Travails of a Trailing Spouse

by Stephanie Suga Chen

  Sarah conveyed this dilemma to Carys one morning, seeking her friend’s advice as a language teacher: did Carys think she should just get over her issues and let Jason teach her? Carys, ever the sceptic, responded, “Well, I wouldn’t hire a fifth grader to tutor me, would you?”, referring to Jason’s approximate Chinese ability level, which Sarah had previously relayed to her friend.

  Feeling better after receiving an expert’s implied support, Sarah went online to search for a tutor, finally settling on an outfit named Julia Mandarin, a ridiculous name, but, evidently, pretty effective marketing. Julia, whose actual last name was Zhang, came to Sarah’s condo and described her teaching philosophy and network of tutors that she dispatched to students across Singapore. Sarah told her that her eventual goal was to be able to understand the Chinese news broadcast and read a Chinese newspaper, to which Julia responded, if Sarah kept to the programme and studied 30 minutes a day, she should be reading the newspaper in six months to a year.

  Sarah knew this was a bald-faced lie, but admired the woman’s nerve at delivering this assurance with a straight face. Sarah wrote her a cheque for 30 lessons, a hefty sum, big enough to signify to herself that this was a serious investment, and therefore commitment, on her part. She was glad to do it, to feel productive after a long period of feeling adrift.

  In the beginning, as was often the case when starting a new hobby, Sarah quite enjoyed it; she was a diligent student, building her stack of flashcards, some days as many as 20 at a time. She zipped through the first book of the series of textbooks her tutor had provided her, never mind that they were for preschoolers.

  About six weeks into her lessons, Sarah fell ill, worse than she had ever felt in her whole life. She had heard that she should have expected this – new environment, new germs and all – but it was still horrendous when it came: fever, cold sweats, congestion, intense fatigue, dry cough, all hitting in one blow. She was flat on her back for a full five days, although this period was probably extended by the fact that she had their helper, Patricia, to help her with the kids, in addition to everything else Patricia did around the house. On the sixth day, Sarah finally summoned up enough energy to go see a doctor, with the diagnosis coming back as mycoplasma, a bacterial infection Sarah had never heard of and thought the doctor was mispronouncing, thinking for sure there was a missing “r” in there somewhere. She was sent home with a bag full of medication, including antibiotics, and the advice to try not to spread it to her children.

  When she was able to stand upright and resume her studies again, Sarah found that she had forgotten more than half of the characters she had so diligently memorised before she had got sick. It was a depressing setback and she expressed this to her friends one morning when they were all gathered at Sara’s place.

  Sara, a true friend and her biggest cheerleader, said she was still impressed with Sarah’s drive to learn Chinese so industriously, when she herself wasn’t doing much of anything. The truth was, though, it was Sara-without-an-H who was always planning interesting things for the group to do – looking up activities or events that were happening around town, or suggesting restaurants and even vacation spots they should all visit together. If it weren’t for Sara-without-an-H, Sarah-with-an-H would probably have never left the 1km radius of their condo building.

  Sarah dutifully continued to push forward in her studies, trying not to be deterred by the minimum 3,000 characters she would need to learn in order to read a newspaper. It would be a marathon, she knew, and at the end, she would be an Asian woman who was fluent in Chinese, one of at least half a billion in the world, she thought cynically.

  chapter 16

  MOTHER’S DAY

  RUBY’S KINDERGARTEN WAS having a special Mother’s Day performance; all the mothers had been invited to attend, via carefully written, construction paper invitations rolled up and tied with a ribbon. Ruby eagerly handed one to Sarah one afternoon after school, asking, “Will you come?” as if there could be any doubt.

  The invitation included a note from Ruby’s teachers requesting a mother-child photo, which Jason took the next morning as they were eating breakfast, their matching hair-styled heads tilting in towards each other. Sarah had chopped her long hair off shortly after arriving, finding it much too burdensome, given the heat, reverting to a style she had worn in high school and college, an asymmetrical bob. A few days later, after re-tying Ruby’s ponytail for the third time in one day, Sarah decided to take her back to the salon for the same haircut, Ruby exclaiming when it was done, “We’re twinsies now!”

  After posing for the photo, Sarah asked Ruby what was on the agenda for the performance. Ruby replied, “It’s a surprise. But you’re going to get a present,” she said, mysteriously.

  “Ooh, what kind of present?” Sarah asked.

  “It’s a surprise,” Ruby said again. “We’re making it, not buying it. Because I don’t have any money,” the five-year-old said, matter-of-factly.

  “Well, right,” Sarah said, “You will someday, though.”

  Ruby considered this. “How?” she asked. “Who will give me money?”

  Sarah didn’t know if she should cherish this moment of innocence or cringe that Ruby didn’t understand the basics of home economics.

  “Well, you’ll get a job and work, and then you’ll earn money,” Sarah said.

  “But where do you get your money from?” Ruby asked, making a logical jump.

  Sarah winced, for real this time. She explained to Ruby that Mommy had worked as a lawyer for many, many years, didn’t Ruby remember coming to her office, way up high, with a view of the bridge? Jason used to take Ruby there often, before Eric was born, picking her up from daycare and taking the light rail train together to Sarah’s office. Ruby always took off her shoes at the door, lining up her impossibly tiny sneakers or Mary Janes against the wall under the light switches.

  Ruby’s eyes went upwards, as if recalling the memory, and said, “Oh, yah,” (and Sarah had to stop herself from reprimanding Ruby for using yet another Singlish term, instead of the more international “Oh, yes”), but not very convincingly. “But you don’t go to work now,” she said, sounding a little unsure of herself.

  “Well, Mommy is taking a break now, to maybe find something new to do,” Sarah said. “And to play with you and Eric. Is there anything you think you might want to do for a job, later, when you grow up?” Sarah asked. She was probably breaking some parenting rule, asking the wrong question too early.

  “I want to be a mommy, like you,” Ruby said, earnestly.

  “OK, but you need to have a different job, too, that you like to do, like a lawyer like Mommy or a scientist like Daddy, where you earn money,” Sarah said gently.

  “Oh,” Ruby said, then paused. “I want to take a break, like you.”

  “Well, before you take a break, you have to have a job first, see?” Sarah stopped herself before going further; it was getting a bit too weighty, even for her.

  “It’s OK, you don’t have to decide now; you have plenty of time to think about it,” Sarah assured her, patting her head.

  “OK,” Ruby said, finishing her milk and setting down the cup with a flourish. “Is it time to go to school now?”

  Sarah looked at the clock on the wall. “Yes, I think it is,” she said.

  At lunch later with her friend Gina, another American whom she had met on the Expat Wives online group – the first friend she had met on the Internet, actually – Sarah described the conversation she had had with her daughter that morning.

  “Hm,” Gina said. “Are you worried that she thinks you don’t work?” she asked. “I mean, I’m not working right now and I don’t really care what my kids think. Like, I’m going to work again, you know? Aren’t you planning on, at some point?”

  Gina had gone to Yale undergrad, had got her MBA at Harvard, worked in management consulting, then in an abrupt about-face, had gone to culinary school, then formed her own start-up, a food logistics company. After selling that c
ompany a few years ago, she had moved to Singapore with her husband, who was running the Asia ex-China division of a large investment bank. She was the real deal, emanating sincerity and genuine care for others, able to dig beneath the surface almost instantly upon meeting someone. During their first lunch together, the two women had quickly dispensed with the preliminaries and immediately jumped into a deep discussion about their family backgrounds, marriages, careers, and future life goals, or lack thereof.

  “I’m planning to, yes. But hopefully not going back to law,” Sarah said. “Although I guess there is the possibility that I don’t ever go back to work. Would that be bad?”

  Gina thought about that for a second. “No, not bad, per se. If you were happy with that, if you ‘owned it’, you know what I mean? You could always change your mind later.”

  Yes, Sarah did know. She had been thinking about that a lot recently, could this just be her life, forever? Somewhat busy with the kids, the odd lunch out with a friend now and then, nagging her husband at night? It wasn’t a pretty picture in her head, and she said that to Gina.

  “Well, listen, it’s obvious you’re capable and could do whatever you wanted. It’s finding the thing that you want to do that’s hard. When’s the last time you spent more than an hour doing something that you really enjoyed?” the other woman asked.

  Gina was bold and brash, always honest, and when she was talking, she held Sarah’s attention so firmly that it would be a year before Sarah realised Gina didn’t have any eyebrows, due to an underactive thyroid, and that was only because Gina herself pointed it out to her.

  Sarah thought about her question and she honestly couldn’t remember. Everything she did these days seemed mind-numbingly boring; she couldn’t concentrate on anything for more than a few minutes, much less an hour. She had continued plodding on with her Chinese lessons, but progress was slow. She and Jason had started watching some local TV programming in the evenings, soap operas that her Chinese tutor had recommended to provide her with more exposure to the language. But the plots were predictable, the dialogue insipid; it simply wasn’t interesting to her. Eventually, it ended up being just Jason watching the show, Sarah sitting in front of the TV but completely tuned out, her mind elsewhere.

  “Well, do a bit of exploring, follow an inkling, anything that might turn into something. Just get out there, meet people, see what sticks,” her friend suggested.

  Sarah knew Gina was right, and tried to formulate a plan in her head.

  The conversation shifted to their husbands, with Gina asking, lightheartedly, “And how’s that convict husband of yours?”

  Sarah gave a small smile, saying, “Well, no calls from the police yet; it’s already been three months, not sure if that’s good or bad. In the meantime, we’re island-bound, for now, at least.” She sighed, “We’re hanging in there, I guess,” and told Gina about the Lee Hsien Loong fight.

  “Oh, stop, you did not tell him to be more like Lee Hsien Loong,” Gina chortled.

  “I totally did,” Sarah said, nodding.

  “Only you would compare your husband to the Prime Minister of Singapore,” Gina said.

  “I know, I’m such a bitch! And you know what, though, Jason thought he was the President!” Sarah rolled her eyes.

  “Ah, tomayto, tomahto,” Gina waved her hand. “If it makes you feel any better,” she started dramatically, “I think my husband’s gay.” Seeing Sarah’s expression, she insisted, “No, seriously. He bought this ridiculous Italian leather bag the other day.”

  “Oh now you stop,” Sarah said, covering her mouth, laughing.

  “That’s not even the worst of it, then he bought a special stand to put by the front door that’s especially for the bag,” Gina continued, starting to laugh herself.

  “No, seriously, please stop,” Sarah said, holding her stomach.

  “Yeah, and then, last week, he came back from Hong Kong with a 15-pound leg of 100% acorn-fed Ibérico ham, which is now sitting on our countertop on a special stand for it, too.” It was too much; both women were laughing uncontrollably now.

  “OH MY GOD, is that even allowed?” Sarah asked, in between breaths. Singapore had rules on bringing meat products into the country.

  On the day of the Mother’s Day performance, Ruby asked Jason to drop her off at school because she didn’t want Sarah to see all the decorations they had hung up in her classroom, waving goodbye to Sarah and saying, “See you at 2 o’clock, Mommy!”

  Sarah arrived at the stated time, leaving Patricia at home with Eric, who was still taking his afternoon nap. She took a seat with the other mothers on one of the small chairs that had been set up in rows at the back of the classroom, which indeed had been beautifully decorated with tissue paper flowers and heart cut-outs.

  She recognised most of the mothers, but was not close to any of them. They were almost all Singaporeans, working mothers who had plenty of friends and family to fill their appointment books; it wasn’t a priority for them to make new friends and Sarah didn’t blame them. She and Jason had a running bet on which one of the two could get a Singaporean to invite them over for a home-cooked meal. So far it didn’t look like either of them was going to get paid out any time soon. They had been to a few kids’ birthday parties, held at the function rooms of big condos, but the conversations had been cursory and strained; she was grateful when the party invitations started coming with the words “Drop-off” on them, saving them from all the awkwardness.

  A few minutes past 2pm, the children marched out and lined up in a neat formation in front of their mothers; Ruby, being the shortest in the class, was in the front and waved excitedly when she saw Sarah. They sang and danced two well-choreographed numbers, one in Chinese and one in English, the boy standing next to Ruby concentrating very seriously, never breaking into a smile throughout, even as he waved his hands and shook his hips energetically during the dance parts.

  At the end of the performance, the children ran to a side table and brought to each of their mothers a small vase containing a flower with petals of different colours made from cardboard. The centre of the flower had the mother-child photo that each student had provided, cut into a circle to fit. Sarah gave Ruby a big hug and kiss and told her she was proud of all her hard work. They proceeded to the snack table, where the kids had rolled cookies earlier in the day into different shapes and sprinkled them with coloured sugar. Ruby’s was a fat heart with red sprinkles and they pulled it apart together, sharing it along with some other drinks and snacks that the teachers had prepared. As they left, the teachers passed out a handful of candies to everyone.

  As they walked home hand in hand, Ruby turned to Sarah and said, “We can put the candies in Eric’s eye patch bowl; he will be so happy.” Sarah squeezed her hand; her daughter really was too sweet for words.

  It wasn’t until later that night, when Sarah put the vase and flower on the shelf above her desk, that she noticed there was something written on the flower in light pencil. On the backside of the photo, in the centre, it said, “Mommy, thank you for:” and on each petal was a different phrase.

  She presumed the teachers had helped the children decide what to write, spelling each word out patiently. Ruby’s round handwriting on each petal wrote out:

  “Teaching me”,

  “Playing with me”,

  “Taking care of me”, and a final one,

  “Taking a break”.

  Damn, that little girl was a good listener, Sarah thought.

  chapter 17

  UPROAR

  SINGAPORE CARES ABOUT Dogs (SCAD), one of the 10 or so volunteer-run animal welfare groups registered with the Agri-Food & Veterinary Authority of Singapore (AVA), was having an adoption drive at the mall across the street and Ashley caught sight of a labrador mix puppy that she just had to have. She couldn’t take him home that day, though; one of the volunteers passed her a form to fill out and said someone would contact her to set up a home visit.

  Sarah and Carys were with her,
watching her cuddle with the little guy, who actually wasn’t that little, while their sons, Eric, Noah and Lucas, ran up and down the large, concrete steps that surrounded the atrium where the adoption drive was set up.

  “You know he’s going to be about twice as big in just a few months, right?” Sarah said to Ashley, thinking about the size of their condo units.

  “I know, I know, but just look at his face,” she said, bringing him up to her own face and giving him a nuzzle.

  Ashley had had a golden retriever growing up, an amazing, perfect-specimen of a dog, she told them – a present from her father about a year after her parents had divorced. Her mother had thrown a fit when Ashley and her sister showed up with the dog in tow after the weekend at their dad’s, but Ashley demanded that they be allowed to keep him, the foundation of her strong will setting in at that very moment.

  The next day, a volunteer from SCAD named Jeslyn called Ashley, saying that she had reviewed her application and wanted to set up a home visit. Ashley asked Sarah if she wouldn’t mind being there, in case “things got weird, you know,” she said.

  Sarah didn’t mind, of course, and arrived at Ashley’s place a few minutes before Jeslyn was due to arrive, making herself useful by playing with Lucas while Ashley set out a plate of brownies for the evaluator.

  Jeslyn Lim was a tiny woman with a boyish haircut and a slight Australian accent, which she explained she had picked up while studying in Melbourne for university. She said hello to Ashley, and then Sarah, not looking bothered in the least about her presence. Jeslyn gave a brief background of SCAD, a non-profit organisation formed in 2001 with the mission to improve the welfare of stray and abandoned dogs in Singapore. They were 100% donor-funded and their work was carried out by volunteers including herself.