Authors: Fiona Cheong
I felt a bird fly past the window. Or rather, I saw out of the
corner of my eye what I thought could only be a bird's body,
flying across the sun in the window. Malika must have felt it,
too. She turned her head at once, but the bird was already
gone.
Sali, from the looks of it, was too busy seducing her film
director to notice anything. She was still talking, her lips still
moving in the mirror as she invented for the fellow more stories
about how her grandmother's ghost was always around to protect her (when in truth, Sali had been given away to an aunt
shortly after she was born because of a fortuneteller's warning
that her moon and her mother's moon would collide otherwise,
and when this aunt, whom Sali had grown up calling her mother, had followed her husband, whom Sali had called her father,
from Malacca to Singapore, Sali was only three years old, and
that was the last time she had seen her grandmother). Malika
and I watched as her right hand fluttered up to Madam's peacock. She caressed the diamond feathers, and then, as if she
were innocently unaware of the blunt bulge straining in the fellow's pants, she let her fingers drop, coyly down her blouse,
touching her nipple underneath in passing.
When Malika glanced up, she seemed startled to find me in
the mirror.
Or perhaps I was mistaken about that.
WHAT MALIKA REMEMBERED about Miss Shakilah had to do
with the two occasions on which Miss Shakilah had been at
Madam's house before. Once was when Madam's whole class
had come over at the end of the school year in 1973 (Malika
remembered the heavy rain cascading off the tiled roof of the
patio while the girls were serenading Madam with a song they
had written to the musical score of Top of the World, which was
popular that year and sung on cassettes by Karen Carpenter,
the one who later became very sick and died), and the second
time in 1979, also in December. That time, Miss Shakilah had
come alone, looking a bit different from the first time because
she was no longer twelve years old. By then, she had cut her hair
(she used to wear plaits), and she had lost a lot of weight (not an
ounce left of her puppy fat), and Malika would remember how
the seat of Miss Shakilah's blue dungarees had hung off her backside with enough room for two fried chickens, as she put it.
Now, fifteen years later, Miss Shakilah didn't look so different from when she had left for America. (That was the reason
for her second visit to Madam's house. She was gone two days
later, on a late-night Pan American flight departing out of the
new Changi Airport and destined for the John F Kennedy
Airport in New York City, via Hong Kong and Heathrow. What
I've heard is that no one suspected it would be the last time anyone here would lay eyes on her for so many years, perhaps not
even Miss Shakilah herself. Certainly, her mother was expecting
her to come home during the summer holidays at first, and
when that didn't happen, Miss Shakilah's mother had told herself, and anyone who asked about it, that her daughter was just
busy with her studies and would return after getting her degree. Not even Miss Shakilah's closest friend since childhood, her
friend Rose, who had grown up with Miss Shakilah as if they
were sisters, knew Miss Shakilah's actual reason for staying
away, although because they had been so close, Rose did suspect it wasn't just Miss Shakilah's studies. Besides, Miss Shakilah
had received her first degree in 1983, and another one, her master's, in 1985, both in Fnglish literature, and still she hadn't
come home.)
That morning, she was talking in the kitchen with Madam
until a quarter to seven, when Madam had to leave for school.
(Madam had been driving herself ever since the family chauffeurs retirement shortly after her husband's passing. This was
partly to save money, but also as Malika believed, Madam liked
the new feel of independence that came with driving her own
car. She had owned a driver's license since she was twenty-one,
which she had kept renewing over the years, mostly in case
there was an emergency and the chauffeur wasn't available. But
in all the years that Malika had been with her, Madam had
never driven her own car. Now she would take long drives by
herself, along the new highway to the airport, where she would
turn the car around and drive back. Malika thought it was
because that was the longest drive possible in Singapore without traffic jams, as Madam had mentioned to her once. Which,
by the way, was why Madam would leave for school at a quarter to seven, in case of a traffic jam, even though driving to St.
Agnes usually took less than twenty minutes now that part of
the drive was along the new highway. She wanted to be sure she
was never late, because General Assembly started at half-past
seven and she was in charge of the music. She was late once, on
the morning her husband was taken to the hospital for the last
time, but from what I've heard, it was only that once.)
Miss Shakilah and Madam had been discussing what to do
about Miss Shakilah's dilemma, which they had started talking
about in bits and pieces on the night before. (On the night before, they had talked mostly about their families, Madam asking about Miss Shakilah's mother (Miss Shakilah's father having
passed away some time ago) and Miss Shakilah asking about
Madam's daughters and the grandchildren. Miss Shakilah had
known Madam's daughters in school, but none of them were
exactly her age, so they wouldn't have been in the same classes.
Francesca was a year older, Caroline was a year younger, and
Michelle was four years younger. Francesca and Miss Shakilah
could have been friends but Francesca hadn't been very sociable
as a child, and as for Caroline, she had been so wild, dressing up
and wearing lipstick and mascara even before her elder sister
did. Miss Shakilah, when she was still a schoolgirl, hadn't shown
a hint of wildness. Malika remembered her as Madam's favorite
pupil for years. Bright, quiet, respectful. With the kind of
curiosity that might kill a cat, Madam used to say. Her Shak
could come up with questions no one else could think of. This
was what Malika remembered, when she looked back upon
some of her conversations with Madam in those years.)
From what Malika understood, Miss Shakilah's dilemma
boiled down to her having too many voices in this latest novel.
That was how Miss Shakilah had described the problem to
Madam. Her publisher thought there were too many voices, or
more precisely, too many storytellers. They made the story difficult to follow. This publisher wanted Miss Shakilah to revise
the manuscript, cut the book down to three voices at the most.
Miss Shakilah didn't want to do it. Leaving the book with only
three voices would change the story entirely, she told Madam.
Yet, how was she going to get the book published, otherwise?
Her agent believed she would run into the same problem with
most American publishers. Given her new state of affairs (the
baby coming), she couldn't afford to be lackadaisical about
money.
"Why are more than three voices so difficult to follow?
Don't Americans know how to pay attention to several people talking at one time? They should come sit at a dinner table over
here," Madam had pointed out, on the night before, while
Malika had nodded her head in secret agreement. (It was the
first time Malika had heard anyone discuss storytelling in such
a serious way, and she had gleaned enough from the conversation to understand that this kind of discussion must happen
often in America, or perhaps only in the university. She wondered what Miss Shakilah meant by her argument that fewer
voices would change the story entirely. Malika always tried to
leave room in her mind for things she might not be aware of due
to her lack of sufficient formal education.)
"Americans aren't used to it, I guess. That's what my publisher thinks. My editor's afraid the book won't sell." Miss
Shakilah had said this with a sigh, and then she had shrugged
her shoulders loosely, as if it didn't really matter why the publisher thought there were too many voices. American publishers
were impossible to argue with. That was what her sigh and
shrug conveyed.
That was when Madam had invited Miss Shakilah to spend
the night, so that they could both sleep on it and see if a
solution presented itself in the morning. Given how late it was
getting, especially (almost midnight). Taxi drivers would be charging double rates soon.
"Two heads are better than one," Madam had said, smiling a
hit sheepishly at the cliche as she leaned forward on the sofa to
clink glasses with Miss Shakilah.
So the night had ended, with Madam calling for Malika to
close the windows while she found some pajamas and a new
toothbrush for Miss Shakilah, and then Madam had turned on the
air conditioner in Michelle's old bedroom, and she had given Miss
Shakilah a foot massage with eucalyptus oil to help her relax.
But no solution had presented itself, after all.
Malika watched as Miss Shakilah rose from the table with
her empty plate in her hands (both she and Madam had had two slices of buttered toast each, which, accompanied by black, sugarless coffee, was Madam's usual breakfast). Sunlight from the
window above the sink was pouring into the room, throwing
long shallow beams across the black-and-white checkered floor
(modeled after the kitchen floor of a hotel suite Madam and her
husband had stayed in when they were in New York City in
1959, the year after Francesca was born and before Malika
arrived). As Miss Shakilah put her plate down in the sink,
Malika saw how slim her feet still were, but striped pale where
the straps of her sandals had blocked the sun, making Miss
Shakilah's feet look like the feet of any European tourist. Except
for that, and except for her American accent, and the little extra
weight gained because of her pregnancy, Malika thought Miss
Shakilah seemed very much the same girl who had come to the
house in the loose dungarees, with the same air of impatience in
her movements as when she had hugged Madam fifteen years
ago and said lightly, "See you in June."
"Miss, you can just leave it," Malika heard herself say, as
Miss Shakilah stood a moment at the sink as if she were about
to wash the plate.
Madam had left the kitchen and was in the dining room
(where before Madam's husband had passed away, he and
Madam used to have their meals but now, the dining table
would be set only when her daughters and grandchildren visited, or when Madam decided to throw a dinner party for her old
friends, which happened occasionally, once or twice a year"before they all keel over," Madam was fond of saying, with a
wry smile). Malika could hear her gathering her papers and
books for school, and then the lid of the piano that sat against
the dining room wall closing with a soft thud. Madam was
going to give Miss Shakilah a lift home on the way. "Come,"
she had said, and from outside the back door, while sorting
out clothes to be put into the washing machine from clothes
to be hand-washed, Malika had seen her stroke Miss Shakilah's forearm lovingly before she left the kitchen, "I'll take you to
your mum's house."
(Madam had asked Miss Shakilah when they had first sat
down to breakfast, what about getting the book published in
Singapore. "You want me to ask around for you?" she had
offered, and Miss Shakilah had replied, "I don't know," in a way
that meant no, politely. Then with a sigh, Miss Shakilah had
added, "I don't think publishers here pay much."
'Tell your editor this is how we tell stories," Madam had
suggested, finally. "Ask him-him or her?"
"Her."
"Ask her to look at a piece of batik. Ah, that's what you
should do, show her a piece of batik, how complicated and
interwoven everything is. Maybe then she'll understand. What
do you think?" Madam had so wanted to be of help, and Miss
Shakilah had smiled, aware of this, and said she would try it,
perhaps it would work.
Malika didn't know if Madam had heard in Miss Shakilah's
tone another no. It was a quarter to seven by then and Madam
had started getting up from the table.)
"Did you see her?" Miss Shakilah was asking, still at the
sink. She was looking out of the window but not at anything in
particular, Malika could tell.
"See who, Miss?"
"I think you know."
Malika thought at first that after so many cold American
winters, Miss Shakilah was standing in front of the window so
she could feel the heat on her face and neck (Miss Shakilah was
wearing the yellow linen dress she had worn the day before,
loosely fitting with short sleeves and a scoop neckline), but later
Malika would wonder if perhaps she was wrong, if perhaps Miss
Shakilah had been searching the garden for the girl, although
the sugar cane was on the other side of the house and ghosts
were often fussy about where they chose to appear.
I saw you," she said, turning to Malika. "Earlier, when you
were opening the windows. You must have seen her. Did you?"
There was a certain urgency in Miss Shakilah's voice, and
Malika saw in Miss Shakilah's long-lashed brown eyes (still clear
and bright but definitely older, definitely experienced, Malika
thought now) an anxious glimmer, as if Miss Shakilah desperately wanted to hear that she, Malika, had seen the girl. What
Malika wondered was how it had been possible for Miss
Shakilah herself to have seen the girl, since the windows in
Madam's study opened out towards the banyan trees and the
back fence. There were no windows in the wall near the sugar
cane. The only way was if Miss Shakilah had noticed the girl
before going into the study, so Malika told herself that must
have been what happened.
Only later would she realize, as she replayed the scene over
and over in her mind, that there had been no one in the sugar
cane when she had first looked through the glass of the livingroom windows, when they were still closed.
"Yes, Miss," she said, in reply to Miss Shakilah's question.
"The girl in the sugar cane, yes, I saw her. You know who she is,
Miss?"