by Sky Lee
“Go home,” the waitress ordered Woo, without a glance in his direction. The man obediently swung the instruments off his shoulders and leaned them against the steps. Then he disappeared silently into the obscurity of the night.
“Here so early,” she said to Choy Fuk. She stepped out of her muddy boots into a pair of homemade cloth slippers which had been left waiting beside a post. Then she took her boots and knocked them a couple of times against the side of the porch to dislodge more mud. She shuffled over to the end of the porch and left them on a wooden crate. After that, she put away the hoe and shovel. They had already been cleaned, perhaps by that fellow. Choy Fuk watched her every move, and when she disappeared into the shack, he followed.
“Have you eaten?” she greeted him, checking the wood stove. She also turned down the lamp to save a bit of fuel. Her diligence was beginning to irritate Choy Fuk.
“I came early to have a word with you,” he announced brusquely. The waitress immediately sat down across the table from him. She became very still. Under the glow of the lamp, she looked serene, even soothing. Her small dark eyes flickered softly over his face, then looked down politely at her hands, still grubby with work.
Choy Fuk’s problem was that after six months of spine-tingling sexual intercourse with the waitress, night after exhaustive night, she was still not pregnant. He tapped his fingers on the table top and looked at her.
There she sat, the waitress, radiating sympathy and patience, but definitely not pregnant. He had resolved to ask her about this, since she was getting paid, and handsomely, to be pregnant with his child.
Whether she was or was not with child did not stir any kind of emotion in Choy Fuk. This whole affair was after all his mother’s idea. When she had first approached him, he couldn’t believe his good fortune—a wife and a whore! However, now that he was fast on his way to becoming the biggest laugh in Chinatown, he couldn’t help but get a little clouded over, because it woke him up at night now, dripping with sweat, gasping for breath, groping for deliverance.
Suddenly, in his dreams, he was fifteen again, within a few months of coming to the Gold Mountains. It was a brilliantly jewelled summer’s day, and he stood naked and tremulous on the edge of a cliff, overhanging a swimming hole. From this vertiginous height, Choy Fuk stared into the cool green water. He could see the fishes, eel-like, lazily sifting around the pond. He could see his companions, as fluent in water as long-legged frogs, their white buttocks gleaming wet.
“Jump, Fuk boy! Jump!” they egged him on relentlessly. It was his turn, and he longed to jump, to fly carefree through the sunlit air like the rest of them. Tears blinded him. He heaved for breath. There were white boys who joined in the chant too.
“Tiew-ya! A Fuk-doy a boya! Tiew-ya!” they mimicked parrot-like.
“Fly, you celestial! Fly!” they sang. Choy Fuk simply couldn’t do it. There was no confrontation. The boys, both chinese and caucasian, began frolicking with each other in the shining water and quickly forgot about him. But Choy Fuk was still up there, lurking on the brink.
Having lost his intention to be calm and resolute, Choy Fuk set upon dishevelling his waitress’s composure instead.
“What was that broken-down dog doing here? Do you sleep with him when I’m not around? How can I expect to trust a slut like you? I drop in unexpectedly to find men hanging about like flies.”
The waitress bided her time, concentrating on her work-worn hands.
“Well,” he persisted, “what was that beggar doing here? Answer me!”
“Exactly what you saw. He was helping me dig up the back acre,” she answered crisply.
“Do you sleep with him?”
“No, I don’t sleep with him,” she answered neatly.
“Why does he help you with your work then, and why don’t you sleep with him?” he demanded peevishly. To Choy Fuk, this particular brand of logic made a lot of sense.
The waitress looked at him full in the face and an-swered precisely, “He helps me with the turning of the sod because I am his friend. And I don’t sleep with him because he is my friend.”
Enraged by her impertinence, Choy Fuk sprang out of his chair and poised the back of his hands over her head as if to strike. “You bitch! I should cut you out right now! It’s part of the bargain, you know! If I so much as suspect a man within a mile of those female parts of yours, you’re out without a penny!”
The woman did not cringe as Choy Fuk had wanted. She slowly moved herself back a little more on her chair, foxlike eyes penetrating his innermost secrets. He deflated and sat back down. What’s the use, he thought, this woman doesn’t have feelings like other women.
“What . . .” the waitress asked slowly, in as even a voice as she could muster, “did you come to talk to me about?”
Now it was Choy Fuk’s turn to occupy himself with his hands—smooth, and white, and thick. A splendid egglike burmese jade ring on his fourth finger. A ring like that could do a lot of damage in a fistfight, bruising tender eye tissue, tearing flesh with a sharp jab. He could almost feel the teeth crumbling under his knuckles, cheekbones collapsing bloodlessly. Thwack!
“My mother’s going to cut off the money. We’ve been at it for six months, and you’re still not pregnant. Are you?” His confession tumbled out of his mouth so easily; his anger dissipated as if it had never been real.
“It’s too soon to tell this month,” the waitress shrugged, to Choy Fuk’s dismay.
“Listen, that’s not a good enough answer any more. I don’t dare tell her that. She’s hard enough to bear as it is. She cornered me again today and threatened not to pay you another cent unless she knows there’s going to be a pregnancy. Lucky for you, you don’t have to work with her any more! She won’t have you back, you know. Remember that!” Fuk enjoyed that little bit of extra leverage, pausing to search for a reaction on the waitress’s face, but she gave none.
“It hasn’t been easy for me, you know,” he continued to circle aimlessly. “She hounds me until my head reels round and round.”
“So, go back to your wife.” With that answer, the waitress got up and headed for the wash basin. She filled it with hot water from a dark urn on the top of the stove. Then she hauled a bucket of cold water up from the floor and poured in some of its contents. By the time she unbuttoned the front of her dress and slipped it off her bony shoulders, Choy Fuk was panic-stricken.
“Just like that? You think it’s over just like that!” His arms flailing. “How can I face my mother, huh? How can I dare show my face in Chinatown, huh?”
“You shouldn’t have opened your mouth in Chinatown.” The waitress dampened a thin rag in the warm water and rubbed it against a rough bar of soap. Then she began to wash herself, starting with the face and neck. He watched as she knocked her breasts about, this way and that. Water dripped down the hollow between her breasts with their huge, almost black nipples. Then the rag explored the armpits. Choy Fuk wet his lips as she swept each damp dark crevice and sweaty fold.
He sighed heavily and complained, “How can I stop those many-mouthed birds from spreading rumours? How can one keep such a secret in such a place?”
“You’ve made things difficult for me, yourself, and especially your mother. I hope she never finds out why I really left. No matter what, Mui Lan’s always been good to me.” She spoke so quietly and matter of factly that Choy Fuk felt guiltier than ever.
He knew her words were very true. For a few moments of dirty-minded jocularity with his drinking pals, he had revealed just enough to capture their attention. He had to admit that when he had first started this sticky business of “fishing with his sturdy green-stick,” so to speak, he’d got too cocky for his own good.
Having always been the centre of attention, Choy Fuk knew only what it was like to be in an enviable position—to have wife and whore, to be heir to a small fortune, to be blissful. He couldn’t have been expected to know what it was like to be one of the envious who-didn’t-have. Those stripped from �
�mutilated families,” whose need for vindication became greater as their dreams of becoming whole again diminished with each passing day.
The waitress lived in too isolated a part of town for their affair to be readily found out. But once Choy Fuk dropped a few too many innuendos, he had set himself up for others to speculate upon. Then, of course, the mystery was easily unravelled; Choy Fuk enjoyed his notoriety too much to stop swaggering. He did not notice the contempt of others swarming over him like mosquitoes. The waitress noticed immediately, and she retreated out of Chinatown, out of their target range, not only for herself but also in the hope of saving Mui Lan from embarrassment.
Burying his fat head in his soft hands, Choy Fuk tried to console himself. “Who cares?” he said shakily. “This matter is already old hat. Besides, it’s only my friends who know.”
The waitress just lifted a naked leg up onto a wooden crate and tilted her pelvis forward for easier access to the dark-skinned parts between her thighs. The rag began to roam gently in the purple petals of her flowery creases. Choy Fuk stared, entranced by her hand hovering over her warm wetness, water trickling down her white legs. He glanced nervously at her face, but found it impenetrable, afloat in her own thoughts, apparently unaware of him.
“Is it my fault that the old bitch chose another worn-out bag for me?” he growled. He jumped up and pointed an accusing finger at her.
“You . . . if there are rumours about, it’s because you’ve been blowing foul air all over Tang People’s Street, haven’t you? How do I know that you haven’t been smearing my family’s good name with every sonovabitch who offers you his hot dog!”
She nonchalantly rinsed out her washcloth and resoaped it. “You want to get me into trouble, don’t you? You want to see me with a shamed face . . . so . . .” he searched excitedly for the words to convey his distress, “so you and your lovers can have a good laugh.”
At that, she jutted out her dimpled haunches and slipped her soapy hands down the sepia crack between the two great moons. She moaned.
Choy Fuk lunged at her and grabbed two huge handfuls of flesh, squashing as hard as he dared. He twisted her around, frantically kneading her breasts; the basin of sweet-smelling, frothy water slopped onto his shoes as he tangled his legs around hers and clung hopelessly in a passionate embrace with her.
“Wash my feet!” the waitress said hoarsely.
TING AN
1925
Later that evening, Ting An ducked into the back door of a blood-coloured brick building on the corner of Pender and Columbia. Inside the lobby, he walked past a little box office, unmanned and unlit, towards two great, heavy doors ornately carved with gold-flamed dragons. Exalted beings that they were, they writhed and frolicked silently in a cloud-petalled heaven under his fingers, yet out of his grasp. Ting An pushed one back, and the door opened just enough for him to slide into a darkened theatre. Immediately, the thin wail of a lone chinese fiddle reached out to him. Surrounding him, rows of empty benches lined the large floor, patiently waiting for an audience to fill them with gaiety and laughter. Far away, a small stage gave off the only light; it was empty except for a lion dance headpiece artfully arranged in the centre, mouth open in perpetual surprise.
After Ting An’s eyes adjusted to the dimness, he made out a few bobbing black tops of heads inside the orchestra pit underneath the wooden stage. From there, a tired voice directed in a patronizing tone, “A Low Lee-ah, three clangs of the cymbals like this!” Brass cymbals crashed together, followed by high-pitched, off-key falsetto singing. “That way, O.K.?”
Ting An stuffed his hands into his pockets and sidled up to the musicians to greet them. “Still hard at it?” he asked cheerlessly.
They all grunted at him, worn out and edgy.
“Yee Gaw,” Ting An singled out the director, “why don’t you go a little easier!”
“Pah, go die!” Yee Gaw sniffed irritably. “With the first performance tomorrow night, these good-for-nothings still can’t get it right! We miss your flute too,” he added.
The other musicians were already starting to pack their instruments away. Yee Gaw stretched his back with arms akimbo. He was a tall, thin man with sharp features and pointy elbows.
“No more time, Big Brother!” answered Ting An.
“What’s this no-more-time business? A young loafer like you! What’s so important that takes up your time now?”
Ting An just smiled a little stupidly and shrugged.
“Too much whoring in those Powell Street whorehouses, you pretty boy!” Yee Gaw added lightly as he put away his clackers. A dark shadow flickered across Ting An’s face, but no one noticed since he quickly snuffed it out. He didn’t like that kind of talk. He deliberately pushed both his sweaty hands deeper into his pockets and wiped them against his legs.
“Let’s walk!” he commanded good-naturedly, to switch the topic of conversation. “I’m thirsty.”
He immediately headed for the stage door, anxious to taste the scotch whiskey he knew was waiting for him at the Kuo Seun Social Club. Once there, he’d be able to relax and sink into his thoughts, with his close friends around him laughing and enjoying themselves too much to take notice of him. That was the way he liked it.
“If you want, we go!” His older friend slapped him on the shoulder, urging him towards the front doors instead. “But everyone is at the Lucky Money Home Club tonight. We’re going to join them to find out who won the lottery.”
Ting An jerked back. He didn’t want to do anything out of the ordinary, and he didn’t like the patrons of the Lucky Money Home Club. He was the type who liked to sit in the same seat, to listen to friends he trusted, and to know that he didn’t have to say a thing if he so chose. Most of all, he didn’t want to meet up with Choy Fuk.
“What lottery?” His voice annoyed and resistant. He stopped dead in his tracks. The other musicians swept past them.
“Hey, you really haven’t been around, have you? Having too good a time ‘plucking flowers by the roadside!’ Ha! Ha! You pretty boy!” Yee Gaw offered with a wink of his eye. He had a nasty habit of flicking his fingers against Ting An’s chest, who was getting extremely angry. He moved away, scowling, until Yee Gaw sensed his displeasure and commenced an explanation.
“This is a very special lottery.” Yee Gaw couldn’t refrain from giggling. “People have been betting on how long it would take Choy Fuk to fill his waitress’s tummy with happiness.” His hands mimicked the graceful caressing of a woman’s globular belly. He jabbed Ting An in the ribs again, then doubled over in a hysterical fit of laughter. “Now who would have guessed over six months and still no hint of a bulge!”
The man was almost rolling on the sidewalk. Tears squeezed out onto his fine eyelashes, as he tried his hardest to gasp out, “I . . . I just have to know who won!”
Ting An was horrified. He stared open-mouthed.
“What are you sputtering about?” he scoffed. “You’re crazy!”
Yee Gaw was about to poke again with his index finger, but Ting An took a step back and made a hesitant half-turn as if to leave. The finger missed its mark.
“You mean . . .” Yee Gaw said, “Don’t tell me that you of all people don’t even know about Choy Fuk and his waitress.”
Since Ting An hated calling attention to himself, especially in relation to this affair, he steered the conversation away again.
“Of course I heard! Aah, go die! Who takes this kind of foul-mouthed talk to be real? This kind of gossip’s not for me. You’d think that people had better things to occupy themselves with, especially at times like these.”
“Aiya, Lo Wong, get off that high horse of yours! Not everyone has the opportunities for diversion that you seem to have. Even I couldn’t resist two bids.” As he spoke, Yee Gaw extracted from his sleeve a tiny bit of tissue paper with a red number brushed on it. “Coming or not?” he urged already walking away.
“Pah!” Ting An waved him off with a gesture which clearly suggested how disgusted he
was with such activities. Under his breath, he muttered, “That dead boy Choy Fuk has no future.”
Things have gotten out of hand, thought Ting An. He had been aware of Choy Fuk bragging about his escapades, and there was nothing he could do to protect Gwei Chang’s family except sneer at anyone who dared perpetuate such talk in front of him.
Ting An glowered up the street where Yee Gaw was already beginning to melt into the night. This dead town was full of vicious ghosts. He stood alone on his corner of the street, but up along Pender Street he could see bands of idle men dotting the poorly lit doorways like ink spots, underneath flashing electric signs, wherever there was a bench or window ledge to perch on. At every wooden window, crowded faces looking inward; on the second-floor balconies, more batlike forms dangled off the railings as if the never-ceasing clatter of mah-jong tiles would drive them off the edge. The cackle-talk of their trapped spirits; grim laughter rolling off like distant thunder. Ting An felt a swell of fury rising inside him—a pounding fury trapped within the tough shell of his gut, hardened from a lifetime of soul-wrenching bitterness. The source of this fury remained elusive, but he recognized in it the smouldering ferocity of an animal that had known only boundless freedom before walking into a snare.
His human form told him to reconsider. If this kind of malicious thing was going on, better that he should know all about it. “Big Brother Yee, wait up! I’m coming!”
The other one turned and jerked his head to and fro. His big teeth, a bright white grinning from the darkness, wagged at him like a street walker.
Ting An was not a gambling man. He was not that easy to please. Instead, he was the meticulous type—the type who would chew through iron chains to gain his freedom. The Lucky Money Home Club was larger, rowdier and dirtier than Kuo Seun. Slurped up by its chaos, he felt nullified as he looked down at the men at the dominoes table, tap-dancing with their chips and fingertips, faces powdery dry. They played several games at once, addicts needing the flimsy thrill of a win to unlock their minds, shovelling away their meagre earnings with both hands. Tomorrow morning, their corpses would be found floating in the creek, and no one would blink an eye.
