Singapore Noir

She waits for the minutes and hours to go by, stares through the small window at the moon behind a shifting veil of clouds. Between here and the soundproof room, there is a wall of impenetrable silence. She pads into the kitchen and from a tin can picks out the one tea bag she is allowed for the month. More time passes. At long last, she hears men’s voices and the sound of heavy car doors, engines revving, tires on concrete, gradually fading to nothing. Zach appears before her, disheveled and pale, his pupils dilated. His robe, wrapped tightly around him, is stained. Blood trickles from his nose. Merla sets down her mug of cold tea and reaches into the cupboard for the medicine kit.

I’m okay, he mutters. I had too much... stuff...

More familiar with what the box offers than she wishes she were, Merla sets to work. Within minutes, she has done all she can.

Go, she says quietly. Don’t come back.

He takes the soiled cotton wool from her hand and rolls it between his fingertips into a tight ball.

He knows people, says Zach.

The twelve-meter yacht at the front of the villa used to have a different name. The day it was delivered, not long after the house was bought, the man stood impatiently on the berth, using his hand to shield his beady eyes from the sun. When the boat cruised into view from around the sharp curve of the isle, he did a little jump. From behind the curtains in the lounge, Merla watched, agape. She had never been anywhere near a yacht. When the awe receded, she wondered what this luminous white vessel would mean for her existence. How was she to clean it? With a sponge and bucket? Would the hose from the tap by the pool stretch far enough? As it drew nearer, she witnessed an abrupt change in the man’s body language. He waved his arms about wildly as if to say, NO! TURN. BACK. The Malay guy piloting the boat looked confused; he tugged at the peak of his baseball cap and approached closer still, until the man began to stamp his foot irately, point at the lettering inscribed in gold, and holler — something about the FAH-king dealer forgetting that he had changed his mind about some word. When the message ultimately got through, the Malay guy nodded apologetically, offered an awkward sort of salute, turned the vessel around, and sped off. Merla kept watching until the yacht and its trail of foam disappeared from view. That was the last she saw of any boat by the name of Current Escape.

Now, on the murky waters of the cove, the Current Asset gently bobs, moored alongside the berth. A light wind blows and on the sea far beyond, the crest of a wave is spotlit by a few rays breaking through the clouds. On an unstoppable advance, the northeast monsoon.

Merla traverses the full length of the berth a third time, the mop in her hands just damp enough to capture what little dust there is on the varnished brown of the wooden boards. Having had his offer of help silently declined, Zach is on the deck of the yacht, sprawled out on the chaise lounge, deeply engrossed in a magazine — an untouched copy of Singapore Tatler which he stumbled upon in the cabin below has been keeping him occupied longer than he expected. Not being a magazine he’s heard of, it was at first eschewed in favor of Vogue Hommes and Jaguar World, later picked up and marked for study only when he grasped that it is about rich people. He leafs through the glossy spreads and, at times, when laboring through some of the wordier columns, wishes he made more of an effort in school. If only, he thinks, there was someone to push him. All of a sudden, his eyes widen. He slides his shades up over his head. In front of him, on a back-page story about some charity gala event, is a photo of the man, fitted in a tuxedo, posing with a bevy of extravagantly gowned socialites. I knew it! thinks Zach, feeling utterly vindicated. Magazine in hand, he bounds off the chaise lounge and leans over the side of the yacht, waving to catch Merla’s attention.

Someday I’m going to be super loaded! exclaims Zach, his tone playful, arms stretched out wide. I’m going to be a megastar actor. I’m going to travel the world! First, I have to make it as a model!

Merla is no longer ill at ease at the sight of him with his shirt off; she has seen it enough times. As she glances up at his perfect yet still developing form and his beaming face, she suddenly feels — dare she say it — grateful for the respite of not having seen the man for weeks since the party, for Zach’s unfettered optimism, and for the relief he unknowingly provides for her pain of not seeing her own brother grow from boy to man.

Where would you go? Zach asks. If you could go anywhere in the world?