The Trophy Taker

by Lee Week

  The noise of excited girls greeting one another, of locker doors bouncing off their hinges, was deafening, but the camaraderie was touching. Lucy threaded her way through.

  ‘Hey, Lucy, what’s up?’ The distinctive American tones of Candy could be heard above the racket. ‘You late?’

  ‘Nah … been out already …’ Lucy sassed over her shoulder as she made her way through.

  Candy feigned amazement. ‘Jesus, Lucy! You’re gonna be rich!’

  Lucy giggled, then screeched as she heard her number called over the tannoy:

  ‘NUMBER 169,MISS LUCY … NUMBER 169,MISS LUCY …’

  She doubled back and squirmed through the waiting girls to meet her mamasan on the other side of the velvet curtain.

  ‘You must be good girl now, Lucy.’ Mamasan Linda held on to Lucy’s hand and trotted ahead like a mother escorting a naughty child to receive judgement from a waiting father.

  They wound their way through half-full tables, past the Filipino band singing the Police song ‘Don’t stand so close to me’ quite earnestly, considering that a consignment of blow had arrived that day from Manila, past a man from Taipei who was on the dance floor clinging pathetically to the pencil-thin, Lycra-slippery hips of his young date while the changing light patterns on the dance floor stole his drunken feet from beneath him. And past Bernadette, who was leaping from foot to foot in a frenzy of chiffon. Her hair sat rigid on her head like deep-fried roadkill, while the rest of her body hopped madly around the dance floor. Lucy remembered going out on a double date with Bernadette. What a nightmare! She recalled Bernadette straddling a diminutive Taiwanese, his face exploding like a bullfrog on heat at every squeeze of those massive white thighs. Lucy had had to drag her off at the end of the evening with her screaming, But I haven’t feckin’ come yet!

  Mamasan Linda stopped in her tracks and turned back to talk to Lucy. She lowered her voice.

  ‘He’s a good customer. He’s come back many times and asked for you. Look after him, okay? Be a clever girl, huh? Big VIP. He owns all this.’ She swept her hands in the air theatrically.

  Lucy gave her a ‘teach grandma to suck eggs’ look and fell into a trot behind her again, following the red and gold cheongsam swishing hypnotically from side to side. They approached a booth that was situated to the back of the club, in the VIP section, overlooking the semicircular dance floor.

  ‘Here she is.’ Mamasan Linda let go of Lucy’s hand and pushed her forward. ‘Here is Lucy.’

  Lucy smiled and slipped in behind the round table until her thigh made contact with her client’s. She studied him but her eyes were still adjusting to the gloom and it took time to recognise him as the man who had bought her out a couple of weeks before and a few times before that. It took time to place body with face – to transcend the gap between leaving the club and leaving the Love Motel. Then she placed him and a surge of adrenalin went through her as she remembered his peculiar tastes that had taken some time to heal.

  Chan spent his evenings doing the rounds of the hostess clubs. He was son-in-law to C. K. Leung, the Dragon Head of the Wo Shing Shing triad organisation – the most powerful society in Hong Kong. It was Chan’s job to oversee some of the Wo Shing Shing’s many business concerns and, at the same time, he liked to cherry-pick any new young hostesses who had just come on the market. Chan had a bent towards pubescent girls. He liked his girls to be girls. Surprising then, that he had asked for Lucy, she wasn’t really his type – too fat and certainly, at twenty-four, too old. But tonight he had come looking for her. He had need of her quite extraordinary talents.

  ‘So, Lucy, how’s things?’

  ‘Good evening, Mr Chan. Everything is good, thank you. It’s nice to see you again.’

  Lucy smiled, met his eyes, and began her usual routine. She feigned ‘coy mistress’ mixed with ‘sure bet’ in as few seconds as she could. The act was wasted. He was busy signalling to Mamasan Linda that he would be buying Lucy out and he was ready to leave.

  ‘Go change, quick-quick,’ she said, appearing beside the table.

  Lucy stood up and left the two to negotiate.

  ‘See you in a minute, Mr Chan,’ she said. He didn’t answer. He was already busy with his wallet.

  On the way she met Candy en route to one of the VIP suites at the back of the club. Her tall figure – broad shoulders, stiff hips and straight back – dwarfed the two Chinese hostesses with her. Her eyes widened in mock disbelief as she glanced at Lucy. Lucy grinned. Candy had no need to worry. She always did well. She lived in an expensive apartment near Tsim Sha Tsui and came to work in the evening to recruit customers for the next day instead. Moving from table to table, she never wanted to be bought out – preferring to make back-to-back appointments for the following day. She was sending the money home to an Italian boyfriend who wanted to open a deli in New York.

  Chan dropped Lucy back at the club afterwards. She smiled sweetly and thanked him for his patronage. He wasn’t listening. He was anxious to be rid of her. He was always the same afterwards: curt, cold and callous. He had hurt her, but he didn’t care. He had overstepped the mark, crossed the boundaries, and ignored the signal to stop. Now he couldn’t even look at her. Not because he felt any guilt, but because she repulsed him. Easing herself out of the car, Lucy turned to wave goodbye, but he had already pulled off erratically into the stream of traffic. Lucy wouldn’t be able to work again that night.

  19

  She packed her evening dress away in her locker, put her leather trousers back on and said her goodbyes to the handful of girls left in the Dressing Room. She had done enough work for one night. It was only when she reached the line of taxis that she decided she wasn’t in the mood to return home just yet – she deserved a little fun after her ordeal. She caught a cab to the Macau ferry terminal, just a short distance away, and boarded the waiting ferry.

  The journey would take nearly an hour, but tonight she didn’t mind. Usually she was impatient to arrive; but this time she knew it would give her the time and space to mull things over. Mostly she thought about Georgina, who had just arrived – landed, almost – in their lives. She smiled to herself. Those big hands! That innocent face! She brought out the maternal instinct in Lucy. God knows, that was funny, feeling maternal to a girl just two years younger than herself. But why not? She could take care of them all.

  She sat back to take stock of her surroundings and to enjoy the anticipation and the rush of pure adrenalin and excitement that only Macau gave her. Gambling was a need that had grown in her over the last few years. She had become addicted to its thrills, its uncertainty – knowing that she could lose everything she had, or simply win the world. It was a thrill second to none. But it was a deadly game to play. Macau was run, ruined and ruled by triads.

  She looked out of the window to see the lights flickering on the horizon. They would be docking soon. She shifted in her seat and smiled to herself. Her buttocks were raw – it had taken her time to get used to it: the pain, the fear. But she had to cut herself a niche in the hostess market. There were just too many pretty Chinese girls out there.

  She’d started young – she’d had to, when their alcoholic mother was found floating among the boats in Aberdeen, just another piece of flotsam. Then Lucy had to provide for herself and her little sister. She was twelve when she sold her virginity to a Taiwanese, and when that money ran out she went to work in the clubs. She might not be the best-looking girl but she was one of the smartest. She cottoned on quickly to a dark sadistic side to men that they so desired but never dared ask for. Lucy let them have their heart’s desire – as long as they paid, and paid well. It was a lucrative market. There wasn’t a Caucasian she’d met that didn’t like to inflict pain. Not the Chinese so much, except the ones who were educated abroad like Chan. Middle Eastern men wanted that and nothing else, and the Japanese? Don’t ask! Not only could Lucy perform almost any act of self-degradation, in truth she quite enjoyed it. The sting of smarting flesh, the power of perver
sity. She liked to look into their eyes at that point of abandonment and steal a part of their soul. But Chan had gone too far tonight, and not for the first time. In Chan she had met her match.

  Lucy sighed to herself. It would all be worth it one day, maybe even this day. Perhaps tonight would be the night to change everything. She looked around and sized up her fellow passengers. No one she recognised, which was a relief. A bunch of Americans, over-sized and over-dressed. The men wore a uniform of Farah slacks and club ties. The women dressed too young, had sharp features and orange skin, and ridiculously over-dyed, back-combed hair. That’s not beautiful, thought Lucy. Much better to have a good Hong Kong girl than that!

  Apart from the Americans and a few Portuguese returning home, the ferry was practically empty. She stared at the Americans and tried a smile. She might still be able to catch herself a Gweilo. An American passport, that would be the one! Canadian or New Zealand would do very well too. She would even take British if she could get it! At the age of twenty-four she would be happy with any ticket out for her and Ka Lei.

  It didn’t work this time, though. The men’s wayward attention was refocused and held in a mental headlock by their eagle-eyed wives.

  Lucy gave up and stared out at the lights coming from Macau. They were gliding on the water, on its skin, like oil. Her thoughts returned to the future. Lucy wondered what difference her English cousin’s arrival would make in the grand scheme of things. She and Ka Lei were like twins separated at birth, now reunited. They were so innocent, so young. Both of them were like children: laughing, playing, running around the apartment. And Lucy was like their mother. Something told her that whatever it was that lay ahead, her newfound cousin would feature in it.

  She shifted in her seat again: the sitting was beginning to irritate her and concentrating was becoming more difficult. Anyway, that was enough speculation. She didn’t like dwelling on things to come or things gone. ‘Now’ was what counted. Bernadette had told her that life was like driving a car – you just needed to look in the mirror now and again to see what was behind you. The rest of the time, keep your eyes on the road ahead.

  Tonight all roads led to Macau, and one big win would take care of them all: Ka Lei, Georgina, all of them. Lucy knew something big was coming – she felt it.

  But, while it was true that tonight would change her life irrevocably, that all their lives would never be the same from this night on, it was not in the way that Lucy hoped. Not at all.

  20

  Macau was busy – always busy – twenty-four hours a day. Hong Kong didn’t allow casinos, but Macau did. The smartest one was the newest: the Royal Palace. A floating, multi-floored casino that was moored alongside its sister ship, the Portuguese Queen. It had opened only a month previously and it was the first time Lucy had seen it. It was as she was about to enter that she saw Chan. She recognised him from behind: his flat arse swivelled like a woman’s when he walked. Funny, she thought, they had been together just hours before, having sex, and now they were both here! How alike they must be in some ways.

  Chan was keeping an eye on things for the Wo Shing Shing. CK was one of two partners in this new casino; the other was a prominent member of the Chinese government. Money was becoming the new Communist ideal, and Hong Kong was more than happy to wet-nurse. The milk of capitalism flowed freely from her bosom – enough for everyone.

  CK had been cultivating friendships with state councillors and prime ministers for some time. He’d been working his way up the ladder over the years and had built himself an impressive network of influential friends. He finally nailed it after the Tiananmen Square massacre. He was the only one of the prominent Hong Kong businessmen to step forward and support China’s stand.

  Lucy thought nothing of seeing Chan there: he was a VIP after all, and she knew that he was probably involved in many ventures. She watched him walk into the casino and wondered what made him tick. It remained a mystery to her why he had chosen to buy her out on the occasions he did. Surely two concubines and a wife were enough ‘face’ for the man with an erect penis the size of a middle-finger salute? He had weird tastes even by Lucy’s standards: the pretend-virgin thing wasn’t the normal, it was more rape than seduction. And ‘Daddy’, as he wanted her to call him, could certainly inflict pain, but could he take it? No way! ‘Daddy’s’ S&M games were strictly fun for one. Knowing when to stop was a definite problem.

  At the entrance to the casino Lucy caught the doorman’s eye and slipped him one hundred Hong Kong dollars. She always over-tipped the doormen. They had helped her out many times, if just to jump the taxi queue, and it was worth it. She paused for a second or two to admire the casino’s flamboyant foyer, and, as she did so, Chan turned and noticed her. He acknowledged her presence with a slight incline of his head and a curious smile, before passing through the carved mahogany doors into the Royal Palace.

  That night Lucy moved from blackjack to roulette and back to blackjack with losses that were inconceivable. Nothing stemmed the tide of money lost and the speed with which it disappeared. So strange was this catastrophic losing streak for Lucy, who, as a rule, always gained as much as she lost, that she read into it signs of the wrong kind. She began to believe that some huge win was coming her way – she only needed to keep playing – she just needed to stay in the game. But it wasn’t coming, and Lucy eventually took a loan from a triad, a massive loan that she would never be able to repay.

  It was Chan who came to her aid when her money ran out. It was Chan who gave her the loan. It was Chan who moved in on Lucy like carrion on roadkill.

  21

  ‘I’m comin’!’

  Glitter Girl had run out of places to hide and he had found her. The more she struggled against the rope around her neck, the tighter it became. In the end, only her body continued the fight. Her mind said:

  Let me go … Let it be quick … And please, sweet Jesus, let someone find my body …

  Strangely enough, her last thoughts were of Darren, in the days before he’d started hitting her. In the days of disco balls and hot, salty, stolen kisses, fevered embraces and love that should have been forever. She had never truly managed to hate him. She still loved the man she wished he could have been.

  Now her photo stared out from the wall, with the others, and her index finger bobbed in a jar of formaldehyde, just like the one her grandma kept pickles in. In certain lights it still glittered.

  Tonight he would start his hunt again.

  22

  Lucy stumbled off the Macau ferry in a daze, right at the start of the morning rush hour. The bright sun stabbed at her eyes and the car fumes caught in the back of her throat. The walk home was tortuously slow. All she could do was keep her head down, shuffle along the crowded pavement, and pray that soon she would find some respite from the raw guilt she felt. One minute her heart beat so fast she couldn’t breathe, and she thought she would pass out; the next it slowed down so much that she thought she must be walking in a dream.

  Lucy was in shock, in mourning. She had squatted in the gutters of Macau and aborted all her dreams, and not just hers … All the years she had protected her sister from harm and kept her off the streets, made sure she could follow her dream and become a nurse. Now all those dreams would be shattered. Both their lives would be ruined if she couldn’t think of a way to pay back what she owed – a triad debt was a family debt. The pain of retribution would be shared. In fact, Lucy knew that it would be Ka Lei they would come after first, just to teach Lucy a lesson.

  After an hour of shuffling along pavements she finally reached home. She turned the key to the apartment door as quietly as she could and crept inside. There was not a sound in the stagnant gloom of the flat except the plonk plonk of the leaky kitchen tap. Ka Lei had already gone to work and Georgina was still asleep. Lucy listened to the droning of the air-conditioning unit coming from her cousin’s bedroom.

  She tiptoed into her room and sat on the edge of the bed, scared to move, frightened to make a sou
nd in case she woke Georgina and then she might have to tell what she’d done. She couldn’t do that. She definitely couldn’t do that.

  As the hours passed she stared at the blacked-out windows of the adjacent building, seeing nothing, reliving the events of the previous evening. The light in the room changed hue. Shadows lengthened and altered shape. Somewhere outside, the sun arced in the sky, the earth turned, the universe existed, the day completed its rota. Inside the room Lucy went over the process of self-recrimination countless times. She relived the events that had led to her destruction over and over until she became quite exhausted by the process. She hovered above herself and watched herself lose and lose again. Why had she continued? She knew why. She just couldn’t leave, not then, not when she was so down. She just needed to stay in the game, like she always did. It had happened that way so many times before: lose a lot, win a lot more. She had always come out on top – but not this time. Lady Luck had stabbed her in the back last night. Now Lucy must find a way not just to bear it, but to end it.

  Gradually, over the course of the following day, the shock subsided, until, by reworking the events in her mind, they changed shape and became something of far less consequence. She began to reassess the situation. She had survived worse – she would survive this. But now her survival was out of her hands. Lucy had unwittingly made a pact with the devil.

  23

  She waited in the Dressing Room for two hours before her name was called. She knew when she followed Mamasan Linda past the dance floor that they were heading to Chan’s favourite seat. She knew he would be watching her walk the length of the club, his eyes fixed on her. She knew she had to try every trick in her book to make this work.

  ‘Hello, Ka Mei, how’s things?’ His cold eyes fixed on her face.