Now That It's Over

by O Thiam Chin

  When Ai Ling saw the ring during one of our dinners, she looked puzzled.

  “Thought you didn’t like to wear accessories?” she said, holding up my hand to examine the ring.

  “No, but Cody bought this for me. I would never buy it myself.”

  “Does it mean what I think it means?”

  “No, it’s just an anniversary gift.”

  “Can’t be that simple.”

  “It is, don’t overthink it. You women are so drama, always imagining things.”

  “I don’t think so. The ring has to mean something. You don’t buy a ring for someone without a reason.” Ai Ling looked at me, widening her eyes in feigned surprise. “Oh my god, he proposed to you, didn’t he?”

  “No, don’t be crazy!” I protested, and laughed, and pushed our conversation in another direction.

  I’m the eldest son in my family—my father was a car mechanic, and my mother a coffee-shop assistant—and I have three younger brothers. My parents were divorced when I was in primary school, but they kept this from us for a long time. My father continued to stay with us even after, and when he moved out, he took only what he needed, leaving behind many personal items. Because of this, we did not feel his dwindling absence in the house, and subsequent abandonment, for some time. Because my father stayed out late most nights, drinking with his friends, my brothers and I never thought anything was amiss. Only the look on my mother’s face told a different story, but we did not know how to read it. She held back, and carried on: a cycle of housework and chores, taking care of us, cooking our meals. We would not see our father for a day, and we would think nothing of it, perhaps he was busy and had spent the night at the car repair shop. Then it became two nights, but still we held up the illusion; we looked to our mother for a word or some sign, but she did not let on. My father’s absence stretched to a week, and then a month. My brothers and I did not hear from him after that, and whenever the house phone rang, it was usually my mother who picked it up and spoke into it with a moderated tone, turning her back to us. When she hung up, she would avoid our stares, her expression inscrutable.

  When we were alone, my brothers and I would speculate about the disappearance of my father—it was the early eighties, and divorce was a rare thing, something nobody talked about, and we did not know anyone in school whose parents were divorced—and came up with many reasons: that he had killed someone and was on the run, or worse, in jail; that he was suffering from some hideous disease and had to stay away because he did not want to infect us. Not once, in all our speculations over the months and years, did we think that our father had deserted us. It was only years later that we found out that he had returned to Malaysia, to his hometown of Ipoh, with another woman, to start another family. By then, we had not heard from him for so long that he no longer mattered in our lives, a marginal figure that hovered in a corner of our memories. We did not even know he died from prostate cancer until my mother told us and asked one of us to accompany her to Ipoh to attend his funeral; none of us wanted to go until my youngest brother relented. For me, it was a matter of pride: he had abandoned us, and I did not want anything to do with him, even when he was dead. I had banished him to the farthest reach of my mind, but the act of forgetting was never an easy task.

  For many years, I could not understand my mother’s actions, how she had behaved so civilly to someone who had cheated on her and deserted the family. She never felt the need to explain her actions or feelings to us. Perhaps she had thought it was better to maintain a link with my father for our sake, or because of their past and the ties that went beyond what we could see. How she had kept up the correspondence with my father over the years was something she did behind our backs, without our knowledge. She never remarried, and led a quiet life that hardly stepped out of the boundaries of my brothers’ lives and mine. In a stolid, unwavering way, she led her life for our sake, and growing up, we could not get away fast enough from the different ways she was smothering us, keeping us under her fierce watch. Our little acts of rebellion were forms of betrayal to her, manifested in the cold wars that raged between us and her, the long silences broken only when one of us finally gave in, or gave up. Even my coming out was a sign of aggravation towards her, another telltale mark of how she had, once again, failed as a mother. Whatever secret pains she nursed were invisible to us, a self-serving defence, an impenetrable fortress she put up against her own children.

  So, whenever I held up the ring, my mind would dredge up these thoughts about my parents and their failed marriage, and I would have to resist the urge to associate the ring with something I had never truly believed in, an object meant to represent the fragile, breakable bonds between the ones you loved. What was the point of it, after all? I would have given it more credit if it were purely decorative; at least then it would have served a particular function. I wore it less and less, if I could help it, and Cody did not seem to notice.

  One time, I lost the ring at the gym. I was not aware of the loss at the time, and it was only when I was on the train heading home that I felt its absence on my finger. I had picked up the habit of twirling the ring whenever I was deep in thought, an absent-minded gesture that had become second nature to me. So when I could not feel it on my finger, I panicked. Rushing back to the gym, I tore through the changing area, heading for the showers; the ring was where I had left it, on the ledge between the shower stalls. Days after this, when I thought about how I had felt then, I found myself embarrassed at the excessive display of feelings, which ran counter to how I had felt about wearing the ring in the first place. So what if I had lost the ring? Would it have mattered? Cody might chide me for my carelessness, but at least the whole issue would be off my mind, something I would not have to struggle with anymore. This, too, could be a form of immense relief. But I never did find the courage to do what felt like the right thing to do.

  “Do you want me to get a ring for you, too?” I asked, around eight months after he had given me the ring.

  “No,” Cody replied, looking at me to see where I was going with the question.

  “Why not? You bought one for me.”

  “Because if you wanted to, you would have done it a long time ago.”

  “It didn’t cross my mind then. Maybe I can get one for you, if you want.”

  “I don’t need one.”

  “Seems kind of pointless if I’m the only one wearing it, right?”

  “It suits you better.”

  “Nonsense. You know exactly how I feel about accessories.”

  “Anyway, you have got used to the ring now, haven’t you?”

  “It’s just weird for me to wear it if you are not wearing one.”

  “So it would make you feel better if I get one too?”

  “Yes.”

  “Then get me one.”

  “But do you really want one?”

  “Not really.”

  After this, we never brought up the issue of the ring again.

  Lying on the mat in the darkened hut, I can’t sleep, my eyes glued to the ceiling. Light from the table lamp throws long shaky shadows across the floor of the hut. The lonesome moth that has flown in remains stock-still on the wall near the stove, the pattern on its wings like the unblinking eyes of a nocturnal beast. Toads drone mechanically, along with the insistent chirping of the cicadas. Darkness lurks like a predator outside the hut.

  The old woman sits on a wooden stool at the threshold of the hut, fanning herself with a straw fan, looking out into the courtyard, into the dark forest. From where I’m lying, looking at her arched back, she seems vulnerable. Under her breath, she mutters something rhythmic to herself, perhaps a song. The sound comes to me, in a mellifluous cadence, and I strain to catch the notes. In my mind, I play out memories of my dead grandmother, my head on her lap on warm, lazy afternoons, her hand patting me gently on my back, coaxing me to sleep. She would always sing to me in Hokkien, always a song about a lonely, tragic woman pining for her faraway lover, and waiting for h
im to come back to her. I would tried my best to decipher the lyrics with my limited knowledge of the dialect, waiting for the song to end before asking my grandmother about the things I did not understand. Why couldn’t the woman in the song go and find her lover? How could she not have eaten for so many days, wasn’t she hungry at all? Why did she drink the poisonous potion? My grandmother would answer some of my questions, and then tell me to hush and close my eyes. I would try to think of the ways I could save the woman from her misery.

  Now, with the night sounds pressing in on us, I wonder about the old woman’s life in the middle of this deep forest, high up in the hills, surviving all on her own. How can she live the way she does, with nothing except for the barest of necessities? Yet, she can, and she has, for god knows how long. Does she have a family, or someone who’s aware of her existence? Over the past few days, I have seen no other person in the vicinity. For all I know, she might have lived this way for a very long time, without the need for anyone, or anything else.

  And in imagining her life, I recall my grandmother’s, who lived alone for twenty-two years after my grandfather passed away. While she had taken care of my brothers and me on days that my mother was at work, she was often alone, occupied with her own life. She did not trouble my mother, her second daughter, with anything, even on occasions when she was sick; one time she even admitted herself into the hospital after she had a bad fall, and did not inform my mother until the day she was checking out. She claimed she did not want to inconvenience anyone, to make my mother take time off from her job, seeing how busy she already was with us four boys. She did not say much when my parents got divorced, and it was hard to tell how she felt over the whole thing, given the stoic front she put up before us. She kept our lives going on track, and did not let up her tough discipline and punishment whenever one of us misbehaved. In a way, my grandmother had taken the role of our missing father, writ large by her actions and influence over us. She died when she was eighty-five.

  The old woman gets up from where she is sitting and closes the wooden door. She steps towards me, and with the weak light behind her, I can’t see her face clearly. Again, she places her palm on my forehead and utters something. Then she moves to turn off the lamp, reducing the hut to a near-complete darkness. I hear her getting into her bed—a structure made of long wooden planks tied together with ropes—and within minutes she is asleep, her breaths light and even. In the dark, I listen to her breathing and measure it against mine. I stay up for as long as I can, trying to stay afloat against the irresistible pull of the unknown.

  18

  WEI XIANG

  Wei Xiang wakes with a start, the memory of a hand brushing across his face lingering on his skin, and looks around the hotel room. He has slept in the clothes he wore yesterday, which reek of sour perspiration, and have hardened with dirt stains. He feels disoriented; he can’t remember how he managed to get himself back to the hotel and into bed the night before. He lifts his heavy head from the sticky, stale-smelling bedsheet, before letting it fall back again. Wrecked with exhaustion, he rubs his temples, feeling the start of a low-grade headache.

  In his half-awake state, his thoughts run immediately to the strange boy who eluded him the day before in the streets of Phuket. Wei Xiang can’t remember how long he trailed him, always just missing him. Sometimes the boy was right in front of him, and at other times appearing far away, a lonesome figure amidst the thronging, agitated crowd. It was as if the boy were playing a game of cat-and-mouse, teasing and frustrating Wei Xiang at the same time.

  Yet, as he tries to recall what the boy looks like, his mind draws up only fractured images—a mop of wild hair, small seashell ears, skinny legs, dirty unshod feet, a deep scar across his left eye—an incomplete picture. Even when he attempts to put the different parts of the boy together, the resulting image is incoherent, indistinct, an out-of-focus photograph.

  Wiping the dried saliva from his cheek, Wei Xiang checks the time on his watch. 10.45am. The morning is almost over. He rolls out of bed, shocking his body into action. In the toilet, looking into the mirror, he sees his reflection: days-old stubble, dark eye-bags, deeply creased lines across his forehead. His eyes are dull, the light gone out of them. He slaps his cheeks hard, trying to wake himself up fully, his body still steeped in lethargy. He notices Ai Ling’s barrette lying beside the bottles of hand cream and body lotion, and sweeps everything into her toiletries bag on the counter, putting them out of sight. Then he wets a hand towel, rubs his face roughly with it, and steps back into the bedroom to change his clothes.

  At the hotel lobby, Wei Xiang notes that the level of water has dropped significantly, barely at ankle-height now, and a coarse layer of sediment has settled on the exposed surfaces. There is a water-level stain on the walls; the wallpaper has peeled and curled into long stiffened strips. Large flakes of paint have fallen off as well, floating on the water like wood shavings. The furniture has been arranged back to its original layout, though there is something amiss about the placement, as if nothing fits the scene any longer, incorrect props in a stage setup. Stripped of the usual accoutrements—flower vases, throw pillows, travel magazines, mural paintings—the lobby looks like a shell of a room. Nobody seems to be around, not even behind the front desk, a sharp contrast to the commotion the day before, when the noisy hotel guests hounded the staff for updates and whereabouts and flight changes.

  As Wei Xiang walks through the lobby, a man appears from a walkway, carrying a metal pail. Wearing a dirty uniform, he seems surprised to find Wei Xiang standing there, his brows coming together in a crease. It’s the same porter who advised him to stay in the hotel yesterday, to wait till things were better.

  “Morning, sir. How are you today?” the man says, hiding the pail behind him.

  “Okay. How come there’s nobody around? Where are the other guests?” Wei Xiang asks. A face pops out from behind the reception, a sleepy-looking girl with frizzy hair, and looks around nervously. She gives Wei Xiang a wan smile and ducks her head under the countertop.

  “Many people gone yesterday. Only few left.” He hesitates, darting glances to his side, before saying, “Do sir want breakfast? I can get.”

  “No, no, I’m heading out now.”

  “Where sir go today? Outside messy, no good to go out today.”

  “I don’t know. I don’t know where I’ll go.”

  “Then stay in hotel. I bring sir breakfast.”

  “No, no need. I have to find someone.”

  Wei Xiang moves away, his eyes already on the exit. The shattered glass panes and metal frame of the doors have been removed, leaving only a gaping entryway, through which the late-morning sunlight pours in mercilessly, blinding Wei Xiang temporarily to the outside.

  “Wait, sir.” The porter runs off and returns with a bottle of water, handing it to Wei Xiang. He thanks the man, takes the bottle and leaves.

  Out on the street, he feels an uncanny sense of déjà vu, with the crush of people pushing in opposite directions, the scene before him familiar, and Wei Xiang can’t tell whether he is reliving the same day again. The only difference is that the sea water in the street has largely subsided overnight, though many side lanes are still impassable. The salty air holds a rank fetidness—is it the sea? or the smell of rotting flesh? Instantly the images of the dead bodies he saw yesterday flash through his mind, and he has to fight off a sudden urge to retch. He spins the cap off the bottle and gulps down several mouthfuls of water. In the humid heat, Wei Xiang has already started to perspire, his armpits and forehead damp. He assesses the scene before him: an elderly man driving a bullock cart on which sits a family of six; a trio of shirtless street kids—the boy he has been following is not one of them—nosily dousing one another with toy pails of water; and a young woman sitting on a high stool opposite the hotel, staring blankly into space, biting her nails.

  From somewhere across the town, a high-pitched siren blares. Wei Xiang swivels his head in the direction of the sea and hold
s his breath. Except for the wreckage of collapsed buildings, telephone poles and uprooted trees, there is only stagnant water all around. Lumpy clouds hang low in the azure sky. He waits for a few seconds, anticipating a sudden change in the density of the air, or for something ominous to appear on the horizon. Nothing but the stream of people dispersing into the alleyways and lanes, each moving with a sense of purpose.

  Then he hears the words in his head: You’re not really looking; you are not seeing what’s there.

  Ai Ling uttered these words to him on their first day in Phuket, after they checked into the hotel and were planning to take a short stroll to Bangla Road, the main thoroughfare in Patong, before meeting Cody and Chee Seng for dinner. She pointed to something in the sky, but Wei Xiang could not see what it was at first. Then she told him: a flock of seagulls gliding back and forth in the distance, over a patch of sea. The sharpness of the memory causes his insides to tighten: You are not seeing what’s there.

  Shaking off his thoughts, Wei Xiang heads back to the school, where he can check for updates. He refuses to entertain any thoughts that might pull him asunder; as long as he acts decisively, things will come around or take a fortuitous turn. Everything will be all right in the end. Life is unpredictable this way, he reasons, and it’s no excuse to lose hope and despair. He only needs to press on, and to have faith in his own actions.

  At a bend along Sai Nam Yen Road, near a row of boarded-up restaurants, Wei Xiang feels an odd sensation rippling under his skin, of being observed. He whips his head around, and comes eye to eye with the boy with the scar, who is standing several metres away from him beside a pile of fallen bricks. The boy tilts his head as though he’s hearing something interesting in the commotion around him. His feet are coal-dark with dirt and grime, and his skinny arms hang from his body like the long limbs of a marionette doll. Despite his shoddy appearance, he is calm and composed. Not wanting to scare him off, Wei Xiang crosses the street without any visible hurry, and walks up to him. The boy does not run away this time, but remains where he is, looking up at Wei Xiang with a steady gaze.