just…just go with them. Ma…she wants them to take care of you. Give her that comfort, okay?’
He nods again, unable to speak. Lily too is silent as they stand facing each other across the corridor.
‘You better go, Sis.’
‘Do you need anything else? I’ll bring it on my next visit. And if you…if you’re in the home, they’ll let me know. I’ll visit you there. Do you need anything?’
‘A phone card.’
His voice is hoarse. He pulls out a small hand towel and coughs into it, careful not to befoul the air with his coughing.
‘Get me a card for my phone. The line was cut. I…I didn’t pay the bill. If I’ve a phone, you can call me. No…no need to visit.’
A deep racking cough rises from the cold hollow in his chest.
‘Pass me your phone. I’ll buy a card for it.’
He goes into his room and returns with his mobile phone. Lily does not take it immediately. She digs for some tissues in her handbag and wraps her hand in tissue paper before taking his phone. She puts it in a plastic bag and knots the bag tightly.
15
A thick hedge and green leafy trees mute the traffic on Marymount Road. The home is clean, airy and quiet. Two fans on the ceiling stir the torpid afternoon air. Grey-faced listless men wait for the hours to pass. The men show no sign of curiosity about one another, preferring to keep to themselves. And if they do talk, it’s about the present, the here and now, never about the past, and never about their families. Most of the time, they lie on their beds, eyes closed, shutting out the world. And the two or three, who open their eyes, turn their gaze inward.
He remembers the same inward gaze on his old man’s face in the weeks before he jumped. The same inward, self-absorbed gaze. He had come home from school that fateful afternoon to find his old man, sitting in the cane chair, his good leg stretched out on the floor. The other leg, amputated at the knee, was sticking out of the seat like a sawn-off tree stump. His father’s eyes were red, glazed, and unseeing. The room was littered with broken beer bottles and glass shards. Without a word, he took a broom and started to sweep the shards into a dustpan. A move that his old man took as criticism. His crutch hit him hard on the head. The sudden force caused his nose to bleed but he didn’t move away. He didn’t cry out. He didn’t retaliate. Looking back, he realised why he had stood still and let the old man hit him. He didn’t have the heart to fight the cuckolded cripple. ‘One-legged Tortoise.’ That was what the neighbours had called his Pa, and why his father drank himself silly. Lau Or Kui was Hokkien slang for a cuckold. He was fourteen then, and convinced that his Ma, known in the neighbourhood as the ‘Toilet Auntie’, must have done things inside the toilet cubicles besides cleaning them. And yet, he could not hold it against her. She was a good mother and a long-suffering wife. The old man was impossible after he lost his leg and job at the construction site.
‘John, your sister is here.’ Sister Susan wheels him into the visitors’ room.
The afternoon sun is blazing outside. Pinpricks of light glitter among the trees. Lily brings him the latest news. In between reading out the newspaper report to him, she gives her version of what the prosecution said on the last few days of the trial.
‘The suon kueh sellers in JB vanished. The Malaysian police can’t find them. No one saw them or knew them. So Ma is gone case. Listen to this. The law in Singapore is very clear. Drug trafficking is a capital offence. The mandatory punishment is death. The evil that drug trafficking inflicts on thousands of people demands that we punish drug traffickers severely. The problem has to be tackled at the source. And the newspaper also said. The accused had four hundred grams of heroin hidden among the pieces of suon kueh she was carrying in several styrofoam boxes packed inside a plastic bag. The main prosecution witness, the mother of the toddler, said that the accused had tried twice to put the bag into her child’s pram. Ingrate! Ma was just trying to help her push the pram!’
Lily sounds loud and harsh in the quiet of the visitors’ room. From where he’s seated, facing the doorway, he can see the dazzling red and purple of the ixoras and bougainvilleas blooming in the brilliant sunshine. Sunlight bounces off their dark glossy leaves, and the sun’s glare makes him close his eyes. The anger in Lily’s voice tears through his frame. His gastric pains return.
‘And do you know what else is said by all those kaypohs and busybodies in the coffee shops? They talk like they know the law in this country. Just because they went to court for a few days to listen and gawk. Ya, they gawked at Ma and Nancy and Molly and me. Like they’re at a show, pointing their fingers at us! And the reporters! I wanted to slap them. They kept taking photos. I didn’t care. They want to take my photo! Take, lah! But Nan and Molly hid their faces behind newspapers. I told them no need to hide. Why hide? Those uncles in the coffee shops know who you are already! And you know what one uncle said to me? He said a murderer kills one person, affects only one family. Drug traffickers kill hundreds of thousands. Destroy whole of society. Oi, uncle, I said. I didn’t care. I asked him. What about the fat cats? What about those who sell tobacco and alcohol? Run casinos and make millions? Own prostitute houses? They also ruin hundreds of families and thousand of lives, what! Do you want to hang them too? He kept quiet. I was so furious. You see now what Ma is up against? She’s got no chance. The law is the law.’
The anguish in Lily’s voice, the unshed tears and dark rings around her eyes stab him. He feels useless. Utterly useless. He stares at the flowers in the brilliant sunshine. Lily is the only one who visits him. The other two blame him, and rightly so. His head feels heavy and feverish. He longs for his mother’s hand, for the rough palm that stroked his forehead sometimes. He’d dreamed of her hand last night. It had brushed against his face, and he’d caught a whiff of the pine-scented detergent that seemed to cling to her skin.
‘Kow Kia, you okay?’ Lily is staring at him. ‘Are you all right?’
‘Just very tired.’
‘I’ll come again. Maybe next month.’
‘I want to see Ma. Ask the lawyer to plead with them. I’ve…I’ve got to see her. I want to see Ma one last time. Before…before…’
He bangs his head against the back of his wheechair.
‘Kow Kia! Stop it! The government is the one killing her! Not you! Not you! Get that into your thick head! Our Ma is going to die! But she wants you to live! Understand or not?’
16
The grounds of Marymount Convent and its chapel is a sea of flickering candlelights. The Good Shepherd sisters and parishioners are holding a vigil for his mother. The mood of the gathering that numbers more than five hundred is quiet and sombre as night falls and Sister Susan leads them in prayer.
Sitting in his wheelchair, his hands trembling uncontrollably, his heart is a tumult of feelings. He has received news that the family will be allowed to see their mother one last time. Lily kneeling on the grass beside him is sobbing quietly in her husband’s arms. Nan and Molly are kneeling beside the nuns.
Sister Susan places a rosary into his trembling hands. ‘John, meet Peter and Marc, the organisers of this prayer vigil. They’ve something to t
ell you.’
Two men, a Chinese and an ang moh shake his hand. His voice quavering, he thanks the two of them.
‘It’s the least we can do,’ Peter Chia smiles. ‘Your mother is a good woman. She used to work in my office and I bought suonkueh from her. I wish I’d known about you earlier, John. You see I am like you … HIV positive. Marc here is my partner. We have spoken with your sisters and doctor. We would like to take care of your medication. With the right medication you can live a normal life. We travel to Bangkok periodically to buy the pills. Much cheaper there.’
He doesn’t know what to say. His sisters are standing around him. Lily’s hand reaches out and her fingers intertwine with his. The touch of his sister’s hand sends a sharp joy through his heart. He holds on to Lily’s hand as they listen to Peter Chia speak to the sea of flickering tea lights and candle-lit faces.
‘My grandmother and my mother, Mrs Mary Chia, remember Madam Ah Gek very well. She was our family’s maid when my brother Paul and I were born. She learnt to say the rosary and followed my grandma to church every Sunday. My mother said that Madam Ah Gek was very hardworking. Very honest. She was only fourteen when she came to work for my grandma. Her family was very poor and Madam Ah Gek and her brothers and sisters often had no food to eat. My mother wept when she heard about Madam Ah Gek’s death sentence. Thank you all for coming to this vigil and rosary service to pray for her and her family. My grandma is eighty-nine and she’s bedridden. She can’t be here but she is praying with us at home. Let us pray for mercy and compassion to prevail. A petition is going round over the Internet. We’re pleading for Madam Ah Gek’s life to be spared. Let’s pray that justice in our society will be tempered with mercy.’
A soft murmuring rises from the sea of flickering lights as a lone flute plays, and Marc sings,
‘God of mercy and compassion,
Look with pity upon me …’
* * *
ADDENDUM
To His Excellency
The President of Singapore
Dear Sir,
I wrote the above story with the kind help of a writer who visited the Good Shepherd Convent. It has been 10 years since my mother was sentenced to Death’s Row. My sisters and I beg you to review our mother’s case.
Yours very respectfully,
John Tan ( Kow Kia)
7
Gloria
She wraps her brown brawny arms around him, holding him between her knees, hugging him close against her breasts. He leans back, sinking into the fold of her arms, his eyes fixed on the tv screen in the living room. But her eyes are not on the tv. They’re gazing through the black iron grille of the balcony, gazing at the distant lights of the ships anchored out at sea, gazing towards where the brightly lit buildings shine like altars to their Chinese gods, and beyond that to the dark sky, the same dark sky that arcs over Manila City, the same dark sky with the same bright moon shining on the garbage of the Pasig River. Oblivious of the glances of her ma’am, seated in the armchair in the living room, her hand is stroking the child’s back. The family is watching tv after dinner, and she has slipped out of the kitchen to join them. But she does not sit with them. Although her ma’am has not said anything, she knows that it will be regarded as presumptuous if she sits with them in the living room. So she sits on the cane chair in the balcony, and the boy, Timmy, the youngest of the two boys and a girl under her charge, has come out to sit with her. She wraps her arms around his warm tubby belly, inhaling the lavender fragrance of the talcum powder she has rubbed on him after his bath. When she has saved enough, she will buy a small tin of the same Johnson & Johnson talc powder to take home to Migoy and Amy, her two youngest. She kisses the boy’s head.
“Timmy! Come in here!”
With a start, her arms drop to her side. The boy runs to his mother.
“What’re you doing in the balcony, darling? Full of mosquitoes out there. Sit here with Mummy. Gloria!”
“Yes, Ma’am.”
“Have you finished washing the dishes?”
“Yes, Ma’am.”
“What about the kitchen towels? Did you wash them and hang them up to dry?”
“Yes, Ma’am.”
“Bring out the chocolate cake in the fridge. And don’t forget the plates and forks this time.”
“Yes, Ma’am.”
She goes into the kitchen and returns with the cake, the plates and forks on a tray. She sets it on the coffee table.
“How am I going to cut the cake without a knife? And you forgot napkins.”
“Yes, Ma’am.”
She goes into the kitchen again, returns with the cake knife and some napkins.
“No, you don’t cut it. I’ll cut it. You still have laundry to do tonight, don’t you?”
“Yes, Ma’am.”
“Well, what’re you waiting for then? I don’t need you here.”
She retreats into the kitchen, and sits on the floor of the narrow alcove where the laundry is hung and where she sleeps at night. She sits beside her suitcase, the green and brown canvas suitcase that Tita Flora had lent her when the village knew that she was coming to Singapore to work. She sits beside it, her brown brawny arms wrapped around her shoulders, rocking her upper body back and forth, back and forth, as though she was rocking her baby. Her little Migoy.
* * *
“Good morning, ah, Mrs Ling.”
“Good morning, Alice. This is my new maid.”
“Oh, your new maid, ah?” The receptionist at the clinic looks at her. “What happened to the old one?”
“I had to change her,” her ma’am replies.
“To change maids, you got to pay extra or not?”
“This maid agency is very good. The employer is allowed to make two changes. No need to pay. You pay a transfer fee only at the third change.”
Her ma’am hands over a sheath of official papers across the counter.
“Glori-ah An-ton-nia Bern-na-dette San-tos,” the receptionist reads out her name in the singsong lilt of the Chinese in this clean and green city where even the trees look neat and tidy, very different from the unruly trees back home. But the sunlight is the same, the same. The sun that shines in this rich city is the same sun that shines on her barangay.
‘Glor-ri-a!” the receptionist turns to her.
“Yes, ma’am.”
Her voice squeaks like one of those tiny white mice in the pet shop. The clinic is full of watchful eyes. The eyes of these strangers are scrutinising her, eyes that say she’s the stranger, not them. She keeps her head down, suddenly ashamed of her shabby blouse and faded black pants. The receptionist continues to address her in a loud voice as if that will help her to understand better.
“You, ah! You take this cup and go to the toilet. You pass urine into the cup, okay? Make sure enough urine is inside the cup, not outside; otherwise cannot do the pregnancy test. You got pee or not? If cannot pee now, you drink some water.”
The woman turns to her ma’am.
“Must always tell them to drink water. Some of them, no pee, also go inside the toilet and stay there a long time. And their employer is out here waiting and waiting, and the maid is still inside the toilet. Many people complain to me. Other patients also want to use the toilet. So now I tell all the maids. Go drink some water first.”
Her ma’am smiles and shakes her head. “I know. You’ve got to spell out every single step before they do it right.”
“Ya, lor! Glor-ri-a, you go pee now.”
Head down, she walks towards the closed door.
“Oi! Not that door! The other door! That other one!” the receptionist shouts across the crowded waiting room.
A young man rises from his seat and points her to another door. He gives her an embarrassed smile. She nods, goes in and locks the door. The words, ‘thank you’, are stuck like a fishbone in her throat. She leans over the sink, turns on the tap and cups her two hands to drink some water. It’s only when she unzips her pants and squats over the plastic cup
that she lets her tears fall.
A mother since age sixteen, she’s thirty-six but looks fifty-six. This is the medical examination to decide her fate. Make sure that she’s not pregnant before they will confirm her employment. What they don’t know is that she doesn’t want to get pregnant any more. She’d pushed Alex away. After the first four, she didn’t want it any more. Didn’t want more babies. But how could she keep saying no to her Alex? He wanted her even when they already had ten mouths to feed. And the wife should submit to the husband and not push him into sin, Father Paolo Biviendo had preached. These priests. They know only God’s will. She cleans herself, zips up her pants, and washes her hands at the sink. She’s through with these priests. It’s up to Suzie and her now. Suzie will take care of the others. They will have to depend on their eldest sister. It’ll be five long years before Alex is out of prison. In the meantime, she’ll work and make money. Make lots of money. Pay back the agent; pay back the lawyer; pay back Tita Flora; pay back Ma Lulu and the others. She opens the washroom door, carefully holding with both hands the white plastic cup half filled with yellow urine.
* * *
“Speak up, Gloria. I can’t hear you.
The Man Who Wore His Wife's Sarong Page 12