“I wish you won’t go,” Allison said without looking up from her ironing.
“Why?” Sarah asked then carefully traced the outer edges of her mouth with a scarlet lip liner.
“You have only met him. You should not go on a holiday with any man you fancy just because he asked.”
“Chee Kong is not just any man. He is the only son of the Ta-Hai Shipping tycoon.”
“But there will only be the two of you. The neighbours will start talking …”
Sarah raised both arms in the air. “This is the 21st century. An old-fashion, conservative woman doesn’t get anything.”
Alison put the iron aside and furrowed her brow as she followed Sarah’s agitated primping in front of the foyer mirror.
“Yes, you are right. In this age and time, you can choose to be anything you want, so why don’t you choose to be happy. Some of the other men you have gone out with were good, responsible and loving. You are beautiful, you have your own business…. Give your family some face. Bintulu is a small town.”
Sarah turned with one hand over her hip. “Face? What face are we talking about? Our mother was a kept woman.”
Allison turned back to her ironing. Sarah sniffed then checked her image one last time in the mirror before walking out the door. She had worked hard and learnt to use her charms to get whatever she fancied. Five years ago, she had opened her beauty salon at the Tanjung Mall with money borrowed from two men. They both knew nothing about the other. One didn’t want his money back while the other would no longer need his money. The expensive salon and high end business had provided her with a platform to approach wealthier men. She kissed a tear-shaped pink diamond on her finger for good luck.
The woman at Level 3 was beautiful; milk-hued skin, black marble-glow curls and full lips that pouted like a kiss. Sayu watched her lift the straw of a dew covered glass to the mouth that had but a moment ago smiled up at an older man. Her neck, ears, arms and fingers sparkled with rocks and metals that Sayu could not name. The janitor swirled her mop in a bucket of dark liquid, and squeezed out the excess water with her hand before swabbing it over the cracked tiles.
“Hoi!” a fat Chinese lady called out. “Every time after you mop this place smells like a toilet. Do you even clean that thing?”
The beautiful woman stared her way with a white napkin held over her mouth and nostril. The resulting blush stung Sayu’s eyes to tears and she quickly dragged the bucket behind her as she hurried back to the public toilet. She smiled at a sour-faced colleague manning the booth before walking into the Ladies’ Room to put away the cleaning equipment in a janitor’s stall. After wiping her eyes on her sleeve, she unzipped a patchwork bag on the floor next to an old broom and took out a yellowed plastic container. It was lunch time. She went back outside and sat on the floor behind the booth.
Her colleague, Liza, reached out for twenty-cent coins from a group of teenagers as she said, “I hear the old lady shouting at you again.”
“She can shout all she wants, but there is not much I can do about the smell.”
“I think she will talk to the supervisor.”
Sayu sighed. “Mrs. Liu told me that if she hears another complain, she will reassign me to the factory rooster.”
“Oh, that is terrible.”
“It cannot be that bad.”
Liza picked up her food container from the floor. “That place is worse than here. The air is hot and always dusty. There is barely time for you to sit down and rest.”
“What can I do? The only way to clean the toilets is to rub them down with the mop. The last time I bought a toilet brush, it was stolen, remember.”
The beautiful woman approached them. As she placed a twenty-cent coin on the booth, Sayu stared at the bright platinum ring on her manicured finger. She watched the woman cat-walked into the restroom then bowed her head over her lunch box. The scent of a fruity perfume lingered.
Loud music blared through the mall, followed by a man’s voice that called for the crowd to gather. Sayu kept her head down as the woman walked out, then she got up and went into the Ladies’. It was her turn that day to clean the stalls after lunch. She flushed and mopped, flushed and mopped but just as she was about to flush the third stall, she noticed that clear water had filled the bowl to its rim. After putting on a black rubber glove, she dug into the latrine. Her fingers fell on a fist-size lump and the water drained the moment she pulled it out.
She flushed, then stared down wide-eyed at the crumbling ball of napkin. A ring sparkled on her gloved hand. As she washed it in the sink, she wondered if the woman had dropped it. Again she stared at the pale pink diamond: It was more beautiful than the Taiwanese crystals they sold in Level 2. She knew she couldn’t keep it, for no one would believe that she had found it. And if the woman reports its loss to the police, she may never get another job.
Sayu wiped the ring dry on the hem of her shirt-uniform and dropped it into a pocket. She must find a way to return it to the owner though she dared not approach the woman directly, for she had once publicly accused Sayu of stealing a misplaced mobile phone. The gush of hosed water rose in whirls as she filled the bucket. It overflowed and splashed her sandals. She rushed to turn the tap off, all the while ranting at herself for causing the mess. Out came the mop again, painting swirls of grey over the old tiles. Once the extra work was done, she plodded into the Men’s Room. Washing his hands at the sink was the man she had seen with the woman.
He smiled into the mirror and said to her image, “Is something wrong? I don’t have anything stuck to my back, do I?”
Sayu stammered, “Excuse me sir, but the pretty lady you had lunch with today dropped her ring.”
“Oh, she did?” he turned, surprise written all over his face.
Sayu held out her palm and the diamond sparkled on her callused hand.
“Thank you so much,” he said as his eyes misted over. “Thank you,” he said again as he took out a wallet and passed her a hundred ringgit.
Sayu entered the first stall. She flushed, mopped and stepped out. He was still there, staring at the ring as though mesmerized by it. Shrugging away a goose-bump on her nape, she went into the second stall. She was relieved to find him gone when she came out.
Sarah fidgeted. Maybe she was too hasty in throwing away the ring. She should have sold the rare diamond instead. But what was it that Chee Kong said: If the man who bought her the ring had truly loved her, she would see his face reflected in the rock. She giggled. He was such a tease. A warm glow spread over her face as she imagined herself being the love of his life. Her stomach growled but she ignored it. She must fit into her red dress when they visit Bangkok.
An old man sat cross-legged outside the flat building, mumbling old Chinese poetries that nobody cared much about. Sayu gave him a piece of rice cake that she had saved from lunch. He continued mumbling; oblivious to her gift.
The dark staircase fumed with the odour of day-old vomit and urine. She opened her flat door but nobody was home to greet her with childish chatter, for both her daughters were back at the longhouse with their grandmother. She unhooked a row of dried laundry from the louvered windows, put them over a chair and pulled the curtains close before gripping the sides of an almost empty food shelf in the kitchen. She nudged the shelf out a little, took out the hundred ringgit note from a flaking purse, and folded it into a crack under a loose tile on the floor. After taking out a red ten ringgit note from the meager pile, she covered it again with tile and shelf. Her fingers pried open a can of crackers then she sat down to dinner with a cup of lukewarm water poured out of an old thermal pot. A mold-stained wall returned her stare.
Sarah gaped at the diamond on the counter. She looked about the shop but everything was in its place. The bolt lock had not been tampered with and the shop alarm had not gone off. Could she have dreamt about throwing the ring into the toilet bowl? Chee Kong tapped on the glass window. She smiled, picked up the ring and slipped it onto her finger.
Napkins, paper cups, lunch wrappers and canned drinks filled the bins to overflowing. Sayu went about emptying their contents into two large bags that she dragged behind her. As she lifted the restaurant’s bin, a teenage boy knocked against her arm, and made her spill some of the contents on the floor. He hurried away embarrassed. Sayu emptied out the remaining papers and plastics from the bin then went down on her knees to collect the scattered rubbish. The ring fell out of a crumpled napkin. Involuntarily Sayu picked it up and slipped it into her pocket.
What should she do? Maybe the man will give her another hundred ringgit. When the man saw her reflection in the mirror that evening, he turned to face her without question.
“Excuse me, sir. I found your friend’s ring again. I think it must be too loose for her fingers.”
“Thank you.” He passed her another hundred. As he rolled the ring on his palm, he said, “She was my best friend’s lover. He bought her the ring because she liked it. He sent me a picture of them with her holding it up to the camera. He was so happy to have pleased her, he sent me a picture.” Again his face became trance-like, as though his mind had gone seeking for a painful memory that he wished to re-experience.
Sayu kept her head bowed as she walked away. That night her hand shook when she opened the door to her empty flat. She picked up a faded photo of her husband in his Forest Ranger’s uniform and held it close to her heart as she wept. That was the only thing she had left of him. Everything else was pawned when her younger daughter came down with dengue fever two years ago, even her wedding ring.
Squatting low on the floor, Sayu buffed the stainless steel banister vigorously. On seeing the woman, she bowed her head and did not look up until the clicking heels had passed her. Music blared across the mall, signaling that it was near to opening time. A high pitch shriek startled Sayu to stand and scan her surroundings. The woman had fallen on her back. She gave out another scream as she back-pedaled on her heels. Office workers, janitors, shop assistants and owners rushed to her side with sticks and folded umbrellas. They saw nothing. The silenced crowd crescendo-ed into an uproar as one shop girl wondered aloud if the woman had seen a spirit. Sayu saw the light of the ring on the floor.
The man shouldered his way into the shop. He looked down on her and said, “Chai promised to always love you.” He dropped a pair of keys on her lap.
“No, no, no!”
“You told him you love him and he gave you everything you wanted.”
“No….”
“Don’t you want him to be with you?”
She stared up at him vehemently. “He had nothing. He lost everything.”
“He became careless because he wanted to become rich enough for you. He couldn’t afford the house or the car you wanted, so he borrowed and gambled all his assets in the stock market.”
“It wasn’t my fault.”
“He lost everything when the market crashed.”
“It wasn’t my fault,” she said as she sobbed streaks of dark mascara down her face.
“He couldn’t pay his debts. He couldn’t pay the debts he incurred for you.”
Eyes blazing and spittle foaming in her mouth, she shrieked, “He chose his own actions. I had nothing to do with it.”
“You could have let him sell the ring and give him a new leash in life. Instead you left him and openly flaunted a new man before him.”
“He didn’t have to die; he was weak!”
The man knelt, picked up the diamond and slipped it into her struggling finger. “Don’t you understand,” he said as he held her hand in a crushing grip, “Chai died because he wants to be with you. He knew that you love the diamond more than him, so he became the diamond. You told him when he asked for your help, that there is nothing in the world that can separate you from that pink rock. Because of that, he became the diamond, so he could stay with you forever.”
She screamed and laughed, then screamed again.
The crowd inched away, but their eyes were drawn to her. Nobody looked at the man as he left. Sayu quickly turned her terror-filled gaze away as the man approached her.
He said, “Chai would have worked his life away to make her happy. The night she rejected his love, he called me and said that he will change into a diamond to be with her. I did not understand; I laughed.”
Another shriek. Sayu shuddered as she watched the woman try to take the ring off her finger.
Again the man said, “I did not know how to apologize to Chai for laughing when I should have cried. I thought that if I kill her, they will be together. When you pass me the ring, I knew then that Chai had always been with her, and now he will always be with her.”
Sayu wrung the rag in her fists until her fingers showed white. The man left the scene just as two policemen appeared. They tried to calm the woman and when one officer tried to find out what had happened, the crowd told him that a dead spirit had driven her mad. There was no other statement he could get out of them.
Sayu returned to her post in front of the public toilet. She never saw either the man or the woman again.
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