by Vann Chow
“You are so weak, coach!” One of them said, and the others giggled.
Shirley hushed them quite, and she said, “You boys are so not careful. That's why it is necessary that a woman is presence to make things alright again.”
One of the latecomer leaned on her shoulder, wanting to get a better look at my injured face. Shirley stood up as if she had just been touched by a molester. “Go away! Dirty brat!”
The kid fell to the ground and started sobbing. Needless to say, his mom came over and started to quarrel with Shirley. “Be careful with my kid!” I heard her yell. I was too tired to care. The sun was shinning directly above my head and sitting still on the same spot after running around the field with the kids exhausted me. I closed my eyes and fainted.
When I woke up, I was in the guest room of Shirley's parents' city apartment. The room was massive for guest-use and all around there were mirrors and white marble decorative panels and white leather furniture. I felt myself and realized that someone had helped me change out of my own soiled soccer outfit. Good, otherwise Shirley would be really upset about it.
I looked around for my own clothes. They were neatly folded and placed into a small stacks on the white-washed bedside cabinet next to the small lamp. Still feeling dizzy, I slowly wobbled to the door behind the fake wall behind the bed frame headboard and opened it. As I thought it was a private bathroom within the guest room. In most apartments in this part of the world, only the master bedroom would have its own bathroom. I could only imagine how grand the rest of the apartment looked like as I washed my face with cold water coming out of the exquisite, highly polished French faucet. I didn't know if I was imagining it but the water, I licked the side of my lips it just to see how it would be, seem to even taste sweet, compared to the bland water at home, coming out from the rusty spout that we called faucet.
When I turned off the faucet, I could hear muffled noise coming from the other side of the wall. Instinctively I leaned my head on the cold tiles to hear better. This was Shanghai after all. Despite its outward appearance, the walls were still paper thin, probably stuffed with mixture of concrete, sand and newspapers by greedy hands of dishonest construction contractors.
“Just bear with it. It's only for the time being.” Shirley said. Yes, it was distinctively her voice.
“I couldn't bear the thought of you being with another man.” A male voice said. Then there were a period of nothing but muffled rustling noises of different kind fabrics.
“Mmm...don't do that. He's in the next room!”
I felt my heartbeat racing. Shirley was hiding a man from me. On second thought, I had only known Shirley recently. From the familiar tone she used to talk to the other man, they might have known each other before I got together with her. So we were the affair, not the other way around. Now the question was, why? Why deceived me?
The man on the other side had the exact same question. “What do you like about that idiot? You could have picked a better rival. I feel insulted.”
“He's a man also is he not? And if he's an idiot like you said then that's all the better. He would never notice. It is perfect.”
I understood that at some point, Shirley would realize that I was an idiot, she being a student at Harvard and all, but to hear her say that in such a context, I felt extremely crossed. I pressed my ear closer to the ice-cold tile and listened ever more intently.
Under the circumstances, I needed to be as quiet as possible until I had gathered as many facts as possible in stealth, but I felt an intolerable itch in my throat. Involuntarily I coughed to get rid of the itch. I clasped my hand immediately over my mouth. It was too late. The discussion on the other side of the room stopped. What felt like two seconds later, Shirley busted into the guest room and rushed to my side. Luckily I had already slipped under the thick layers of duvet and I coughed again to keep up the appearance of being sick. She gave me a kiss on the forehead and asked me in soft gentle tone that was completely different from the tone she used to describe me when she spoke to the other man. She spoon-fed me some medicine and I fell asleep again. In my dreamy state, I remembered saying to myself in my head that it seemed like I could apply the same sentence to Shirley as well, “She would never notice the glitch. It is perfect.”
Chapter 23: Parental Guidance
When I woke up from my summer stupor, an anxiety washed over me. Through the uncurtained window I could see the beautiful skyline of the Bund. There were very few obstacle that blocked my million yen view. Despite the view, I dressed myself up as quickly as possible in the moonlight that shone through the glass window panes, and walked out the front door.
I thought I could catch a glimpse of who Shirley was speaking to. Instead I saw Shirley, Simon and their mom and dad enjoying dinner. On the side, two servants were waiting on them. One rushed forward to give me a pair of slippers. It did make me feel a little bit more secure, for the marble flooring was really cold. Gingerly I walked a few steps towards them and apologized for my intrusion.
Shirley's dad did not look up at me. Her mom turned her head to give me a glance and then her head was turned back to the soft, steamy bowl of pearlescent white rice she had in her hand. There were six or seven dishes on the table. One of them were garlic baked razor clams. I felt my mouth watering. My stomach growled.
“Hey, come join us for dinner!” Simon said enthusiastically. Shirley walked to my side and grabbed my arm before I could protest, for I felt already the unwelcome by the manner of her parents. “We are having grilled pork belly in red wine tonight. You will like it!”
“Mom, dad. This is my boyfriend.” She introduced me as such when I sat down between Simon and Shirley, keeping my distance from the tigers on prowl, bracing in my head for attack.
It was difficult to endure the silence during dinner. Fortunately everyone was a fast eater, including myself. When my energy was replenished, I was sat on the massive couch on the other side of the living room that sat on top of an expensive looking red and gold rug, directly opposite to Shirley's mom and dad, who were sipping after dinner Dragon Well tea. The smell of it was so good I could not resist the temptation when one of the servant offered one to me.
I knew I had to be the one to break the silence and get the discussion over with. So I did. Conventionally, when you meet your girlfriend's parents for the first time, you are supposed to bring some symbolic gifts and introduce yourself extensively to impress them. In my case, I was taken in because I fainted, I gathered. There was no opportunity to purchase anything impressive, nor was I dressed appropriately. Shirley did not seem to mind in this instance as much as I thought she would. She chimed in to sing my praises when I started my monologue about who I was, where I worked, where my parents came from and all the other facts about me that could impress, or in the least provide confidence to her parents that I was a capable man worthy of being their beloved daughter's boyfriend. I still did not find out what the earlier discussion about me between Shirley and the mysterious man was about but in front of bigger enemy I had momentarily forgotten about it. Swimming against the stream of hostility, I managed to say something that Shirley's dad was interested enough to say something about. It was the fact that I was going to Boston together with his daughter.
“Where are you staying?” Her dad squinted.
Shirley quickly eyed Simon, who rescued us from coming under the line of fire by saying that he had arranged for me to stay with his American friend's dormitory. It was a cultural taboo for a Chinese woman to stay in one room with a man before they were married.
“Why can't you afford your own place for just a few weeks?”
I was about to answer that I could afford anything I want in the world but saving money was a virtue, something that a lot of rich folks did not understand. Simon seemed to read the preposterous answer in my mind and he decided it was best that he answer for me instead.
“My friend is going away for the summer. He could use someone to look after his cat. This is best arrangeme
nt for all of us.” I did not bother to tell Simon that I hate cats.
It was subtle but I thought I saw her dad rolled his eyes.
Then it was her mom's turn. “Are you the one with the kid?”
“Mom...shhh!” Shirley hushed her.
“What?! Your dad ought to know if he has a kid!”
“What are you talking about?” Her dad rumbled.
“I have lots of kids.” I smiled. “I coach them soccer every week. That was what I was doing as well today.”
“Not those, I meant your own.” Shirley mother's corrected me.
“Oh, shoot! I completely forgot about Jessie.” Jessie was waiting for me at home that evening because as usual, Paula left him alone in the house again.
Shirley chimed in before the misunderstanding worsen. “Jessie is his Godson. They are not related. He has a very big heart. He coaches these kids from poor families and underprivileged conditions school works. You taught Jessie English, too right? Last time you told me you watched BBC with him?” She said, looking me, searching for confirmation of her lies. “He's such a nice person I wish I could be more like him.”
“Excuse me. I need to give him a call...” I excused myself as Shirley was still singing my praises and back traced my way through the enormous apartment to the guestroom to look for my cell phone. In the corner of my eyes I could feel her parents' disgruntlement.
“Hey, little man. What are you doing?” I said to Jessie. My mind was split into two. I was trying to process the parallel conversation happening between Jessie and I, and the one that still continued in the living room between Shirley and her parents. They seemed to have immediately started a fight over my unwelcome presence in their lives as soon as, they thought, I was out of earshot. The apartment was great, but as I have mentioned before, the acoustics of this place was terrible. You could hear everything from everyone anywhere in the apartment. I could hear clearly that her dad described me as “good for nothing, stingy, not fit for business” and her mom, “lack of manners, impolite, poorly dressed.” All in all, I got the impression that if I were to become Shirley's husband, I would be the disgrace of their family.
In my ear, I could hear Jessie's eager voice longing for me to come home so we could play Superman action figures together. I was just happy he did not starve to death or got into some sort of freak home-alone accident.
“Thank you for your hospitality. I have to go, to look after Jessie.” I smiled as politely and as gracefully as I could after being insulted behind my back to Shirley's parents.
It was then that her dad said the longest sentence to me the whole evening. “Take this kid of yours, Jessie, with you to America. I will pay for his flight and any expense incurred.”
Shirley looked distraught by the offer, no, actually the command of her dad. I could understand how senseless it was to her to think that we were going to spend time just the two of us together but instead we would be taking care of a kid that did not belong to neither of us on his first trip on the plane to a foreign country. It would be a full time job instead of a full time summer vacation. I, of course, could see where this was coming from. Obviously Shirley's dad wanted to make sure we would not be doing anything we were not supposed to do when we were out of his reach, so he would like to plant a kid in the mix. With a kid close to us, we would not be sleeping with each other any time soon, he thought. In those instance, even the cleverest parents were wrong. It would be a great inconvenient, but it had never stopped Paula and I. So I could not see how this would stop Shirley and I.
I tried to look taken aback to keep Shirley's dad into thinking that he had ruined my plan. In the back of my mind I was exhilarated. Jessie would be so excited about the free trip. He had been begging me to bring back some American comic strips since the day I told him about Boston.
“No, Boston is famous for Irish gangs and good beer, not comic strips,” I corrected Jessie with information I presumed correct which I had learnt from years of watching American TV series and movies. “Do you know the Departed? The Chinese movie that got a remake in Hollywood? It was filmed in Boston.”
“Andy Lau!” Jessie shouted on the top of his lungs. He loved Andy Lau.
Chapter 24: Airplane
If I were a braver man I would have confronted Shirley about what I heard the other day. Being the wuss that I was, I told myself that whatever that was could wait until after I arrived in America. So what if she was in love with another man, and condescend to make me her boyfriend-for-public? It was not like I entered into this relationship with a pristine open heart. To be honest, I did not think love is something for me anyway. It cost too much money. When the money ran out, the woman was gone. I had the taste of this bitterness one too many times. If this constant bitter disappointment was love, then I was perfectly fine not to have anything to do with it.
In Chinese, men who needed women's financial support were called Little White Faces. I had been verbally abused by people around me all my life with all sorts of names. But Little White Face was a title I had never earned. As I rather enjoyed being showered with gifts, and feel entitled to good things once in my life, like the other women who had all came into my life and left me destitute both mentally and financially, this time I had my eyes set on being called just that.
I would compromise on the loving feeling even if there was ulterior motive behind.
It was lonely to be so perfect in all respect. This Shirley's parents knew very well, and they tried their utmost to protect her from someone like me. Given how inhospitable her parents were towards me, who was a, in my humble opinion, reasonably polite and honest man, when I met them last, Shirley's secret boyfriend must be a hundred times worse than I was in some aspects, if not all. That would be a good reason for her to take me in as a surrogate boyfriend to appease her difficult parents. Thinking of this, I could not help but snickered.
The man sitting across the aisle from me on the plane gave me a condemning frown. I did not know one cannot snicker to yourself in First Class, I told him. He turned away his cocked head and stared into the nothingness that was the wall panel.
I had not been on long distant flight too many times, but I could conclude that based on my current observations, there was nothing so special about First Class, apart from the amount of uncalled for, almost disturbing, attention I got from the various six-feet tall heavily made up air hostesses, that I would come back for more given the steep price tag.
No, I did not want a wine, nor did I need any slippers. I did not want to read Wall Street Journal, nor Financial Times. The Harold was absolutely irrelevant both to the origin and destination in my point of view I had to voice my opinion about her inconsideration. When the air hostess ran out of offers, she asked me if I had any request. Jessie immediately brightened up and asked for a comic strip. “We have one,” the pretty but annoying hostess came clacking down the aisle with a Chinese comic book. Jessie brushed her off, looking pissed with his arms crossed in front of his chest. Shirley only smiled and took a picture of us at that moment.
Half way through the flight, there was a commotion on the other side of the curtains, in the business slash economy class. An air hostess came through the curtains from the other side, carrying an important looking news for the captain. She conversed shortly to her colleague who gave us the Chinese comic book earlier, and went straight into the cockpit.
“What was this all about?” The man across the aisle asked, flustered that someone had broken his peace.
“Hi, ladies and gentlemen, there is a small incident in the economy class. Our crew is working hard to resolve the issue right now. Please remain seated with your seat belt fastened and I will make sure that whatever is happening will bring no discomfort to all of our First Class passengers.” The comic book lady announced to us. Then she turned to the man with the brightest smile she could muster, “would you like to put on your headphones for some excellent classic music from the Romantic Period? Perhaps a plate of complimentary cheese and wine
with it?”
The man nodded and seemed pleased again. Sometimes I felt like other people have wrong priorities in life.
Just at that moment, the door of the cockpit busted open and a man in captain uniform walked out, following the air hostess that brought the news. They rushed through the curtains and I caught a glimpse of what was out there when it flung open.
“Two passengers were having a fight, over the last can of coke.”
“I told the manager to stock more! See what happens when she did not listen to the crew.”
The two air hostesses gossiped at the threshold of the class divider.
When the second one peered through the curtains, she made a an opening. Through it, I saw the captain was being beat to the ground by a grouchy-looking man.
“Such low quality people on the plane.” The man next to me said.
“I agree with you!” I said, directing it to him, which he did not realize, like all self-absorbed assholes. I unbuckled my seat belt and walked through the curtains to the man throwing punches madly at the captain. The two women, I realized later, were supposed to stop me but they were too scared by what was happening, and they let me through without any protest nor concern for my First Class discomfort.
I grabbed the attacker's shirt in his shoulder and before he could look up at me, I punched him hard in the stomach. He fell backwards. There behind him was the other passenger that got in the fight with him in the first place, sprawling on the ground with cuts on his arms and face. When he saw the opportunity, he immediately leaped over the fallen guy and clamped his arms together and behind his back. I too had by then jumped across the body of the captain, who was wringing in pain on the floor, and grabbed the spraying legs of the struggling man. The two of us managed to subdue him and kept him on the ground by sitting on him while one of the smarter air hostess came running towards us with plastic twist ties to bind his hands and feet together.