Chapter Twenty-Six
“So, the whore’s decided to come home.”
Sai Ma sat on my bed, her legs crossed. It was after midnight, long past when I usually sneaked back to the house, but I didn’t care. Impervious to her presence, I picked up my brush from the side table. My hair was mussed, and I began brushing it the way she did, one languorous stroke at a time.
If there was anything Sai Ma hated, it was being ignored.
“Where were you?” she demanded.
“I went to the night market. Bought a new pair of stockings. Mine ripped.”
“You devil, you dare lie?” My bed creaked as Sai Ma sprang to her feet. “I know who you were with. Haven’t you done enough to tarnish this family’s reputation?”
“What I’ve done is cook and clean for you the last three years,” I said crisply. “I’ve repaid my debts, and I want my bracelet back.”
“You think you’re so clever, seducing a tycoon’s son.” Sai Ma sneered. “I hope you asked for the check before you spread your legs.”
“I want my bracelet back,” I repeated.
She shook her wrist so I could see Mama’s golden band entangled with her tawdry jades and pearls. “I don’t think so. I’ve grown rather fond of it.”
“Then keep it,” I replied, regarding her through my mirror. I made a deliberate pause. “You can buy me a new one for my wedding.”
I savored the shock on Sai Ma’s face, how her cheeks sucked in and her nostrils twitched.
“You stupid girl,” she said then, letting out a laugh. “You really believe that Tommy Yeung will marry you?”
“Baba married you,” I retorted.
“You suppose you’re better than I am? You can’t even read.”
I wouldn’t let any of her petty jibes rile me. “You ought to be relieved,” I said. “The first thing I’m going to do is leave this house. I’ll have my own home on the Peak, my own car and my own maids. You’ll get to be the most beautiful woman in Happy Valley again.”
It was the worst thing I could say to Sai Ma, whose face turned a murderous shade of gray. “Hide all you like behind that pretty face,” she said. “God knows what a demon you are. He’ll make you pay for what you did to Lily.”
I clenched my hairbrush. Sai Ma was rewriting the past in her head, I reminded myself, so she could have someone other than herself to blame. I couldn’t let her poison my happiness.
“I did nothing to Lily.”
Sai Ma merely smiled, a feral red smile that made me shudder.
Finally she turned for the door. Once she was gone I sucked in my breath, welcoming a glittering rush of cold. Sai Ma was right about one thing, there was a demon inside me.
One day, I prayed, it would see her to hell.
Repercussions were swift.
A few days later, Gu Ma burst into the kitchen. Sai Ma came too, stony faced. “There’s someone here to see you,” my aunt exclaimed, rifling through the cupboard for the expensive tea.
Susu was frantically boiling water while Gu Ma dragged me out into the main room. My knees faltered when I saw who had come.
“Director Fung,” I whispered.
His gray hair was now cotton white, pomaded into a wintry cap with not a strand out of place. Otherwise he was as I remembered. A tree, cold and unbending.
Tommy was at his side. Neither man was smiling.
“This is an honor, Director Fung,” said Gu Ma. “Please, sit, sit. Susu, bring the refreshments!”
Tea was poured, and Susu brought a last-minute assortment of cut fruit, nuts, and day-old cakes on a tray.
Director Fung remained standing. He kept his gloves on and ignored the tea that Gu Ma offered. “I am here to settle the matter of my grandson’s proposal.”
“Proposal?” Gu Ma let out a startled breath. “Forgive me, Director, but I’m not clear on what you mean.”
“To your niece.”
She hooked arms with my father, whom she had summoned from the den. “Young Mister Thomas has proposed to Yut Ying? What a happy occasion—”
“I think not,” Director Fung interrupted. “The Chan family has come under scrutiny in recent years. A union between our families is not suitable.”
“Yut Ying is not a Chan,” said Gu Ma, nudging me forward. “She is a Ha, and the Ha family has always been of repute. Why, my ancestors were advisors to the emperor—”
“Do you know why I’ve selected him to be my successor?” interrupted Director Fung again. “I have five grandsons. Tommy is not the brightest. He’s reckless and idealistic, and he lacks the ruthlessness it takes to run a business. So why did I choose him?”
Gu Ma, Sai Ma, and Baba were silent. They had no idea. But I knew.
“Because he loves Peaksoy the most,” I replied.
“Yes,” Director Fung replied, echoing me, “he loves it the most. But does he love it enough?”
“Grandfather’s offered a compromise,” Tommy said, finally speaking. He wouldn’t look at me. “He says we may marry—after I finish my first year at university.”
Was that all? I almost laughed. Did the old man think that Tommy and I wouldn’t be able to last a year? We’d known each other since we were children.
“Yes,” I said. “I can wait a year.”
Tommy still wouldn’t look at me.
Something wasn’t right. My relief curdled into an icy knot of dread as I inched toward him. What is it? What else is there?
Tommy regarded my aunt. “I would like to speak to Yut Ying alone.”
It was an insolent thing to say to one’s elder, but Tommy was rich, so Gu Ma nodded politely. “Of course. The parlor—”
“I’ll take her outside.” Tommy gestured to the courtyard. “We’ll return shortly.”
He led me away from the house to where the bauhinia tree had once stood.
“Don’t,” I said as he wrapped his arms around my shoulders. “Not here.”
“Who cares if they see?” Tommy nuzzled the side of my neck. “I want them to know that they can’t hurt you.”
“Not here,” I said again. I tried to push him away. “What do you want to tell me?”
“Ying . . .” His lips were on my temples, the sound of his voice vibrating against my skull. “I’ve tried everything; my grandfather won’t change his mind. I have to marry Priscilla-Mae.”
I have to marry Priscilla-Mae. At the words, pain shot up my left ear, making my entire head throb. “What?”
“I don’t like her,” Tommy was saying. “It’s a marriage for business. Her family owns a gambling house in Macau, and they’ve promised to invest in Peaksoy.”
It was as if an invisible string had cut off my breath. The muscles in my throat tensed, the air so thin my ribs trembled when I inhaled.
“A marriage for business,” I repeated. “Don’t you have enough money already?”
“Ying, I know you’re disappointed . . .”
Disappointed? Was that the ache in my heart, squeezing so hard I thought I might burst?
“. . . but it’s to secure the future. I do this, and we can be married. We can have everything we wanted.”
“I’d be a second wife,” I said tersely.
“Is that so bad? Look at your Sai Ma, your father dotes on her. He never goes to see your moth—”
“Don’t!” I warned him.
Stricken, he pressed his lips together. “Sorry.”
I pushed myself out of Tommy’s arms. How could he compare me to Sai Ma? Obviously life as a second wife hadn’t been bad for her, because Mama lived in an entirely different country. I wouldn’t be so lucky married to Tommy. I’d always be the mistress. The concubine.
“If you don’t want it this way, then wait for me,” Tommy pleaded. “After a few years, I’ll file for a divorce.”
“What will I do during those few years?” I cried, my voice rising. “You could change your mind, you could have a child, you could—”
“I won’t.”
He said it with such conviction, I wanted to believe him. Truly I did.
But a woman like me was brought up never to dream, never to seek more than she was given—while a man like Tommy was used to thinking that he could have everything: Peaksoy, his grandfather’s approval, me.
Never did he stop to consider the cost, because he wouldn’t be paying the consequences. I would.
I wanted to scream, I wanted to cry, but instead, a heaviness settled in my chest. I could feel my bones sinking, my heels boring down into the earth, my shoulders falling.
It hurt to speak. “What happened to running away together and not caring what your grandfather thinks?”
“Peaksoy needs this investment—”
“So you choose Peaksoy over me.”
“It’s not about choosing, it’s about the best solution. Can’t you see I’m helping you? This way, with my grandfather’s approval, I can save your aunt’s factory—”
“What does the factory have to do with us?” I cried. “You made a promise to me. Me, not my aunt.”
“Just because the investigation’s over doesn’t mean that it won’t be seized later on. Ying, I’m doing this because I love you.”
My hands collapsed to my sides. Did he?
Funny, it wasn’t the war that had hardened me, it was my years at 12 Harbourage with Sai Ma and my aunt. I was familiar with the machinations of the mind, the twisted ways humans could convince themselves that someone else’s pain wasn’t pain at all, but a sacrifice for a greater cause.
Maybe Tommy’d always been like this. Maybe he’d changed. In the end, it didn’t matter.
Old Director Fung knew I was too proud to become a second wife. I could imagine what he’d told Tommy. That if I refused, it meant I didn’t love him enough. Or that I was only after their family’s money.
“Your grandfather is a clever man,” I said through my teeth. “You never told me he was a cruel man.”
“Ying . . . please.” Tommy held my arms. “You’re angry, and you’ve the right to be. After you’ve calmed down, you’ll see I had no choice. Sometimes we have to do things we don’t want to.”
He’d said that once, long ago. It ought to have been a warning.
I stepped back. “Now I know the ending of that story you used to tell. Yeh Shen married the emperor, who swore to love her to the end of his days. But he lied. Upon their marriage, she was made into a concubine, and once the emperor tired of her, she was cast into the shadows, forced to serve the highborn lady who was empress.”
“Ying, what are you talking about? That was just a story—”
“That won’t be my fate,” I said over him. “It won’t.”
I twisted out of his grasp and whirled for the house. Sai Ma was waiting for me by the door shelling peanuts while wearing a jubilant smirk.
Inside, everyone started talking at once. Baba, Gu Ma, Director Fung. I didn’t know what they were saying, only that at the sight of me, my aunt caught me by the collar and hissed into my good ear, “Don’t be stupid, Yut Ying. Think about your family. Think what this could do for us.”
I stole a glance at Tommy. Stupid girl that I was, some desperate part of me was waiting, was counting on him to come to his senses and choose me. But he merely stood at his grandfather’s side, his eyes trained on the floor.
Never in my life—not even on that hellish morning crouched inside Mama’s cupboard, one broom’s sweep away from murderous Japanese soldiers—had I known a silence more thunderous.
“May Yut Ying have a few days to consider?” Sai Ma said, coming to my side.
Gu Ma sent my stepmother a scathing look. What are you doing? Have her accept now!
“We’ll come back next week,” Tommy agreed.
I barely noticed as Sai Ma wove her arm through mine and guided me to the settee. “Susu, bring her a cup of herbal tea.” My stepmother rubbed my shoulder. “And persimmons. Yut Ying’s always liked my persimmons.”
Hot tears tracked down my cheeks. So this was what people called heartbreak, I thought. So this was betrayal.
It hurt. It hurt desperately.
I held my tea to my lips without drinking and listened to the sound of Tommy’s footfalls until they grew faint, far, then silent.
A piece of me broke with every step.