Crazy Rich Asians

Fiona gave him a disapproving look, but he glared at her so forcefully that she retreated from any further objection. Eddie shoveled down a few rolls of shrimp cheong fun, got up, and announced imperiously, “I’m off. I have important clients to attend to!” And with that, Eddie stormed out, leaving a rather relieved family in his wake.

Tony, mouth full of food, whispered to Cecilia, “Let’s see their entire family plunge into the South China Sea on Leo Ming’s fancy-ass plane.”

As much as she tried to, Cecilia couldn’t stifle her laugh.

7 Eleanor

SINGAPORE

After a few days of strategically placed phone calls, Eleanor finally nailed down the source of the disturbing rumor involving her son. Daisy confessed hearing it from her daughter-in-law’s best friend Rebecca Tang, who in turn revealed that she’d heard it from her brother Moses Tang, who had been at Cambridge with Leonard Shang. And Moses had this to report to Eleanor:

“I was in London for a conference. At the last minute, Leonard invites me down to dinner at his country estate in Surrey. Have you been there, Mrs. Young? Aiyoh, what a palace! I didn’t realize it was designed by Gabriel-Hippolyte Destailleur, the architect who built Waddesdon Manor for the English Rothschilds. Anyway, we were dining with all these ang mor[14] VIPS and MPs[15] visiting from Singapore and as usual Cassandra Shang is holding court. And then out of nowhere Cassandra says loudly across the table to your sister-in-law Victoria Young, ‘You’ll never guess what I heard … Nicky has been dating a Taiwanese girl in New York, and now he’s bringing her to Singapore for the Khoo wedding!’ And Victoria says, ‘Are you sure? Taiwanese? Good grief, did he fall for some gold digger?’ And then Cassandra says something like, ‘Well, it might not be as bad as you think. I have it on good authority that she’s one of the Chu girls. You know, of the Taipei Plastics Chus. Not exactly old money, but at least they are one of the most solid families in Taiwan.”

Had it been anyone else, Eleanor would have dismissed all this as nothing but idle talk among her husband’s bored relatives. But this came from Cassandra, who was usually dead accurate. She hadn’t earned the nickname “Radio One Asia” for nothing. Eleanor wondered how Cassandra obtained this latest scoop. Nicky’s big-mouthed second cousin was the last person he would ever confide in. Cassandra must have gotten the intel from one of her spies in New York. She had spies everywhere, all hoping to sah kah[16] her by passing along some hot tip.

It did not come as a surprise to Eleanor that her son might have a new girlfriend. What surprised her (or, more accurately, annoyed her) was the fact that it had taken her until now to find out. Anyone could see that he was prime target number one, and over the years there had been plenty of girls Nicky thought he had kept hidden from his mother. All of them had been inconsequential in Eleanor’s eyes, since she knew her son wasn’t ready to marry yet. But this time was different.

Eleanor had a long-held theory about men. She truly believed that for most men, all that talk of “being in love” or “finding the right one” was absolute nonsense. Marriage was purely a matter of timing, and whenever a man was finally done sowing his wild oats and ready to settle down, whichever girl happened to be there at the time would be the right one. She had seen the theory proven time and again; indeed she had caught Philip Young at precisely the right moment. All the men in that clan tended to marry in their early thirties, and Nicky was now ripe for the plucking. If someone in New York already knew so much about Nicky’s relationship, and if he was actually bringing this girl home to attend his best friend’s wedding, things must be getting serious. Serious enough that he purposely hadn’t mentioned her existence. Serious enough to derail Eleanor’s meticulously laid plans.

The setting sun refracted its rays through the floor-to-ceiling windows of the recently completed penthouse apartment atop Cairnhill Road, bathing the atrium-like living room in a deep orange glow. Eleanor gazed at the early-evening sky, taking in the colonnade of buildings clustering around Scotts Road and the expansive views all the way past the Singapore River to the Keppel Shipyard, the world’s busiest commercial port. Even after thirty-four years of marriage, she did not take for granted all that it meant for her to be sitting here with one of the most sought-after views on the island.