Last Tang Standing Read online

“Oh, thanks,” I replied. “I like your, er”—I gave him a desperate once-over, looking for some article of clothing I didn’t have to lie about liking: I don’t get male fashion these days, and he was a walking poster of trends—“Invisalign,” I finished feebly.

  I tried hard to find a good conversation starter. Now that I was sober, for the life of me I couldn’t think of anything safe. Here’s the thing about dating without alcohol at my age: it’s pure agony. You lose the ability to lightheartedly banter as you age; instead you worry about sounding intelligent (but not in an intimidating fashion), being current without trying too hard, while being politically correct. Plus I could clearly see one of the partners from my law firm seated just two rows away from us, munching on an anemic-looking salad, looking morose and clearly hoping that someone would walk up to him and blow his head off or at least give him an encouraging hand job. God, why did I choose the busiest salad bar in the freaking CBD[fn1] for a first lunch date?

  Oh right. I had a conference call right after and it’s close by the office. Priorities.

  Somehow Orson came to the rescue. “So, what about this wrap, huh? Don’t you wish we were having nasi lemak instead? Speaking of which, being a Malaysian, how do you find Singaporean food?”

  And just like that, we were off to the races. We pitted Malaysian and Singaporean cuisine against each other and dissed each other’s national claim to having invented Hainanese chicken rice. We talked about our favorite hawker stalls, casual and posh eateries, our secret holes-in-the-wall, all the obscure little places where we would never bring anyone other than family, close friends, and bosses we wanted to bribe with nonsexual favors.

  I ended up having way more fun that I was supposed to. It’s strange how much Orson and I have in common. Maybe it’s fate, moving in mysterious ways?

  11

  Friday 4 March

  12:25 p.m. There was a huge commotion earlier today at work because Mong fainted in the pantry. At first we thought he’d had a heart attack, which in his case would be expected, but he came to a few seconds later, looking bemused. He was about to go back to his office when his secretary and one of the senior partners intervened and marched him off to the hospital. They ran some tests and turns out the man had contracted dengue. With that diagnosis, he now has no choice but to stay home for two full weeks.

  The doctor was apparently surprised/horrified that he was able to get to the office this morning and work since, you know, he was running a fever and his white blood cell count was so low it was life-threatening. But that’s Mong; he’s nothing if not dedicated. #workgoals #restecp (to quote the great Ali G).

  Suresh and I have been tasked to cover his files, the few he would never delegate, preferring to work on them directly with the help of his lackeys/junior associates, Olivia and Yu Han. I will never leave the office. Never.

  9:35 p.m. Left the office with Suresh. Yu Han and Olivia were killing each other to distinguish themselves to us and were unwilling to leave the office before us, so when Suresh asked if I’d like to grab a drink, I surprised myself and said yes.

  Made beeline to a tiny little pub that is popular with the afterwork crowd in our building and finished a tower of beer and a bottle of sake. At first the drinking took place in silence (we were tired), then we began to talk. We talked a lot about our families. His mother was now convinced that he and Anousha were never going to get married in time for Anousha to bear children without the helping hand of technology. He showed me a bizarre WhatsApp conversation with his mother where she started sharing articles about how important it is for women without clear romantic prospects to freeze their eggs after hitting thirty, how sperm and egg quality decrease with age, what diseases geriatric-egged babies were more prone to get, etc.

  “What?” I said, or perhaps shouted. I was very drunk. I was also very outraged. “What gives these goons the right to … the right to tell you where to put it? Where were they”—my voice rose higher—“when you needed to know where babies came from and they told you to ask your high school biology teacher, because that’s what they’re paid to teach? Where? Nowhere, the cowards!” I slammed the tabletop for emphasis, passion rising, spittle flying. “You know how to dissuade them from sending you stuff like that, right? You just need to send them detailed texts about all the sexual positions you use with Anousha and ask them for tips on how to get each other in the mood. That should make them stop the passive-aggressive ‘suggestions’ about your sex life, the nosy jerks.”

  He looked at me and said, “Andrea, stop talking or we might become friends.”

  11:05 p.m. Home at last. We ended up spending the last two hours strategizing on how best to thwart annoying attempts at matchmaking/speeding up marriage and babies by our respective parents. Surprised by cross-cultural similarities in Asian parents across the spectrum. Also vindicated that I was not the only one who started out a virgin at uni. I don’t know how we got to sharing something so personal, but Suresh is very easy to talk to. And maybe the drinking helped a little.

  Anyway, speaking of sexual inexperience, I wonder how things would be in the sack with Orson; nowadays, the younger generation are so blasé about sex. They’ve seen all the mind-boggling stuff with one click that you had to dig through dodgy bookstores to get an idea of (not speaking from personal experience, of course). They know how a threesome works before they’ve even gotten to first base with another person. For young people these days, porn is not something to be consumed in a dark corner, with shame and peanut butter and jelly sandwiches (again, not speaking from personal experience).

  Hmm. I wonder what kind of dodgy stuff Orson expects me to do. Maybe it’ll involve food. Mmm. Food.

  11:25 p.m. This is what Val texted to remind me of our plans:

  Tmw be at Swissotel pickup point by 7pm for Sexy Book Club and dress NICE or else.

  Really knows how to sell a fun date, that one.

  12

  Sunday 6 March

  2:07 a.m. Back from Valerie’s shindig with both my kidneys and my soul intact, so that’s a relief.

  At 7:00 p.m. sharp, Valerie rolled up to Swissotel in Bugis. My jaw dropped when she popped out of a black Mercedes-Benz S-Class, dressed in a black one-shoulder dress and making me look completely dowdy in comparison in my gray slacks, cap-sleeved cream silk blouse, and safe, gold ballerina flats.

  “Sweeeeetheart!” she said, tottering out in silver heels tall enough to make a supermodel out of a gnome and holding two glasses of bubbly. Everyone was staring at her. I scrambled into the back of the car, dying to get away. “Why are you dressed so fancy?” I asked, flabbergasted.

  “DeeDee, my friend the ex-actress, told me to dress nice!”

  I shut the door as Valerie got in on the other side. “And you went straight for cocktail attire? What if she meant business casual?”

  “When DeeDee says ‘nice,’ she means ‘fabulous.’ These people don’t work! We’re talking thin air, high altitude here, not your working poor!”

  “Oh, excuse me,” I said sarcastically. “I’ll just go back to my corporate hovel with the gold-plated taps and the Molton Brown toiletries, and shit while overlooking the sea.”

  Valerie patted my arm as though I were a troll with coal for brains. “Hush. The point is, you have to work. Ergo, poor.”

  Valerie had no nuance. How she ended up eking out a comfortable living as a curator at one of the poshest, most respected art galleries in town, I had no idea.

  “Well, if I’m poor, so are you,” I shot back.

  “I’m not poor!” Valerie said in a deeply offended tone. She had been briefly married to the heir of a very wealthy Indo-Chinese family who, as it turned out, was gay. The dude was so deep in the denial closet that he was all the way in Narnia. Valerie literally had to catch him in the act of hoovering chauffeur dick for him to admit that, maybe, just maybe, he was gay. Heartbroken but not stupid, Valerie whipped out her phone and took as many photos of her husband and her naked chauffeur as she could before st
orming out of their marital home, intending to use them to secure a great divorce settlement. Not that her quick action made a big difference to her fortunes in the end: unfortunately, thanks to an iron-clad prenup, she divorced the man with little more to show (by billionaire divorce standards, that is) than a large River Valley penthouse and eighteen thousand dollars of spending money a month. Add that to the fact that she had had very little sex for the almost nine years that she was married, I thought she had done very badly for herself.

  “It’s all a matter of perspective,” Valerie was saying. “I don’t need to work for a living if I don’t want to. I like my job.”

  We decided that we would stop arguing in favor of drinking the champagne, a delectable 2002 Pol Roger rosé, which was fizzing dangerously flat. Priorities and all.

  We each downed two glasses in quick succession, which was unusual for Valerie.

  I soon found out why. “You know, I was joking about the devil-worship the last time we spoke, of course, but to be honest, given DeeDee’s swinger reputation, anything is possible tonight,” Valerie said as we wove our way through rush-hour traffic. “We could find ourselves in an Eyes Wide Shut situation later.”

  “That’s exactly what I’m worried about,” I confided. “If this turns out to be some kinky swingers event, I’m going home. I have on underwear so old that it can shrink an erection, and I’d rather nobody saw it tonight.”

  “And the closest I’ve ever gotten to any group action was watching a National Geographic special on snakes!”

  “What have we gotten ourselves into?” I said wildly. “We should turn around and go back now.”

  “You can’t,” the Grab driver cut in.

  “And why not?” Valerie demanded.

  “Well, you have to reenter your destination into the app, plus I’m not turning around until I’ve seen this crazy hot party house. And also, we’ve arrived.”

  So we had.

  After we had passed through security, we were deposited in front of an imposing oak, ushered into a reception room by a maid in an actual uniform, and given a flute of champagne each. Then DeeDee Halim, former beauty queen, model, ex-actress, and alleged orgy buddy of a prince, greeted us herself at the door in a jeweled kaftan in flamingo pink and gold and an armful of gold Cartier Love and Frey Wille bangles, interspersed with bright turquoise bead bracelets. It was a breathtaking vision. She was still beautiful, with full, sensuous features, a shock of graying hair swept into a bun, and large, limpid eyes the color of sand.

  “Darling,” she said, air-kissing Valerie. “Don’t you look adorable.” Even her voice was velvety.

  “Don’t you!” Valerie cooed, not seeming to mind smashing her carefully honed, Janet Jackson–esque waxen cheekbones against DeeDee’s real ones.

  DeeDee turned the full blare of those doe-like eyes to me and we exchanged air kisses. “And you must be Andrea, Valerie’s good friend.”

  “I sure am,” I said in an unnatural high voice. I had to fight back the impulse to say “ma’am” like a school child.

  “Pleased to meet you,” DeeDee said. “Follow me.” She sashayed away.

  It was hard not to gawk as she led us past room after well-appointed room to the living hall. We were like Alice entering Wonderland—an extremely tastefully executed, designer Wonderland. You know those achingly beautiful houses you find in Architectural Digest, Home & Design, or Pinterest? Those gorgeous homes that have custom everything and never had an Ikea anything? This was that house. Hardwood floors, tasteful lighting, a brutalist chandelier that threw amber-gold light everywhere. Walls done in washes of ecru and pearl, hung with quiet art; a dining room with porcelain vases, brass sculptures, and a crystal chandelier almost as long as a table.

  The living hall was the most colorful room in the house so far, thanks to the owner’s interesting collection of brightly colored, eclectic art: a trio of Mirós, what was maybe an Alphonse Mucha, framed Persian miniatures in dazzling detail, beautiful collages from an artist that neither of us knew, and a large, show-stopping centerpiece by an artist called Ashley Bickerton that made Valerie gasp. Bouquets of burgundy tulips and lilies in crystal vases dotted the room.

  I looked around, intimidated, as I understood what Valerie had been trying to tell me: I was underdressed. A dozen or so beautiful people in cocktail-appropriate attire were fanned out around the room, chatting gaily as two waiters in linen pants and white shirts circulated with flutes of champagne and platters of hors d’oeuvres. In one corner of the room was a large island of food: iced trays of oysters, mini quiches, an assortment of mini toasts, two different salads, bowls of olives, gorgeous platters of macarons and chocolate truffles, next to a bar where a smiling chef stood behind the counter, slicing sashimi that no one seemed to be asking for.

  I tried to act nonchalant. Beside me Valerie’s eyes were glazed with desire and wonder, and she was possibly low-grade hyperventilating. “OMG, that’s Wilson Lam!” she whispered excitedly. I had no idea who she was talking about, but before I could reply she had dashed off, Road Runner–style, to a man in a white suit with silver hair and more work done on his face than Valerie’s. A white suit! I shook my head, amused. But then I saw a good-looking man in his forties in a brocade bleu de france suit with a Hermès orange bow tie and matching pocket square walk in with a poodle on a monogrammed leash, followed by a woman in ripped acid-green jeans, a black long-sleeved top with large paillettes sewn into the collar and carrying a neon yellow patent leather bag, and that took all the wind from my sails. Maybe I was the one who was out of place, not them.

  For a few minutes I stood there alone, sipping on champagne, unsure of what to do. All the guests were engaged in intimate conversations with unwelcoming body language. Twice or thrice, with different groups, I tried to insert myself into a conversation and was politely but so cleanly rebuffed that I gave up and wandered over to gorge on oysters. But when I saw that I was the only person eating I felt uncomfortable and stopped. I looked down at the table where nine empty oyster shells, mine, lay on the bone white porcelain bowl and I felt exposed by my peasant gluttony.

  The living room’s glass sliding doors were open. I slipped out onto a sloping lawn with a long, lit oblong pool and an unobstructed view of the city. I spied a hillside deck on the edge of the manicured lawn and made my way toward it, eager to take in the magnificent view of the city with its blinking neon eyes. As I strolled I took in the large rain trees bordering the lawn, old, majestic, framing the starless night sky with their stark black boughs. Someone had strung fairy lights in the trees to make up for the missing stars; they needn’t have bothered. There were fireflies in the bushes and darting through the frangipani-scented night air.

  I stepped gingerly onto the timber deck, nervous to be this close to the edge of a hill. But the view was worth it. Here was Singapore’s CBD, skyscrapers slashed with light. Standing there on the deck I could hear the rustle of bird wings and the song of crickets. Crickets!

  Tears sprang, unbidden, to my beady, plebeian eyes. That so much beauty was possible in the heart of this stone-and-concrete city, that it should be owned by one person, while I paid almost half my salary and almost all my waking hours for not even a hundredth of this space—it hurt. How could this be what my life had become about?

  “Is this spot taken?” someone said in the darkness behind me.

  Startled, I whirled around. Behind me was one of the waiters, leaning against the deck railing in a creased white linen shirt and an equally rumpled pair of tan linen khakis. He was older, in his late forties or early fifties, and had a kind face with intense eyes. “Not at all,” I said. “There’s enough deck space for a harem of dancing hippos.”

  He chuckled. “Cute imagery.” He gestured at the view. “Isn’t this something special? I mean, the Singapore skyline is nowhere near as grand as Hong Kong’s and Shanghai’s, but I prefer it. It’s more … approachable, if that makes sense.”

  “Hmmm,” I managed, noncommittal. I totally go
t what he meant.

  I could feel him studying my profile. “You don’t sound very enthused. Are you not enjoying yourself?”

  “It’s just … so … much, you know? These people.” I pointed at the beautifully rich cluster, visible through the glass doors. “This place. It’s a dream. I feel like I’ve just walked into a snow globe of magic rich-people glitter. It’s just a little too fabulous. But what do I know, I’m just a poor everyman.” I laughed a little self-consciously—what must this older man think of poor li’l entitled me moaning about life in my relatively pricey clothes and champagne and $350 cologne. I leaned toward him and adopted a conspiratorial tone. “Anyway, between you and me, I can’t figure out this evening. I mean, I know it’s supposed to be a book club, but come on, we all know it’s really just an excuse for a bunch of super rich, obnoxious people to fellate each other’s egos, am I right?”

  His eyes twinkled at me. “I’ve heard it said that ‘There are only two things wrong with money: too much or too little.’ I suppose you think these people have too much.”

  “Yes. And I know where that quote’s from, that’s by Charles Bukowski.” I was full of admiration; he’d quoted it word for word. “Are you into poetry as well?”

  “A little. I like the greats: Li Bai, Bai Juyi, Li Shangyin. Do you read Chinese poetry?”

  I quoted a Meng Haoran poem in response.[fn1]

  “Beautiful.” He was studying me; I blushed. “I think an appreciation of poetry is a good foundation for any relationship. If you’re bored, you can just hang out with me. I promise I won’t talk about my fleet of Lambos or my watch collection. We can just talk about you.” He offered his right hand. “I’m Eric.” He had an unusual accent, unplaceable, with a raspy smoker’s voice.

  “I’m sorry, where are my manners? I’m Andrea.” I extended my hand to shake his and he pressed it against his lips before releasing it gently. It was an unaffected, graceful gesture. It was then I realized that he wasn’t a waiter—he was one of the guests. Judging by his wrinkled clothing and his Apple Watch, this was a fellow interloper, one of the working poor, perhaps a friend of a richer friend.