Unrest

1

OLD FLAMES REKINDLED

I

ONE MORNING A FEW DAYS LATER, the male protagonist of this novel receives a call in his office—it’s her, calling all the way from Hong Kong.

This is thrilling. He hadn’t thought he’d hear from her again. She’s one of his secrets. Like a schoolboy who scored full marks by cheating on a test, there is alarm beneath his surprise and delight, a fear of detection. Has his secretary guessed who this woman is to him? Is she listening on the extension?

He squirms in his seat, lowering his voice and half-covering his mouth for good measure. He wishes he could put down the receiver and tiptoe to the door, to see if Miss Lin is eavesdropping. But if he did that, his caller might think he’d hung up on her. He stays in his chair, nerves wound tight as a cat on the prowl, talking with bated breath, eyes fixed on the frosted glass of the office door.

From outside comes a clatter like teeth champing. Miss Lin typing away as usual. He ought to feel relief, but his heart continues to thump wildly.

II

Weikang receives a letter from Guoliang, saying he’ll be visiting Guangzhou soon.

Recently, Weikang has been thinking a lot about Guoliang and their time together in Singapore. Their friendship, like sediment, swirls up from the deepest reaches of his memory. Even after so much time has passed, he is unwilling to face his feelings for Guoliang, but neither can he discard them— not that he could bear to. Is he a pervert? Guoliang’s features, delicate as a girl’s, his soft voice—they still quicken his heart and flood him with shame. Guoliang must be almost fifty by now. What does he look like these days? Weikang longs to see him, yet fears their meeting. His thoughts chase each other by the dim light of his bedside lamp. He stares at the faces of his sleeping wife and child, as if their eyes, now shrouded beneath heavy lids, might be able to penetrate his brain and look into the secrets of his past.

Weikang shakes his head and smiles grimly. He is married with a kid, and loves his wife. Therefore he must be a normal man. He was helpless back then, desperate for love and comfort, and Guoliang was the only person to whom he could turn. His need for affection was distorted into lust. How did that happen? Weikang tells himself: Guoliang was so soft, it was easy to pretend he was a girl. What they did was no different to any other drunken fumble between a man and a woman. Seen this way, his behaviour doesn’t seem debauched or obscene. Still, he curses quietly under his breath, and resolves not to be ensnared once again by that period of his life. He thoughts turn instead to the town where he grew up, Cha’ah New Village.

Now he does his best to pull the strands of memory together, forming a clear, complete picture. In the yellowish lamplight, the paper before him becomes an illuminated screen. One hand on his forehead, a pen in the other, he carefully sketches a fence around a piece of land, the New Village where they lived.

Outside the village were the trunk road, the river, palm trees, rubber plantations, and beyond that, a thick jungle where Malayan Communist Party guerillas lurked. Along the fence, he scrawls little circles like metal vines. The fence was meant to keep out the MCP insurgents, known to the villagers as mountain rats. In fact, some of them had relatives in the village, and at New Year or other festive times, the bolder ones would sneak over the fence to join in the festivities. If the belly of a woman whose husband was in the jungle began to swell, the others would ask companionably, So, you’ve had a visit? and she would nod sheepishly. There was a neighbourhood watch group meant to keep Communists out. They made a show of patrolling at night, but mostly hid in the schoolhouse to nap and play cards. No one ever saw them clash with infiltrating Communists, let alone capture one.

Weikang stops drawing and rubs his tired eyes, staring blankly at the village he has conjured on the paper. He was fifteen when he left Cha’ah for Singapore, and the memories of his youth have begun to fade. Still, there are traces. He remembers the many trees beyond the fence: durian, rambutan, apricot, guava, mangosteen, soursop. He sketches these fruits, and tries to recall how they tasted. Then his pen hovers over the village, trying to locate his house.

Finally, he picks a spot on the right hand side and draws a little square. This was where they lived.

III

Or I could have started this novel at the other end:

For several days now, she has been picking up his business card again and again, kneading it between her fingers, hovering over his phone number. Would he really be happy to hear from her? What if she called when his wife was in the office? But so what if she was? Why such strange anxieties? Was it because she had been to bed with him?

She never wanted to be in this position. She has only slept with him once. Does that make her the other woman? She isn’t in love with him. The whole incident was no more than an aberration, a one-off fantasy made flesh. She doesn’t want to see him again, let alone start any kind of relationship.

And him? If he’d known they’d end up in bed that very night, would he still have given her his card?

But if she doesn’t want to see him again, why is she even thinking about calling him now?

Once again she pinches the card between her fingers, uncertain what to do next.

IV

Weikang’s home was above a shop that sold liquor, soft drinks, cigarettes and beer snacks—peanuts and dried fish. The two-storey wooden building accommodated both the family and its business. The lower level held a few tables and chairs, an icebox, and the cashier’s desk. Their only customers were out-of-work neighbours who spent their days chatting and drinking.

The family were close to their clientele, socially as well as geographically. Through the ceiling, the customers heard the cacophony of life: footsteps, blurry cries, squabbles. And in return, the family received beer-sodden chatter, lofty speeches, sudden bursts of laughter, and drunken arguments—the background music to Weikang’s childhood, as he did his homework, ate and slept. Weikang’s father was a builder who, when there was no work available, sat with his colleagues (who doubled as his drinking buddies) in the shop, getting through eight or nine bottles of beer over a few hours—none of them paid for, of course. Weikang’s mother often had a go at him about this, but he retorted that she wasn’t seeing the big picture—it would be even less worthwhile to spend his beer money in some other shop. When the nagging got too much, he made good on his threat and took his crew to the rival establishment across the road. This didn’t happen often—not because he didn’t want to part with the money, but because he seldom had it in the first place. Weikang’s father didn’t work very much. The village didn’t change from year to year, so naturally there were few construction jobs. Only once every two or three months would something come up in town. You can imagine how little they earned. They were more like unemployed drifters than proper builders. Father’s wages barely paid for his gang’s carousing, and Weikang would have starved if not for the proceeds of the liquor store—hence his mother’s annoyance. One good thing about Weikang’s mother was her reluctance to make a scene in public, preferring to sulk while serving his father’s friends so that they grew uncomfortable and left after a couple of drinks. When his father returned late at night, grumbling about her attitude—that’s when she let her anger out.

His father knew he was at fault, and didn’t try to defend himself for long. Instead he quietly washed, read the paper, and slunk into bed. Their arguments were like bursts of rain, loud sputters followed by silence. Four-Eyes from the provision shop next door had it worse. His parents’ quarrels were thunderstorms, loud enough to be heard by half the village.

As you might have guessed, Four-Eyes wore thick glasses, which made him look prim—the other boys called him a sissy. The village kids didn’t know how bad his eyesight actually was, but supposed anyone who had to wear spectacles must be practically blind, an impression reinforced by how vague and helpless he looked without them. He didn’t play much with the other boys, preferring to skip rope or play five stones—tossing small cloth bags stuffed with green beans—with the girls. His fingers were even more nimble than theirs. The girls adored Four-Eyes and treated him like one of them, tussling with him and giggling. He didn’t like being with the boys because they teased him, grabbing his chest, rubbing him down there, sometimes ripping off his shirt or even his shorts, stopping only when he burst into tears. These boys didn’t dare touch actual girls, so Four-Eyes became the receptacle for their murky fantasies and nebulous desires.

Weikang was gentler towards Four-Eyes than the others, not joining in when they molested him. If they went too far—like removing his trousers—he tried to stop them. Even so, there were two or three times when they managed to strip Four-Eyes completely, and Weikang experienced a strange sensation on seeing his little birdie. That night at home, his own little birdie felt strange too, and he started fiddling with his foreskin, discovering how to bring himself to climax. He began noticing that even though Four-Eyes wept and wailed as the others mauled him, he seemed to derive some obscure pleasure from it. After that, under cover of protecting Four-Eyes from the others, Weikang took the opportunity to reach into the scrum of bodies and touch his cock.

The village boys often gathered in an empty field not far from the liquor store to play catch or hopscotch. From beneath a coconut tree, the medicine shop’s lethargic sandy-coloured dog watched. If not for its lolling tongue and sharp eyes, it would have looked the ruminating philosopher. It was even-tempered as one too, not seeming to mind when the children flung their flip-flops at its nose. It lay there, not even barking, or else slowly stood and moved to a calmer location, placidly observing the playful group from a different angle, its tongue still showing, deep in thought.

V

She brushes her teeth by the bathroom mirror.

I’ve been watching her closely. She appears mildly obsessive about dental hygiene—but strangely, never looks in the mirror. She avoids her own image. Instead, she looks down at the sink, and brushes with unusual energy and concentration. Hiding from herself—the scrutiny of her own gaze, her thoughts, her soul. Her face lowered, she brushes fiercely—twenty times up, twenty times down, twenty times left, twenty times right, then again twenty times up, down, left, and right. She brushes as if it’s been too long, as if cleaning her teeth were an unspeakably important task. She enters into it with her entire being, her focus absolute, her attention so undivided she doesn’t notice I’m watching her.

She is the female protagonist of my novel.

VI

Even though Weikang has shaded his desk lamp with a magazine, the light still wakes his wife. She mumbles something about why isn’t he asleep yet, and he soothes her yes, yes, until she rolls over and goes back to sleep. He clips the magazine more firmly over the lampshade, and retreats into his memories, completing the picture point by point: his parents’ shop, then to the left and right a provision shop, medicine shop, photo studio, a place selling Western imports and a coffee shop. Houses stand squashed against the fence. Next come an out-of-business cinema, a meeting hall, a mosque, Kwan Yin temple, a church, the market, and a police station along the main road, by his primary school.

He recalls an old people’s home, but can’t find room for it.

His pen hovers over the space embraced by the fence, now crammed full of little circles and squares.

Giving up, he scratches out some shops from the middle and replaces them with a long rectangle. This is the village square. The government propaganda vehicles often parked here, broadcasting their anti-Communist speeches, interspersed with songs by the stars of the day: Bai Guang, Wu Yingyin, Zhou Xuan, Yao Li, Yao Min, and so on. In the evenings, threads of melody drifted through the village streets, Sighing Ten Times or Thinking of You Beneath The Bright Moon. They nailed some wooden boards together to make a small stage in the middle of the green, and the exhibitionists of the village would perform there for the entertainment of the others. Their primary school teacher often led a student choir to sing, Outside the pavilion, by the ancient path, emerald grass reaches for the sky. He can still remember the tune.

There was a bus stop too—he draws a circle outside the fence, his pencil scoring the paper. After starting secondary school, he used to stand here waiting for the bus to Singapore. This was during the Emergency, and the bus had to get back before curfew at seven. In the end, he stayed at an uncle’s house in the city all through secondary school. To be honest, he left for Singapore reluctantly, unwilling to fend for himself or accept the end of a carefree childhood. His parents practically had to force him to go.

Most of New Villagers were Chinese, and most of those Hakka—even the few Malay and Indian children could speak a little of their tongue, while Weikang learned some Malay words and even a smidgen of Tamil. He can still remember some of the Malay even now, but only one or two Tamil words, and probably in garbled pronunciation. When they weren’t playing in the field, the village children made for the river. Rather than leave by the main gate and walk round, they slipped through a hole in the fence that lead straight to the riverbank. Upstream was the Chinese cemetery, where it was said a couple of Communists had been spotted scavenging food left as offerings. Nearby was scrubland and, behind that, a mysterious hilly forest. The grown-ups always warned them to play in the open and not to venture into the scrub, never mind the deeper jungle. There was wild boar out there, not to mention tigers and pythons in the denser jungle. The children spotted the occasional wild pig, but never a tiger. Walking along the river, they encountered rattlesnakes and yellow-spotted cobras, but most often the garter snakes that draped themselves over the branches of the guava trees like beautiful silvery belts. They knew these creatures were poisonous and tiptoed around them.

The children loved adventure. To start with, they played amongst the bushes, then they stumbled along well-trodden paths, thus proving others had come before them. They followed them deeper in, clearing the way with their parangs, pushing through thorns and vines until they reached the forbidden territory of the jungle.

Even at the fringes of that dark place, it was a different world. The dense foliage blocked out the sky, penetrated only by isolated dabs of sunlight creating a criss-cross of shadows across the bare ground. Birds they didn’t know the names of called out above. Here and there they saw small groups of monkeys swinging amongst the branches. Aside from the rustling of dry leaves underfoot, the atmosphere was peaceful, mystical. Their hearing sharpened, and they could distinguish the various bird and insect species, the dialogue between leaves and wind, the passage of small creatures over bark, falling fruit and distant streams. Even their giggles and chatter reached brighter notes. Upon entering the jungle, they rattled tin cans, making as much noise as possible, so the MCP would know they weren’t the army, and the army would know they weren’t the Communists. That was the idea, anyway.

Occasionally they came across the indigenous Sakai people, men and women with white cloths wrapped around their waists, their upper bodies bare, holding daggers and blowpipes. They didn’t seem alarmed to see the children, rather jabbered a few words before disappearing back between the trees. It was the boys who were shocked, primarily because it was the first time seeing a woman’s naked breasts. Apart from catching fish in the clear river water, their favourite activity was playing ‘Communists and Soldiers’. Their group of seven would split into two, using branches as rifles, shouting bang! bang! bang! as they darted amongst the trunks like real life insurgents.

Once, while playing, they heard the rapid ka-ka-ka of a real machine gun—the army and insurgents exchanging fire nearby. The sound ended crisply, and seemingly close-by. Any minute now, bullets would be flying over their heads. Trembling, they ran.

They scrambled through the hanging vines, thorns trying to ensnare them. They reached the scrub, and still gunshots were audible behind. They continued on, almost losing their way in the confusion. They reached open ground and still they didn’t stop, as if the Security Forces were chasing them. Through the graveyard, across the marsh, along the river, the whirlwind of their footsteps disturbing the slumbers of lizards and pangolins, interrupting the games of squirrels and flying foxes, dispersing these creatures back into the shelter of the trees and bushes.

Finally, the tangle of boys blew loud and shaken straight into the kampong—the closest Malay village.

The Malays watched them dash through like startled deer, ignoring the frenzied barking of their dogs, until they were back at the New Village. There the boys stopped at the entrance, by the fence, gazed up at the distant hills, then bent over and gasped for air, embarrassed to look at each other and still a little frightened.

Afterwards, they sat in a row against the fence, chattering like sparrows as they vividly recollected their close escape. One boy claimed he’d heard a voice, another said he’d turned to see a guerrilla passing between two trees, but whatever the case, the Communists and the army must have been nearby, and the battle had definitely been moving in their direction. They could have been caught in the crossfire at any moment, or else mistaken for Communists and shot. As they spoke, their fear was replaced by excitement, maybe even valour. Even those who’d squealed in fear during the retreat began to think of that afternoon as their most thrilling, intrepid experience. At the same time, even though no one would say it, they knew they would never set foot in the jungle again. They also silently agreed this would be their secret. None of the other children would hear of it, let alone the adults.

Very quickly, the flock of little sparrows recovered their spirits and made for the entrance to the police station to wait for the army trucks to see if they contained any dead Communists. The boys didn’t find dead bodies frightening, perhaps because they were used to them. Usually in the evenings, Weikang and his family would be eating dinner when the street would suddenly fill with noise and people running past. Realising the army had shot another insurgent, they too would put down their bowls and hurry to the police station. Sometimes Weikang and his friends would be playing by the entrance to the village when an army truck came by, and they would follow after.

The speeding truck would wobble down the dirt road, raising cloud after cloud of hot and yellow dust, before stopping to disgorge men in camouflage. The dead bodies were lifted down, naked apart from a torn scrap of cloth wrapped around their waists, tied to wooden planks. The soldiers leaned them against the fence, like suckling pigs ready to be roasted. They looked smaller than living men, perhaps because they had bled