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Chapter Text

Time Period: Spring and summer 2033

Dramatis Personae:

• 方武 Fang Wu (a.k.a. Frederick Wentworth) Note: “Wu” means “military”
• 方文 Fang Wen (a.k.a. Edward Wentworth) Note: “Wen” means “academic”
• 蔡盈Cai Ying (a.k.a. Sophia Croft) Note: “Ying” means “lacks nothing”
• Admiral Cai, nicknamed “Lao Cai 老蔡” i.e. “Old Cai” (a.k.a. Admiral Croft)
• 夏健 Xia Jian (a.k.a. Captain Harville) “Xia” is pronounced as “Har” in Cantonese
• 郑喜喜 Zheng Xixi (a.k.a. Henrietta Musgrove) Note: “Xixi” means “happy”
• 郑乐乐 Zheng Lele (a.k.a. Louisa Musgrove) Note: “Lele” also means “happy”
• 陈健明 Chen Jianming, also known as “小明 Xiaoming” (a.k.a. Charles Hayter)
• Nur Atiqah binti Eusoff (a.k.a. Anne Elliot)

They had just run an English-language article entitled “The Best Is Yet To Be” in Hong Kong’s South China Morning Post, when Fang Wu, who was a star forward on Team China and a multiple domestic league champion with his club Shanghai Port, and who had also been a factor in both sides of the Canton Derby during his early pro career, announced his retirement from professional football.

The article wasn’t wrong; he was, indeed, playing some of the best football of his career, and thus far, he had avoided being plagued by any major injuries. There really wasn’t any reason for him to declare at this moment that the best was not only not to be, but never to be again, when he was arguably at his peak, save for his personal ego. But, as with many of his life decisions, pride drove him, and he wanted his fans to remember him at his very best, rather than to witness the inevitable decline that would surely happen now that he was over the age of 30. And he said just about as much to the press, seemingly oblivious that such bold-faced words would surely disappoint the fans who wanted more, when he announced his retirement at age 31 after an illustrious 13-year career in club and international pro football.

Nobody understood his decision: not his fans, who now spanned half the eastern coast of China after his transfer to Shanghai Port six years ago, nor his manager, who suggested that if he was tired of Shanghai, he could consider pursuing a transfer back to the rebuilt Guangzhou F.C., the original springboard of his career. Little did Fang Wu’s management team know that, for reasons which he kept strictly to himself, that was the last thing that he wanted.

Perhaps the only people who even came close to understanding him were his two elder siblings: his sister Cai Ying (nee Fang Ying), who served with her husband in the Navy off its base in Sanya, and his brother Fang Wen, who had moved back to rural Hunan and lived in a village very similar to the one where they had grown up in, where he now taught primary school. They were the ones who knew that the base of Fang Wu’s rootlessness had come not only when he switched clubs and moved north, but much earlier than that.

The sheer vastness of China meant that often, children were separated from their parents far too early in life for their own good. When he was barely 10, the Fang family had shipped Fang Wu out on a bus to the next bigger town at the behest of his fourth-grade teacher so that he could get the level of training and competition that he needed to fully develop his talent in football. Since then, he had never truly had a home, nor any satisfactory means to communicate properly with their illiterate parents.

When he had effectively been thrown out to shift for himself since he was 10, was there any wonder that he kept his own counsel and stuck to his own choices, no matter how bizarre they might seem to anyone else?  Possibly even his stubborn pride had been born from his forced early independence, for in his new team, 10-year-old Fang Wu had been the runt of the litter, and the veneer of bravado was the only thing he had in his toolkit to deal with the inevitable bullying that came from the older boys.

But it was no use crying over spilt milk; whatever damage that had been done was water under the bridge long ago. If Fang Wu regretted retiring too early when he woke up in his trendy Shanghai apartment with its panoramic view of Hangzhou Bay, well, he had already made his statement with the press, and it would be too embarrassing to recant it.  Retirement, it seemed, was dastardly in its effectiveness at uncovering the emptiness of his life. It forced him to wonder what he, a son of southern China, was doing up here in Shanghai, a booming commercial metropolis with a football club that sat at the very top of the Chinese Super League (the top domestic pro tier in China), but where he didn’t know a single word of the local dialect.

When Fang Wu sat in one of the ‘aesthetic’ and ‘Instagrammable’ cafés that dotted Shanghai’s downtown watching the bustling crowd pass him by, it sank into his very bones that a life devoid of activity and striving would leave him deeply dissatisfied. Disillusioned by the rat race, many of his generation had sunk into tangping 躺平 or “lying flat”, which meant giving up on career progression and earning the bare minimum that they needed to survive, but just one day of doing tangping convinced Fang Wu that this would be no way for him to lead the rest of his life.

Ever restless and nomadic – for the places that he had lived in spanned two-thirds of the length and breadth of China –   Fang Wu’s solution for his sense of emptiness came in travel. He packed up his bags – and his apartment (for what business had he now in a city where he had no roots after the fame and money had dried up?) – and headed to the places where the three most important people in his life were. Since age 10, Fang Wu’s sense of being had never again been tied to a specific place, only to people. When even those people were now scattered far and wide, it simply meant that he had nowhere to seek refuge, no one physical place to call his home. He’d buried that, coming to roost in any place that could bring him career success, but in retirement, even that was taken away from him.

There was his best friend, Xia Jian, who had literally grown up with him as a footballer. Guangzhou, the biggest metropolis in southern China, was the hub for all the best talent from the south, and Fang Wu had met Xia Jian in the Under-16 league when he moved there for senior high school. After emerging from the youth leagues, Fang Wu and Xia Jian had embarked on their pro careers side by side, competing first for Guangzhou City and then Guangzhou F.C., the #2 and #1 teams in the area which made up the Canton Derby.

Perhaps it was unfair that Fang Wu had played offense and Xia Jian had played defence, because it meant that Fang Wu took the lion’s share of the limelight even though they had been nearly equally responsible for the success of their club. Although Guangzhou F.C. had been relegated from the top-tier Super League to the second-tier China League One in 2022, it had flourished in its new league placing third in 2024, which was a very heady achievement for a pair of 22-year-olds who came from humble beginnings. Surely, they had been convinced, this would be the start of a bright future.

The role of team captain was not an immutable status for the season but passed from one team member to another depending on the makeup of the starting XI and the strategy for the day. During the years when they had competed together, the captain’s armband had been regularly traded between Fang Wu and Xia Jian, with Fang Wu perhaps edging Xia Jian out narrowly in the number of matches that he had captained. Indeed, the margin between their talent and their contributions had been only hair thin.

With that first taste of success, Fang Wu and Xia Jian had been hopeful that they might start drawing notice for bigger opportunities. While Fang Wu had fervently aspired to get to the Chinese Super League and even to play internationally, Xia Jian had shared his dream only to the extent that he could remain in Guangzhou, where he had lived all his life. Sadly, eight years ago in 2025, their Chinese Super League ambitions had been dashed through entirely no fault of their own when Guangzhou F.C. failed to pay up its debt and got expelled from professional football. From being third in their league, Fang Wu and Xia Jian had suddenly been thrown into a situation of not even having a season to look forward to.

They had dealt with that curveball in very different ways, driven by their different priorities. Then aged 23, Fang Wu had moved west to join Yunnan Yukun, the 2024 China League One champions who were newly promoted to the Super League for 2025, while Xia Jian had resolutely stayed in Guangzhou even though it meant demotion to China League Two.

For Fang Wu, moving almost clear across the country from the south-easternmost coast to the south-westernmost province bordering Myanmar, Laos and Vietnam had mattered very little, because he had been displaced so many times already. However, being Cantonese was a huge part of Xia Jian’s identity. The Cantonese dialect, known by the Chinese as yue yu 粤语, was so distinctive that it was nearly considered to be a language of its own. This was because even though Cantonese shared the same written script as standardised Mandarin (the national language across China), it had unique intonation and idioms that formed the backbone of its character. And except in Hong Kong, it was not taught in schools but passed down the generations through daily family immersion. Fang Wu might have moved on, but Xia Jian, a Cantonese born and bred, would never leave Canton, even though the unfortunate local club situation unjustly relegated him to football obscurity.

Fang Wu and Xia Jian’s paths had diverged even further when, a few years later, Xia Jian suffered a debilitating knee injury that left him with a lifelong limp and ended his career in pro football. It hadn’t hurt their friendship one bit, but it did send them along very different life trajectories.

Xia Jian now lived in Foshan, or “Fatt-san” as it was pronounced in Cantonese, together with his wife and children. Unlike the neighbouring Guangzhou, it didn’t have the shine of being one of the major world-class Chinese cities. Still, it was part of the thriving Pearl River Delta metro region on China’s southeastern coast, full of opportunities for the next generation. After quitting football, Xia Jian had moved here because he wanted his children to grow up with the Cantonese dialect as the native language of their daily lives, rather than standardised Mandarin. That could never happen in Guangzhou, the capital of Canton, because too many non-Cantonese people had moved there for economic reasons.

Once upon a time, Cantonese had been the lingua franca for everyone in Canton. In recent decades, that had changed because of the use of standardised Mandarin (also known as guoyu 国语 i.e. the national language) in the national education system. It didn’t help that it was very difficult for non-native Cantonese (or even some of the younger natives) to learn the dialect, because it had seven tones whereas standardised Mandarin had only four. As a result, a whole generation of Cantonese people were slowly losing their roots.

Xia Jian and his wife had grown up in Guangzhou, the biggest beating heart of Canton. Their families had been there for generations, so there were few people who could be considered more Cantonese than them. And yet, they had been taught in school with only standardised Mandarin, which was also the language that they used to communicate with their friends (including Fang Wu), who came from all over China. They now considered themselves Chinese first and Cantonese second, despite their fervent loyalty to the Canton province. Adopting the common language of the country had been an imperative when it meant that they could network with people from other parts of China, which was essential for getting the best job opportunities.

Now, having gotten the economic leg up that came from plugging into the burgeoning Chinese national economy, Xia Jian and his wife’s priorities had changed. They wished for their children to become Cantonese first and Chinese second, just as their parents and grandparents had been. If everybody went on speaking standardised Mandarin at the expense of Cantonese, their dialect would become extinct in less than two generations. Even if he hadn’t gotten injured, Xia Jian would have wanted to quit football prematurely so that he could move wherever he wanted by the time his eldest daughter started school. Only a move to a more localised area of Canton, outside the city of Guangzhou, could ensure that Xia Jian’s children picked up enough Cantonese to pass it on to future generations. It was Xia Jian’s sole option to salvage a heritage that didn’t deserve to die off after having existed for centuries.

So, Xia Jian and his family were happily situated in a flat near a metro station in Foshan. Despite his disability, Xia Jian hadn’t subscribed to the concept of tangping either. While he had never been particularly good at academics, he was an extremely accomplished woodworker and earned more than a living wage selling his wood carvings online.

“小健，你是我的偶像, (Xiaojian, you’re my idol,)” Fang Wu said, and while he was known for sometimes being outright facetious, this time he was dead serious. It might be true that unlike him, Xia Jian had never tasted any international football glory (no matter how equally deserving he might have been), but he had an occupation that would last him a lifetime and a firm grasp on his roots. Both were #goals that Fang Wu now belatedly found himself sadly lacking in.

“大哥，你在开玩笑吧? (Big Brother, you’re joking, aren’t you?)” was Xia Jian’s incredulous reply. And, to his later shame, Fang Wu didn’t disabuse him of that notion, didn’t admit to Xia Jian just how much he truly envied Xia Jian’s success in life outside football. It was his pride, all over again, that didn’t allow him to let go of the hierarchy that had ruled ever since Fang Wu and Xia Jian had started competing together. He, Fang Wu, had been Da Ge 大哥, the “big brother”, and he had always addressed Xia Jian by the affectionate diminutive of “Xiaojian” 小健 or “Little Jian”. Even if the margin between their football prowess had been razor thin, their nicknames established and reinforced to everyone within earshot that they were nearly brothers, but Fang Wu was clearly the elder and Xia Jian the younger.

Visiting Foshan had been a simple metro ride from Guangzhou Baiyun Airport with a couple of line transfers. That was a testament to the rapid infrastructure development that spanned the 22,000 square mile Guangdong – Hong Kong – Macao Greater Bay Area. In contrast, getting to where Fang Wu’s elder brother Fang Wen lived was much more arduous, involving a flight to Changsha, the capital of Hunan, and many hours of bus rides deep into the countryside.

The village that Fang Wen now called home was not much different from what Fang Wu remembered of his earliest childhood. People lived in dilapidated little one-or two-room houses, and the children, who trudged to school wearing identical track suits with their little red scarves tied around their necks, relied on state-provided school breakfast and lunch for their main meals. Like his own younger self, most of them had neither father nor mother in their daily lives, with most of their parents having decamped to the cities to seek a living, leaving them here with their elderly grandparents.

Once a week, Fang Wen would make a round of his pupils’ homes, speaking to the mostly illiterate grandparents in their native Hunan dialect, to update them on the children’s progress in school and convey important announcements. Now that Fang Wu was here for a visit, Fang Wen immediately dispatched him in the role of little brother by sending him off to the local market to buy enough fresh fish and prawns to distribute to all his students and their families as a treat. Seafood, always considered as a delicacy in China, was an extremely rare extravagance in that impoverished village in landlocked Hunan, but the return of a beloved brother after years of separation merited a huge celebration.

“恭喜，恭喜 (Congratulations, congratulations),” most of the elderly village folk wished Fang Wen as he paraded Fang Wu on his rounds, and while Fang Wu felt the irony of being feted for his fade out to obscurity, he gladly obliged all the requests from the children for his autograph. After all, he had been like them once, and perhaps this might inspire some of them to aspire to better things in the future, just as he had.

After his stop in Hunan, Fang Wu flew out from Changsha to Sanya, the naval city at the southern tip of Hainan Island that was home base for Cai Ying and her husband, Admiral Cai, whenever they were on shore.

Back in their childhood days, Fang Ying had skipped town just a few months after Fang Wu did to enlist in the Chinese Navy after her gaokao 高考 (high school graduation / university entrance exam). She had been enamoured of the Navy since she was just a little child, and one of Fang Wu’s first memories as an infant was the sound of his nine-year-old sister’s voice singing him to sleep with the age-old Chinese song Jun Gang Zhi Ye 军港之夜, or “A Night At The Naval Port”. When the song was re-popularized during the 2019 season of the variety show “Our Song” (我们的歌) by Na Ying, the biggest mainland Chinese international singer of the ‘90s, and Xiao Zhan, one of the biggest young contemporary acting heartthrobs of the time, people in the audience had said that the song was nostalgic to them because their grandparents had sung them to sleep with it. Well, the then-17-year-old Fang Wu wouldn’t admit it, but he still sang himself to sleep with it every night in his mind, remembering the beloved sister who had been home and anchor to him when he was just a baby.

“你看，你现在给我们作榜样了, (You see, we’re now following your example,)” Cai Ying quipped.

“你这句话是什么意思? (What do you mean?)” asked a confused Fang Wu. His success might have swelled his head enough that he was constantly bossing Xia Jian, but no matter how red-hot his career got, Cai Ying had never allowed him to forget who was boss between them.  In fact, everyone who knew both Fang Wu and his big sister deduced that the reason why Fang Wu was so stubborn had to be because he and Cai Ying had likely inherited that common trait from an ancestor somewhere up the line.

“你退休，我们也退休! (You’re retiring and we’re retiring too!)” exclaimed Cai Ying joyfully. “你说这样爽不爽? (Isn’t that a blast?)”

“无所事事的，你还说爽? (How could you say being idle all day is fun?)” remarked Fang Wu dubiously. “你还是别让我诱惑你了，以免我误导你的下半辈子, (You’d better stop letting me be a negative influence on you, or else I’ll mislead you in the latter part of your life),” he warned.

“呸，你胡说八道些什么? (Fie! What kind of nonsense are you talking?) 我们都一大把年纪了；我也得接受，退休是天经地义、理所当然的事儿。(We are getting on in years, and I must accept that retirement is a natural and logical thing.) 更何况，我们还要环游世界呢! (Furthermore, we want to travel the world!)”

Fang Wu facepalmed big-time when Cai Ying announced that the first destination on the cards for her and her husband, Lao Cai 老蔡 (i.e. “Old Cai”), was Spain, where they would embark on a month-long hike called the Camino del Norte. If Canton had the honour of being the ground of the biggest joy and heartbreak in his professional life, Spain held that very same distinction for his personal life.

During the downtime that switching clubs last-minute had given him, Fang Wu had gone there eight years ago to unlock the secret of how the major European nations stayed at the very top of football rather than to stay at home warming the bench. Instead, he had come out unleashing the biggest folly of his life. How could he have ever been naïve enough to be mesmerised and blinded by the spell of a 19-year-old football prodigy who was utterly beautiful, utterly talented, and utterly virtuous… but also utterly Muslim?

At twenty-three, he had been a full-grown adult, and he ought to have realised that it was a non-starter from the very beginning. Instead, he had nearly committed himself to exploring a possible conversion to Islam down the road, a thing that was nearly unheard of among the majority Han population in China, a huge shift in his own cultural paradigm, and a clear message that marriage was his long-term intention. He had done all that only to be told, just one day later, that it had all been a game.

Of course it was a game. Everybody knew that Malay people were Muslim by default. And Chinese people were, well, Chinese, with their eclectic blend of Buddhism and Taoism and agnosticism but all bound by the common teachings of Confucius. Yes, there were Muslims in China, but they were mainly from two minority ethnicities: Hui and Uighur, so it would be highly unnatural for either him or her to try assimilating into any of those communities. So, Fang Wu maintained that everybody should consider it elementary knowledge that a relationship between a Chinese and a Muslim was impossible.  Yet he had been caught in a fog of blindness, which he could only attribute to Chinese TV having influenced him into an over-romanticisation of his time in Europe.

If Cai Ying and Lao Cai found his travel recommendations for Spain rather lacklustre, they politely chose not to mention it. Besides, Fang Wu was highly supportive of their travels in all other ways. For a week, Fang Wu helped them with shopping for their trip and packing their backpacks, and he even saw them off at Sanya Phoenix International Airport.

After Cai Ying and Lao Cai left, Fang Wu felt a now-familiar sinking feeling returning to his stomach. Xia Jian, Fang Wen, and Cai Ying, the three people who held his roots and his sense of home, all had their own lives and a clear sense of purpose, while he had… nothing.

Bereft of house and home – for neither Shanghai, Guangzhou, Yuxi, nor Hunan had enough for him to truly feel as if he belonged in any of those places – Fang Wu was at a loose end about what to do with the rest of his life. Shanghai, the place where his international and domestic football careers had seen their zenith, had ceased to be relevant. It was likewise for Guangzhou, which had been the birthplace of his professional football career and his friendship with Xia Jian, but which held even less significance for him than it did for Xia Jian now. At least Xia Jian considered himself Chinese first and Cantonese second, but Fang Wu, who had moved to Guangzhou solely for the sake of football, was solidly Chinese but by no means Cantonese. And Yuxi, his home for the two years when he had played with Yunnan Yukun, was several provinces away from all the people whom he cared about.

There was still Hunan, the place of his birth and early childhood, the province where he had lived until his middle teens or thereabouts. He scarcely remembered when he had left it behind nearly for good. But his old village could only be a place of memories, not a viable place to live a life, when he had gotten used to modern flats with all the amenities of the city.  To go back to living in a one-room shingle-and-plaster house without even the benefit of central heating would be a privation to him, even if it wasn’t to his brother Fang Wen.

What could he do with his life that would still give it meaning? While he had never admitted it outright, he admired Fang Wen, impoverished though his brother’s life might still be. Fang Wu and his siblings had once been children living in the deep heart of rural agrarian China, watching their parents practically break their backs through unending physical toil. Now, Fang Wen had made his life’s mission to ensure that the next generation would have a better future than that, just as his teachers at school had once done for himself, Cai Ying, and Fang Wu. “师者, 人之模范也 Shi zhe, ren zhi mo fan ye (Teachers are the example of mankind)” was an established piece of wisdom in the Chinese language, and didn’t he still have his football skills, which he could impart to the next generation?

And yet, coaching gigs, like everything else in China, were immensely competitive. Fang Wu didn’t know if he could adjust to becoming simply a digit in this vast country of 1.4 billion people where many stars burned bright and fizzled out just as quickly. After football, the only thing that remained of his identity was that he was a son of southern China, and as generations of southern Chinese people before him had done for centuries, one path remained: to seek his fortunes in Southeast Asia, also known to the Chinese community as 南洋 nan yang, ‘the South Sea’.

He had heard good things about Singapore: it was often the first overseas destination for middle-class Chinese when they could afford international holidays. When Xia Jian expanded his business overseas, it was one of the first countries that he shipped his woodwork to. A plethora of Chinese businesses were setting up shop there to bring a taste of home to the hordes of people who migrated there from China, be it for a season or for years, to make a living.  Furthermore, Chinese players and coaches were considered as a vaunted source of talent for almost every sport. 

It also happened to be the place where she lived, to the best of his knowledge, but what could that matter? A population of six million was nothing compared to the nearly 25 million in Shanghai, or the nearly 100 million across the Greater Bay Area region. Still, it was big enough that running into her would be as unlikely as finding a needle in a haystack.

A major international move involved enough logistics to keep Fang Wu busy for quite a while. Firstly, he needed to find work, and secondly, he also needed a place to stay. If he had to choose an estate (for that was what the government-built public housing communities where 80% of the people in Singapore lived were called), why shouldn’t he go for la crème de la crème? 精益求精 Jing yi qiu jing, or ‘keep striving for the best’, was an established Chinese saying after all. Being used to years of garnering accolades over accolades, for him, only an award-winning place would do: Tampines, the public housing new town that had won the 1992 UN World Habitat Award. It was so excellent that it had even vaulted Singapore from the developing to the developed nation category! That she lived there, or at least she had when he last spoke to her – eight years ago – did not signify. At least, he had to convince himself that it didn’t.

There was a thing that years of living in Canton did to you – it made a body, every single body, inordinately obsessed with superstitions involving numbers. In the Cantonese dialect, the number four was pronounced as ‘sei’, which also was (albeit with slightly different intonation) the word for ‘death’; and the number eight, pronounced as ‘bahtt’, came close enough to the word for ‘prosperous’, or ‘fatt’, for the two to become synonymous. Eradicating all block and unit numbers with fours in them and going for the maximum number of eights and sixes (another number that denoted prosperity in Cantonese) landed Fang Wu with Block 866, #08-188, and he immediately offered a rent for the unit that his would-be landlord could not refuse.

A month in, everything was falling into place. He had a job teaching PE at a neighbourhood school in Singapore’s HDB (Housing and Development Board) heartland, and while that wasn’t exactly the same level of sacrifice that Fang Wen had made to become a village teacher, he was using football to reach out to ordinary, even disadvantaged, children that the system might otherwise have overlooked. The weather was hot and humid, but not worse than it would have been in Shanghai or Guangzhou in July and August. It helped that his flat was large and airy, bigger than the one he had in Shanghai, and situated on a high enough floor for the breeze to blow through it. 

There were lots of made-for-China food, too. To his surprise, he didn’t find large Western supermarkets like Sam’s Club, Costco, Carrefour and Aldi here, the way he had in Shanghai. But unexpectedly, there were neighbourhood supermarkets and minimarts stocked with imported snacks from China. Fang Wu’s stint in Spain had taught him that pickled fish and fried crab flavoured Lay’s potato chips most likely weren’t available anywhere outside China, but he could find them here. Better still, he could actually indulge in junk food like this now, whereas he had needed to control his diet strictly while he was playing.

Fang Wu’s needs were simple, really. While theoretically he liked big-city life because there were nice flats, good shopping, pop concerts from international stars, a vibrant sports scene, all the latest movies, and a slew of cafes and restaurants, the asceticism of his lifestyle as a professional athlete meant that the only one of those things that factored into his day-to-day life was the presence of high quality authentic Chinese food, a thing that Singapore had in abundance. He could – no, he had – convinced himself that he was contented and happy.

Every day, he fell into a stable, if unvarying, routine. Well before dawn, he would walk the five hundred metres from his block to the school where he worked, because in Singapore, school started at 7:30 AM and pupils often reported to school at 7:15 or earlier. His day might get broken up by a quick lunch at the school canteen, but overseeing co-curricular activities (CCAs) often meant that he stayed in school until 5 PM or later.

And then, he would drop by a neighbourhood hawker centre or coffeeshop to pick up a simple takeout meal before heading back to his flat to partake of it in front of the TV. CGTN (China Global Television Network), the international arm of China Central Television, aired news and documentaries on local cable, albeit in English rather than in Mandarin, and he was able to access episodes of mainland Chinese dramas and variety programmes through YouTube or streaming to supplement the local fare of Singapore-produced Mandarin-language content and a mix of Mandarin or Mandarin-dubbed dramas coming from Hong Kong, Taiwan, and South Korea. It wasn’t quite home, but he was in a fair way getting to making a life here.

He had fallen into this pattern for about two-and-a-half months when the September school holidays hit, which meant that he could work very light hours for a week and explore more of his neighbourhood.  Being out and about at times when he was usually working meant that he discovered things which he normally wouldn’t, and one of them was the highly unusual sound he heard at the void deck of his block while coming home from lunch one day.

Void decks were another thing that existed here which were alien to him in China – some of the public housing flats, especially the ones that were closest to the town centre, had shops and community facilities on the ground floor, but the vast majority of them simply had open spaces occupied only by the bare foundation pillars and a vast floor of bare concrete, which created areas for residents to congregate and ensured that everyone had privacy because their homes were all above ground level. In fact, they were pretty good spaces for children to kick a football, except that the government had implicitly banned that through installing temporary barricades and imposing fines, which meant that mostly, they served as gathering places for local senior citizens.

Today, the lilting female voices that he heard speaking rapidly in the Hunanese dialect, which few in Singapore understood, were definitely not local, and neither did they sound like they belonged to senior citizens. Yes, Singapore was positively teeming with Chinese people. They made up more than 70% of the total population, in fact. However, they spoke Hokkien, Teochew, Cantonese, Hainanese, or Hakka, if they spoke any dialect at all. Disappointingly, many Chinese Singaporeans were even incapable of speaking coherent standardised Mandarin, because English was the medium of instruction in the local schools with Mandarin taught as a second language. Fang Wu could only conclude that was the main reason why the ethnic Chinese people in Singapore conversed in creoles called Singlish and Singdarin that mixed highly ungrammatical English, Mandarin, Malay, and Hokkien in random proportions with accents that sounded outlandish to him. Indeed, the likelihood of him finding someone speaking in his native dialect was nil or next to nil most of the time.

“各位小姐，请问贵姓？我也是湖南人, (Ladies, what are your names? I’m also from Hunan,)” he said, approaching the two ladies and bearing his most charming smile. He wasn’t a player and seldom flirted, but the fact that he had met two other people from his province at the very block where he lived, indicated that it had indeed been an extremely auspicious choice. Here he was, quite ready to make a foolish match, and anybody from Hunan between the ages of twenty and thirty may have him for the asking.

“喂！姐，你看，他是方武呀! (Hey Sis, look! He’s Fang Wu!)” exclaimed the younger of the two women. They looked very close in age and nearly identical, with the same long straight jet-black hair, pale skin, and slender build that characterised hordes of Chinese women in their twenties. But who was Fang Wu to be particular? The sticking point was that they were Chinese, and they had come from the same province as him, and they had serendipitously shown up in his neighbourhood, so what more of kismet could he wish for? It certainly didn’t hurt that in this place where everybody was crazy about the EPL (English Premier League) and none of the locals watched Chinese football, they still recognised him anyway (which was also because they were Chinese! From China!). 

Wryly, it occurred to Fang Wu that such tribalistic thoughts must mean that he was catching onto the local mindset, because the ethnic Chinese majority in Singapore called themselves 华人 hua ren (ethnic Chinese) in Mandarin and simply ‘Chinese’ in English, but they specifically referred to him and other Chinese people who had come straight from China, as opposed to being born in Singapore, as ‘China Chinese’, or ‘PRC Chinese’. 

It was markedly different from his own worldview of Chinese people, where he would have called them 华裔 hua yi, or ethnic Chinese diaspora with non-Chinese citizenship, whereas he belonged to both the categories of 中国人 zhong guo ren (i.e. mainland Chinese nationals) and 中华民族 zhong hua min zu (i.e. ethnic Chinese, encompassing also the people of Taiwan and the diaspora). Strangely enough, although the people of Hong Kong were also ethnic Chinese who spoke the same Cantonese dialect as the Cantonese natives of Guangdong (Canton) province (albeit with some local variations), they called themselves 香港人xiang gang ren (Hong Kongers) and refused to subsume themselves under the broader umbrella of the Chinese ethnicity. 

Indeed, the notion of Chinese identity was fraught in many layers: language, ancestry, ethnicity, nationality, and politics. It was a whole plethora of nuance that got swept, rather simplistically, into the English concept of ‘Chinese people’. Back in China, Fang Wu had never thought about unpacking the many facets of being Chinese. All his life, being Chinese and framing his entire existence around China had been as natural as breathing. Hence being in Singapore, where the ethnic majority identified themselves as Chinese but thought about the West more often than they thought about China, challenged Fang Wu’s paradigm of being Chinese more than he liked.

In this country full of diaspora, it was inevitable that someone from his province was the closest to “his own people” that he could get. That was all it took for Zheng Xixi and Zheng Lele to become something of a standing fixture in his life. As luck would have it – didn’t he always say he was lucky? – they lived in his block, albeit on the fourth floor. “都是乡下人嘛 (We’re all from the same hometown anyway)” was as good an excuse as any for him to call on their flat with alarming regularity (after he had furnished them with autographs, of course).

Eagerly, Fang Wu plied the sisters with an abundance of Chinese food. Practically at their doorstep, there already were outlets of the massively popular and highly international Taiwanese Din Tai Fung 鼎泰奉 and Sichuanese Haidilao 海底捞chain restaurants. These were situated at Tampines Central, their local town centre, which was a mere ten-minute feeder bus ride away from their block. If they took the MRT (Mass Rapid Transit) to the neighbouring towns of Bedok and Pasir Ris, they could even get a taste of their native food at Xiang Xiang Hunan Cuisine 湘香湖南菜. Distances in Singapore were much smaller than they were in sprawling Shanghai, so Fang Wu didn’t mind a once-a-week metro ride to farther-flung parts of the island for good Chinese food, when such journeys out of Tampines to other parts of Singapore took a mere five to ten minutes at best and thirty to forty-five at worst.

Dinners out soon progressed to dinners in, where Fang Wu, trained by two decades of living alone and fending for himself, whipped up traditional Hunan dishes that he couldn’t obtain easily outside his hometown. Xixi and Lele had grown up affluent in Changsha, and even though they had lived in Singapore for years now, ever since the start of their respective undergraduate studies at the National University of Singapore, they still didn’t cook much at home, preferring to pick up takeout instead. After all, street food was so ubiquitous, and so affordable!

Naturally, having a hot former national footballer cooking for them was insanely hard to resist. It was no wonder that Xixi and Lele promptly latched on to the habit of having weekly home-cooked dinners which alternated between Fang Wu’s flat and theirs, the aroma of the stir-frying billowing out and tantalising the neighbours.

With the hot weather, they often left the front door open when Fang Wu cooked, both to allow the breeze to pass through, and to let the inevitable fumes that came from the intense stir-frying escape the flat. Singapore was such a safe place, and there was still the metal outer gate to prevent anyone coming along the common corridor from entering the flat, even though everyone who walked past could see clear into the living room when they did that. But nobody cared, really - a Chinese man hanging out with two Chinese sisters was nothing unusual.

Initially it was just the three of them, until Xixi invited her longtime boyfriend, a nerdy local guy named Chen Jianming, to make these effectively double dates. Or at least, anyone looking in on them could construe them to be dates, regardless of what Fang Wu considered these gatherings to be. Thus far, he hadn’t yet felt the wish to make any physical moves on Lele, but he certainly met up with her frequently enough that he knew he was creating the impression of being romantically interested in her. Well, what alternatives did he have, anyway? He wouldn’t be able to find a better cultural match than a fellow Hunan native, and her eyes told him that she was clearly attracted to him, so even if he wasn’t quite feeling that the attraction was fully mutual, he would by no means resist.

They were cooking up a storm and laughing, with Lele insisting that Fang Wu hold her hand and teach her how to cook, when a voice called at the door. Dang, how could that voice be still so recognisable, when he hadn’t heard it for eight years?

“Xi Xi, Le Le, where are you? I got Old Chang Kee curry puffs for you, come!”

It was a very Malay voice, he reflected, and when there weren’t many Malay people in China, there was only one way he could have known that. Yet of course, just as surely as being Chinese wasn’t a monolith, being Malay shouldn’t be one either –

What was he kidding himself with? He would have recognised that voice from anywhere, Malay or not.

Nur Atiqah binti Eusoff, football prodigy and the former love of his life, stood just outside the metal gate holding two paper bags of greasy curry puffs. He hadn’t tasted Old Chang Kee before he came to this country, but like many things uniquely Singaporean, the widely beloved signature curry puffs were growing on him too. And he was certain that in the one bag that Atiqah intended for Xixi and Lele, there wouldn’t be enough to have one for him.

She looked different, too. Eight years ago, when she had been a Under-19 youth player and the Chinese Super League phase of his pro career had yet to blossom, T-shirts, Bermudas and flip-flops had been the order of the day when they weren’t training. While he’d never known if make-up had been strictly forbidden because of her Muslim faith, he had thought that for her, it would anyway have been superfluous.

This Atiqah wore slim-fit jeans, a pair of low-heeled strappy sandals, and on top – well, he couldn’t see her top at all, because her head and shoulders were covered under a mint-green head scarf that did double duty as a shawl, enveloping her body from the crown of her head almost to her waist. It was adorned by a cute little pin, and did she have on makeup? They called this scarf the tudung, a new piece of vocabulary that he had picked up in Singapore, and it was worn primarily by the most devout of Muslim women, although in Singapore, which was relatively liberal because it wasn’t an exclusively Islamic country, they often allowed it to do double duty as a fashion accessory. Which Atiqah was clearly doing now, as was plain to see. To him, seeing her in the tudung was like a slap in the face – a stark reminder of how, in the folly of his youth, he had once thought in impossibilities.

“Atiqah! Come, please come in, and we can eat together!” He knew Lele well enough to know that she could be effusive, but he hadn’t any idea that Lele and Atiqah were such fast friends. “Atiqah, this is my boyfriend, Xiaowu 小武 (i.e. Little Wu).” It was also the first time he heard her using that diminutive with his name, which indicated extreme affection and familiarity.

Her boyfriend. That was not a thing that they had overtly discussed, not that he minded if it ended up happening somewhere along the way. But to be introduced as such – to frame the situation, as it were, as if he and Atiqah were strangers, even if to all intents and purposes they now were – that felt wrong, and he couldn’t let Lele continue in his vein.

“Atiqah and I already know each other,” he clarified. “We met while we were training in Spain.”

“Spain? I never knew you went to Spain,” gushed Lele. “How romantic!”

“It’s football training,” pointed out Fang Wu grumpily. “Nothing romantic.”

“That’s still exciting,” insisted Lele, “Come, sit and tell me everything about it!”  The gate was already unlocked and Lele slid it open, gesturing for Atiqah to come in.

“Sorry,” Atiqah apologised. “I need go home to my dad. And I didn’t know you were here, let me get one more curry puff for you.” Deftly she opened the other paper bag and pulled out a curry puff from it with her fingers, dropping it into the bag that she handed to Lele.

And in a whiff, she vanished, too quickly for Fang Wu to realise that she had just given the curry puff that she had bought for herself to him. Even so, he did realise that he had uttered her name for the first time in eight years, but she hadn’t addressed him by his.

Chapter Text

Dramatis Personae:

• Atiqah (a.k.a. Anne Elliot) – Meaning: beautiful, charitable, loving
• Aisyah, Atiqah’s late mother (a.k.a. Lady Elliot) – Meaning: Life and prosperity
• Azlan, Atiqah’s younger brother (a.k.a. Mary Elliot) – Meaning: Lion
• Farah, Azlan’s wife (a.k.a. Charles Musgrove) – Meaning: Joy, happiness

“Ibu. (Mother.)”

It wasn’t Friday, nor was it Hari Raya Puasa, the date known in the wider Muslim world as Eid-al-Fitr, which marked the end of the month of Ramadan. In fact, Ramadan was just about to start in a couple of weeks.

There was no holy reason for Atiqah to visit her mother’s grave, only the wish to have someone in whom she could confide her jumbled emotions.

Had her mother, Aisyah, been alive, Atiqah wondered what advice she would have given her, both then and now. Though in all honesty, her feelings were so unmentionable that she wondered if she would have shared them with anyone at all – even her mother, who had been her closest confidante in the world.

Placing her hands on the concrete headstone, which felt comfortingly cool in the sweltering heat of the late morning, Atiqah rested her forehead on them. She squeezed her eyes shut, trying valiantly to stave off tears.

She was ridden with guilt.

She had met the individual whom she least expected to ever see again in person, and yet to her deep regret – she couldn’t even manage the common civility of greeting him and addressing him by name. But of course, the last time that she had uttered the name of Fang Wu was when she banished him from her life for good. There was no way she could ever greet him as a common acquaintance without having flashbacks of that.

In all honesty, she didn’t blame Fang Wu for not forgiving her. In fact, she expected him to have completely forgotten about her by now, except that his introduction of her to Lele provided evidence to the contrary. Eight years ago, at nineteen and still a few months away from turning pro, what had she known about marriage?

She had understood enough to appreciate what a tremendous gift he had offered her by asking her to wait for him to fulfil his ambition to represent China in football, at which point he would quit and convert to Islam for her sake. Nineteen wasn’t too young for her to fully grasp how gargantuan a sacrifice he was committing himself to in suggesting an early retirement for himself – which would be for her benefit alone, since they couldn’t play football for two different countries and have a life together – but he would also make a religious conversion that must feel like a change to the core of his very being.

And how had she received that gift? After less than twenty-four hours, she lied to him that it was all a game and that she didn’t love him. That she couldn’t love him. The latter might be the more accurate formulation of her feelings, but two things were certain: firstly, she wasn’t at liberty to love him, and secondly, she had forfeited his presence in her life forever.

The summer she turned nineteen, her life had pivoted so rapidly that it nearly gave her whiplash to think about it, even now.

She’d started 2025 in a dead heat to the ‘A’ Levels, and even though the British international school that she had attended while training in Spain wasn’t as much of a pressure cooker as Singapore schools were, old habits died hard.  The edicts known very well to every teen in Singapore remained deeply ingrained in her: study hard, place her social life on the back burner, pass or die, and don’t even think about dating. It was FORBIDDEN in bold, caps and underline.

By that summer, the ‘A’ Levels had come and gone, and everybody in her year had turned eighteen and started drinking.  Her classmates from school scattered to the four winds: gap years, extended backpacking adventures, exotic volunteer postings, and idyllic holidays on resort islands all over Europe.

The only people her age who didn’t have the freedom to roam far and wide were her fellow footballers in her Under-19 squad. 

Atiqah had studied and trained in Barcelona all alone since she was fourteen, and never had she been so lonely. All around her were people her own age who had embraced their new freedoms. Apparently, even aging into legally drinking alcohol was addictive. It started with that first not-forbidden drink (as if her peers hadn’t been clandestinely sneaking sangria and beer for years), and then wine and beer became the highlight at every lunch or dinner gathering they had.

In a group of 18- and 19-year-old youths where she was the only Muslim and therefore the only person who couldn’t participate in the local wine culture, she had barely anyone to hang out with, which naturally led to having hardly anybody to love.

Fang Wu had already been a pro, spending the summer on loan with the football club that hosted an Under-16 boys’ squad where she spent 50% of her training time. Ever since she had started football at the age of five, she’d been such a strong player that she trained and competed among boys to increase the challenge. Spanish boys at 16 might not yet have filled out to their full physical build, but most of them had gone through their adolescent growth spurts and towered over her. That was something, when at 168 cm (5’6”) she already stood one head above many of the Asian ladies of her acquaintance.

She was determined to emphasise that playing football with boys didn’t make her a butch (sadly, too many people thought so). So, Atiqah always wore her hair long and sported a T-shirt that said, “Play Like a Girl”.

When even boys a few years younger than her already outweighed her, she couldn’t hope to beat them through sheer physicality. Instead, she focused on her ball skills and her speed, reminding herself that she was nearly as tall as Messi who had deployed those strengths to such advantage despite being one of the shortest players on the pitch.

It was at one of those training sessions that she first noticed Fang Wu sitting in the stands watching her. Perhaps it hadn’t been the first time he’d done that (and later he would confirm that he’d watched all her training sessions with the U16 boys since his arrival in Spain), but to her, the pros were so rarefied that she hardly dared to look at them, let alone single out any of them to talk to.

And yet this man of twenty-three, already a pro whom she later learned had already achieved a top three domestic league finish, had deigned to speak to her. After a training match where she had scored a hat-trick, she was walking back to her dorm alone (as usual) when she heard his footsteps catching up with hers.

“You shouldn’t need to always be alone,” he’d said. “Let me walk with you. My name is Fang Wu, by the way.”

What could she say? She never socialised with the Under-16 boys whom she trained with. They were simply in a different life stage than her (which was code-speak for saying that their behaviour was immature, let’s admit it). It was naturally the case, when they were still in secondary school whereas she’d finished her ‘A’ Levels. But she could hardly say that out loud. Surely, Fang Wu would think that she was being arrogant and anti-social.

“I’m Atiqah,” she finally replied. “And usually I’m more social than this, but now everyone my age is drinking alcohol, and I can’t.”

“Of course.”

From the instant that Atiqah first set eyes on him, she knew that Fang Wu was Chinese. In Singapore where she’d lived until the age of fourteen, she’d been surrounded by Chinese people. They were her neighbours in her public housing estate, her classmates at school, and her teammates on the pitch.

To Atiqah, Chinese people were simply… people, who understood and respected her Muslim faith but weren’t part of it. They could be her friends, and many of them were.

“And I already know your name,” he added, “your reputation goes far and wide for being the only lady who plays at our club.”

“I… I’m not a butch, even if that’s what everybody thinks,” Atiqah blurted out. “When I go home and turn pro, I’ll only be playing women’s football.”

“Oh, sorry, I didn’t mean that.” If Fang Wu had been offended by what she’d implied, he’d been very gracious not to show it. “What I meant was that you’re doing exactly what I hope to achieve – to play as equals in a great football nation despite a significant physical disadvantage.”

It was then that she dared to look at him and notice his height, among his other physical attributes. He was less than 10 cm (4 inches) taller than her, which was downright short in the European football world but above average among Chinese men. His weight would make him undersize in European football as well: he was lean and wiry, all compact sinew and no fat. The crew cut that he wore his hair in made him look even thinner than he was. But there was an air of relentless energy which befitted the spare ascetism of his physique.

“You… you flatter me too much.” Atiqah felt embarrassed that a pro, someone who had already established his career, could say that he was aspiring to follow in her footsteps. What had she done to earn that compliment? She was still merely a youth player, running around on the pitch with secondary school students. “I am not yet a pro like you.”

“But one day soon you will be. You might get your first international cap before I do, when you’ll certainly be on the Singapore national team.”  He knew, then, that she came from Singapore! But naturally – at a men’s club where a girl playing with the U16 boys’ squad must be an oddity, her reputation must precede her in all respects.

“And let me guess – are you from the US, Australia, Hong Kong, or Taiwan?” Had he been from Singapore, she would already have known him, and his accent eliminated the possibility that he might be from Malaysia.  She would say, in fact, that his accent sounded sort of Western, yet she couldn’t place whether it resembled more of an American or a British one. She didn’t yet know that people from mainland China spoke like this because they learned English as a second language from Westerners.

Fang Wu laughed. “None of the above, I’m from China. We call ourselves descendants of the dragon, 龙的传人 long de chuan ren.”

That was not how any of the Chinese people Atiqah knew described themselves, and for some reason she found it incredibly poetic. Her Chinese friends knew that their yellow skin, black hair, and the fact that they had to learn Mandarin as a second language in school (in Singapore, English was everybody’s first language) marked their race. Just as the things which made her Malay were her brown skin, her facial features, her language, and her religion.

What gave them pride was not a mystical sense of ancestral heritage like what Fang Wu alluded to, but that they were Singaporean, and Singapore would be celebrating its 60^th birthday this year. All year, the festivities for SG60 had been kicking into high gear.

“Compared to China, Singapore has a very short history,” she replied. “I’m so proud to have the same birthday as my country, which will be turning 60 years old on National Day. That’s coming up on the 9^th of August, not very long from now.”  Then she realised that she had changed the subject and wanted to redirect the conversation to its original point.

“Is it very hard to get international caps in China?”

Inwardly, Atiqah kicked herself for asking such a stupid question – there were more than a billion people in China, of course it must be! But she wasn’t used to thinking of China as a major football nation, when all the greats that the global football community idolised were from Brazil, Argentina, Spain, England, Germany, and Italy. Asia could be football-crazy, Singapore most certainly so, but most Asian footballers knew that they weren’t even footnotes in the beautiful game.

“It can be,” Fang Wu said. “Last season, my club placed third in China League One. That’s the equivalent of the English Football League Championship, you know, the league just under the EPL. This year I transferred to a new club, Yunnan Yukun, which was newly promoted to the Chinese Super League. That’s like the EPL of China. And then I have to make my name in the Super League to get on the international team.”

“China must be able to support many more leagues than Singapore,” Atiqah mused. “But then, playing football isn’t the type of career that most Singaporeans dream about. Typically, our parents push us to be doctors, lawyers, or top civil servants.”

“I didn’t end up playing football because I dreamed of it,” said Fang Wu matter-of-factly. “I’m playing because I want to fulfil my country’s dream. Even before I knew what I wanted to do when I grew up, I was sent out of my hometown to play football. It’s the only thing I know how to do, and it’s my duty to try my best to get China into the World Cup.”

Everybody in Asia who watched football watched the World Cup. Qualifying for it, though, was a hope that bore reality only for the likes of Japan, South Korea, and Australia. With Singapore’s population of only six million, Atiqah knew that the World Cup was not a stage that she would see in her lifetime.

As for Fang Wu’s prospects, China was making its mark in so many arenas that nobody would doubt their determination to get into the World Cup. However, currently they were far from being a superpower in football. The only time they’d gotten in was 2002, which she would later learn was coincidentally the year of Fang Wu’s birth. And in that outing, they’d bowed out ignominiously at the bottom of their group with 3 losses and a goal difference of 0-9.

“That’s a big dream,” said Atiqah. “I would be happy just to be on the national team. That’s what my mother always wanted for me.”

“It might not happen in my lifetime.” Fang Wu shrugged. “But that is the nature of Chinese history, we make whatever progress we can and then pass it on to the next generation. The Yellow River has been around many centuries more than any of us have.”

That felt like impressively big thinking to Atiqah. She was a 19-year-old living in a 60-year-old country: an independent Singapore (which was the only Singapore she knew) hadn’t existed for even three generations yet.

“How long will you be here?” asked Atiqah. “I’m going back after I age out of U-19 in December, because the Singapore season starts and ends in May.”

“My next season starts in February,” said Fang Wu, “so I hope to be here for the summer, but not much longer. I am already sitting out most of this season because I just changed clubs, and I don’t like to waste time.”

“Is this your first time in Europe?” Atiqah asked. “Before I came here, I never travelled out of Singapore before. If you’re here for only one summer, I can imagine there’s a lot of things you want to experience.”

“To be honest, I never thought I would ever go to Europe,” admitted Fang Wu. “At least, not until I start playing internationally. But since this is your last summer here and my only one, will it be too much for me to ask you to show me Barcelona in your free time?”

They had reached Atiqah’s dorm, and she found this conversation interesting enough that she wanted to pick it up again if there was another chance. So, without thinking about how she was agreeing to a whole bunch of one-on-one time with a man several years older than herself, she said, “Yah sure, I think that will be fun.”

It wasn’t hard for Fang Wu to become Atiqah’s favourite person when he treated her like the pro she would become, rather than the youth player she was. Her coaching team back in Singapore ensured that she had her eyes trained on her future pro career already, but her peers in Spain didn’t think that way. Most of them were still in student mode because they would be going on to uni.

Only Fang Wu, who had turned pro when he was 18, was aware or even conscious that she wasn’t too young for international glory.

And when Fang Wu made the inevitable blunder of saying that her mother must be looking forward to her return, he didn’t make it awkward when she explained that her mother had passed away when she was thirteen. Instead, he had simply said, “At least you still have your father.”

Neither did he make a big deal out of having lost both his parents when he was between twelve and sixteen. He never looked for sympathy because he was an orphan, focusing instead on his good fortune to have two supportive elder siblings, and trying to live his life to the fullest.

She didn’t read any romantic intent into his request for her to show him the sights in Barcelona, either.  Part of that was because she knew that he was unattainable – he wasn’t Muslim, and she had no reason to believe that he would ever become one. As a pro already, she was certain he must feel the difference in their age and status, and so he couldn’t possibly think of her that way.

And it was perfectly natural when neither his family nor hers had the money for overseas leisure travel, that they would both consider this their last chance to enjoy and experience summer in Barcelona and therefore tour the city together.

He lived up to what she would expect of a perfect gentleman, though it never occurred to her that he might behave otherwise. They deeply enjoyed talking to each other and did so often, but never did he try to initiate physical contact of any kind.  She liked that; in school she’d had male classmates who told her that she was a prude because all physical contact between opposite genders, even a platonic side-hug, was forbidden in Islam. But Fang Wu never needed to be reminded of her boundaries.

Neither did he ever attempt to bring her to bars or nightclubs (again, unlike said classmates). While she appreciated very much that he respected her abstinence from alcohol, what took him to a different level of special was how he accommodated her preference for halal food to a fault.

At the minimum, she never ate pork (which was difficult enough to accomplish in Spain when Iberico pork was everywhere) but to be truly halal, meat had to be prepared in a certain way. Not even all vegetarian food was necessarily halal, because it might contain something else forbidden, like alcohol. The rules around food were so stringent that she had to relax them to a degree when going out in groups with her school or football friends.  No pork, no lard, and no alcohol usually sufficed. There were enough Muslims in Barcelona that halal restaurants existed, but Fang Wu was her first friend here who Googled for them and planned ahead before inviting her out to dinner.

Not that Atiqah usually had many occasions to eat at restaurants – back in Singapore, all the mainstream fast-food chains, namely McDonald’s, Burger King, and KFC, were halal-certified, and every food court and hawker centre had at least one halal stall. Sit-down full-service restaurants were beyond her family’s budget, and when delicious Malay food was easily available at hawker centres, that constraint didn’t matter one whit. In contrast, the halal establishments in Spain were much more upscale because they were patronised by well-heeled Arabs who lived in or frequented Europe. 

Atiqah felt uneasy going out to nice places for dinner when the dressiest outfits she owned were knee-length skirts, short sleeve blouses, and flat leatherette sandals, and she owned no makeup. Remembering it now made her shake her head at her innocence then, but her 19-year-old self didn’t have any reservations in telling Fang Wu that they should eat at fast food places and not restaurants because she had no money to buy nice clothes to wear and didn’t wear makeup. Any man, her 27-year-old self now realised, would consider this as an attempt to fish for compliments, if not a direct hint to take her out shopping on his dime.

But Fang Wu had taken it very literally. In a matter-of-fact way, he’d told her that she looked nice enough in what she had, and that when he was in China, he never ate at restaurants either. Here it was different – it was like the word “carpe diem” that they used in Dead Poets Society, and so he didn’t mind spending more to do things that were special which they’d never have a chance to do again back home. And after that, he’d stuck to casual falafel joints, anywhere that made her feel comfortable.

How had she not realised that they had been, in effect, dating, even if they hadn’t called it that or thought of it that way? In the present day, Atiqah facepalmed and rolled her eyes at her former obliviousness, but at 19, she had been so perfectly conditioned to compartmentalise all thoughts about romantic relationships that she had never faltered in the belief that she and Fang Wu would never be anything more than merely friends. Nor, unprovoked, would she ever have wished for more.

Halal dating was done within the auspices of the Muslim community, often chaperoned, and carried the intention of marriage. Atiqah was too young to marry anytime soon, and Fang Wu wasn’t Muslim. Besides, they would soon part ways to (hopefully) represent different countries in football. So, all the time they spent together that summer could not be dating.

Besides, Atiqah had been, and still was, sure that if there had been any fellow Malay or Chinese people in their immediate circle, she and Fang Wu would have included them in these outings. She believed that the only reason why they were one-on-one all the time was because they were the only two individuals in this place who weren’t as free about wining, dining, partying, and – in all honesty, sex – as people living in Spain might be generally wont to do.

This paradigm skewed Atiqah’s perception of all the things they did together, including everything that, if considered in a different light, might be deemed romantic.

For example: Barcelona was full of art, and as with any place where art was plentiful, much of it was highly suggestive. One of the major attractions of the city was a mural made of 4,000 photos, formed in a mosaic called “The World Begins with Every Kiss”. Each of the photos were collected from a local family in Barcelona and meant to depict the concept of freedom, but when put together, they formed a picture of two giant lips beginning a romantic kiss.

Of course, Atiqah had seen films where people, mostly Westerners, kissed with their lips. When she couldn’t possibly have gone through adolescence without a steady diet of Hollywood movies, she certainly was aware that there were couples who did even more than only kissing, and without necessarily being married.

Yet when she stood in front of that mural with Fang Wu and took a wefie with him and it, the only thought that passed through her head was, “What a pretty picture – and of course, these things are for them and not for us.”

Looking back, the 27-year-old Atiqah might wonder whether Fang Wu had indeed thought about kissing her in that way and held back. But her 19-year-old self never considered that Fang Wu might see the mural differently than she had – that the Spanish could do what they liked, but these things weren’t for them.

The most insane thing about that summer, Atiqah realised, was that they had gone swimming so many times at the beach, yet she never let herself think of any physical temptation regarding Fang Wu, not even once. Of course she found him handsome – a remarkably fine young man, with a great deal of intelligence, spirit, and brilliancy – and when he wore board shorts with no T-shirt on, of course she thought he was attractive, in the way she might say a film star was. But her belief in his unattainability made it unthinkable for her to consider any course of action. And perhaps it was her conviction that he found her equally out of the question romantically that drove her unwavering certainty that he would never make a move on her.

On her birthday, Fang Wu had orchestrated the most magical 24 hours for her.

The night before, August 8^th, he had stayed overnight at her dorm, sleeping on the floor. There, they watched delayed broadcasts of the National Day Message and all the pre-parade programming. The next morning, they both skipped training to tune into the Channel News Asia livestream of the National Day Parade, which aired from 5:30 to about 9 PM Singapore time, which was between 10:30 AM to 2 PM in Barcelona. After that, he went out during siesta hours and came back in the evening with halal meat from the butcher shop to make her dinner.

“Have you ever tried Chinese food?” he asked.

“Maybe a few times, but not very often.” Atiqah wasn’t prejudiced against trying non-Malay cuisines, but Chinese food was very tricky. Even if she avoided pork dishes, she couldn’t always tell when the food might contain the invisible pork, i.e. lard. It was only at catered group functions in Singapore where a halal international buffet was served that she sampled a few Chinese dishes.

“I hope you will like it,” said Fang Wu, “because this is the only thing I know how to cook. One thing I can assure you is that all the meat and all the sauces are halal.” He had made a point to use her pots too, so that she could be certain that no non-halal food had touched what he was cooking.

Malay food was spicy, but this kind of food was a different kind of spicy, sour-hot rather than spice-hot was perhaps the best way she could describe it. Fang Wu’s stir-frying sent the aroma of the garlic and the sauce wafting through her dorm kitchen, and Atiqah realised now that the source of the cooking smell that had emanated from Lele’s flat the past few weeks must have been Fang Wu cooking for her.

(It was highly ironic that Lele conducted a home-based French baking business out of her kitchen but had no interest whatsoever in day-to-day home cooking.)

Well, what was it to her if Fang Wu was only in the flat next door, making himself agreeable to others? The sour grapes she felt about Fang Wu cooking the same dish that he had made for her as a special birthday treat, only now it was for her next-door neighbour, made Atiqah appalled at her own selfishness.

Yes, once upon a time he had promised to come and look for her, and to try converting to Islam for her. There was no reason for him to do so now, but seeing him show up almost at her doorstep, unconverted and most decidedly not there for her, felt outright painful.

And yet what could she expect? He was Chinese, and if he found a Chinese woman to marry, that could only be the most natural course of things. She just wished she didn’t have to witness it.

How could she have been so blind? If she still felt so possessive about Fang Wu cooking a dinner especially for her on her birthday, eight years after the event, it could only mean one thing. Even then, she had already fallen rapidly and deeply in love, only she hadn’t been allowed to admit it, not even to herself.

She might never have needed to admit it, if he hadn’t done so first.

After her birthday, they had had one more month of carpe diem, of beautiful sunny afternoons at the beach, visits to La Sagrada Familia and the cat sculpture by Botero at the end of the Rambla del Raval, even a La Liga game watched live at the newly renovated Camp Nou stadium, home of the revered Barcelona F.C.

True to the spirit of treasuring every day in Barcelona which they wouldn’t have again, Fang Wu hadn’t hesitated to splurge on things like wakeboarding, which he said was a rare treat that he seldom got to enjoy except during his infrequent visits to his sister in Sanya. But beaches in China were overcrowded, and even though Spain overflowed with tourists in the summer, he still felt as if he had more breathing space here. Coming from an island that barely made a dot on the globe but still packed six million people, Atiqah agreed.

The urgency of packing everything they could into that single summer, soaking in the city that appeared to burst into a thousand colours for just those few months, made them feel as if they’d known each other for years. And finally, the penultimate day arrived before Fang Wu’s inevitable return to China.

His going back was a good thing, Atiqah had reminded herself. It meant that he didn’t have to waste an entire season, and the more time he got on the pitch now, the greater his chances would be to get noticed in the Super League. Salvaging this season would set him up for greater glory in next year’s season, which would then give him a chance to make an impact in the qualifiers for the 2030 World Cup. 2026 was a lost cause already, so it would be a long haul to his dream.

Nonetheless, she had known that she would miss him bitterly, certainly the most in the remaining months of her stay in Barcelona. After she went home, she would have her family around her, and when she turned pro there would be plenty to occupy her time and her mind. But for now, she was losing the one person in her world who cherished and understood her best, second only to her late mother. 

And even if they both achieved their goals to play internationally, they might still not get to meet again in person, not when men’s and women’s football tournaments were rarely held together.

Back then, she scarcely allowed herself to wonder what Fang Wu might be thinking, too. He was a pro, and he had his career in China.  Surely, she could be forgiven for believing that the summer must have meant less to him than it had to her, all the way up to their last day out in town, the day when they went to Park Guell.

If Barcelona was a city of a thousand colours, Park Guell was the place where they all came together in a riotous celebration. It was the ultimate canvas for the ineffable imagination of Antoni Gaudi, the man whose architecture painted the entire city with its unique flair of expressiveness.

A teal blue-green mosaic dragon, flecked with blue and brown and yellow, guarded the principal staircase at the entrance of the park. More salamander than dragon, it showed its friendly face to all and sundry, the streaks and dots of colour on its body glinting in the sunlight. Hadn’t Fang Wu called himself a descendant of the dragon? Atiqah had seen enough pictures of dragons (and dragon dances) in Singapore to know that Chinese dragons did not look like this, but nonetheless, she was overtaken by sentiment anyway.

He had apparently been so too, because he remained silent as well. For several minutes, the two of them stood transfixed and speechless, each buried in their own thoughts and reflections.  Then Fang Wu broke the silence.

“我是龙的传人，我的目标就是龙之队, (I am a descendant of the dragon, and my goal is the Dragon Team,)” he declared. To translate for her, he continued, “I need this, I need to chase my dream. There are those who sent China into space, the men who bravely fought the Japanese, and before them our ancestors who built the Great Wall. I might be just a poor country boy, but I want to send China to the World Cup.”

Only an Asian would know the audaciousness of that ambition. Just getting to the group games (not even talking about the knockout rounds) would be a modest goal for the Europeans who played the game to lift the trophy, but it would be a massive achievement for China, never mind that it was the country with one of the deepest talent pools in the world for just about everything. It was the most ambitious goal that remained anywhere within the realm of reality.

Despite the loftiness of that goal, such confidence, powerful in its own warmth, and bewitching in the wit which often expressed it, was enough for Atiqah.

Perhaps it was crazy to think about the World Cup when he had just got out of China League One and hadn’t even yet seen any action in the Super League. But somehow, Atiqah felt certain that even by sheer force of determination (backed by skill, of course, and she had watched him play and knew that he had skill in spades), he would achieve that dream.

And impossibly, irrationally, she wanted to be there with him when he did it.

Never in her wildest dreams had Atiqah imagined that he might wish that too.

“I don’t want this to end,” he had said, breaking the silence. All that summer, the city of Barcelona had burst out in a thousand colours, teasing, tantalising them to drop the veneer of restraint that they had desperately clung to. At least, this was how Atiqah saw it now, that all along she did not know what might truly have been in his mind, so fixed she had been in the notion that he saw things exactly as she had.

“Me too,” she had replied. “I’ll miss you, but it’s all for the best. 加油 Jia you (i.e. Chinese slang similar to ‘Break a leg’), OK?” The meagre scraps of Mandarin (and Hokkien) that she had picked up just by virtue of living in Singapore had never been more useful than now, when she could at least say something to him in his language.

“I’ll try my best.”

Clearly, from the restless look in his eyes, he didn’t think this was enough. Neither did Atiqah, but she didn’t dare to suggest that they could keep in touch via emails and texts.

It was different when they were both here, when their common status as voyagers away from home kept them together. Corresponding, by contrast, sounded too much as if they were seeking each other out by design.

Specifically – though 19-year-old Atiqah had scarcely dared to think the word – it would seem too much like dating, which was impossible.

Forbidden.

Unmentionable.

Taking a deep breath, he reached out and grabbed both her hands. “You’ll wait for me, right? I love you.” Love was a word that Atiqah could barely contemplate. Love meant marriage, and marriage was the remotest thing from her mind when it would be years before she could save up the hundreds of thousands of dollars it took to buy a public housing flat.

And yet, was this love? The feeling that all your world was wrapped up in one person to whom you hoped and wished you’d never have to say goodbye?

“Wait… for…?” She hardly dared to say what was next, not when all this was alien territory. Furthermore, there was one more problem – “But you aren’t Muslim, and you won’t -” she blurted out. “It’s not possible.”

“Not in China,” Fang Wu acknowledged, giving Atiqah at least the cold comfort of knowing that he’d thought this through to some extent. “In China, the Muslims mostly come from the minority ethnic groups, so it would be very strange for me to become a Muslim there. But there’s always Singapore, or even Malaysia. I have my goal for the World Cup 2030, and just one chance – either I get it, or I pass it on to the next generation. Five years, and I can come to wherever you are.”

“You’re saying…?”

It was too much to be believed, if that was indeed what Fang Wu was implying. That he wasn’t only thinking of marrying her, but that he would be willing to convert to Islam to do so.

“I know it will be a big change. I’m not going to lie to you, it won’t be easy for me. But I also know it’s the only way to keep you in my life, and I don’t want this to be the last day of you and me.

“You’re still so young, and I’m sorry to do this to you now. Honestly, I was going to be the one to wait, instead of making you wait. But if you go home without me saying anything, you might marry someone else, and I’ll lose you forever. That’s why I can’t afford to remain in silence.”

Such a speech was not to be soon recovered from. It was a lot of information, a deluge of feelings for Atiqah to process. He loved her, and it dawned on her that she had no idea what love was really like. To think that he was willing to convert to Islam, if that was what it took to clear the way for their marriage!

That was a concrete demonstration of what she meant to him, and it was too precious to throw away.

“Yes, I will,” she choked out. “I’ll wait.”

If love was desperation, then perhaps she felt it too.  Her mother, the only person who might have talked to her about dating and love, was long gone. Speaking of love without marriage was forbidden, and marriage was a distant, future idea to her.

But five years – that felt reasonable, when she would be 24 and he would be 28. If he came back and converted for her, it was a thing that she could do. Especially when the alternative would be losing him from her life.

“Really?” Stoic as he usually was, the delight on Fang Wu’s face was almost painful to see. Could it be possible that he had thought her just as unattainable as she found him?

“Yes,” Atiqah replied with the conviction that only desperation could bring. “I don’t want anything else.” Mustering up her courage to say what she really felt, even though she was skirting on dangerous forbidden territory, she added, “I don’t want to lose you.”

Their lips had barely brushed, not even the hint of a kiss if one were to ask any of the Spaniards around them, but as the Kiss Wall knew, sometimes the suggestion of something could convey a million feelings. In that brief period of exquisite felicity stood an ironclad promise of forever, a key into each other’s future even if for now, they had to part.

Those few hours where they roamed the city of Barcelona for the last time were the happiest memory in Atiqah’s life, not just for the 19 years that had come before, but also for the eight years that followed.

But when she went back to her dorm that night and closed the door behind her, she could feel the reality literally crashing around her.

What had she done?

Touching between a man and a woman who were not married and not related, with perhaps the exception of a business handshake, was strictly prohibited by Sharia law. And yet, she had allowed a boy – in fact, a man (how scary that word was) – to hold her hands and practically kiss her. That their pact contained a de facto engagement did not change the fact that she had committed the Islamic crime of khalwat.

In fact, she had been committing it for the entire summer, because merely being an unmarried and unrelated man and woman alone together was already enough. Sex – or any form of sexually suggestive contact – was not required. Just last year, the papers had reported about a man in the eastern Malaysian state of Terengganu getting publicly caned for it.

Upon later reflection, Atiqah realised that this could perhaps be why the law was made that way.  Her younger self had been too inexperienced to see the signs that an attraction could develop between herself and Fang Wu, too confident that their mutual unavailability would guarantee their innocence. But surely, in a city as romantic as Barcelona, half the sum of attraction, on either side, might have been enough.  There was no guarantee that they would not fall for each other, quite the opposite in fact.

Traumatic as it had been for the 19-year-old Atiqah to realise that she had committed an Islamic crime, she had still felt (the bravado of youth!) that she could make it right if she stopped doing anything untoward with Fang Wu and waited out the five years patiently. He would get China into the World Cup – or not – and he would come to Singapore, and if he converted, they could marry in Islam. She would not have breached anything.

But then, could she bear to see the suffering that the conversion would bring him? Even 19-year-old Atiqah had known that pork and lard were practically staples of the Chinese diet, and that making any Chinese person go cold turkey on those two things would be brutal. She had even thought of how never being able to drink alcohol again – not just to abstain for a summer, but for life – would have to be hard on Fang Wu.

And 27-year-old Atiqah could add one more layer to that argument: that for Fang Wu, turning Muslim would mean replacing Confucius with Allah. What sort of a life was that?

Flipping the argument – if she were to see that converting was so painful that she wanted to spare Fang Wu from that, could she see herself leaving Islam? It would feel like an immense betrayal of the heritage that she had been born into. She didn’t choose Islam, but she had come into it by default just like all the Malay people she knew among her family and friends. There must be Malays who gave up Islam among those who moved to the West and married foreigners, but 19-year-old Atiqah had never met any. That hadn’t changed in the eight years since.

At 27, Atiqah could now see the asymmetry of Sharia law where 19-year-old Atiqah couldn’t. A Muslim man could have a non-Muslim wife and still have his marriage recognised in Islam, but a Muslim woman could not have an Islamic marriage with a non-Muslim man. With the insight that came with age, she saw that this was a necessary corollary to the fact that a Muslim father would beget Muslim children, so to marry a non-Muslim man would effectively mean terminating the line of Islam in the family.

In any case, had she not imagined herself consulting his good, even more than her own, she could hardly have given him up. Singapore would not flog her for committing khalwat, and nobody would need to know when they could hold this secret between them until they married. He had always been so upright and considerate, so she had no doubts that his intention to convert was utterly sincere.

What he had offered her was essentially an engagement. But what persuaded her to believe the engagement a wrong thing was her doubt in her own ability to reciprocate the immense gift that he had offered her. If for any reason he were to find it difficult for himself to convert when the time came, she could not bring herself to leave Islam for him.

How could she tell him this? If she said that he meant as much to her as she might mean to him – and if that was called love – it meant that she had fallen in love with a non-Muslim man. That was such a flagrant breach of her religion that it was inadmissible, even if it wasn’t impossible.

The next closest thing to the truth that she might say was that she appreciated him as a friend and wanted to keep in touch. But that would end up with them corresponding, with her knowledge that he was in love with her. That was still dating, which was haram (forbidden by Islamic law).

What alternatives did she have? Her only way out was to convince him that she had never loved him. She knew that it was cruel and that it would cost her any chance of friendship with him. However, she reasoned, this was better than committing them to a path of wrongdoing which they both might regret.

The next day, she had still gone to Barcelona El Prat Airport to see him off. Yes, there would be the misery of a parting, a final parting, to deal with, but it was the right thing to give him closure and to not mislead him into having hopes that she might not be able to fulfil.

“Fang Wu, I’m sorry,” she had told him, clasping her hands behind her back so that he wouldn’t try to take them. “Yesterday, I lied to you. I only wanted to know what it was like to date a boy, but I don’t – I can’t – love you.” That had only been half a lie; at that time, she still wasn’t sure if what she felt was love. (It was only in the eight years that ensued that she became certain it was.)

“不仁不义 Bu ren bu yi ([You] have no morals and no integrity),” Fang Wu had spat. She hadn’t understood the words, only that he was extremely angry. Whipping around and walking through immigration without a backward glance, he had left the country in consequence.

Atiqah knew that she didn’t deserve to be forgiven. Sometimes, she even blamed herself for agreeing to spend so much time with him.  He understood enough of Islam to know that halal food, abstinence from alcohol and absolute chastity were important to her. But he couldn’t possibly have known the rules around khalwat and why they existed.

She did not blame the Sharia law, nor did she blame herself for being guided by it. But late at night, far too often, she wondered what advice she might have received from her mother, or even what she might have told her younger self if she could go back in time.

Kneeling in front of her mother’s grave, Atiqah imagined what she might say if she had a daughter in that situation. Such a thought exercise could only be painful when it dredged up regrets that she might already have a son or daughter if she had married Fang Wu.

Firstly, she would be shocked. She knew that such a reaction was prejudicial, but she would wonder why her daughter didn’t consider other Muslim men before falling for a non-Muslim one.

Secondly, she would need to get involved immediately. Her 19-year-old self hadn’t known about sexts but now she did, even though she’d never seen one. She would have to ensure that all correspondence between the pair went through her, so that she could vet the content. That was such an invasion of privacy that she found it shocking. And yet chaperoning was an integral part of Muslim dating. It ensured that no physical or sexual intimacy happened before marriage.

Thirdly, she now recognised the uncertainty in the arrangement that Fang Wu had proposed. Many things could happen in five years. While back in China, he might meet a Chinese woman more suitable for him than she was, and would he have a change of feelings? If he got injured and couldn’t play football anymore, how else could he earn a living? He had left school at 18, so neither desk jobs nor manual ones would be possible for him in that scenario. Only with 20/20 hindsight could she know that all that he had told her would follow in his career had indeed taken place.

Lastly, she would have told her daughter not to blame herself, no matter what the outcome turned out to be. At twenty-seven, Atiqah thought very differently about the matter from what she had been made to think at nineteen. She had seen her friends dating and getting married. Furthermore, her younger brother, Azlan, had a Muslim girlfriend while still in secondary school and married her when they were eighteen.

She now felt that were any young person, in similar circumstances, to apply to her for counsel, they would never receive of such certain immediate wretchedness, such uncertain future good. She was now persuaded that despite the possible disapprobation at home, all their probable fears, delays and disappointments, she should yet have been a happier woman in maintaining the engagement than she had been in the sacrifice of it.

Instead, she was now stuck in a situation even more irreparable than she had believed it to be at the age of nineteen. There had been a time, when there could have been no two hearts so open, no tastes so similar, no feelings so in unison, no countenances so beloved. Now they were as strangers, no, worse than strangers, for they could never become acquainted. It was a perpetual estrangement.

The midday sun reminded Atiqah that it was lunch time, and she was almost clear across the island from where she needed to be. Her father would be needing lunch, and she would still need to take a Grab (the equivalent of Uber in Singapore) from the graveyard in Choa Chu Kang to the nearest MRT station, then ride almost the entire length of the East-West line to get home. Drying her tears with a tissue, Atiqah squared her shoulders and prepared herself to face the reality that she would have no choice but to be a witness to.

Chapter Text

It wasn’t like Atiqah to come home so late, Eusoff bin Ismail thought.

Almost immediately, he chided himself for his selfishness. His middle child, the one who was the most conscientious about his needs, hardly ever went anywhere just for her own sake.

She was constantly shuttling in and out of their flat to run errands for the family, to drop off and pick up her two young nephews at their preschool, or to pray at the mosque, but unlike his two other children Aizah and Azlan, she never went out for dinner or clubbing with her former schoolmates. Eusoff knew it wasn’t right, but he also knew that Atiqah had little freedom to do so when she was his designated caregiver.

His impatience was more befitting of it being 1:45 AM rather than 1:45 PM, and Eusoff was aware of that. But he couldn’t help himself when he’d eaten his way through the modest stash of snacks in the house (Atiqah was so meticulous at managing his diet!) and it was nearly two hours past his usual lunchtime.

“Ayah (Father),” Atiqah’s gentle, melodious voice rang out as she opened the door. “Sorry ah, I was running late. I da bao (bought takeout) lunch already.”

Well! She had bought begedil (a deep-fried mashed potato patty) with the rice, a forbidden item which he barely got to eat these days. Ever since Eusoff’s diabetes diagnosis Atiqah had refused to make him anything deep-fried, saying that it was unhealthy.

Takeout was also a rare occurrence in his household. In addition to having a very limited budget, Atiqah watched the sugar, salt, and fat content in his food like a hawk. But what were the little joys in life if he couldn’t have some junk food once in a while?

A genial teddy bear of a man, Eusoff’s sweet tooth was even worse than those of his grandchildren. That was saying a lot, because his two grandsons, Aziz and Yusuf, had no sense of self-denial whatsoever. He liked nothing more than to sneak fast food when Atiqah wasn’t watching. But he couldn’t do it as often these days, not after he lost his right foot and couldn’t move about either as much or as quickly as he used to.

The purpose of his prosthetic foot was for him to walk. His doctors and Atiqah constantly reminded him of that. But it felt so unnatural to put weight on a foot that didn’t belong to him. And so, as with everything involving physical effort, he gave up. As a result of the inactivity, his weight ballooned, which meant it took even more effort to move.

That was the vicious cycle that had fed upon itself for the past few years. By now, Eusoff never left his flat except when Atiqah insisted on bundling him into a taxi and chivvying him to the community centre for seniors’ activities.

Eusoff eyed the begedil in his food packet – and Atiqah’s – with glee. He was overjoyed that she chose to give him a treat today. But what a pity that there was only one piece for him!

“No, ayah,” said Atiqah, giving him the side-eye. She was sharp – she caught him the moment he started eyeing her begedil! “This is mine.” Although she was still chewing on her rice, she popped it whole into her mouth to prevent him from stealing it. After lots of chewing and swallowing, she gave him a loving smile.

This was why he loved Atiqah so much. She treated him like a little child sometimes, but it was obvious that she did so because she adored him. Truly, he doted on all his three children and wished that his late wife Aisyah could see them now. Although he had to admit that they were very different indeed!

Aizah, his eldest, was the pride of the family.

Her university graduation portrait hung right in the middle of the sky-blue main wall in their living room. She had studied Economics at the National University of Singapore and graduated with Second Class (Upper) Honours, which made her the most learned person throughout all the generations of their family.

Having been sponsored by the Public Service Commission (PSC), a government body that recruited talent for the Singapore Civil Service, Aizah now worked with the Ministry of Trade and Industry as an international trade negotiator. She specialised in multilateral negotiations within the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN), where she naturally fit in with her counterparts from Malaysia, Indonesia, and Brunei, which were all Islamic or majority Islamic countries.

Of course, a demure yet well-spoken young woman who exuded a sense of no-nonsense competence would be an effective negotiator. Furthermore, she wore business suits and stilettos but topped it all off with a tudung. That nod to tradition endeared Aizah to her counterparts from other Islamic countries. Many of her negotiating partners from Malaysia and Brunei were ladies, too. They loved Aizah, and Aizah loved her job.

The only issue was that there were ten dialogue partners that ASEAN negotiated with on a multitude of topics, so almost every other week Aizah was out of the country. She hardly ever put away the carry-on suitcase that constantly held a change of business clothes, ready for her next flight.

But Aizah’s pay was solid, much better than what Eusoff had taken home when he had been the sole breadwinner of the family.  He could hardly complain when his only career highlight had been his role as the security guard of Kellynch Hall, an upscale condominium in the Upper Bukit Timah private residential housing area. That was three-quarters of the island away from their home, a rich area but not quite the richest of the rich.

Next there was Atiqah, who was his joy.

They had once held high hopes that she would represent Singapore for football, and it still brought a smile to Eusoff’s face to recall how his late wife, Aisyah, used to cheer her on at all her practices.

Just like many Singapore households, they were rabid EPL (English Premier League) fans, and Atiqah’s love of the game had been apparent ever since she was a little girl. But unlike many Singapore households, they could boast of having one of the most talented local football players to grace the pitch under their very roof.

He'd looked forward to seeing Atiqah play for Singapore’s national women’s football team, nicknamed “The Lionesses” because “Singapore” was derived from the Malay words singa and pura, which meant “Lion City”. While the World Cup might be out of the question for Singapore, the Asian Football Confederation (AFC) Asian Cup was a very decent stage for her talent to shine at the regional level, even if their country was too small to ever be truly world-class.

It was possibly his weakness for sugar and fried foods which ruined that, though on a day when he allowed himself to indulge in denial, he would blame it on his bad luck. Six months after Atiqah returned from her four-year training stint in Spain, which had added layers of confidence and maturity to her playing, he was diagnosed with diabetes. Atiqah had insisted on staying local because with Aizah constantly on the road, there was no one else to watch over him.

Well, that wasn’t entirely accurate – there was Azlan, his youngest child and only son. However, if he was entirely honest with himself, Eusoff would characterise Azlan as the worry of the family.

Never a scholar, Azlan had ended up in the Normal (Academic) stream in secondary school, which meant he took five years to complete his ‘O’ Levels instead of four. Along the way he had acquired a girlfriend, Farah, who was now his wife. They had given Eusoff two adorable grandsons: four-year-old Aziz and two-year-old Yusuf. Yes, one of them was even named after Eusoff, his grandfather!

On paper, that should be the happiest and proudest thing in the world, but the reality felt so different.

After completing Secondary Five at the age of 17, Azlan had announced that he was done with school. And yet, he wasn’t in any hurry to replace school with a full-time job of any kind.

Some days he worked hard, running about the island for twelve to sixteen hours at a stretch on his e-bike doing food deliveries as a Grab Eats (Singapore’s local counterpart to Uber Eats) rider.  But every time he felt burned out, he would fall back on the refrain of being “sakit (sick),” and loll around all day on the sofa with his PlayStation.

When the government lamented the lack of focus among Singapore’s youths, Eusoff could point at Azlan as a prime example.

That being said, gig workers suffered the most in the economy. Yet despite the lack of benefits and stability, Azlan wouldn’t consider anything other than gig work because he wanted the flexibility. (Eusoff was convinced that Azlan’s concept of “flexibility” was merely code-speak for his desire to waste his life playing video games.)

In contrast, Azlan’s wife was the epitome of discipline and focus. Six days a week, Farah left the flat before 5 AM to help her parents set up the Malay food stall they operated at a hawker centre not far from Tampines Central. The eldest in a family of five siblings, Farah understood that the stall was her birthright, and she innovated new ways to jazz up her ayam penyet (fried chicken with rice and spicy sauce) for the Westernised tastes of the new generation.  On her workdays, she returned home well after sunset, with only the energy to fall into bed before she did it all again the next morning.

Between Azlan’s unpredictable schedule and Farah’s long working hours, most times there would be nobody to bring their two little boys to and from preschool if Atiqah didn’t pick up the slack. Eusoff had helped for a while in the beginning with Aziz. But he lost his foot when Aziz was still a toddler, before Yusuf was born. Thus, Atiqah’s burden had only increased with time, while Eusoff was now unable to help in any way.

Nonetheless, Azlan’s wedding photo took pride of place on the wall next to Aizah’s graduation portrait, the family all decked out in the traditional Malay costumes that they wore for these special occasions.

It was criminal that there was no picture of Atiqah in her football kit.  Eusoff knew it, but it simply couldn’t be helped. He’d poured all his earnings as a security guard into this spacious five-room (3-bedroom, 1300 square feet) flat that the family had lived in for over 30 years. The little left over for luxuries like professional photography were reserved only for major life events, namely weddings and university graduations.

Atiqah had had neither a wedding nor a university graduation, and now even her football was taken from her. Eusoff could shoulder some of the blame for his own lack of discipline in breaking his diet and not exercising enough, which was why his foot got amputated.  But then, shouldn’t Azlan and Farah also be held partially responsible for having a second child before they had the time, the money, or in the case of Azlan, the maturity for even one?

Their flat was falling into disrepair. The wooden furniture was scratched, the tiles were yellowing, and the walls could use a fresh coat of Nippon Paint.  Five-room flats were at the upper end of the public housing spectrum, and Eusoff had once felt it a luxury to have so much space for a nuclear family of five. However, they had now expanded into a multi-generational family of seven, and the space inevitably felt cramped.

Azlan and Farah had the master bedroom with an ensuite, which they shared with their two young sons. In this room, the clutter was so disgraceful that they had to permanently close the door if they didn’t want visitors to see it.

Every cent that Azlan earned went into buying toys – not just for the kids, but also for himself. He had the fastest PCs, the latest gaming consoles, and the newest edition of just about every video game on the planet. Combined with his Chelsea football jerseys and the knick-knacks belonging to the little kids, the room always looked as if an earthquake had hit it.

The somewhat more sensible Farah thought (rightfully) that education was the best investment for their children and poured thousands of dollars a month into sending them to private preschool. Married at 18 and with two children by the age of 23, Azlan and Farah didn’t have two cents to rub together at the end of each month.

Even then, they insisted on balloting for the extremely limited new construction flats in Tampines whenever a fresh batch became available. New-build flats in established housing estates like Tampines and the nearby Bedok were extremely oversubscribed and came at a premium. But because Azlan and Farah weren’t willing to move to a newer estate with bigger housing supply, they were never successful in their ballots. 

Frankly, even if they could get a new flat, Eusoff had no idea how they would be able to afford to pay for one. They were stuck under his roof for good, or at least for the foreseeable future.

Atiqah and Aizah shared the bedroom that they had occupied since they were children. They still used the same pink Hello Kitty bedlinens, now faded to nearly white, that had been on their bunk beds since they were in secondary school. The glass-fronted cabinets that were built into their study consoles along the wall were now cloudy with age. But the medals and trophies that Aizah and Atiqah had won for their academics and football still sat there proudly, as if hardly any time had passed since Aizah and Atiqah’s school days.

They had outgrown all that, the peeling plywood desks with their yellowed schoolbooks still stacked in nooks and crannies. But housing was prohibitively expensive, and society castigated any unmarried adults who didn’t live with their parents as unfilial. So, marriage was the only thing that would release Atiqah and Aizah from the stasis of their childhood bedroom, a time warp that had stood still for more than two decades.

And Eusoff took the third bedroom, which had been Azlan’s before he got married. He no longer needed the extra space, whereas Azlan did. Truth be told, he hadn’t needed it ever since his wife had passed nearly a decade and a half ago.

It had been very sudden, a bout of dengue haemorrhagic fever. Aisyah had been the pillar that held up this household, cooking and cleaning and ensuring that all the children got to school on time. And then, in far too little time, she was gone.

The prayer rug that lay on the floor of Eusoff’s room next to his single bed, where he prayed five times a day facing in the direction of Mecca, didn’t come anywhere close to filling that void.

But at least he had this space now where he could engage in the rituals of Muslim prayer exactly the way he wished. To adhere strictly to the rules of his faith, he had to perform the salah five times a day, with the times of prayer aligning to specific positions of the sun.

Unlike white-collar workers who might have a prayer room at their office premises, Eusoff hadn’t had a private space for prayer when on the job. Despite the challenges, he’d stuck to his prayer routine faithfully through the decades.

And now, in retirement, the prayer space in his room was the one luxury that life had chosen to save for him. Eusoff might not have yet realised his lifelong dream to go on the haj, but he could consider his mission in life fulfilled to the best of his ability.

This flat embodied all that Eusoff had ever strived and saved for – once proud, now a little pitiful. It was all he could show Fang Wu, the new neighbour who showed up at his gate to introduce himself with almost ceremonial politeness.

“Hello, Uncle Eusoff,” he said. He was a handsome young man, tanned and built like an athlete, wearing a Dri-Fit T-shirt and track pants. “I’m Fang Wu, your new neighbour. Just yesterday, I found out that I’m living in the same block as Atiqah. I’m on the eighth floor.  She was kind enough to give me a curry puff, so I came over to bring some Polar cakes for you and your family.”

If he hadn’t mentioned Atiqah’s name, Eusoff would have been surprised at this stranger knowing his. But any friend of Atiqah’s would be welcome with him and his family.

Their Chinese neighbours were always polite to a fault. It was natural in this country where everybody was supposed to respect each other, regardless of race or religion. But Fang Wu came off as somewhat more formal than the typical Chinese Singaporean. Part of that was probably because he didn’t have the Singapore accent and spoke proper English instead of Singlish.

In any case, Fang Wu seemed to know how to make him very happy indeed. Polar was a highly popular local halal bakery chain. With their limited budget for outside food, Eusoff and his family hadn’t indulged for a while, but cakes from Polar were exactly the thing his sweet tooth needed.

“Thank you thank you!” Eusoff opened the gate and ushered him in. “Come sit for a while, OK? Did you say you know Atiqah?”

Fang Wu nodded. “Yes, she used to train at the club where I was on loan for a summer in Barcelona.”

“Barcelona, that was very long ago, eight years?” Eusoff smiled, remembering the pride he had taken in telling everyone that the Football Association of Singapore was sponsoring his daughter to study and train in Spain. “So, you are also a football player?”

“Until recently, I was,” replied Fang Wu cheerfully. “Now I teach PE at Poi Ching School.”

Eusoff nodded approvingly. “That is the SAP primary school near our block, right? We need teachers, it’s very nice to see young people who are willing to teach.”

SAP stood for Special Assistance Plan. These were the schools that had been converted from the Chinese-medium educational institutions to the national education system in the 1970s. 

In the early years of Singapore’s independence, the government had to exercise tight control on the Chinese-medium schools to curb the influence of Communism that crept in through them. But it also recognised that there was a need to cultivate a Chinese bicultural elite who could pave the way for business and diplomatic relations with China.

Hence, the birth of the SAP schools, which taught Higher Chinese at the primary and secondary levels. The children who attended these schools learned Mandarin at closer to the native level than most of the local ethnic Chinese who were taught the language at second language (i.e. foreign language) level.

Poi Ching was the primary school closest to their block, but they wouldn’t be sending Aziz and Yusuf there when they got to school age. Malay was their mother tongue, and it was what they wanted the boys to study in school alongside English. At an SAP school where all the children were defaulted into learning English and Higher Chinese (i.e. both languages at first language level), that wouldn’t happen.

“That’s right.” Eusoff could swear he’d never met a young man who smiled so much. If only Azlan could be more like him. “I was a little sad to find that there aren’t any Chinese-medium schools in Singapore, but this is as close to it as I can get.”

“Did you come to Singapore recently, Mr… Fang?” His accent betrayed Fang Wu as one of the growing number of Chinese here who hadn’t been born in Singapore. Eusoff was curious to hear his story.

“Please call me Fang Wu. Yes, I came here about four months ago, I started after the June school holidays.”

“Then please call me Pakcik. No need to stand on ceremony.”  While Eusoff was used to his young Chinese neighbours addressing him as “Uncle”, he felt that the Malay term was more intimate. It felt more like family.

“Pak-chik?” The young man struggled slightly with the pronunciation of the word.

Amused, Eusoff couldn’t help smiling broadly.  “Pakcik is the Malay word for ‘Uncle’,” he explained.

“Pakcik.” One thing that could only add to Fang Wu’s charm was that he caught on to social situations quickly. “Thank you for having me, I think I will go now.”

“Wait, we are neighbours, right?  Let me give you my number,” said Eusoff. Atiqah barely had the chance to meet with any of her friends these days, so if one of them lived in the same block as them, it would be a welcome social diversion for the family and for her.

“Actually, I’m hopeless with phones, let me give you Atiqah’s number instead.” Eusoff let Fang Wu hand him his mobile phone to punch Atiqah’s number into his contacts list. “Now you can just text her and she will have yours.”

“Thank you, Pakcik,” Fang Wu replied. “And please let me know if you need anything.” Waving away Eusoff’s offer to see him to the door, he strode out of the flat and down the corridor toward the lift.

Right after Fang Wu left the flat, Atiqah emerged from the kitchen where she had been washing the dishes.  “Ayah, who was that?” she asked.

“Our new neighbour,” explained Eusoff enthusiastically. “He brought Polar cakes for us.” Opening the box, he was thrilled to find that there were seven cakes, enough for all of them! Clearly, Fang Wu had some idea of the makeup of their family, but didn’t he say he knew Atiqah from training? That surely explained why.

“Ayah, only one of them is for you.” Only Atiqah would be so strict, caring solely about his diet when they had a nice new neighbour dropping off their favourite cakes. “And I’m cutting it in half for you to eat in two portions.”

At that moment, Atiqah’s phone dinged, and she gasped when she saw who had pinged it. Jumping up as if the very floor had scorched her, she retreated into her room.

Now what was that about? Eusoff shrugged and helped himself to his piece of cake, tucking in before Atiqah could take half of it away from him.

~~~⚽~~~

It appeared as if Fang Wu and their next-door neighbour were dating, Eusoff noted to his extreme amusement. For decades he had earned a living by sitting in a booth and watching the street.  Now, in retirement, he spent most of his day sitting next to the window at the front of his flat, watching the communal corridor.

Fang Wu and Lele promenaded there on a near-daily basis.  Since the long end-of-year school break had started, and he was a teacher, there would be six weeks of this. Having raised three kids, Eusoff was more aware than most people of the times of year when school was out, even though the school holiday crowds barely impacted him these days.

The sight of Fang Wu and Lele might be even more entertaining if he ever caught them acting like the couples in the Korean dramas that Aizah always watched in the rare occurrences that she was at home. Unlike the Western dramas, the Korean ones were always chaste but conveyed young love in cutesy ways like the trademark piggyback ride. Too bad his young Chinese neighbour couple had disappointed him thus far.

From the way Lele physically clung to Fang Wu, Eusoff was certain that she’d be through the moon if Fang Wu were to piggyback her down the hallway. He’d wager, though, that the gentleman was less than eager to do so.

At 25, Lele was increasingly anxious to get married, and Eusoff predicted that Fang Wu would be neither the first nor the only man scared away by her excessively eager overtures.  After all, this wasn’t the first romance involving Lele that Eusoff had witnessed from his front window, and it probably wouldn’t be the final one either.

While it lasted, it provided some meagre portion of intrigue to spice up Eusoff’s monotonous life, and that was all he cared about.

One day, Fang Wu showed up at Eusoff’s door again, this time with Lele in tow.

“Hello Uncle Eusoff!” exclaimed Lele. She was always the epitome of cheerful energy, but Eusoff thought she seemed even more bubbly than usual.  “Tomorrow, Xiaowu will be showing us his travel photos and videos,” she proclaimed, squeezing the arm of said gentleman and resting her head affectionately on his shoulder. “Since Atiqah is his old friend, I thought it would be good for all of you to join us.”

“Travel photos?” Azlan put his game on pause and looked up from his Playstation. “Did you go to the US? Bapa (another term for ‘father’), he can show us Disneyland!”

“I haven’t been to the US, but I have a lot of scenic shots from China,” said Fang Wu. “Please come, we will be very happy to have you.”

“Aziz might not feel up to it.” Atiqah’s soft voice startled Eusoff. It made him feel slightly guilty that he so often almost forgot about her, but she was always such a quiet, shadowy presence in the corners of the house. “Ayah, it’s OK, I can stay with him while you all go.”

Oh yes, how could he have forgotten? Just the day before, Farah had called Atiqah in a frenzy. Another kid had pushed Aziz off the climbing structure in the playground at preschool, and he was hurting so badly that the teachers had called an ambulance. It all ended with Atiqah going to Kerdang Kerbau Women’s and Children’s Hospital, which handled all the paediatric emergency cases in Singapore, and bringing the sobbing child home in a taxi. He’d dislocated his shoulder and badly bruised his back.

“Aziz, what did we tell you about self-control?” Eusoff had lectured. “When other children are climbing, you need to line up and wait.”

“But Datuk (grandfather), Peter sit there for so long and won’t move!” little Aziz had protested. “He pang sai (Hokkien for taking a dump) is it?” 

While Eusoff found it sad that his eldest grandson was getting to be self-centred and rebellious (and apparently vulgar besides), he had to face the unhappy truth that Azlan wasn’t any different.  It was no wonder, then, that his grandchildren were getting to be chips off the old block.

But the kids nowadays grew up with so many creature comforts (look at all the toys and gadgets!) that nobody could afford, not in his parents’ nor his own generation. Little Aziz and Yusuf were scarcely the only pampered little princes and princesses who lived in Singapore. In fact, it could be considered a happy problem that young parents were now affluent enough to spoil their children. Just one generation ago, their parents hadn’t had that luxury.

Moping about with his arm in a sling, Aziz had pouted and fretted his way through the last 24 hours. Truly, Eusoff didn’t know how they would have managed if Atiqah hadn’t managed his painkiller doses. As the least-educated member of the household (Eusoff had dropped out before finishing secondary school), anything involving doctors and medicines terrified him.

After some nagging from Eusoff, Azlan had programmed the dosage times into his smartphone. But he ignored the alarms if he was in the middle of a particularly interesting gameplay. And that evening, he (in)conveniently decided that it would be a good time to work through the night doing food deliveries. Azlan had puttered off with his e-bike at the exact moment when the exhausted Farah came in and plopped straight on her bed, too tired to even take a shower.

No matter that Fang Wu and Lele invited them over, Atiqah was the one who was relied on to nurse Aziz. Eusoff and Azlan might say they wanted to help, but the only task within their capability was to entertain Yusuf enough to keep him out of her way. 

It was such a pity that Atiqah had to stay behind, but there would be other times for her to catch up with their friendly neighbours after his grandson recovered, Eusoff reasoned.

“Mak Ngah (second aunt), I want to go!” little Aziz piped up. This was the most cheerful he’d been ever since he got injured. “I want you to go with me,” he whined, pulling at his aunt’s arm with his uninjured one.

While Eusoff was sceptical that his little grandson would be recovered enough to make it through the evening without whining, nobody ever said no to the children. Hence, it was settled that Aziz would go, and Atiqah with him. If the child got cranky halfway, at least Atiqah would be there to see to his needs and bring him home if he needed it.

“OK,” said Fang Wu brightly, making the sign with his hand. “Tomorrow 6 PM at Lele’s flat, is that convenient for everybody? You’re not fasting yet, are you?”

“No, Ramadan isn’t until next week,” replied Eusoff with an expansive smile. To think that a young Chinese man who had just come here from abroad remembered that they would be fasting! “Thank you, that’s very kind of you.”

That was how they ended up piling into Lele’s flat, which was so very different from theirs. It had a comfy L-shaped sectional sofa and a large flat screen plasma TV. Recessed downlights shone from a false ceiling, instead of the exposed wires they had that were covered with unsightly plastic trunking. (For safety purposes, the government didn’t allow public housing dwellers to install electric wiring inside the walls. That meant nobody could have concealed wiring without an expensive interior design job.)

Fang Wu was already setting up his laptop when they got there. Two jumbo buckets of KFC sat on the dining table, ready for them to help themselves. Lele and Xixi had already bagged the choiciest seats at the centre of the sectional. Cheerfully munching on the fried chicken, they greeted Eusoff and his family with little waves but gestured that they had full mouths and sticky fingers.

Eusoff settled himself next to Xixi, so that Fang Wu could take the spot next to his lady. Azlan stretched his legs out on the long edge of the sectional until Eusoff gave him a light smack and told him to sit properly. They’d forgotten about the squirming Yusuf who crawled under the table giggling, until Fang Wu picked up the child and handed him to Azlan.

“Be careful, we don’t want him to bump his head,” Fang Wu cautioned, before going back to his laptop to sift through his reams of GoPro footage.

“Ayah, this one is for you.” Atiqah set a plate of chicken in front of Eusoff. After a short while she came back and settled herself on the edge of the sectional, holding Aziz firmly on her lap. “Come, sayang (darling), let’s eat, OK?” She picked up a piece of chicken and put it in her nephew’s uninjured hand.

Firing up the TV with the remote control, Lele unveiled a GoPro video taken from a head-mounted camera while Fang Wu was wakeboarding.  The horizon seemed to do a 360-degree turn every time he leapt up in the water and spun around.  At each leap, some of them revealing terrifyingly high wake park obstacles under them, Xixi and Lele gasped theatrically. At each landing, they showered Fang Wu with thunderous applause.

It wasn’t surprising that a young man would be a daredevil, but Eusoff was relieved that his Atiqah had been more sensible than that. As a national footballer (for Eusoff still thought of her as that even though she’d never ended up playing any international matches at the pro level), she should not be courting injuries off the pitch. And she didn’t. But Fang Wu had been a footballer too, and he didn’t seem to care about one whit about staying safe.

“I never knew you were a wakeboarding champion!” Lele exclaimed. “Do you still go very often?”

“Actually, the last time I went out on a wakeboard was in the summer of 2025,” said Fang Wu. He seemed to direct a pointed look at Atiqah when he said that, but Eusoff couldn’t think of any reason why he might need to do so. Eusoff must have imagined it, then.

“Oh, really? But why?” asked Xixi. “You shouldn’t quit when you were so good!”

“人三十而立 Ren san shi er li,” said Fang Wu, a slight tone of rebuke creeping into his voice. Hastily translating for Eusoff and his family, he continued, “People establish themselves when they’re thirty. There’s a time when we put away childish things.”

When all his days had hitherto been spent imagining the Korean drama of Fang Wu and Zheng Lele, Eusoff decided that he couldn’t be seeing things this time when he noticed Fang Wu glance again at Atiqah.

It seemed that 2025 had been an extremely eventful period in Fang Wu’s life. That year constantly came up in the conversation as he described his move from Guangzhou to the picturesque province of Yunnan.

“云南 Yun Nan means ‘south of the clouds’,” Fang Wu explained. “I love the sea, but I also learned to love the mountains. And the town where I stayed, 玉溪 Yuxi, was right next to a beautiful lake.”

The GoPro switched from the water to a long, winding road that wended its way up a terrifyingly high mountain. Off a steep slope that descended into nowhere, the concrete block of the building that sat on the mountain’s edge not even guarded by a parapet, the video stopped. On the next clip, which bounced with Fang Wu’s steps as he walked, a colourful traditional Chinese building came into view.

“Is that a Buddhist temple?” Those were the first words Atiqah had uttered all evening.

“It’s a Tibetan temple!” Xixi exclaimed. “Fang Wu, I never knew you were so cultured – are you a Buddhist?”

“Where’s Xiaoming?” Lele pointedly asked her sister. “I thought he was coming tonight.”

“Yes, he’s coming later,” replied Xixi. Again, was Eusoff imagining things, or did a hint of sullenness creep into her voice? “He has to eat dinner with his mother and help with the dishes.”

Chen Jianming, or Xiaoming (‘Little Ming’) as the sisters liked to call him, was a familiar sight to Eusoff and his family. Lele and Xixi had rented the flat next to Eusoff’s ever since Xixi graduated from the National University of Singapore. That was, what, four years ago? Anyway, even at that time Xiaoming was already her boyfriend, nerdy and bespectacled just like many of the local men in Singapore.

In the big scheme of things Xiaoming was quite a good catch. He had a civil service job which was just about the most stable employment that one could get in Singapore. Apparently, Xixi thought so too, as she often confided to Aizah and Atiqah that she hoped that Xiaoming would propose to her soon.

Usually, Lele was the one who vehemently insisted that Xiaoming shouldn’t pop the question to her sister until he was willing to buy a new flat for them. An only child, Xiaoming lived in Marine Parade, a seafront housing estate. It had a prime location but was also rapidly ageing. One of the first few public housing developments to be built in Singapore, the flats dated from 1975 and were nearly 60 years old.

It was a given that Xiaoming would inherit his five-room point block flat from his parents when they passed on. It was one of the choicest on the island with its panoramic sea view. But it was also a ticking time bomb, if not a potential money pit, with about forty years left on the 99-year lease.  Lele cared about that on behalf of her sister, even if Xixi didn’t mind it at all.

So why was Lele pushing Xiaoming at her sister now?

In any case - speak of the devil, the doorbell rang and Xixi got up to admit the very man himself. Grabbing Yusuf who had shifted from his father’s lap to his grandfather’s, Eusoff shuffled over to make space for Xiaoming.

“Oh, er, hi.” Never as good with people as he was at academics, Xiaoming was perpetually awkward. But he had an honest look with his bangs that hung a little long in the front and his square black plastic-rimmed spectacles.

“Hi, Xiaoming! Look what you missed,” said Lele, while Xixi lazily stretched her arm around his waist, her hand digging slightly into Eusoff’s side. “We were just looking at pictures from China! Xiaowu, why don’t you have any videos of yourself? We want to see you!”

“I didn’t have anyone to take pictures of me,” Fang Wu stated. “All my travel videos are from my GoPro.”

“Did you find it dangerous riding up the mountain like that?” Eusoff asked. He noticed from the GoPro footage that Fang Wu appeared to have dismounted from something when he reached the edge of the slope. In fact, Eusoff thought it might be a Vespa scooter, like the one he himself used to ride.

He could sense an elephant in the room, though he didn’t have any idea what it was, and he was eager to change the subject.

“Not any more dangerous than being on the pitch,” said Fang Wu, altogether too cheerily for his own good. “In every game of football, there are twenty-one other human beings running around who could bump into you.”

“But really, you could say that about any kids’ game,” Lele chimed in. “They’re just people, what harm could they do? And you are here,” linking her arm with his, “and very safe.”

“Hitting somebody’s bones can be quite painful. I had a concussion once from bumping my head on somebody’s elbow.” Fang Wu’s tone was so utterly cavalier that Eusoff could only shake his head in disapproval.

“Oh no!” Lele exclaimed, running her hand over Fang Wu’s crew-cut hair. “Tell me, where was it? Does it still hurt? And you should be careful, you could have broken your skull!”

“If I did fracture my skull, I would follow the example of Petr Cech and play out the rest of my career wearing a helmet.”

Oh yes, this young man was indeed too gung-ho for his own good! Where it came to being a prudent footballer, it would have benefitted him to have taken some lessons from Atiqah, Eusoff thought.

“Excuse me,” said Atiqah, hastily handing off Aziz to her brother. “I think I have a stomachache.” She made a beeline for the flat’s common bathroom, which was situated in the back off the kitchen.

Now, what was that about? They’d eaten the same sambal kangkong (a green leafy vegetable stir-fried with chili sauce) and chicken rendang curry (Atiqah’s special low-sodium edition) that Atiqah had prepared. Eusoff had never contracted food poisoning from Atiqah’s cooking, and right now he felt perfectly fine.

“Who’s Petr Cech?” asked Lele. While Fang Wu pulled out his phone to Google Petr Cech’s name and show her, Azlan replied, “A Chelsea player who had a skull fracture and almost died.”

Of course! Eusoff and his family knew decades of EPL history almost by heart. He’d even watched the match when that horrific incident had occurred on TV, back in 2006.  Atiqah must be spooked by the idea of any footballer of her acquaintance potentially meeting a similar fate. But when she and Fang Wu had both stopped playing, it puzzled Eusoff that she should feel so strongly about it.

“All this talk about people dying is so depressing!” That was Lele, and did he see Atiqah returning from the bathroom?

“Xiaowu, can you show us some happy photos, 拜托你 (please)?” Lele demanded.

“This is Shanghai,” said Fang Wu, pulling up yet another GoPro video of an endless waterfront boardwalk flanked by majestic old buildings. “I took this while cycling along the Bund. I was living there for six years, so I know the city like the back of my hand.”

“It’s, like, 10 times the size of Clarke Quay!” exclaimed Azlan. “Brother, you are rich, is it? It must be very expensive to stay there.” Like the way Westerners might call a good friend ‘bro’, a Singaporean man addressing another as ‘brother’ was a gesture of comradeship.

Fang Wu smiled. “Shanghai is a good place to earn money quickly,” he acknowledged. “It’s a pity my friend Xia Jian never had a chance to play there when he could have easily made his mark in domestic and international championship football. He needs money much more than I do, he’s got a wife and 3 kids.”

“I am lucky you know Shanghai so well,” crooned Lele. “Next time we could go shopping there.”

Ignoring her obvious hint, Fang Wu turned his attention to Eusoff. “Pakcik, would you be interested in watching a film about Shanghai before and after? I think it’s incredible how much the city has developed in just one generation.”

“Of course,” replied Eusoff. “Should we do same time next week? Or – wait, we will be fasting, so maybe we should come over after we can eat.”

“We can watch the film and then have dinner,” suggested Fang Wu. “I’ll prepare hot pot from my hometown for you to try.”

“Yes! That sounds good.” Azlan punched the air, accidentally brushing his son’s injured shoulder and causing the child to whimper. “On, man!” That was the Singlish way of saying that he accepted the invitation.

“Would you mind if we brought one more person?” Atiqah asked, almost shamefacedly awkward in her wish not to impose. “Farah – that’s my sister-in-law – missed today because she always works on weekends, but I’ll talk to her parents to see if they can give her some time off. It isn’t fair that she never gets a chance to enjoy herself.”

“No problem, ma’am.” There was something deliberately impersonal, perhaps even sarcastically so, in the mock salute that Fang Wu gave her.

“Let me see - ” Lele reached over Fang Wu’s lap to browse his laptop. “What are these? Is that your sister and brother-in-law? Oh, they’re in Europe, how romantic!” She double-clicked on the thumbnail, sending a photo of Cai Ying and Lao Cai kissing in front of the Eiffel Tower onto the big screen.

“请饶了我吧! (Please spare me!)” In an exaggerated display of despair, Fang Wu buried his head in his hands. “这些都很老套，你不会这样想吗？(This is all very cliché, don’t you think so?)”

“这哪里是老套，这样才浪漫啊！(How is this cliché, it’s romantic!)” Lele countered, prying Fang Wu’s hands from his face.

When they started bantering in Chinese like this, Eusoff thought it best that he should leave the couple to themselves. Nudging Xiaoming, he whispered to him, “I think we should make a move, my grandson is tired. Please let Fang Wu and Lele know.”

After taking his leave through Xiaoming, Eusoff rose and with a wave of his hand, he summoned Atiqah and Azlan to go with him.

“Good night,” Azlan announced, hoisting little Aziz up onto his waist as Atiqah stepped over to her father’s side to carry Yusuf. “I think the little ones are getting sleepy.”

Looking up from where Lele was practically lying in his lap while rummaging through his videos on the laptop, Fang Wu said, “All right, have a good night, OK? And see you next week.”

“You bet!” In his enthusiasm, Azlan bounced his son a little too hard again, causing the child to cry.

“Are you sure it won’t be too much trouble?” asked a tentative Atiqah. Sometimes his daughter worried too much, Eusoff thought. He wished she would be more carefree - it would make her a happier person.

“Not at all.” Fang Wu waved them off with a smile. “Good night!”

“Good night, see you next week!” called the sisters and Xiaoming in unison.

“OK, OK!” When they were all so friendly and eager to hang out with him and his family again, Eusoff could convince himself that this evening had been a resounding success. “Until next time, yah?”

“Pakcik, let me help you.” Upon noticing Eusoff’s limp, Fang Wu had shot up from the sofa and was at his elbow in an instant. “I’ll walk you home.”

The prosthetic foot was supposed to give Eusoff mobility, but his unwillingness to put weight on it robbed him of said mobility all over again. Usually, Atiqah was the one who helped him, but tonight she was carrying a child. That was why the family rarely ventured out as a unit.

“Thank you, ah,” said the grateful Eusoff when Fang Wu brought him to his front gate. “OK, I should be able to manage now. Fang Wu, did your mother ever tell you that you are a good boy?”

“My mother - ” A lost look swept across the young man’s face before he rapidly covered it up with a smile. “No, I mean, this is only what I ought to do. See you again, Pakcik – and good night.”

Well, of all the strange, strange things of this evening, Eusoff could be nearly certain that on that last bit of leave-taking, Fang Wu had shot a furtive glance at his daughter. Now, why would he do that?

Chapter Text

IV.i – Lele

“郑欣乐，接下来我该做什么? (Zheng Xinle, what should I do next?)” Fang Wu called to Lele from the kitchen.

On the one hand, Lele could welcome this as a new era of domesticity. On the other, she wished they had dates with more romance in them. How had their situation devolved into this?

During the long school holidays, Lele was inducting Fang Wu into her home baking business. She fervently hoped that were he to marry her in the (preferably near) future, they could spend their days working side by side, just the way that they were now.

Well, maybe not quite the way they were now. It grated on her that whenever they were alone together, Fang Wu addressed her with her full name, in the manner that one might speak to a school classmate or a colleague.

“你干嘛这样叫我？我是你同学吗？(Why are you addressing me like this? Am I your classmate?)” Lele nearly berated him. She was supposed to be always a sunny personality – her very name demanded it! Since when had she ever sulked the way she did now?

“乐乐公主，臣奉令承教, (Princess Lele, your subject shall obey all your commands,)” replied Fang Wu in falsetto. When he teased her in this way, Lele had no idea whether he was doing it because of their growing familiarity or if he might be mocking her.

Was it so hard for him to simply adore her the way everyone else did?

While they were growing up, their father had called Xixi and Lele “两个小娃娃 (the two little dolls)”. He’d doted on them as if they were his favourite dolls too, never denying them the dresses and toys they asked for.  Between braiding their hair, sewing sequins on their dance costumes, and doing their makeup when they had recitals or competitions, their mother had made them feel like little princesses. And the trophies that Xixi and Lele had won for dance throughout their childhood adorned their parents’ upscale flat in the Tianxin district of Changsha.

Neither Xixi nor Lele had needed to do a lick of housework while living with their parents, before they came out here for university. Like many upper-middle-class urban families in China, the Zheng family hired an “ayi阿姨”, which translated literally to “auntie” but really meant a servant.

Even now, their parents still paid their rent in Singapore and gave them the money to call in a part-time helper to clean up their flat twice a week. In fact, the Zhengs could afford to rent their daughters a private condo unit, but Xixi and Lele preferred this flat because it was 300 sq ft bigger than the average 3-bedroom new private apartment. That was why the sisters never cared to do something as mundane as everyday home cooking, though they found it sweet to have boyfriends who were willing to cook and clean for them!

Oh, if cooking really was a love language in Asian culture like people said, Lele could be certain that Fang Wu was in love with her! His cooking was truly divine, even though he seemed impervious to the most basic instructions in baking.

But why was his manner towards her so difficult to read? Couldn’t he see that their union was meant to be?

A princess was nothing without her prince. And Lele was vastly overdue to have her first knight on a white steed come – and stay – in her life. She’d taken five years at uni to pursue a double Honours degree in Mathematics and Chemistry. That was plenty of time for her to find a boyfriend to graduate with, but she hadn’t.

What had she done wrong? Was this a punishment for her dynamism?

After all, Xixi (who was her senior by two years) had found Xiaoming before the third year of uni. By the time Xixi was 21 and Xiaoming was 23, they’d become as inseparable as if they were joined by glue.

Singaporean men were two years older than the women in their year at uni because of their obligation to serve in the army before they embarked on their tertiary education. By right, Lele believed that should make the National University of Singapore the most fertile matchmaking ground. It would ensure she was surrounded by real men, instead of immature boys.

Lele was used to turning heads. Indeed, many men had asked her out on dates during her years at university. Disappointingly, none had progressed to long-term relationships.

It was her unconventional approach to life that was intimidating to most men, Lele decided. After graduating, she continued to be bold in forging her career. Baking, unlike cooking, was interesting because it served not only to provide food but also to create a form of art. Furthermore, baking was all about chemistry, which came naturally to her thanks to her scientific talent.

On top of her home-based bakery business, Lele worked three days a week at a Chinese medicine shop in Chinatown. To her, it was exciting to be able to straddle multiple identities across the Eastern and Western influences in her life.

She’d been out of university for more than a year now. More men had come, but all of them had gone. Repeatedly, Xixi hinted that perhaps Lele’s standards might be a notch too high.

Though Xixi wasn’t in a much better position either. Her progress with Xiaoming was still frustratingly slow. Although Xixi and Xiaoming had dated for more than six years, he had yet to propose.  Despite Lele’s fervent hints on behalf of her sister, he stubbornly shied away from the topic of buying a flat.

Unromantic as it sounded, the offer to buy a new Housing and Development Board (HDB) flat was the way in which most Singaporean men proposed. But Xiaoming didn’t see any need to acquire a new flat when he was guaranteed to inherit his parents’ one.

Well, in the coming year of 2034, Xiaoming would turn thirty. Lele was certain that if the prospect of a government-subsidized flat hadn’t served as sufficient impetus for him to propose to Xixi, this significant birthday would. So, she felt mounting pressure to find a partner. When Xixi and Xiaoming inevitably got married, her parents would surely redouble their nagging on her if she didn’t.

Miraculously, Fang Wu walked right into her life.

He was the ultimate man among men – handsome, sociable and polite to a fault. After he approached her, Lele decided there was a reason behind all those years of romantic frustration after all. She had merely been waiting for the right man to appear. Someone who wouldn’t be fazed by her two jobs, her two degrees, or her strident personality.

And who else could Fate have intended for her, but a man who would be intimidated by no one because he had been to the World Cup?

Driven and competitive since birth, Lele was determined that if her sister was on the cusp of matrimony, she would not be long to follow suit. Thus, there was no way she would allow her budding relationship with Fang Wu to fail.

Even if she didn’t know what was in his mind when he teased her. Well, if it made her live up to her reputation for cheerfulness, she would assume that the teasing was his way of showing love.

~~~⚽~~~

IV.ii – Xixi

Zheng Xixi didn’t ask for much in life.

Truth to tell, there wasn’t much she needed that she and her sister Lele didn’t already have. Their dress had every advantage, their faces were rather pretty, their spirits extremely good, their manner unembarrassed and pleasant; they were of consequence at home, and favourites abroad.

And yet – just for Xiaoming to pop the question, was that too much to ask?

In their school days, Xixi and Lele had been among the prettiest girls in their class. Their parents had enrolled them in ballet and modern dance lessons during their spare time, which made them more adept at makeup than most students their age. But as in many other Chinese families, dating had been as forbidden as housework when they were in high school.  Every minute of their attention that wasn’t taken by their studies was supposed to be focused on their dancing.

High school in China was extremely competitive, too! During the third year of senior high, the teacher would count down the days to the university entrance exams, known as the gaokao 高考, on the classroom blackboard. On a weekly basis, the academic ranking of every student in the class was updated on a notice board visible to everyone in the school.

Xixi hadn’t disappointed her parents. She had scored very respectably on the gaokao and ranked among the top five students in her class. And her parents had sent her and her younger sister to Singapore so that they could attend university classes taught in English. This would be their key to the rest of the world.

Boyfriends were the one thing that had been forbidden in high school but not in university, and Xixi had wasted no time in making her choice. Chen Jianming was in her year, studying engineering while she was pursuing her degree in Business Administration.  His parents were both civil servants. Therefore, everything checked off in his pedigree.

Yes, he was socially awkward and nerdy, but Xixi could overlook that when engineering was a prestigious degree, second only to medicine or law.  Most importantly, he was a very amiable, pleasing young man who might prefer books to people, but treated everyone with courtesy and respect.

Jianming, or “Xiaoming” (‘Little Ming’) as Xixi and Lele called him because he was as skinny as a teenager, was so adorably filial, too! An only child and a mother’s boy, he invited her home to dinner with his parents on a weekly basis.  He was often late for their dates, but Xixi always forgave him because his tardiness invariably stemmed from something he was doing for his mother.

“我的乖儿子, (My good son,)” Xiaoming’s mother often praised him, patting him on the head as if he was still a little boy. And she’d started calling Xixi “我的乖媳妇 (My good daughter-in-law)” ever since they graduated, too!

Xiaoming’s reaction to his parents’ praise was irresistibly cute. Xixi loved seeing his face light up behind his square-rimmed glasses. But he stubbornly refused to heed his parents’ hints to make her part of the family.

Of course, when they had been fresh graduates, money had been a problem. But now, a solution was within reach. Their jobs were stable and well paying, with Xiaoming in the Public Service and Xixi at the local office of a large tech company. After working for four years, this year they finally had enough socked away for the downpayment on a flat if they wished for it.

The problem was that Xiaoming didn’t wish for it, despite all the well-meaning hints that Lele (embarrassingly) piled on him for Xixi’s sake.  Xixi could understand that the independent Lele would never marry a man who didn’t have a place of his own. But she understood Xiaoming best, and she knew he would never be able to do without his parents.

Xixi didn’t know how to tell Xiaoming that she liked him without having to change the way he was. That she liked him enough, in fact, to move into his nearly-60-year-old flat and live with him and his parents, if only he would ask her to marry him. In fact, Xixi was sure that the only reason why he hadn’t proposed yet was because he didn’t know that she wouldn’t require the offer of a new flat of their own to say yes.

Only rarely did Xixi feel any misgivings about Xiaoming’s divided priorities between herself and his parents. While Xiaoming was always frugal with his own spending, there was one thing he never spared any expense on: his yearly overseas holiday with his parents. This year, the Chen family had been on a three-week tour of the US when Fang Wu had walked into Xixi and Lele’s lives.

She barely admitted it to herself, even though she knew her feelings must have been transparent to her sister. For a fleeting two weeks, Zheng Xixi had dared to compare Xiaoming to Fang Wu and found that the tally wasn’t necessarily in Xiaoming’s favour.

The concept of 男子汉大丈夫 nan zi han da zhang fu (a masculine man) was a thing. A thing that was surprisingly attractive to her despite her long-attached status. And it was a thing that Xiaoming would never quite be.

For those few weeks that Fang Wu had traipsed all over Singapore with her and her sister to check out the local Chinese food scene, Xixi had allowed herself to fantasise that perhaps Fang Wu might just choose her.

Of course, that had been merely a passing fancy. Xiaoming had come back from his US trip with the discounted Coach handbag that she’d asked him to buy for her from the premium factory outlets. The first weekend after he returned, he’d come by specially to present it to her. But he’d also seemed aware of being slighted. After all, Saturday night usually was when she went to his flat to dine with his parents. This time, she’d told him to come to her flat for dinner with Lele and Fang Wu instead.

Xiaoming had stalked off before dessert. Of all the excuses, he said that his parents had purchased a fresh durian that morning and were waiting for him to open it up for them to eat after dinner!

“Surely you can have one of Lele’s choux eclairs before you go?” Xixi had nearly pleaded.

“No,” Xiaoming had replied, impressive in his resolution for once, “there is nothing worth my staying for;” and he was gone directly.

Upon self-examination, Xixi had the guilty conscience that all through dinner, she had sometimes the air of being divided between Xiaoming and Fang Wu. She’d waxed too lyrical in her praises of the man who had cooked their dinner. (She hadn’t meant to offend Xiaoming, but a man who cooked – especially one who cooked well to boot – was so sexy!) Hence, this was her fault, and she’d patch it up. Xiaoming had brought her the Coach bag as he’d promised, after all.

She’d gone to Xiaoming’s flat the next day with enough Bee Cheng Hiang 美珍香brand bak kwa (barbequed pork jerky) to feed Xiaoming and his parents for a month.

“Xiaoming, I’m sorry,” she’d said. “I wasn’t trying to compare you with Fang Wu. Even if you never learn to cook, you’re still mine and I love you.”

“Do you like the bag?” Upon seeing that Xixi was carrying it, Xiaoming’s face had broken into a smile.

They had made up over a long stroll along the beach that was a stone’s throw away from Xiaoming’s family home. There had even been two leftover seeds of Mao Shan Wang 猫山王durian from the evening before that he’d saved for her despite his anger and jealousy.

And after that, Xiaoming had ensured that they spent one evening every weekend dining at her flat with Lele and Fang Wu, and the other evening at his flat with his parents. 

Xixi was sure that Xiaoming must know how badly she wished to marry him. She had made the first move to reconcile, after all. She’d even agreed to let his mother teach her how to make tang yuan 汤圆 dumplings for the upcoming Winter Solstice. She, who never went into the kitchen!

It didn’t mean that Xixi stopped appreciating Fang Wu. To the contrary, the more time she spent with her sister and him, the more she felt that Fang Wu was more masculine, more independent, deeper-thinking, and more adventurous than Xiaoming might ever become.

But Xixi also accepted the reality that Lele, with all her dynamism, would be more matched in personality to Fang Wu than she ever would. And she wasn’t going to throw away what she had with Xiaoming. Not when the sweet little things he’d done for her, even while he had been ridden with jealousy, showed that he cared deeply for her in his own way.

Thus, even though Zheng Xixi was certain that Xiaoming’s proposal was guaranteed not to be romantic, she decided that all she wanted now was simply the chance to hear it.

~~~⚽~~~

IV.iii – Fang Wu

Fang Wu had believed that finding two women who spoke his native dialect would make him feel at home in a foreign land. Ironically, it was turning out to be quite the opposite.

In his world, dialects were for family. Standardised Mandarin was for friends and colleagues. And English was only for people who didn’t understand Mandarin.

There had been one time in his life when love had transcended that hierarchy of language, but surely it couldn’t count when it had lacked the power to endure.

Fang Wu had initially gravitated towards Xixi and Lele because they could speak the Hunanese dialect, but he barely used it with them now.  In fact, he hardly even spoke Mandarin at the Zheng residence most of the time.

That was primarily for the sake of Xiaoming, who spoke only English with everyone who knew it, even though he understood a fair amount of Mandarin. (This was the modus operandi of almost every ethnic Chinese Singaporean Fang Wu had come across thus far, so he couldn’t complain.)

But Fang Wu couldn’t deny that his lack of desire to flaunt his linguistic commonality with Lele also came from his deep-seated unwillingness to build more intimacy with her than he was ready for.

He didn’t find this sliver of self-awareness helpful. How could he allow himself to be distracted by what was unavailable to him, when it was so much more pragmatic to focus on what was?

Focus, he kept telling himself. Focus and accept.

What was wrong with finding a nice Chinese woman to settle down with, just like so many other Chinese men did? Anyone of decent character should be good enough. Hadn’t he accepted long ago that his youthful attempt to transcend the divide of race and religion had been mere folly and ignorance?

He considered it such an embarrassing instance of weakness that he had never confided in anyone – not even his siblings nor Xia Jian – about the events that had transpired in Barcelona.  He could not succumb again to that weakness now.

Before he set eyes on Atiqah again, he’d had no problem sticking to his resolution. Now, there was no reason why he should waver.

“不仁不义 Bu ren bu yi.” Four pithy words, indelibly seared into his consciousness for the past eight years. Words that he’d uttered in that moment of the deepest betrayal he’d ever experienced.

If Atiqah had rejected him from the beginning instead of a bait-and-switch, he wouldn’t have felt so horribly played out. He’d known that he was going out on a limb in asking her to wait for him to advance his career and convert to Islam to marry her. There were so many reasons for her to say ‘no’ that he hadn’t truly expected her to say ‘yes’.

She could’ve said that she was too young for love. Or she might’ve made it clear that she would only marry another Malay Muslim. Or she could simply have told him that she didn’t feel the same way about him; that to her, this was friendship rather than love. He would have believed that when he hadn’t detected any deliberate attempts at flirting from her, only straightforwardness.

It was that straightforwardness which he had found so piercingly disarming. He’d believed her to be entirely without artifice, a refreshing breath of fresh air from the jaded young ladies he so often met while living in the city.

For those few short months that they’d spent hanging out in Barcelona, he never had cause to believe she did so to get something out of him. She hadn’t been after his money, and certainly she hadn’t been in it for sex. They had simply been two human beings of like mind, enjoying each other’s conversation and company.  Naively, he’d thought that this – being of like mind – meant they ought to be together for the rest of their lives.

Her telling him that she didn’t and couldn’t love him, less than 24 hours after she had implied the contrary, caused him to doubt the veracity of all that he had seen in her. In that single moment of emotional whiplash, the first phrase that had come reflexively to his mind carried the understanding of betrayal that transcended centuries.

The Confucian concept of ren 仁, which was shorthand for “ren de 仁德”, meant to show benevolence and principle in one’s dealings with others. And yi 义 stood for “dao yi 道义”, which meant loyalty. Both were supremely important to him both on and off the football pitch.

And by bait-and-switching him, she’d violated the very precepts he lived by. Bu 不meant “not”, so “bu ren bu yi 不仁不义” meant that she lacked any sense of loyalty, integrity, or principle.  Since the Chinese had seen fit to codify this into a four-word chengyu 成语 within the canon of traditional sayings, he was evidently far from being the first human to be played out in this fashion.

It hadn’t taken long for Fang Wu’s initial contempt for Atiqah to soften slightly at the edges. Even before his flight from Barcelona to Shenzhen had taken off, taking him away from Atiqah for what he believed to be forever, he’d realised that she might not be capable of the malice it took to mislead him deliberately.

But he did think she was childish, that she had mistaken curiosity for love and found out too late, which was why she had changed her mind.

Ultimately, it didn’t matter whether Atiqah had been intentionally playing with his feelings or been merely misguided. It still spoke of a frivolity in her attitude towards him that didn’t match the seriousness with which he’d considered his future with her.

All those years ago, Fang Wu had merely been trying to do the right thing. In fact, finding a solution had cost him many sleepless nights.

At 23, he’d been on several casual dates. But because he had prioritized his career over dating, he’d never had a long-term relationship. 

Still, Atiqah had been much less experienced than him in matters of the heart, and he’d known it.  She had just finished school, after all. And her religion wouldn’t have allowed her to experiment the way most teenagers in Spain would.

He hadn’t wanted to take advantage of Atiqah’s youth, truly he hadn’t. That was why he had tried to keep their relationship strictly platonic throughout that fateful summer. Even when he knew he wanted more, he’d denied himself.  Sometimes, he had felt that he’d needed nearly superhuman levels of self-control.

Still, their unique situation had forced his hand too far, too soon. By the rules of Islam, any openly declared romantic interest would need to lead to marriage. And as far as he’d known then, any marriage would have to be between two Muslims.

If they’d had the luxury of time to stay in touch within a shared community, the way most Muslim couples did, he would have been able to wait for Atiqah to be ready before he broached the subject. The problem was, they hadn’t.

Destined to part ways at the end of the summer to play football for two different countries, it had been now or never for him to make his intentions known. As it was, he’d waited until the last possible minute before doing so.

What he had to offer had been a raw deal for them both, and he’d been aware of it.  But a long engagement had been the only option that wouldn’t compromise their goals to bring football glory to their respective countries. They’d sacrificed years of childhood and adolescence, spending considerable time away from family, to get to where they were.

And in the case of Atiqah, every cent for her training had come from her national football association. At that juncture, making a major international move would have been not only impulsive, but irresponsibly risky for either of them.

Thus, with or without an engagement, the stakes for Fang Wu and Atiqah to remain a part of each other’s lives had been insanely high. While technology could have enabled a long-distance relationship, Islam wouldn’t allow that to happen without an engagement and his stated intention to convert.  Fang Wu might have pursued that path half out of desperation, but it had been the only honourable course of action available to him.

Converting to Islam would involve drastic lifestyle changes: no pork, no alcohol, and one month every year when no food nor drink could be consumed between sunup and sundown. Those who were born into Islam took it all in their stride, but he was keenly aware of the suffering he would endure in choosing it.

Yet he had convinced himself that this was what he would do if he truly loved her. She wasn’t at liberty to choose her religion, but he could choose his. He’d grown up offering incense at the altar honouring his ancestors and occasionally at Buddhist temples, but by and large his life had been secular. He wouldn’t be betraying any long-held religious beliefs by converting to Islam.

That had been a lot of philosophising for a 23-year-old man. But it had all come to naught anyway.

And when the barriers were this high, Atiqah’s rejection had been the ultimate deterrent for him to ever make any attempts to rekindle their relationship.  Their shared memories – whether genuine or fake on her end – could remain firmly rooted in the past.

It was baggage that he’d rather not confront.  If he wouldn’t even discuss this with the three most important people in his life, there was no way in hell he’d ever mention it to Lele.

So, when Lele had asked him why he didn’t greet Atiqah as an old friend when he first saw her again, he’d grasped at the nearest cop-out that wouldn’t spill all the dirty laundry of their history.

“I’m not used to seeing her in the tudung,” he’d said. “For a minute, I wasn’t sure whether it really was her.  I’ve never seen her in person since I was in Barcelona.”

Fang Wu would have been very content to let this fleeting meeting come and go, to never bring up the subject of Atiqah again. But his conscience gnawed at him after he belatedly realised that she had given him a curry puff that was most likely intended for herself or her family members.  If she extended that kindness to him as a neighbour, it was his due to reciprocate it.

The Confucian principle of 道之以德齐之以礼 dao zhi yi de qi zhi yi li, which meant that it was more effective to influence people to do the right things through their sense of morality and courtesy than through laws and punishments, apparently applied all too well to him. He’d wished for nothing more than to walk away and had perfect freedom to do so, yet moral obligation forced him to beard the lion in its den one last time.

Eight years of memory hadn’t failed him. He knew exactly how he ought to address Atiqah’s father Eusoff. And Lele had given him Atiqah’s unit number and the latest updates about how her family situation had evolved.

What he hadn’t expected was that the sight of Atiqah’s flat invoked neither contempt nor indifference in him, but a deep sense of pity.

Dilapidated though their flat was, Eusoff and Atiqah still lived in more comfort than Fang Wu had in his childhood. Yet it was painful to see that Atiqah’s future, brimming with so much promise when he had last known her, had been annihilated through no fault of her own.

When her burdens were laid out in plain sight before him - an overcrowded flat with seven people in it, a father plagued with mobility issues, and the general squalor left behind by family members who didn’t bother to pick up after themselves – he couldn’t bear to cut Atiqah’s family outright.

His conscience, telling him to treat Eusoff with respect and offer him neighbourly assistance, was the only reason why Fang Wu had accepted Atiqah’s number. The principle of 仁德 ren de told him that the knowledge of Eusoff and his family’s plight meant that he should continue to befriend and help them to the best of his ability.

Yet it was so hard to move on to his future when his past came back to haunt him at every turn!

Had that evening, when his – their – past and present had collided in a single room, affected Atiqah as much as it had affected him? Rather than to face an answer that could only bring him more hurt than he had already suffered, Fang Wu had convinced himself that it didn’t matter at all.

Hence, here he was at the residence of Zheng Xinle, obediently rolling out pastry and yawning through episodes of The Great British Bake-Off when he didn’t care in the least about the right folding technique to make good Kouign-Amann. (Before this, he hadn’t even known that French pastry had multiple variations.)

He was literally allowing her to lead him around by the apron strings.

But no matter how tepid and emasculating he found his relationship with Lele and how reluctant he was to accelerate it, the thing that kept him coming back was that Lele shared his origins. Therefore, she was safe. Unlike with Atiqah, there wouldn’t be any cultural pitfalls to trip him up again.

That safety might be the enemy of true felicity was a precept that Fang Wu had once not only owned but rocked. In fact, him embracing it had brought much glory to his country and his career.

Tragically, Fang Wu’s consciousness screamed the opposite of that now, while his subconscious blocked it out to protect his dignity and prevent him from falling victim to yet another broken heart.

~~~⚽~~~

IV.iv – Atiqah

If it was exquisite irony to find out that her father had given Fang Wu her handphone number, that paled against the agony Atiqah felt every time Fang Wu addressed her father as “Pakcik”.

She was living a grotesque parody of the life she would have had if she had waited for Fang Wu to come to Singapore and convert to Islam for her sake. They would have had each other’s numbers and used them to message each other by the day, if not by the hour. 

Now, she was fully aware that her father had given Fang Wu her number not because he was encouraging them to date, but because he didn’t see the remotest possibility of any romantic interest blossoming between them.

She’d overheard her father asking Fang Wu which school he taught at while she was hiding in the kitchen. The answer put paid to any notions that Eusoff could possibly have about the potential of them building deeper ties than friendly neighbourliness, because it accentuated the language divide between them.

If they had been engaged, Fang Wu would have called Eusoff “Pakcik” before marriage and switched to “Bapa Mertua” or “Ayah Mertua” (both of which meant ‘father-in-law’ in Malay) after they married.

Azlan calling Fang Wu ‘Brother’ had no such associations. Had Fang Wu and Atiqah been engaged or married, Azlan would have used the Malay term of Abang instead.

Well, of all the ironies, it seemed like Fang Wu was well on track to marrying Lele. Atiqah still clung to the firm belief that Fang Wu didn’t date women to play games. And Fang Wu and Lele living in different flats within the same block as Atiqah and her family meant that she would be entrenched in this neighbourly relationship with them after they married, regardless of which flat they eventually selected for their matrimonial residence. 

Atiqah had never imagined a situation where Fang Wu would be calling her father “Pakcik” while married to somebody else. It was horrific.

Castigating herself for her selfishness only made Atiqah feel worse. They had broken off for so long by now. In fact, strictly speaking, they’d never truly had an official relationship.   

They couldn’t have, in fact. Had they allowed their relationship to turn romantic without the prospect of conversion and marriage, that would have been such an outrageous breach of Islam that Atiqah would have risked being disowned by her family and shunned by the Malay Muslim community, particularly the elder generation.

When revisiting their past was so taboo and so fraught with heartache, Atiqah knew it was as much Fang Wu’s prerogative to move on with another woman (of any race or religion) as it was hers to marry a Muslim man. The fact that neither had happened in eight years didn’t take away their right to proceed with their separate lives now, with no regard whatsoever to the other.

And Atiqah noticed how Fang Wu defaulted to Mandarin every time he felt the need to express his feelings. That was natural when it was the only language he had required while living in China.

Eight years ago, Atiqah had broken her pact with Fang Wu because she believed that relieving him from the pressure to change his cultural identity would be to his benefit. So why was she now begrudging the fact that Lele could converse with him in Mandarin while she couldn’t?

The worst of it was that when he talked, she heard the same voice, and discerned the same mind. He should be allowed some credit for the self-command with which he attended to her father, giving him the respect due to an elder. That showed a rare sense of virtue when many people saw Eusoff as a senior citizen with insufficient education, no income, and only one foot, and treated him accordingly.   And Fang Wu’s eight years of GoPro footage displayed the unwavering pride he’d always harboured for his native land, as well as his adventurous spirit.

Even though they had now both retired from their football careers, time had bestowed widely differing levels of kindness to them. Fang Wu still rode on his recent glory of being a national star. Meanwhile, Atiqah considered herself a has-been, or perhaps more accurately, a “has-never-been”.

The first time she’d run into Fang Wu by accident at Lele’s door, at least she had sported more presentable attire than usual because she had come from an errand at the town centre and stopped by the mosque. Now that he’d seen her toiling around at home wearing tired old T-shirts and shorts, she wouldn’t be surprised if he might think she looked more like an Indonesian maid than a daughter of the family.

Worse still, the years which had destroyed her youth and bloom had only given him a more glowing, manly, open look, in no respect lessening his personal advantages. If anything, he’d filled out enough that his relative lack of height no longer made him appear as undersized on the pitch when compared to the Caucasians. His stance exuded enough raw power to make his opponents know that he was a force to be reckoned with.

She knew he noticed their differences, too.

Lele was a blabbermouth, and two days after Atiqah had run into Fang Wu at her flat, she’d dropped by with two mini cakes for the boys and said, “Why didn’t you tell me you know Fang Wu? I thought you’d be so proud of being personally acquainted with a football star!”

“Barcelona was a very long time ago, Le Le,” Atiqah had demurred. “Back then, I was in a completely different stage of my life.”

“You must not have known each other very well, then,” Lele had continued. “Do you know, he said he couldn’t recognise you in your tudung?”

The Fang Wu whom she knew and loved would be too respectful and considerate of others to mock at anyone’s religion. But even if she gave him the benefit of the doubt, that his words should not be taken exactly the way they had been conveyed, she couldn’t escape his meaning. He couldn’t recognise what he had once seen in her.

“Altered beyond his knowledge.” Atiqah had fully submitted, in silent, deep mortification. Doubtless it was so, and she could take no revenge, for he was not altered, or not for the worse. She had already acknowledged it to herself, and she could not think differently, let him think of her as he would.

~~~⚽~~~

IV.v – Fang Wu

“你看，好可爱喔！(Look, [that’s] so cute!)” came Lele’s squeal from the living room. For an instant, Fang Wu wondered when he’d become so subservient to Lele’s wishes that he was willing to putter away in the kitchen while she lounged around like a princess in front of the TV.

(He didn’t want to be reminded that conflict avoidance was the easiest way to skirt around his emotional turmoil, nor that this was his tactic for maintaining some space between Lele and himself.)

The sight of a buck-naked toddler running at a full clip down the common corridor inspired a very different reaction in him than it had in Lele. For heaven’s sake, didn’t Lele know that this was dangerous? If the child tumbled down the stairs or ran into the lift, who knew what peril might meet him?

Tearing out of the flat, Fang Wu sprinted off in pursuit of the child. It wasn’t until he picked up the little boy that he registered that this was the nephew of Atiqah.

Well, regardless of whose family this boy belonged to, Fang Wu had a duty. The indignity of the squirming, giggling toddler urinating down the front of his shirt made that reality even grimmer.

Marching back up the corridor with the child in his arms – what a relief that he’d caught little Yusuf just before he got to the top of the stairs! – Fang Wu saw that the door was already wide open when he arrived at Eusoff’s flat.

In the doorway stood a very frazzled – and soaking wet – Atiqah. And beside her stood Aziz, wrapped up in a bright green dinosaur hooded towel with a row of plush spikes that ran from the top of his head down his spine.

Fang Wu suppressed a laugh at the thought that the spiky towel made it visible to all and sundry just how diabolical that child could be. By this time, he’d seen enough of Aziz and Yusuf’s antics to feel indignation at the tyranny they wreaked upon their aunt.

He ought not to think about how every inch of her outline stood in even sharper relief than when they’d gone swimming during their days in Barcelona. (She’d always swum in long sleeved rash guards to protect her modesty.)

Further to that, he ought not to be conscious that even more of their anatomy came into contact when he handed the child to her than when he’d made his de facto marriage proposal.

His mind told him that the civil thing to do was to apologise for smearing her with pee, even though that was more Yusuf’s fault than his and it couldn’t be avoided.

For all the other reasons stated above, he simply couldn’t form the words.  His line of thinking was verboten when he had firmly resolved to stick to concrete possibilities and abandon vain flights of fancy.

Principle dictated that Fang Wu stayed long enough to ensure that little Yusuf was grasped firmly and safely in Atiqah’s arms before he wordlessly headed to the lift that would take him to his eighth-floor flat. After all, he couldn’t possibly go back to Xixi and Lele’s place covered in pee.

~~~⚽~~~

IV.vi – Atiqah

Bath time had just started to get easier before Aziz got injured. Now that he was four, Atiqah was finally able to trust that when she handed a soapy washcloth to Aziz, he would use it to the effect that he exited the shower in a cleaner state than when he entered it. Unfortunately, all that progress evaporated after he dislocated his shoulder.

The most efficient way to get the boys clean had always been for them to shower together. On the irregular occasions when Azlan was the one to help them, he used the ensuite attached to his room.  Atiqah always used the common bathroom, which was the shared property of Eusoff, Aizah and herself.

Like most public housing flats in Singapore that hadn’t been worked over by an interior designer, the common bathroom off the kitchen featured a pedestal toilet, a wash basin and a wall-mounted shower head and water heater. There was no bathtub or shower stall, the water simply flowed into a drain hole in the floor covered by a metal grate.

Atiqah didn’t relish this phase when she had to go back to soaping and rinsing both boys off again. It was worse than it had been before, with Yusuf now in his terrible twos. Furthermore, she had to take twice as much time with Aziz so as not to put too much pressure on his injured shoulder and back.

Patience was never the strong suit of toddler boys, and while Atiqah was soaping Aziz, Yusuf often had a field day spraying her all over with water.

Still, getting wet wasn’t half as bad as having to handle the flight risk that Yusuf posed now that he’d figured out how to undo the flimsy lock on the plastic accordion-style bathroom door. The day he twisted it open and bolted out while she was still soaping Aziz was the most nightmarish one in her recent existence.

“Yusuf,” she yelled, “come back! If you don’t come, Makcik (Aunt) will be very angry with you!”

Unfortunately, Yusuf thought this was more funny than scary. He did a cheeky dance and slipped away when she hastily reached out to catch him.  When Azlan was out at work (he always deigned to work at the most inopportune times!) and Eusoff couldn’t move, there was nobody to halt the child’s progress out the door that they kept ajar to combat the stuffy tropical heat.

“Yusuf, listen to your makcik, OK? She told you to come back, come, come to Datuk.”

As Atiqah threw Aziz’s hooded towel over him and patted him dry as hastily as she could without hurting him, she took some meagre relief from hearing her father back her up.

Not that it mattered – by the time she got Aziz reasonably dry and went to the door, Yusuf was already out of her sight. She wondered if Aziz would also try to run out if she left him with his grandfather while she went in pursuit of Yusuf.

Thankfully, her deliverance from that dilemma came before she could propose that arrangement. Her gratitude at seeing Fang Wu carry Yusuf down the corridor towards her flat was only matched by her embarrassment at the wet stain on his shirt that she saw when he drew near.

When Fang Wu had sort-of proposed to her, he’d only held her hands. Now they practically bumped bodies when he handed Yusuf over to her. It was again a parody of the romance they could have had. The fact that Yusuf had peed all over him felt like an added layer of mockery.

Her sensations on the discovery made her perfectly speechless. She could not even thank him. Certainly, if she did, she would have to apologise, in the same breath, for the outrageousness of letting her nephew urinate on him. That was far too shameful to put into words.

His kindness in stepping forward to her relief, the manner, the silence in which it passed, the little particulars of the circumstance – this was no occasion to reflect upon it. She had Yusuf to clean up all over again, as well as to clean herself.

No doubt Fang Wu had slunk off in silence because he was offended not only at her gross negligence, but her nephew’s sheer impudence to soil him.

While she carried Yusuf towards the bathroom, Eusoff limped to the front door and shut it to prevent Aziz from running out too.

“Yusuf,” her father said in his strictest voice, “what did I say about obeying Datuk and Makcik?”

Atiqah knew her father deeply appreciated the respect and courtesy that Fang Wu always extended to him.  She could comprehend his regretting that Fang Wu should have done what Atiqah ought to have done herself.

But neither Eusoff’s feelings, nor anybody’s feelings, could interest her, until she had a little better arranged her own. She was ashamed of herself, quite ashamed of being so nervous, so overcome by such a trifle; but so it was, and it required a long period of solitude and reflection to recover her.

Still, what use were such feelings when they could only end in futility? The only thing that could unlock their current impasse was for Fang Wu to consider converting to Islam again. When Atiqah couldn’t see that happening – certainly she didn’t have a right to ask it of him, not anymore – there was no option but to remain mired in silence.

Chapter Text

Once they had been so much to each other! Now nothing!  Just neighbours, tied together by the rules of social etiquette. What could be so difficult about that when Fang Wu and Nur Atiqah binti Eusoff were grown adults of about thirty (give or take a couple of years)?

Nothing could be more innocuous than a multi-generational hot pot and movie night.  Fang Wu had chosen the film My Country, My Parents 《我和我的父辈》to show Eusoff the drastic development of Shanghai within a single generation. It was a family movie, not a love story at all: a cultural and historical anthology about the relationships between fathers and their children in 20^th and 21^st century China.

That ought to have been the safest territory on earth, with no pastel-hued romance tropes to invoke the ghost of that long-gone-and-buried summer in Barcelona.

But if mortification was the name of the game, and its balance tracked by the goals conceded, the mental score that Fang Wu and Atiqah privately kept went right through the roof. It soundly beat even the most prolific matches in World Cup history.

Worse still, many of the goals were own goals, meaning that both parties were nearly equally guilty of putting their foot in it.

The technicality that this evening lasted much longer than the regulation 90 minutes for a football match was only significant in that it prolonged their agony.

Wasn’t it stupid and petty to keep score anyway?  Not that anyone asked them, nor did they know what was going through each other’s heads. 

If they had known how much the other cared about making a good impression on them, or just how similar their mental scores of the evening turned out (albeit perceived from different angles), it might have made a difference to their suffering in the moment. But they didn’t.

Here was the score of the night (approximately), in the minds of Fang Wu and Atiqah:

FangWuLeLe (1) – (0) The House of Eusoff

House of Eusoff own goal: Aizah crashes the party

Fang Wu’s interpretation: FangWuLeLe score to accommodate one more guest

“Sorry, is it OK if we bring one more person?” For how long, Atiqah wondered, had her life revolved around thanking and apologising? She had never been so conscious of it until Fang Wu became the object of both her thanks and her apologies.

Neither of them had breathed a word about the brave rescue of little Yusuf after that mortifying day. And now, Atiqah’s family members were taking turns to send her into the hall of shame with their obliviousness to imposing on their kindly neighbours.

Most weekends when Aizah was in Singapore, she met her former uni classmates at Orchard Road, Singapore’s high-end shopping street, for movies and dinner.  Dining in with their next-door neighbours could hardly match that level of chic, but Xixi and Lele were firm friends with both sisters, and Aizah was eager to see what Lele’s new boyfriend was like.

Atiqah didn’t know how much more effort preparing hot pot for 11 people versus 10 would take, but she hoped it wouldn’t be too much trouble for their hosts. Thankfully, Lele took the last-minute request with as good grace as she could expect.

“np,” Lele texted. “fw is cooking”

To make sure Fang Wu and Lele felt appreciated for being so accommodating, Atiqah went to Bengawan Solo and bought enough kueh to serve two pieces to everyone for dessert.

With their arrangement where Aizah contributed the money for the household while she contributed the labour, Atiqah usually tried to spend as little as possible. But one instance of splurging to return a courtesy wouldn’t hurt. Besides, she knew her sister wouldn’t begrudge her the money. Bankrolling the household was how Aizah dealt with the guilt of her work taking her away from home so often.

It was more important that Fang Wu should know that her family had no intention to sponge off his and Lele’s hospitality with impunity. After all, she decided, he had enough reasons to be disgusted at her without her family adding more.

FangWuLeLe (1) – (1) The House of Eusoff

Azlan scores: Historical comment hits home

Atiqah’s interpretation: No score or a House of Eusoff own goal

“How come they had no cars in 1942?” Azlan wondered aloud as the film’s opening scenes showed a troop of Chinese mounted cavalry in a vast swath of countryside. “I mean, nowadays you guys are leading the world in electric vehicles. How can it be that the Japanese had planes, and the Chinese had… horses?”

“1942 was almost a hundred years ago,” huffed Lele. “Weren’t the Ford Model T and the Wright Brothers’ first flight also about a hundred years ago?  Before cars came about, of course they used horses!”

Fang Wu regretted popping out of the kitchen at just the right time to hear that last snatch of conversation. He kept the sliding kitchen door shut so that the aroma of the simmering broth wouldn’t tantalise Eusoff and his family before they could break their fast.

Was it his imagination, or did Fang Wu see Atiqah raising an eyebrow just a smidge? Could it be possible that he might have divined the direction of her thoughts?

No, it couldn’t be telepathy, just mere coincidence. He saw the irony: although Lele had been to university and he hadn’t, he knew she was more than thirty years off in her estimation of history.  If he were to guess, that was probably what Atiqah was thinking too.

To avoid letting his mind stray in that direction, Fang Wu chose to focus on the painful truth that Azlan had brought up instead.

World War II had been horribly close to the era when the British had coined the nickname “Sick Man of the East” for China.  Before rising strong and proud, his country had endured decades, no, a century, of humiliation since the Opium Wars of the mid-19^th century.

The near decade that he’d hid the shame of his unrequited love was nothing in comparison to that.

Fang Wu knew he came from very humble beginnings and that he was part of the first generation growing up with China in an age of prosperity. He usually celebrated being able to ride the coattails of the past two decades of meteoric growth.

But Azlan voicing his incredulity at the under-developed state of Chinese World War II military technology didn’t help his fragile self-esteem. Not with his life’s greatest humiliation right in front of him.

Slipping back into the kitchen seemed to be the best option; no one needed to know there wasn’t much to do besides passively watching the two pots of broth simmering on the stove. Just for the illusion of busyness, he lifted one pot lid and stirred the bubbling liquid with a pair of long chopsticks.

FangWuLeLe (2) – (1) The House of Eusoff

Fang Wu scores: His chosen film educates everyone

“The US put a man on the moon in 1969, and the Chinese sent a satellite into space in 1970! Do you think one day Singapore will send a rocket to space?”

That was Aizah, dandling her little nephew on her lap and pointing to the scene on the TV screen. It was a re-enactment of the release of China’s first satellite, Dong Fang Hong #1 东方红一号.  Of course, Miss International Trade would be able to spout all these fun facts off the top of her head.

“Mak Long (eldest aunt), I don’t think Singapore is big enough to launch a rocket,” declared Aziz matter-of-factly with a cherubic grin. Clearly, the child expected to be applauded for how smart he was, though Fang Wu thought smart-alecky was a more appropriate description.

At least, thought Fang Wu, Azlan’s sons were equitable in the way they antagonised their aunts. They seemed to know how to hit where it hurt most, too. With Aizah, they challenged her intelligence, and with Atiqah, they made a mockery of her manners.

He wasn’t quite ready to forgive little Yusuf for peeing on him. But neither would he be ashamed of his relief that Yusuf had chosen him for a target instead of Atiqah. There could be nothing undignified in having a sense of human decency.  One did not have to be in love with another human being to have the wish to see them treated with fairness.

Besides, he could feel vindicated that Aizah had highlighted something which lots of people missed. In all the hubbub about China taking over the world by storm, few remembered that China’s space program was every bit as old and established as the United States’.

FangWuLeLe (2) – (2) The House of Eusoff

Atiqah equalises with a soul-piercing comment

Fang Wu had resumed eavesdropping listening to the conversation because it was futile to pretend there was anything left to do in the kitchen. They were merely whiling away the time until the sun set, when the fasting members of Eusoff’s household would be allowed to eat and drink.

Usually, Fang Wu was the life of every party. Playing forward necessitated some boldness of character, so he was used to being the centre of attention. This was even more so when he almost always wore the captain’s armband in the latter years of his career.

But to avoid being blindsided by any more of Atiqah’s expressions, tonight he hid in the shadows, letting Xixi and Lele vie with Azlan and Aizah to dominate the room. He positioned himself such that he couldn’t see her face. Still, when Atiqah spoke, steady but never strident, he could distinguish the tone of that voice when it would be lost on others.

“Aziz,” she said, “not every country has to go to space to become great. Not all achievements need to come with a big bang to be worthy of honour.”

When showing up at the World Cup had meant everything to him, even if crashing out in the group stage meant nobody in the world but the Chinese cared, that statement was straight on the mark.  Whether he cared to acknowledge it or not, she still grasped the essence of him more than any other woman had in the eight years since.

FangWuLele(3) – (2) The House of Eusoff

FangWuLeLe score: Halal Hunanese hot pot!

“Let me unveil…” Lele announced with a trill, “ta da, the world’s first halal Hunanese hot pot!”

Pulling open the kitchen door at the stroke of sundown, Lele gestured to the kitchen, signalling to Fang Wu and Xiaoming to parade out with the jugs of broth.

They’d gone to Best Denki to buy two new electric steamboat pots for the occasion. Yuan yang huo guo 鸳鸯火锅, which was hot pot served in a divided cauldron with spicy soup on one side and non-spicy on the other, was tremendously popular in China.

In their version of it, one of the pots had spicy soup and the other had herbal chicken soup. They would seat the children with Azlan, Farah and Eusoff at the end of the table with the non-spicy soup base, while the rest of the young people had the spicy soup.

To get dinner on the table, Xixi and Lele had worked the men hard all day.  It had been Fang Wu who discovered Hao Halal Hub, a Singapore Chinese-owned speciality convenience store stocking only halal-certified food. He’d taken a bus to the outlet in the neighbouring town of Pasir Ris to get the ingredients.

Xixi and Lele had done their share of chopping and slicing, more than they would have done in three months if left to their own devices. But they did want to impress the men with their domesticity.

They left it to the men, though, to slice the meat, carving paper-thin slices off frozen-solid blocks of chicken and beef with cleavers. Fang Wu had to show Xiaoming how to do it, but Xiaoming caught on well enough to impress Xixi thoroughly. 

Lele noted, with simultaneous dread and glee, the enchantment on Xixi’s face while she watched Xiaoming carving. She was happy for her sister, but she could also sense that they were inching towards the moment when she would become the last singleton in the house if she didn’t hurry things up with Fang Wu.

And of course, Fang Wu was solely responsible for making the soup base in exactly the way his parents had when he was a child. He hadn’t been old enough to learn it directly from them, but after he left home, his sister had texted him the recipe and talked him through the process on the phone the first few times he’d done it. Two decades later, he had everything memorised.

It was only fair, Lele acknowledged, to give Fang Wu the bulk of the credit for this meal. But she, Lele, could claim to have contributed a good deal as well. After all, she knew the layout of her fridge best, and it was only because she was used to stuffing crazy amounts of French pastry in it that they managed to fit enough hot pot ingredients to feed 11 people into that narrow space.  Unlike those fantastic Western kitchens she saw on TV, Asian urban living spaces weren’t big enough to accommodate anything more than a single-door fridge.

Therefore, she decided, this dinner ought to be considered a Fang Wu – Lele win.

FangWuLele(3) – (3) The House of Eusoff

Fang Wu’s own goal: Forgetting that Atiqah’s family has never been to Haidilao

Pouring the jug of spicy broth into the electric pot, Fang Wu took a moment to savour the aroma coming up from the steaming soup. That smell had the ability to transport him back to home in a way nothing else could.  It was the part of his parents that followed him no matter how far away he went.

“You’ll find this soup a little bit different from the spicy soup at Haidilao,” he explained to Eusoff and his family. “What you usually encounter at hot pot restaurants is Sichuanese hot pot, which takes its special character from the Sichuan peppercorn. But in Hunan, we use plain dried chilli pepper.”

The soup was ruthlessly blunt in its spiciness, but Fang Wu knew enough about Malay food to determine that Atiqah and her family could take it. No, his blunder wasn’t in making this spicy dish for them, but in the assumptions evident in how he’d just introduced it.

More than ninety-five percent of the people Fang Wu knew were intimately familiar with Haidilao 海底捞, a massively popular hot pot restaurant chain. The story of Haidilao was an even bigger rags-to-riches tale than his own.

Its founder, Zhang Yong 张勇, came from Jianyang, a county-level city in rural Sichuan. He hadn’t even completed high school when he began his working life as a welder earning an hourly salary below what some US states would consider as minimum wage.

Haidilao had started as a simple four-table restaurant in 1994, a go-for-broke gamble taken by a poor man. Though he had a wife to support, he still quit his job and threw all he had into his hot pot business without any formal culinary training. Decades later, Haidilao was now known and loved not only all over China, but across East and Southeast Asia, the UK and North America too. Practically every housing estate in Singapore had a Haidilao outlet at its town centre. 

The company was now listed in Hong Kong, and Zhang Yong and his wife were naturalised Singapore citizens, appearing consistently in the top 10 on the local billionaire list.  But it was the food and the communal experience, not the glamour of its founders, that made Haidilao a special place in the eyes of millions of Chinese and overseas Chinese diasporas.

All the blood drained from his face when it struck Fang Wu that while Atiqah and her family very likely knew about Haidilao because it was everywhere, they might never have dined there.

Of course, Haidilao was the antithesis of halal. Pork and pig innards were popular ingredients for Chinese hot pot.  Theoretically, there was nothing stopping a Muslim family from trying hot pot without the pork or the alcohol. In fact, halal hot pot restaurants were popping up here in Singapore, just as they did in China, to cater to the Muslim crowd.

Still, Fang Wu cursed himself for the stupidity of his unthinking words that assumed hot pot played as central a role in Atiqah’s family’s life as it did in his.

“But of course,” he corrected himself, “I’m sorry, I got ahead of myself. I forgot you might not have tried Haidilao. Well, I can’t presume to be world-class in my cooking quality, but I hope you will enjoy the dinner anyway.”

FangWuLeLe (6) – (3) The House of Eusoff

Fang Wu scores a hat-trick by serving Atiqah first

Fang Wu’s interpretation: Conceded a hat-trick in the obviousness of his preference

Azlan and Farah were ravenous. Not eating for more than twelve hours straight was enough to knock out even the youngest, most vigorous man in the house.

At least, that was the excuse Azlan used to fob off his father’s attempts to chide him for leaning Cleopatra-style on their hosts’ sectional tonight. Of course, it was just like him to forget that his wife Farah had suffered more for being on her feet during her entire fast today.

Even on nights when they weren’t breaking a fast, Atiqah was often the one who put food on Aziz’s and Yusuf’s plates at dinnertime. While Farah felt guilty that her sister-in-law was taking over things that were essentially a mother’s duty, their hand-to-mouth existence left her little space to develop the habits of motherhood – though that was technically her responsibility.

Besides, Farah was scarcely the only Asian woman to be forced into tough choices between survival and family. More than one quarter of Singapore’s population, or about 1.5 million people, was made up of foreign workers. In fact, nearly 40% of the workforce was foreign. And nearly one-fifth of these were foreign domestic maids originating from the Philippines, Indonesia, or Myanmar.

In turns, Farah felt guilty and sad about how she was missing out on the experience of being a mother. If Azlan had been willing to take on shifts with her at her parents’ stall, she wouldn’t need to miss out on so much of her sons’ childhood. But no, all he cared about was his video gaming, and his only sense of responsibility was to earn just enough money to support it.

Thus, Farah was bankrolling the boys’ preschool fees, which at S$4,000 per month practically wiped out all her savings. As the designated sibling to take over the stall, Farah had a profession for life, but for now, to keep her livelihood she had to put all her time in it. 

During this fasting month, she worked longer hours than usual to give her parents a rest. They were well into their sixties, and she could very well imagine that fasting would only get harder when one got older. Nonetheless, they adhered strongly to their religious responsibilities. Hale and hearty for their age, they saw no reason to refrain from participating in Ramadan even though Farah intimated that they should feel no guilt about taking it easy.

It was her good fortune, Farah decided, that she could still sleep next to her sons at night and cuddle them, even if she barely saw them in their waking hours. If she framed her situation against that of those foreign domestic maids who spent years, even decades, living a sea away from their children to provide for their families, she hadn’t the right to complain nor to wish for more.

Besides, Farah was sure that with time it would get better. She and Azlan had gotten married when they were barely more than children, straight out of secondary school. When the boys transitioned from preschool to primary, they would attend government-run national schools which charged almost nothing. Surely, Azlan would grow up someday and decide to get a proper job. And as they got older, the boys wouldn’t go to bed quite as early, which would mean she would get some time to bond with them every night.

For now, Farah eagerly helped herself to the water and soup – how horribly draining it was to spend twelve hours a day operating a food stall while consuming nil by mouth! Only after she had quenched her first wave of thirst did it occur to her to feel guilt that Atiqah was the one putting meat and vegetables into the pot for her boys. Atiqah had fasted all day, too, but she had abandoned her own place at the table to come to the boys’ side and help them.

“Lele, can you help Pakcik, I mean Uncle Eusoff, while I help this side of the table?”

If Fang Wu’s authoritative voice was enough to make Farah swoon, she wasn’t surprised that Xixi and Lele were in a little fever of admiration over him. She was married and a Muslim besides, but she could still appreciate the charisma and the quality of leadership in that man.

Apparently, he was even more perspicacious than she was. Farah had practically lived at Eusoff’s flat ever since she started dating Azlan at the age of sixteen. But she had never truly reflected on how challenging it must be for Atiqah to assist both her father and the boys at almost every mealtime.

And how was it that Fang Wu knew that Atiqah preferred chicken to beef and cabbage to taro yam? For a Chinese man, his understanding of the Muslim palate was astounding. Possibly, Farah realised, he must have a Muslim in his circle of close acquaintance.

But then, some of Atiqah’s tastes weren’t necessarily about her being a Muslim, but about her being Atiqah. In this family, they all had the same restriction of only being able to eat halal food, but that wasn’t sufficient to explain their individual preferences.

Like Farah, Atiqah noticed Fang Wu’s act of kindness. How could she not? The chopsticks she held as she dipped a slice of beef into the soup for one of the boys clattered onto the table as they dropped from her trembling hands.

In an instant, Fang Wu picked up the fallen chopsticks and came back from the kitchen with a new pair that he handed to Atiqah. How he’d noticed this while still halfway through arranging the food on Atiqah’s plate was something Farah couldn’t fathom.

Farah knew that Atiqah was never rude, so she was shocked that her sister-in-law would be so shaken by this that she was barely capable of even whispering her thanks.

Had the family really treated Atiqah so badly that a simple act of kindness could so thoroughly discombobulate her? Farah was under no illusions that Atiqah worked any fewer hours than she did, even though Atiqah’s labour was unpaid.

Yet Farah had always fancied herself the less fortunate of the two. Atiqah spent practically all her time at home, so (theoretically) she could sit down or nap anytime she needed a rest. And Eusoff and the boys were her family. Atiqah knew they loved her even when they were at their most demanding. Farah’s customers, who ran the whole gamut from pleasant and friendly to downright rude and abusive, didn’t.

How had it taken a new neighbour, a near-stranger to the family, to show Farah how beaten down her sister-in-law was?

But keenly as she felt the guilt, Farah was also helpless. She had no way of changing how long it would take for the situation to get better.

Farah had been only nineteen when her first child was born. Naturally, she’d known nothing about infant care at the time. Neither had Aizah nor Atiqah, who had been twenty-five and twenty-three respectively.  Yet, as the women of the family, Farah’s new sisters had stepped up alongside her to take on the financial and physical burden of caring for a newborn baby round-the-clock.

Though Atiqah was only Farah’s sister by marriage, she had become as vital to Farah as a sister by birth. And Farah knew that she would have done the same for Atiqah, if Atiqah had been in her position.

Perhaps it was fortunate, though, that they hadn’t both married young. Otherwise, the mayhem in the flat would be unbearable with four or five children living with them instead of just two. Aziz and Yusuf squared made a monster that gave Farah a migraine simply to imagine.

Four more years, and Farah would be able to relieve some of the burdens on her sister-in-law. There were two more years before Aziz would start primary school, and in two more Yusuf would follow suit. If she squinted, Farah could see some light at the end of this tunnel.

In the meantime, Farah owed it to Fang Wu’s perception of her sister-in-law’s fatigue, and his resolution to give her rest, to give her the wake-up call that she had needed.

She didn’t regret that she had married Azlan too young. In fact, if either of their families had been aware of everything that she and Azlan had been up to while still in secondary school, they would have pushed for, rather than merely condoned, the pair getting married at the stroke of eighteen. 

Indeed, they were struggling and would be for several years yet, but Farah knew she was lucky to be part of a family that struggled together.  And with this stark reminder of the magnitude of the burdens that her family bore for her, she would stick in her oar and try to help out more.

FangWuLeLe (6) – (6) The House of Eusoff

Atiqah decides that Fang Wu’s kindness to her must be a hat-trick in her favour too

Yes; he had done it.  And Atiqah could only feel regret at her inability to extend Fang Wu the thanks that he deserved. Unconsciously, she made all the noises needed to sustain polite small talk at the table. But in front of Xixi and Lele, who knew her and her family so well through their friendship of four years, she could not help but feel exposed.

With respect to Fang Wu, she was very much affected by the view of his disposition towards her, which his every action made apparent.  This little circumstance seemed the completion of all that had gone before.

She understood him. He could not forgive her, but he could not be unfeeling. Though condemning her for the past, and considering it with high (but not necessarily unjust) resentment, though perfectly careless of her, and though becoming attached to another, still he could not see her suffer, without the desire of giving her relief.

It was a remainder of former sentiment; it was an impulse of pure, though unacknowledged friendship; it was proof of his own warm and amiable heart, which Atiqah could not contemplate without emotions so compounded of pleasure and pain, that she knew not which prevailed.

Sometimes in her moments of wry humour, Atiqah had joked to herself that the reason why no one would ever live up to Fang Wu in her mind was because he’d been the first and only man to bring her to Camp Nou. That was the hallowed ground of football that her family and most of her friends could only dream of visiting in person.

But deep down inside, she knew that the perfect unrivalled hold Fang Wu had on her heart was far more profound than that. Ever since her mother had passed on, he’d been the only person to put her needs above his own.  She might have rejected his offer to convert to Islam for her sake, but she’d never forgotten it.

He might be capable of turning the sentiment of a lover into that of a brother, looking out for her while courting and marrying her friend and neighbour. But Atiqah wasn’t sure how long she could carry on before betraying that she couldn’t do the same.

It was her lack of society, Atiqah decided, that was to blame for their current imbalance of feeling. Fang Wu could move on because he had perfect freedom to choose any woman – inside or outside of Asia – to be with. 

Even at 23, without any Super League appearances or international caps to his name, Atiqah had considered Fang Wu irresistible to any woman with the freedom to have him.  He’d perfected the appearance of the handsome bad boy with his slick wakeboarding tricks, while being nothing but kind and considerate at heart.  Sure, he had no parents and hardly any money, but with such a personality, how could a woman see anything but the highest perfection in him?

Now, with a successful career and a modest fortune to his name, Atiqah would be shocked if she found any woman who wouldn’t be willing to date and marry him.  If they cared nothing for his character, they’d still find his looks, fame and money to be extremely attractive.

She’d walked back into his life at a point when he was developing a relationship with Lele. Yet she fancied that as far as she might dare to judge from memory and experience, Fang Wu was not quite yet in love with her neighbour. 

Lele was more in love with him; yet there it was not love. Atiqah had seen Lele in love with the idea of love enough times to know that this was how she behaved with all the men whom she had dated.

Still, Atiqah was convinced that it might, probably must, end in love with one or the other at least. They were a logical pair when they’d come from the same province in China. Lele would be good for him, being lively and cheerful instead of downtrodden and morose. He could be good for her too, giving her the grounding and maturity that she still sorely lacked.

Unlike Fang Wu and Lele, Atiqah didn’t have the freedom to expand her world. Ever since Eusoff had his foot amputated, her life had been lived between Changi General Hospital, Tampines Central Community Club, the Al-Masyhur halal butcher at Tampines Mart, and her nephews’ preschool. 

When Muslims were only about 15% of the Singapore population and she was no longer young but still known to so few, Atiqah suffered from a serious lack of options. Even if being in love – still in love – with Fang Wu hadn’t been haram (which it most certainly was), it was pathetic because it showed how narrow her life had been and still was.

Before seeing him again, time may have softened down much, perhaps nearly all, of her peculiar attachment to him, but she had been too dependent on time alone.  No aid had been given in change of place (except in her return from Barcelona to Singapore), or in any novelty or enlargement of society.

Therefore, was it any surprise that no one had ever come within Atiqah’s circle, who could bear a comparison with Fang Wu as he stood in her memory?  She had never met a Muslim man whom she could fall for, which would have been the only thoroughly natural, happy, and sufficient cure, at her time of life, for her heartbreak.

Atiqah considered it undoubtedly a score, in fact a hat-trick, in her favour to discover that Fang Wu’s sense of kindness superseded his resentment of her. But at the same time, she was miserably aware that it now trapped her into living a lie – one that she could barely conceal – forever.

FangWuLele (9) – (6) The House of Eusoff

House of Eusoff shame: Hat-trick to Lele, who wins the gig war

“Can you tell me what’s wrong with the young people these days?” Having eaten his fill, Eusoff fell into his usual complaint about the instability of gig work in Singapore.  “None of them want to do proper jobs anymore. Fang Wu, of course you know I’m not talking about you.”

This was scarcely a surprise to Atiqah, who had heard her father grouse about his baby boy not having a stable job innumerable times in the past six years. She only wished he wouldn’t expose more of their pathetic family situation to Fang Wu.

“Ayah,” protested Aizah, “are you trying to imply I’m not young? Because you know I’m in a proper job.  And that statement isn’t fair to Xi Xi too.”

“OK, OK, I know, lah,” Eusoff qualified, “I’m not talking about any of the girls. In fact, all the girls in this family are very responsible. But Azlan spends more time at his Playstation than working. So how can you call gig work, work?”

“Uncle Eusoff, not all gigs are the same,” Lele staunchly defended herself. “I might be self-employed, but I call myself a slasher rather than a gig worker.”

“What’s a slasher?” Eusoff tutted, “All of you young people make up so many crazy names, I cannot keep up already! Gig, slasher, all it means is that young people don’t have the humility to work for someone else.”

Atiqah knew that working for oneself sometimes required the most humility of all. Farah and her parents served every customer at their stall with courtesy, even the ones who ordered them around like servants.  But she was also used to Eusoff’s rants. This wasn’t about them, but about his perennial worry for Azlan.

“I think having more than one job requires fortitude and strength of mind,” Fang Wu spoke up. “Every skill has an expiration date. Look at me: I played football, but I must accept that it’s a career that won’t last me beyond the age of thirty. Having the character of decision and firmness to find your many strengths and pursue them, and to know when to quit from one thing and take up another, is the only way we won’t end up unemployed and at a loose end by the age of forty. Zheng Xinle, if you would still be this productive in your November of life, it can only be because you cherished all your present powers of mind.”

He had done, and was unanswered. It would have surprised Atiqah if Lele could have readily answered such a speech: words of such interest, spoken with such serious warmth!

Atiqah could imagine what Lele was feeling.  After all, this was high praise of Lele to the detriment of everyone else in the room.

Azlan would be impervious to their father’s hints about his lack of stable employment, he always was.

Farah tried her best to be enterprising, but in inheriting her parents’ stall, her career had practically been chosen for her at birth. She had never needed to assess her strengths, nor to pursue anything that hadn’t been laid out in front of her.

Aizah earned the highest salary of them all, but Eusoff sometimes took this for granted because she was the only university graduate in the family, so of course being a career woman was the best use of her time.

Xixi had a stable and comfortable career too but was now overshadowed by her livelier sister. In a good month, Lele’s earnings outpaced Xixi’s, although with a stable salary, Xixi could get through her day-to-day budgeting with less accounting skill than her sister.

Perhaps the fact that Lele needed to plan her life on a highly variable income fully merited her that high praise. Atiqah knew that such flexibility was beyond her own capacity, even though she was also aware that the expenses Lele’s parents bore on her behalf cushioned the blow of her career instability.

And in this value system, Atiqah sat on the lowest rung of the ladder. By now, she’d done almost as much unpaid as paid work in her eight years of adult life.

If it had hurt to think that Fang Wu would be swayed towards Lele because of their common heritage, to know that he valued Lele’s career choices more than Atiqah’s was purgatory.

Of course, she knew that had he ever wished to see her again, he need not have waited till this time; he would have done what she could not but believe that in his place she should have done long ago. But even facing the reality that Fang Wu had long ceased to love her, Atiqah could not deny that his indirect disparagement of her life choices through his praise of Lele’s left a sting.

FangWuLeLe (9) – (8) The House of Eusoff

Fang Wu scores his second successive own goal and his third of the night

Atiqah’s interpretation: Score for the FangWuLeLe ship

It truly wasn’t Fang Wu’s intention to be mean. He had been speaking about his own life when he had praised Lele for her career dynamism. Having made enough money to tide him comfortably through a lifetime, not six months ago he’d faced down the existential question of whether he could consign himself to decades of idleness. To be self-employed and never have to ask that question again was a quality he envied not only in Lele but also in Xia Jian.

Only when he saw Atiqah shrink in her seat did he realise that his words could easily have also been about her.  What could he say, this was the most treacherous own goal he’d scored in the entire night.

Not all worthwhile work was paid, and he knew that. Besides, there was something to be said about well-earned leisure after a lifetime of hard work. His sister and brother-in-law were perfect examples of that.

“I’ll be welcoming my sister and brother-in-law to Singapore in late January,” he said, to change the subject. “If they follow their original plan they’ll be flying in from the Maldives, but as you know, backpackers can change their schedule anytime. I’m happy to see them doing something they never had the chance to when they were young, but even happier to hear that they want to spend the Lunar New Year in Asia with family.”

“Oh, is this the same trip where they were kissing in front of the Eiffel Tower?” asked Lele. “Backpacking sounds so romantic and exciting – it must be like a second honeymoon!”

Fang Wu nodded. “Yes, their first stop was in Paris,” he confirmed. “But their trip hasn’t been all roses and sunshine. They did get some pretty bad blisters walking through Spain.”

“As a military man, my brother-in-law thinks trekking for 50 kilometres in a day is fun,” he continued. “And although I don’t understand it at all, my sister makes nothing of such torture. She’d rather send her backpack on with the mail and join him than take a taxi.”

“If I were in that situation, I would do the same thing too,” said Lele. “If I loved a man, like the way your sister loves her husband, I would always be with him. Nothing should ever separate us, not blisters or even anything worse.”

It was spoken with enthusiasm, and undoubtedly moony eyes gazing right at him.

That wasn’t the first hint Lele had made to drive their relationship forward. She’d referred to Fang Wu as her boyfriend without even a conversation with him to confirm their status. She’d suggested several times that they should travel together. There had been that thinly veiled request for him to take her shopping in Shanghai which he’d ignored.

But all of that had been about what he could do for her. This was the first time Lele had ever alluded to doing anything for him.

Every time they went for karaoke, Xia Jian sang the Richie Jen song Xin Tai Ruan 心太软 (Too Soft-hearted) in honour of him. Fang Wu knew exactly what Xia Jian thought about his love life – that the women who could interest him invariably had standards that were too high, and so he always got bullied by them.

This was not fully accurate, but close enough to the truth that he could not refute it.

So, if a woman was going to profess that she would make a sacrifice for him, it would hardly be a hardship for Fang Wu to accept it at face value. At the very least, that would salvage his pride.

“Had you?” he said, catching the same tone; “I honour you!” And there was silence between them for a little while.

On all accounts, such a moment ought to be a score in his favour. So why did it feel so much more like a blunder than a score?

Fang Wu could only blame his conscience – and his peripheral vision – for the feeling that he’d kicked the ball into his own net. Certainly, it was his prerogative to move on and he knew it, but the visible pain it gave Atiqah didn’t bring any joy to himself. 

Besides, what did it all mean when she had been the one to profess that she’d never loved him?  She was not a mean person and would not begrudge his happiness, that he now knew.  He could be certain that she bore him no malice, but he didn’t think he had the capability to invoke her jealousy.  Certainly, she wouldn’t betray her Muslim faith for him.

And for him to ever consider the possibility of converting again, it would take a lot more than a mere failure to meet his eye to convince him.

FangWuLeLe (12) – (11) The House of Eusoff

Hat-trick to The House of Eusoff for revealing Atiqah’s inner world

Three own goals to The House of Eusoff for outing Atiqah and general tactlessness

“How did your brother and sister-in-law meet?” asked Aizah, breaking the silence. “I mean, their love sounds like, you know, relationship goals.”

Atiqah could almost visualise the hashtag, but she didn’t know her sister cared for #goals in anything but her career life. She couldn’t remember the last time Aizah had ever brought home a male friend to meet the family.

“They served together in the Navy,” Fang Wu explained. “Of course, they couldn’t serve in the same chain of command due to conflicts of interest, so they had to spend a lot of time apart. But it seems to have only made them treasure their time together even more.”

“Do you know we tried downloading a Muslim dating app for Atiqah? It’s such a pity she deleted it,” chimed in Farah. “She said something like – I don’t know, finding a partner by swiping right felt so unemotional when it takes time and effort to truly get to know somebody. 

“But I think what you said was kind of like that sort of feeling, that choosing someone just because of their profile picture can’t beat the strength of a relationship that has been tested through bonding and adversity.”

After a moment’s pause, Fang Wu enquired, rather clumsily – “How do Muslims date with apps?”

Atiqah knew he didn’t mean it in a racist sense, not after all that had happened between them. Rather, she thought, this was the first sign of curiosity he’d shown about whether they could have had other options all those years ago.

“I don’t know.” Farah shrugged. “As you can see, me and Azlan got together in school, so we never needed an app.”

“I guess it’s like those Muslims who drink alcohol?” suggested Aizah.

In the course of her work, Aizah spent a lot of time with counterparts from countries where Islam had a far bigger hold on society than it did in Singapore. As a result, she was familiar with the covert (and not-so-covert) breaches of religion that invariably happened when it was imposed on people by birth rather than choice.

It was Aizah who told Atiqah that Malay non-Muslims existed, even though they often lived in the closet. There was always the fear of censure from being seen eating during daylight hours in Ramadan or being spotted consuming pork. Strangely, drinking alcohol was one of the violations of Islam that some people did without feeling that it impinged upon their conscience or their Muslim status in any way.

“How recent was the incident with the app? Was it after Atiqah stopped playing?” were Fang Wu’s follow-up questions. 

Surely, Atiqah felt, for someone who had just professed his admiration for Lele, he was taking an undue amount of interest in her sisters’ efforts to matchmake her.

“I think it was maybe when she was 22 or thereabouts,” said Farah. “I don’t really remember, but it must be around the time when I thought it was fun to get married at 18 and wanted everybody else to be like me.”

There couldn’t be anything worse for Farah to say, though Atiqah knew that her sister-in-law had no idea whom she was really talking to. To intimate that getting married at a young age was pure fun and games would make her younger self seem even more childish in Fang Wu’s eyes than he must believe already.

Fortunately for her, Azlan, who couldn’t stand not being the centre of attention for too long, changed the subject.

“Brother, do you want to come to our place and play FIFA? We came over so many times already, next time it’s your turn to come and hang out.” Looking to Atiqah because she was the cook for the household, he asked, “Kakak (elder sister), that’s OK, right?”

“If he doesn’t mind, it won’t be any trouble,” said Atiqah. Privately, she knew any façade of indifference she kept would fall flat eventually. Hence, the less time she spent in Fang Wu’s company the better, but she wouldn’t say that at the expense of basic courtesy. “But I don’t think Fang Wu will find FIFA on the PlayStation fun when he’s been to the World Cup before.”

“Have you?” Azlan scratched his head. “I don’t remember. But I don’t remember any teams that don’t get past the quarterfinals.”

Trust Azlan, thought Atiqah, to find something to be snobbish about when every aspect of their existence gave them no right to judge anyone else. Since when had Singapore even made it to the World Cup, anyway? But she wouldn’t cause a scene by contradicting him in company.

“I did,” confirmed Fang Wu in a tone of complete nonchalance. “Scored the goal that equalised with the US, in fact. It was a 1-1 draw that broke the curse of China not having scored any goals at the World Cup.”

“So, you’re a football star,” said Aizah. “I would never have guessed! But then, nobody in the house watches Chinese football except Atiqah.

“You know, watching EPL in Singapore used to be very expensive because we had to get a set-top box each from Starhub and Singtel to get all the programs we wanted, but we’re all so crazy about football we did it anyway.  The government stopped that because they had to stop the telcos profiteering from ordinary people.

“But even after we got all the football we wanted on one set-top box thanks to cross-carriage rights – and now, EPL is with Starhub anyway – Atiqah still pays extra money for the Sports+ package just so she can watch Chinese Super League. None of us understand why she does it. I mean, China is a world hegemony in so many things, but definitely not in football.”

At that very revealing speech from her sister, Atiqah couldn’t feel more naked if all her clothes had melted off her on the spot. She wondered if anyone could possibly die of embarrassment, because she very much wished to do so.

“What’s a hegemony? Aizah, you use such difficult words for what? Now we all cannot keep up with you.”

While Eusoff at least saw fit to break the awkward silence before it festered, Atiqah couldn’t stand seeing more of her family’s ignorance on display.  Or rather, not in present company, for while she could trust Xixi, Lele and Xiaoming not to be offended nor disgusted by her family’s foibles, they were in the company of the one person whom she could not.

“I think it’s time to serve the kueh,” said Xixi, getting up and taking Xiaoming by the hand to lead him to the kitchen. “Atiqah, thanks for bringing such a nice dessert for all of us to enjoy.”

At the sight of the fragrant and delicate Nyonya cakes, everybody forgot about the risky politics of discussing China’s status as a world hegemony. Atiqah could never thank Xixi enough for her intervention. Privately, she decided that her family owed the couple a generous wedding gift when, or if, Xiaoming ever took it upon himself to propose.

Undoubtedly the boys, who hadn’t yet grown into acquired tastes like these, would have clamoured for ice cream instead of kueh if they were awake.  Atiqah was grateful for the small mercy that they had both fallen asleep, sprawled along the sectional.

“Let me help you clear up,” she offered, stacking her sister’s empty bowl and plates on top of hers and getting up to carry everything to the kitchen sink. “Fang Wu, Xi Xi, Le Le, Xiao Ming, thank you very much for all the trouble you took to make dinner tonight.”

“Not at all.” The gentleman whom Atiqah thought would be most offended by what he had learned that evening was in front of her, taking the pile of crockery from her hands and blocking her path to the kitchen. “It must be very challenging to fast while feeding three people.  Don’t worry, we can take care of these.”

While Fang Wu went off to the kitchen with the plates, Atiqah wondered in half-stupefaction at the depth with which he perceived her difficulties. Indeed, the practice of not eating nor drinking between sunup and sundown was tough, but to do so while providing food and water to her father and nephews throughout the day tested her resolve to the hilt.

“I hope you all had a good evening.” Upon returning from the kitchen, Fang Wu spoke to all of them, but Atiqah wondered if it was her imagination that he seemed to be addressing her personally. “I can walk you back to your flat.”

Instead of helping Eusoff the way he had the last time, Fang Wu went to the sectional and picked up the sleeping Aziz instead, so gently that he didn’t wake the child. Nodding at Azlan, he indicated silently to her brother to do the same with Yusuf.

There were scarcely any farewells uttered when he dropped them off at their flat, so as not to wake the sleeping children. In settling Aziz and Yusuf into the double bed they shared with their parents, Fang Wu even saw the chaos of Azlan’s room in its full glory. There was no hiding anything from him now.

And yet, when he turned and waved to them from outside their front gate, Atiqah felt that thus far, this was the closest thing to amity that she had experienced from him. At least, it was the first time he graced her with an expression that might in any way approximate a smile.

Chapter Text

VI.i – Xiaoming

East Coast Park was familiar territory to Xiaoming. Since childhood, he came here on at least a weekly basis. Yet tonight was not like other nights. Xiaoming tugged at the collar of his button-down Oxford shirt, trying his hardest not to sweat as he strolled down the footpath.

He’d asked Xixi to meet him at the Bedok Jetty. The 15 km (9 mile) long beachfront recreational area that lay just across the expressway in front of his block of flats wasn’t usually busy on weekdays, except during school holidays. But so long as they stayed away from the playground, food centre, and skate park, they could be certain of their relative privacy.

Bedok Jetty lay slightly beyond the parts of the park that were frequented by families. During the day, it was a haven for fishing. At sundown after work, with the sea breeze sweeping in to take away the stuffiness, it was an oasis of peace and serenity against the bustle of the city.

At least, it was as peaceful as any place could get within a bustling urban city-state. The East Coast Parkway, one of Singapore’s major expressways, was less than a kilometre away.

Xiaoming felt that he was coming of age, and this was his time to act upon it.

All along, he’d been waiting for the year of his thirtieth birthday to tie the knot with Xixi. If pressed, he wouldn’t be able to explain why he thought that was the right age to marry, but like all his decisions in life before this, he stuck to the choices that felt safe.  And nobody could fault him for being too young and incautious if he spent his twenties in a steady relationship that culminated in marriage at thirty.

Now, though, he had reason to speak even though the momentous birthday was still several months away. He had been selected for a three-year overseas posting in Chengdu, Sichuan, with the statutory board where he worked. If he accepted the appointment, he would need to relocate, and he wanted Xixi to go with him.

He’d told his parents of his plans – after all, they needed to consult a geomancer to find auspicious wedding banquet and solemnization dates. He’d also roped Lele in and allowed her to tell Fang Wu. They were the ones who would be capturing this moment for posterity.

In short, everyone closest to the couple knew, except for the recipient of his proposal. Xiaoming didn’t know how to be romantic, not that Xixi seemed to mind. One of the things that he liked best about her was her preference for security over romance.

But Xiaoming had been privy to enough proposals from his friends and colleagues to feel the obligation to create some element of drama and surprise. It seemed that the ladies appreciated this, although it only put more pressure on Xiaoming.

He knew that Xixi would realize this wasn’t just any other day. Usually, they met on the weekends and rarely saw each other after work. But since this was a workday, she wouldn’t need foreknowledge of the occasion to be all dressed up in a skirt and heels. In fact, to Xiaoming’s mind, she always dressed up when they went out together. She never went more than five metres away from her front door without makeup.

Today, Xiaoming thought, Xixi looked prettier than ever. With the breeze ruffling her hair ever so slightly, against the backdrop of the sea he looked upon every day from his window, he could only think of one thing – that with Xixi, he would always be at home.

Yes, there was Xiaoming’s posting as an overseas Centre Director, which would take them away for three years if that was the path that he – or rather, they – might choose. They might even choose to extend their stay for more terms and be away for six years, even nine.

But at the end of that road, there was no doubt that they would eventually return to the seafront flat that Xiaoming had always called home, with this view greeting them every morning and evening. This was where they belonged.

~~~⚽~~~

VI.ii – Xixi

Xiaoming never asked her to come to the beach on a weekday. Without the need for any further hints, Xixi knew that this day was special.

At twenty-seven, Xixi wasn’t the first of her uni cohort to be proposed to, though she knew she also wouldn’t be the last. Among her current colleagues and former uni classmates, there were ladies who liked to one-up each other on how over-the-top their boyfriends’ romantic gestures could be. She’d heard of bombastic proposals proclaimed from the swankiest spots in town, such as the rooftop of Marina Bay Sands.

To Xixi, this was much more intimate and personal. East Coast Park was Xiaoming’s happy place; it had literally been a witness to him growing up.  Through the nearly seven years they’d been dating, Xixi and Xiaoming had spent many private moments here after dinner with his parents.  They didn’t walk as far as Bedok Jetty very often, but they cycled here – and beyond – on occasional Sunday or holiday afternoons when they wanted to get away from it all.

This was no cycling trip, and Xixi was aware of it. She’d taken the Thomson-East Coast Line train from her office and crossed the East Coast Parkway via underpass, making slow but careful progress in order not to mess up her work attire.

Seeing Xiaoming dressed in his best office wear confirmed Xixi’s suspicions of the nature of this meeting. Yet it still surprised her that at the end of the jetty, he went on bended knee.

“Zheng Xinxi – Xixi – will you marry me?” he asked.

As Xixi had always expected, Xiaoming’s proposal would be simple and straightforward. Nobody would ever credit him for his imagination, but Xixi was overjoyed to see that she’d overrated his pragmatism. She’d anticipated that he might propose over a meal at the food court, and this was much better than that.

“Xiaoming,” she said, stretching her arms out to help him to his feet, “of course the answer is yes.” Glowing with joy, she wrapped him up in a tearful hug.

~~~⚽~~~

Vi.iii – Lele

Lele hit the “stop” button on her smartphone camera with a satisfied grin. When it came to her turn, she would love to have a big party with a professional camera crew. But for the painfully shy Xiaoming, she could only feel relieved that he had the sense to ask someone to record this special moment.

She’d dragged Fang Wu along with her to carry the proposal balloons, which spelled “Marry Me”. He’d wrangled the pink foil letters into a bunched-up bed sheet for concealment and wrestled with them to keep them from floating away.

Surely, he was the most fidgety wingman she’d ever seen, Lele thought. As a former professional athlete, he ought to be strong enough to manage a bunch of helium balloons without quite so much wrangling.

With the moment on bended knee caught and captured, Fang Wu was able to release his burden, handing the strung-together letters to Xiaoming.

“Wow,” Xixi gasped. “But now, everyone will know.”

Lele would prefer to believe that her sister cast her eyes down in mock embarrassment. But reserved as Xixi and Xiaoming could be, Lele knew very well that most likely, their bashfulness was real. Which meant that Xiaoming had gone way out of his comfort zone to make this occasion memorable for Xixi.

They captured a few more shots with Xiaoming presenting the balloons to Xixi, and the happy couple sealing it with a kiss.

Lele always kept her smartphone model up to date, which was great for such occasions when she needed a camera with good low-light performance. But she knew her hand-held shots would look amateurish in the wedding video up against the professionally taken same-day footage.

Not that Xixi and Xiaoming would mind – they were intensely private, almost as intensely frugal, and she respected their wish for her (and her other half) to be the only live witnesses to this special moment, simply because she was the person closest to Xixi.

“Do you not want people to see it?” Xiaoming asked. “I thought all ladies want dramatic proposals.”

“傻瓜 (Silly),” said Xixi affectionately, mussing Xiaoming’s hair, “everything you do for me is special.” She wound the string of the balloons around her wrist and let them flutter proudly behind her in the wind.

Their usual lack of demonstrativeness belied the obvious affection in Xixi’s and Xiaoming’s eyes. Lele could scarcely bear to watch, knowing that she had yet to inspire a similar gaze from Fang Wu. Even now, as she cast him a meaningful glance, all she saw was that he was looking away.

~~~⚽~~~

Vi.iv – Xiaoming

For dinner, Xiaoming had booked alfresco dining at the nearby Jumbo Seafood Restaurant, one of Singapore’s most popular chili crab chains. A whole crab would do very nicely for four people.

Tying the balloon string securely to his chair, Xiaoming let the words billow behind him. He had been brought up to believe that keeping his head down and getting the right answers was more important than being noticed, but now that Xixi was his for life, he didn’t mind proclaiming it from the rooftops.

Perhaps, being selected for an overseas posting gave him new confidence – or maybe it was love that made him bold.

Xiaoming was not at all in the habit of ordering wine, but it felt appropriate to get a bottle of Australian white wine to toast the occasion. After all, he and Xixi had more than one thing to celebrate.

“There’s one more thing I wanted to tell you,” Xiaoming announced, “I’ve been offered a post as the Centre Director in Chengdu.”

“太好了! (That’s terrific!)” squealed Xixi. “And so, you asked so I could move there with you!”

“Not just that,” Xiaoming countered. “I would have asked you anyway, because I’m turning thirty and I wouldn’t want to wait. But now I will get COLA (Cost of Living Allowance), which means we can afford a better place.”

Even though he was sure of Xixi’s loyalty to him, Xiaoming couldn’t help feeling insecure that his family wasn’t as wealthy as hers. As career civil servants, his parents had earned a decent and stable income but lived plainly and frugally.  For example, they hadn’t renovated their flat in decades.

On the other hand, the Zhengs were a well-to-do business family, willing and able to afford all the extras.  While Xiaoming knew Xixi didn’t thumb up her nose at public housing – a five-room HDB flat was decently middle-class in Singapore, and she was currently living in one too – he couldn’t help feeling that his ageing flat might seem inadequate to her parents and possibly her relatives. 

Yet Xiaoming couldn’t bring himself to exchange the only home he knew for something newer. There were so many things about his parents’ flat that couldn’t be replaced or replicated: its prime location, the sea view that he loved, and the fact that his parents would never leave it.  He knew that if Xixi loved him as much as he thought she did, she would take him as he was, flat and all. And she had.

Still, Xiaoming couldn’t deny that living overseas on expat terms for a few years would raise his status with her family. It meant he could come back with a handsome promotion into line management too, which would also be advantageous for his income and reputation.

“Congratulations!” As Xiaoming might have guessed, Fang Wu was the first to approve.  While Xiaoming wouldn’t admit it, the appearance of Fang Wu in his life caused him a lot of stress. Nothing was more important to that dude than independence, which was the key aspect where Xiaoming couldn’t help feeling that he came up short. He was relieved that Xixi would have no reason to compare him with Fang Wu anymore.

“Xixi, are you excited to be closer to your parents?” Fang Wu continued. It hadn’t escaped Xiaoming that not having parents might have been a catalyst to Fang Wu’s accelerated independence. With this revelation that Fang Wu treasured family nonetheless, Xiaoming felt less judged than before.

“A two-hour flight isn’t exactly close,” replied Xixi, fiddling with her piece of crab. “I’ve never been in a new place away from my parents, Lele, and my friends.  The first year of uni doesn’t count since I was in a hostel and made friends very quickly. But Xiaoming, since you will be with me, I won’t be scared.”

“Same here.” Xiaoming smiled a little shamefacedly. He wouldn’t confess aloud that he’d never lived anywhere but his parents’ flat for nearly thirty years. Even while attending the National University of Singapore, he’d stayed at home instead of at the hostels. “I’m actually more nervous about speaking Chinese all the time than about moving out on our own.”

“How can a Dunman High boy be worried about speaking Chinese?” teased Xixi.

Xiaoming had attended Tao Nan School and Dunman High, the most prestigious primary and secondary Special Assistance Plan (SAP) schools in the eastern part of the island. He’d studied Higher Chinese from Primary 1 to the ‘A’ Levels, but that still wasn’t enough to make him comfortable with conversing in Mandarin, when everything in Singapore was done in English.

“I think you know,” Xiaoming bantered back. “Haven’t we all seen Dunman High students on the MRT?” Like most people living in the eastern part of Singapore, he regularly encountered students in Dunman High uniforms conversing in English while commuting on public transportation. He’d been one of them once. “But with your help, I’m sure I can learn over time.”

“Xiaoming, how do you think Uncle and Aunty will take it?” asked Xixi a little nervously. It surprised Xiaoming that Xixi would worry more about his parents’ reactions than he did. Had he given her the impression that he was so dependent on them?  And if he had, did it scare her?

“I think they’ll enjoy coming to visit,” he said, trying to sound confident. He’d done his research, and they would be able to stay in China visa-free for 30 days at a time. “We can take them to see the pandas.”

The Chengdu Research Base of Giant Panda Breeding was one of the major local attractions that gave the city its fame, with the surrounding forest being one of the best panda habitats.  It was the home of the giant pandas that came to the Singapore Zoo on loans, and where the first panda cub born in Singapore had gone back to.

They continued talking deep into the night, discussing their future and the upcoming move. Xiaoming regaled the rest with stories about the collective excitement in Singapore at the birth of the first panda cub, a boy named Le Le 叻叻 (not to be confused with Xixi’s sister Lele 乐乐) in 2021.

Xiaoming was surprised to find Lele uncharacteristically silent. She’d badgered him incessantly about getting a flat for the past two years, so he knew she was supportive of him as a partner for her sister.  Perhaps Lele might feel left out with him and Xixi moving away and leaving her behind, but he scarcely expected her to feel upset when it meant that she would have the whole flat to herself and Fang Wu.

But at twenty-five, Lele was an adult. There wasn’t much Xiaoming could do on her account. Besides, there were other concerns at the top of his mind.

After they finished dinner, Xiaoming called a Grab to pick Xixi up and send her home. Graciously, Lele and Fang Wu offered to take public transportation so that he could accompany Xixi in the car and bring the balloons. Xiaoming was grateful for the much-needed privacy.

“Xixi, do you think I am a late bloomer?” he asked. “I mean, normally CDs (Centre Directors) are appointed after three years of work, but it took me four years to get my Centre Directorship.”

“Oh, Xiaoming.” Xixi laid her head on his shoulder and stretched an arm across him. “Even if you never became a Centre Director, I’d love you anyway.  No matter whether you get your promotion early or late, I’ll always be proud of you.” She gave him a blissful hug.

In the dark, Xiaoming’s face lit up, knowing that he had chosen the person who accepted him for who he was.

He wouldn’t fool himself into thinking he was a high-flyer, when many people got promoted faster than him. But he wasn’t doing too badly either – not everybody at his statutory board became Centre Directors, so it was better late than never.  He was hardworking, meticulous and reliable, traits which paid off in the end. 

Best of all, Xixi treasured him for it. Xiaoming would never call himself the luckiest man in the world (the way Fang Wu sometimes did), but he was happy to simply be lucky enough.

~~~⚽~~~

Vi.v – Lele

The travel plans that sprung up after Xixi and Xiaoming’s engagement put Lele into an even more desperate mood than before.

Of course, Xiaoming would join Xixi and Lele’s annual Lunar New Year visit to their parents in two months’ time. For the past six years, Xixi and Xiaoming had spent a fortnight in Changsha every summer, while passing the Lunar New Year with their respective families.  That was the practical choice when in China the New Year holidays spanned a whole week, whereas people got only two days off in Singapore. Furthermore, travel fares were highly inflated during the Golden Week.

When Lele joined Xixi and Xiaoming’s summer trips home, she had already felt like a hanger-on even before their formal engagement. Her parents were too good; no matter how much they showered Xixi and Xiaoming with their approbation, they never openly criticised Lele for her singlehood. Yet, with every inch of praise her parents bestowed on Xiaoming, Lele felt the subtle pressure anyway.

Tagging on to the engaged Xixi and Xiaoming, with all the added baggage that the Lunar New Year brought, would be infinitely worse.  The elder generation dispensed 红包 hongbao, or red packets enclosing cash gifts, to unmarried members of the younger generation.  This customary practice was believed to bring luck.

Xixi and Xiaoming were almost certain to marry before Xiaoming embarked on his posting in Chengdu, so this would be the final New Year that they would be receiving hongbao instead of giving them.  Lele knew that all the relatives they visited would point out this fact ad nauseum, even though she least wanted to be reminded of it.

The prospect of being stuck as the only hongbao recipient left in the family felt to Lele like a damning proclamation of her arrested development. All her life, she only wanted to catch up to her elder sister. She’d always rebelled against being a child or getting treated like one.

Yet Lele also knew that in Chinese families, marriage couldn’t be rushed. Wedding banquet venues were often oversubscribed, necessitating reservations twelve to eighteen months in advance. The waiting lists for new construction public housing flats in Singapore could be twice as long as that.

Even after the two to three years it took for dating to progress to engagement, the road from engagement to marriage was a long slog for those who didn’t buck tradition to short-circuit it. 

For example, Xixi and Xiaoming would need to compromise on the wedding banquet to be married before his posting. Most likely, they would host a small dinner or a lunch instead of a standard banquet dinner with hundreds of guests. 

But then, both their sets of parents were relatively easy-going. A more traditional family would force them to host the customary dinner banquet eventually, even if they’d lived as a married couple for months by the time it took place.

No matter what formalities Xixi and Xiaoming might still be awaiting at the time of their move to Chengdu, Lele was fully aware that she had no hope of catching up to them.

As far as her relationship with Fang Wu was concerned, Lele was barely at step one. And there wasn’t much she could do to accelerate their progress when the burden of courtship lay at least as much in the hands of the gentleman as the lady. 

The only thing Lele could aim for was to have Fang Wu join her for the visit to Changsha, so that she could show her parents that she was doing something to address her single status.

That he would not, was something that Lele never anticipated. Thus far, hadn’t he always done her bidding?

~~~⚽~~~

Vi.vi – Fang Wu

All this chatter about travel to Changsha was grating on Fang Wu’s nerves.

In the few days since Xiaoming’s proposal, Xixi and Lele had scoured the Scoot website almost hourly in anticipation of booking the cheapest air fares.

For the sake of courtesy, he resisted telling them that airline tickets were never cheap in the Lunar New Year peak season, and that they ought to just book whatever was available and be done with it.

“We don’t need a row of three,” Lele called to Xiaoming. “Two pairs of two seats should be possible, right?”

“Two pairs of two? Why would you need four seats?”

Fang Wu disliked having the need to say out loud that he wouldn’t be joining them because it sounded rude. In fact, it shocked him that they assumed he would be part of the travelling party.

When it came to be rationally considered, Fang Wu didn’t have more off days than anybody else working in Singapore.  Furthermore, his sister, who was retired and had all the off days in the world, would be coming to visit him. Who in their right mind could possibly think it reasonable for him to join them on this visit when he was only tangentially related (if at all) to the newly engaged couple?

“Xiaowu, you’re coming along, right? I thought you knew that!” Lele shot back.

Well, he hadn’t.  While Fang Wu had to admit that he had not seriously thought on this subject before, he honestly didn’t suppose that he and Lele were established enough as a couple that a Lunar New Year visit to the parents would be customary.

“That was what I was searching for,” replied Xiaoming. “But I can only find one pair of available seats together, can you and Fang Wu sit separately?”

This was getting even more ridiculous – did Xixi and Xiaoming also consider his relationship with Lele to be that serious? Fang Wu could admit that he hadn’t protested when Lele had proclaimed him her boyfriend. But they’d only known each other for three months. How could any impartial third party ever deem them to be in meet-the-parents territory?

Besides, it didn’t escape Fang Wu that if he spent the Lunar New Year with Lele and her parents, everyone would consider them engaged.  A Lunar New Year visit was much more loaded than a meet-the-parents trip at other times of the year. It meant he would be introduced to all Lele’s relatives as an honorary member of her family. Naturally, it would raise eyebrows if they didn’t follow through with a wedding within a year after doing that.

“I can’t go,” he pointed out. “I won’t be able to take that amount of time off during the school term.”

“Why not? Isn’t that what relief teachers are for?” argued Lele.

“How can I be considered reliable if I took time off like that in my first year? Besides, my sister has already made arrangements to visit me over here,” Fang Wu countered.

“But you said your sister’s plans could change anytime! So, you could just tell her to go to Changsha instead of Singapore,” ordered Lele. “You’re from Hunan, aren’t you? Don’t you have family there to visit?”

“We don’t. My brother is in the rural area. And I already promised to visit him for the Winter Solstice.”

This last statement was untrue unless Fang Wu took actions to give it veracity. His sister-in-law had been expecting a child when he last visited in the summer, so he did owe Fang Wen and his wife another visit before too long. But he’d initially planned for it to happen in either the March or June school holidays, not in December. He had barely settled in, so he had not intended to travel again so soon.

“You can tell your brother to come to Changsha,” insisted Lele. Had he reasoned and talked in vain? If Fang Wu had ever believed that he admired Lele’s resolution of character, he hadn’t imagined that it would go to the extent of not being able to take ‘no’ for an answer.

“Yes, with a baby not even six months old,” remarked Fang Wu. He hated himself for resorting to sarcasm, but he couldn’t conceal his irritation anymore.  “I’m sorry. I can’t go with you.”

“Xiaowu, come here.” Lele stood up and with a swish of her long hair, she strode to the door and pushed it open. The set of her jaw showed that she would bear no opposition.

Despite the many positions of authority he had held over the years (and still did), Fang Wu had never needed to be as stern as Lele was now to be obeyed.

He had met his match, or perhaps even his master, in obstinacy.

Lele grabbed his hand and led him downstairs, crossing the street to Tampines Central Park.  Out there in the open, where Xixi and Xiaoming couldn’t hear them, she lit right into him.

“如果你不去，我也不去, (If you’re not going, I won’t go either,)” she threatened. “明白吗？ ([Do you] understand?)”

“这是你们之间的事, 干嘛要把我扯进去?  (This is between you [and your family], why must you drag me into it?)” Fang Wu retorted.

“就因为是我的事，我偏要你管！ (Because this concerns me, I insist you must care [about it]!) 你要我收红包,收到几时？(For how long do you wish me to continue receiving red packets?)” Lele stamped her foot in frustration.

“我们才认识三个月, (We’ve only known each other for three months,)” parried Fang Wu, “谈这些不是太早了吧！ (Isn’t it too early to talk about this!)”

The moment after the words flew out of his mouth, Fang Wu felt his own hypocrisy recoil upon him like the stroke of a whip. There had once been a time when three months hadn’t been too soon for him to make up his mind. The only difference was that now, he’d made up his mind in the opposite direction.

“我们年纪已经不小了，还浪费时间干什么? (We’re not young anymore, why are we still wasting time?)” Lele demanded.

Switching to English, she continued, “Let me teach you a phrase in Singlish: ‘Ai’ means ‘want’, and ‘mai’ means ‘do you’. So, when you say, ‘Ai stead mai’, it means, ‘do you want to go steady with me’?”

She shot him a meaningful look, as if daring him to speak.

“你在问我吗？ (Are you asking me [this]?)”  Fang Wu knew he was playing dumb, that he was being deliberately and irritatingly stubborn. But if that was how Lele wanted it, two could play at that game.

“难道你不想开口？(Don’t tell me you don’t wish to say [it]?)” Lele challenged him back.

“对不起。([I’m] sorry.)” How had this whole thing left Fang Wu feeling like a cad?  He knew what Lele wanted to hear.

The problem was, he couldn’t bring himself to say it.

Yes, Fang Wu had been unguarded in approaching Lele, but he truly didn’t consider himself involved to the point of being no longer at his own disposal. Still, so long as Lele believed so, he had let her down.

“你就这样一走了之？ (You’re just going to go off like that?)” accused Lele. “既然这样，你就给我滚！ (Since [the situation is] like that, just go away!)”

Fang Wu felt cornered, regardless of whether this pickle was entirely of his own making.  He wished he could say with a clear conscience that it was not, but even while resenting Lele’s obdurate behaviour, he knew that his moment of plausible denial had passed.

He should never have allowed Lele to continue addressing him by a pet name after he became conscious that things could go no farther between them.  But when had he started feeling that way?  He could not pinpoint the exact moment, yet this was undeniably how he felt now, and he couldn’t reverse it.

That she had entrapped him by referring to him as her boyfriend without his express consent was no reason for him not to have spoken out earlier. After all, couldn’t his silence be construed as tacit consent?

“非常抱歉，我不能成全你。([I’m] extremely sorry, I can’t do as you wish.)” With true penitence, Fang Wu hung his head. If he thought he had known indignity and humiliation before, it paled against the shame that now engulfed him. 

All his life, Fang Wu had never done anything that rendered him unequal to looking others in the eye.  But if he believed himself to be honourable to a fault, how had he ended up stooping to this level of passive-aggressiveness?

“我们就到此为止，(We’re over,)” declared Lele. “从此以后，一刀两断！ (From now on, [let’s] have a clean break!)”

Twice in his life, Fang Wu had dated someone seriously. Both times, he’d been dumped.  Painfully, it dawned on him that when Atiqah had broken off with him, she had been the one to apologise, whereas Lele now expected him to apologise to her. 

And he had apologised, repeatedly in fact, but it wasn’t enough to assuage either her anger or his conscience.

Lele stalked off before he did, holding her head high and steadfastly avoiding any eye contact.  Clearly, she saw herself as the party with the moral advantage.

Fang Wu knew the only path for reconciliation with Lele would be to determine himself hers in honour if she wished it.  However, he saw no virtue in continuing this deception. Perhaps it might have commenced unwittingly, but it would most certainly be wilful if he now chose to perpetuate it.

By letting things end here, he would be kinder to Lele than to himself, Fang Wu felt. He’d tried to pursue a relationship where he had best calculated the certainty of acceptance, only to find in hindsight that it had stroked his ego but hadn’t touched his heart.

She would move on; she would find somebody for whom the proclamations of love would not be a lie. He, on the other hand, had gambled twice in love and lost, with no guarantee of being third time lucky.

He barely knew where he wandered to before meandering back to his flat. Once he got home, he wasted no time in booking air tickets to visit his brother.

At such short notice, the nonstop flights on Scoot were fully booked. Fang Wu ended up with a circuitous flight itinerary via Kunming, leaving at 2:30 AM followed by nearly nine hours of travel time including the layover. After arriving at Changsha, he would need to take a long-distance bus into the countryside, making it at least a full day before he could reach his brother’s home.

The journey would be gruelling, but the physical punishment was roundly deserved. From the period when he realised how horribly he’d misled Lele and deceived himself, his emotional penance had become severe. No amount of corporeal suffering could compare to it.

Lele further proved Fang Wu’s unworthiness by showing up at his door the next morning, her swollen eyes belying her outward composure.

“昨天我太冲动了， (Yesterday, I was too impulsive,)” she admitted. Had he been in her place, Fang Wu thought, he would have tacked on an apology to that statement. But it wasn’t out of character for Lele to be too proud to say she was sorry for anything. Three months was enough to give Fang Wu some understanding of her personality, no matter what he had professed.

“那你会去吗？ (In that case, will you go?)” If Lele could temper down the ill feeling of the previous day, Fang Wu would respond in kind.  To let go of anger sat much easier with Fang Wu’s conscience than holding onto it.  How was it that only in hindsight he realised this too?

Resolutely, Lele shook her head.  For a moment, Fang Wu felt guilty that he was driving her to snub her parents at the most important festive season for the year.  Yet guilt wasn’t a good enough reason for him to humour her against his true inclination.

“子欲养而亲不在的感觉，我体验过。 (I know what it’s like to be too late to give my parents the support I would have wished to provide,)” he remarked, as gently as he could. “我劝你，还是去吧。 (I would advise you to go.)”

“我的事，你管不着。(My affairs are none of your business.)” In Lele’s voice, the rancour of the previous day was replaced by sheer resignation. “我祝你一路顺风。 (I wish you a safe journey.)”

When Fang Wu hadn’t told Lele that he would be flying off the very next day, he could only conclude that Lele was implying that she didn’t want to see him again.  That she wouldn’t be communicating with him between now and the Winter Solstice, and most likely beyond.

“那么，(Then,)” he replied, “我祝福你。 (I wish you the best of luck.)”

With the barest of nods, Lele turned and walked away, leaving Fang Wu to close the door. The click of the lock underscored the finality of this conclusion to their relationship.

Left alone to his thoughts, Fang Wu gave in fully to his feelings of horror and remorse at the collateral damage he’d created.

If his unwillingness to commit to Lele had the power to make her cry, her feelings for him could not be as trifling as his turned out to be for her. He’d thought he was moving on, that he could settle for an uneventful relationship with any woman who matched him in cultural background and social standing, provided that her character was compatible enough with his.

"A strong mind, with sweetness of manner,” had made the first and the last of his mental description.

Lele hadn’t missed the mark on those standards – well, perhaps she fell short of the second condition now, after insisting on having her way despite his advice.  Her petulance and stubbornness when he declined her request to travel to Changsha with her was the last straw to convince Fang Wu that they wouldn’t be happy together in the long run.

Worst of all, Fang Wu had figured this out only yesterday.

Prior to that, he had been forcing himself to believe that Lele was the most suitable woman within his reach, on the sole basis that she’d been born in the same province as him. Very ironically, they’d ended up quarrelling over the Confucian values that had been drummed into them from childhood, and they’d broken up using the shared language that should have drawn them together.

By forging ahead purely based on the surface attribute of race, despite his insufficient understanding of Lele’s personality, Fang Wu had been settling. He’d even been subconsciously aware that he was doing so, while completely oblivious to how he might have engaged Lele’s feelings and how deeply disappointed she must be now.

Another man, someone who regarded romantic relationships with less seriousness, might absolve himself of blame in a way that Fang Wu could not.

Mutually deciding not to proceed with someone you met through an app after a couple of dinner dates was one thing. Discovering you were fundamentally incompatible with someone after getting enmeshed into their daily life, perhaps even after getting them emotionally attached, was another. That was something Fang Wu might have learned earlier, if he hadn’t spent the past eight years with his career as a cover for his lack of focus in seeking a life partner.

A small part of Fang Wu wished that he could undo it all, that he could overlook the areas where he and Lele didn’t see eye to eye. She was six years younger than he and accustomed to being indulged with all her wishes. Therefore, he shouldn’t be surprised or repulsed by her decision to forgo paying her parents a Lunar New Year visit for purely self-centred reasons.

Unlike him, she had no experience yet of what she might regret in not taking every opportunity to bond with her family.  He couldn’t expect her to value the same things he did, when she hadn’t been through enough disappointments in life to fully appreciate the good fortune and privilege she currently had.

Yet, a bigger part of Fang Wu stood firm; the easy road wouldn’t be the right one. Even if he could patch things up with Lele for now by caving in, in the long run it wouldn’t change that their values and priorities were misaligned.

A tiny voice whispered in his ear that someone right in front of him exemplified the precept of filial piety perfectly. So much so, in fact, that he should have no doubt as to why Lele would always come up short in his mind.

If he hadn’t witnessed the equanimity with which Atiqah handled the responsibility of looking after her father, even to the sacrifice of her promising future in football, would Fang Wu be as critical of Lele’s self-centredness and lack of filial piety at present? 

Till the previous day, till the leisure for reflection which followed it, he had not understood the perfect excellence of Atiqah’s inner strength, with which Lele’s youthful wilfulness could so ill bear a comparison.

Till he experienced the burning shame of becoming the instrument of someone’s misery, he hadn’t been able to give his younger self – and Atiqah’s – the grace they merited for their honest intentions, despite the unfortunate result. 

Till he compared his memories of being dumped by Atiqah with his current feelings after being dumped by Lele, he didn’t realise that he had imagined himself indifferent, when he had only been angry.  But then, he hadn’t experienced true indifference until now.

The strongest lesson that Fang Wu’s fallout with Lele imprinted on him was the distinction between love and ego.  He should have felt no shame in admitting to a broken heart, when it was far more disgraceful to selfishly, if not quite wilfully, break someone else’s.

~~~⚽~~~

Layovers were sheer torture, worse than any of the eighteen levels of hell.  When the Chinese Super League hadn’t deemed its players precious enough to be above flying commercially, Fang Wu knew he was throwing a toddler tantrum to think this way. 

No, he might not be a snob or a diva (not yet, anyway). But when his mind was now trained to associate long flights with breakups, it ought not to be surprising that he was an even worse flyer than a two-year-old.

He still remembered his passage from Barcelona to Kunming eight years ago with videographic clarity. El Prat Airport was a shopping paradise on the inside, but all of it had passed him by in a blur. It had been a miracle that he’d even been able to find his gate when all he’d been able to think of was the sound of Atiqah’s voice, telling him that she didn’t love him, ringing in his ears.

In his funk, Fang Wu had missed the boarding announcements in Spanish and English. It had taken a desperate flight attendant, running out of the plane to hurriedly make an impromptu boarding call for him in Mandarin, to make him realise that the plane was about to leave without him.

“这是寻人广播，深圳航空 ZH866航班 – ZH866 – 即将就要起飞，请方武先生 – 方武先生 – 立即前往D13 号登机口 – D13 号 – 登机！ (This is a paging announcement, Shenzhen Airlines flight ZH 866 – ZH 866 – is about to take off. Can Mr. Fang Wu – Mr. Fang Wu – please come to gate D13 – gate D13 – for immediate boarding!)”

Somehow the sound of his own name had jolted him out of his thoughts sufficiently for Fang Wu to grab his backpack and shuffle to the aerobridge.  The exasperated sighs of the ground staff upon seeing that he had been sitting right there in the gate hold area while they’d been anxiously paging him only added to his humiliation and indignity.

They probably thought he’d missed the earlier boarding calls not because he’d been distracted by the airport shopping, but because he didn’t understand English! Pettily, he’d chosen to dwell on the cabin crew speaking to him in Mandarin throughout the 13-hour flight as further evidence that they doubted his literacy in English, rather than the more likely explanation that they used Mandarin with everyone who looked Chinese.

Nothing on that flight had gone right. He’d clean forgotten that he was the one who’d volunteered to take economy class to save his club some money and instead resented the narrowness of his window seat on the Airbus A330. Coffee had tasted like drain water when served in paper cups, and none of the inflight meals had been flavourful enough to qualify as real food.  There had been no films worth watching on the inflight entertainment.

For the half a day it had taken to transport him from Barcelona to Shenzhen, Fang Wu had turned into a grouchy, prickly monster.

Landing at Shenzhen Bao’an Airport hadn’t made things any better. Xia Jian had come with his newlywed wife all the way from Guangzhou, a 90-minute drive away, leaving at the crack of dawn to pick him up. He should have appreciated their kindness, but instead their curious and enthusiastic enquiries about the scenery and culture of Barcelona had felt more like being given the third degree. 

And the belated wedding gift in his pocket had seemed to weigh as much as a brick. He’d missed Xia Jian’s wedding banquet that summer because his time was not his own. In fact, Fang Wu’s overnight stay in Guangzhou enroute to Kunming (the capital of Yunnan province where his new club was situated), with the newlyweds putting him up at their flat, had been the only chance he’d had to meet the Xias after switching clubs at the beginning of that year.

Less than forty-eight hours prior, Fang Wu had slipped 1,888 yuan (US$260) into a golden envelope. The special red packet, designed for weddings, bore the Chinese character 囍 with the double ‘xi’ to denote conjugal bliss, and a cartoon pop-up picture of a wedding couple in Chinese traditional dress.  At the time, he’d looked upon the envelope with a smile, imagining how in a few years he might be throwing a banquet with his family and friends giving him envelopes like this.

With the tables turned upon him in a matter of hours, the red packet had felt as if it practically burned a hole in his pocket. He’d divested himself of it the instant he was settled in the back seat of Xia Jian’s car, with no recollection of how brusquely he might have handed it over to his friend.

None of this behaviour had been anything to be proud of. In fact, after Fang Wu had regained his senses, he’d made it a point to apologise to Xia Jian and Mrs. Xia before they saw him off at Guangzhou Baiyun Airport the next morning to catch his onward connection. To this day, he wondered if Xia Jian suspected that anything had been amiss with him beyond the jet lag that he’d claimed as an excuse for his boorishness.

There was something about Kunming and breakups that kept him in a time loop like Groundhog Day, Fang Wu decided. Eight and a half years later, here he was at Singapore Changi Airport at an unearthly hour past midnight, waiting to board his China Eastern Airlines flight headed there, not two days after he’d been dumped again.

Worse still, even though she wasn’t the one who dumped him this time, Nur Atiqah binti Eusoff was still firmly on his mind.

If atonement had a physical manifestation, spending four and a half hours in economy class at 2 AM on a Boeing 737 had to be it.  There was no chance Fang Wu would get any sleep that night and no inflight entertainment on the plane, so thoughts of how he’d ruined everything – not just with Lele, but with Atiqah all over again – flitted constantly through his head.

Flying thirty thousand feet above somewhere in Thailand, Fang Wu had nothing to do but wish that he had earlier learnt to distinguish between the steadiness of principle and the obstinacy of self-will, between the daring of heedlessness and the resolution of a collected mind.

He was aghast at how grotesquely he had misinterpreted Atiqah’s situation. All these years, he’d wondered why he’d never seen her name on the starting XI at AFC (Asian Football Confederation) Women’s Asian Cup or SEA (South East Asia) Games matches.

All along, he had assumed that she had lacked the staying power to follow through with football, just as she had failed to follow through with his offer of love. If he hadn’t become privy to her family’s situation, he would never have realised how wrong he’d been.

After seeing Atiqah again, Fang Wu couldn’t delude himself any longer that she had ever treated his love for her as a game. She still dressed as modestly as before, perhaps even more so now that she wore the tudung whenever she went outside her immediate neighbourhood. Therefore, it was preposterous to think her in any way capable of playing with the feelings of a man.

He’d hung onto her words that she didn’t love him, to the extent of overlooking the words that had followed – that she couldn’t love him.  Within the constraints of Islam, she hadn’t been at liberty to do so, much less say so. At only 19 years old and having never dated before, hanging all her hopes on a man who might convert to Islam years into the future must have terrified Atiqah.

That could only mean that he had been unjust to her merits, because he had been a sufferer from them.  It must have taken a lot of courage for Atiqah to say out loud that she wished to wait for him when such a desire was so taboo, even if she had later retracted her promise. Being the one who held the option to convert, Fang Wu had held all the cards to their future, whereas Atiqah had hardly any choice at all – not then, and not now either.

Her character was now fixed on his mind as perfection itself, maintaining the loveliest medium of fortitude and gentleness.  How could he ever have thought otherwise? She’d had him when she requested him not to bring her to expensive restaurants because she didn’t own the attire to do those places justice.  When all the other young women he’d asked out previously would have jumped at the chance for him to splurge on posh dates, it was refreshing to find someone who cared more about those around her than herself, even at such a young age.

And what had sealed the deal for Fang Wu, not only then but thereafter, was what Atiqah had said to him when he invited her to go wakeboarding in Barcelona. She’d declined his offer to teach her how to ride for a very good reason: for people whose careers hinged on not getting injured, tempting fate through extreme sports in their leisure time felt like an unnecessary risk.

Atiqah’s advice had been why he’d toned down his tricks that day, staying on the flat rather than showing off on the obstacles like he always had before. And after that final outing, he’d never gotten on a wakeboard since.

Everybody Fang Wu knew had been impressed with his wakeboarding. His brother-in-law, who’d taught him to ride when he was fifteen, sometimes lamented that he’d chosen the wrong career. Despite her unwillingness for herself or for him to take the risks, the tricks he’d showed her had brought an admiring smile to Atiqah’s face and elicited her sincere applause, even though what he’d exhibited that day was only a fraction of his skill.

To give up his one indulgence, the only source of thrill that he’d looked forward to off the pitch, had been a sacrifice indeed. But Fang Wu had stuck to it because he believed in Atiqah’s advice. If she could lead him thus at 19, wasn’t her potential to become a trusted helpmeet boundless in the years to come? It was this that had made his 23-year-old self so certain that no matter how many years it took, he would never find her equal.

Eight years on, he was still following her counsel. This could only mean that he persisted in having loved none but her. That she had never been supplanted. That after having seen everything to exalt in his estimation the woman he had lost, he was now left to deplore the pride, the folly, the madness of resentment, which had kept him from trying to regain her when thrown in his way.

Arriving at Kunming and having to bustle through Chinese immigration for his domestic connection interrupted Fang Wu’s train of thought. For all that he had allowed himself to succumb to peevishness the previous time, he resolved that he would do better now.  Honouring his brother with the courtesy he was due was his only means of making things right while he was here on Chinese soil.

It was very generous of Fang Wen to welcome him when he was springing himself on his brother with barely two days’ notice. Fang Wu decided that he was better off staying a night in Changsha to buy some gifts for his brother’s family, so as not to repeat the ungraciousness that he had shown Xia Jian after flying in from Barcelona. Heartbreak was no excuse to treat others badly, and he was long overdue to learn that.

After booking a hotel on Ctrip and texting his brother on WeChat to apprise him of his amended plans, Fang Wu boarded his next flight in a slightly better frame of mind. There was nothing he could do about Lele’s disappointment except hope that it would weaken over distance and time. And as for Atiqah, he would return to Singapore after the Winter Solstice and act as circumstances might require.

The stakes for Fang Wu to pursue Atiqah romantically hadn’t changed. He would still need to state his intention to convert to Islam and pursue marriage upfront, if he wanted to take their relationship beyond the level of common neighbourliness.

But Fang Wu knew it would be premature to consider his readiness for conversion before he ascertained whether Atiqah was still interested in him.  He had been willing to convert before, on the mere condition that his feelings were reciprocated.  Discovering just how precious this second chance was to him should make his fears and doubts about Muslim conversion from the first time even less of a hurdle than before.

Meanwhile, he could find a degree of comfort in focusing on his brother’s joy, instead of wallowing in his own misery.  The onward flight from Kunming to Changsha was just two hours, not enough for Fang Wu to get any meaningful rest. Still, fuelled by pure adrenaline, he roamed the city for the rest of the day after he arrived, in search of the best present to welcome his new nephew into the world.

Perhaps it was out of sheer fatigue, or possibly, it was the newfound peace he found from realising that far from being a victim, he had held the keys to his happiness all along. That night, all alone in a hotel room in Changsha, Fang Wu fell into the deepest and most restful sleep he’d had in years.

~~~⚽~~~

Vi.vii – Fang Wen

Compared to his siblings, Fang Wen led a very modest and retiring life. The rural areas of China had seen many improvements in the past thirty years, but still lacked the luxuries that his sister and brother had gotten used to in the cities. He knew there were good reasons why he was the least-visited sibling, so whenever either of them came, he welcomed them with open arms.

While they were growing up, Fang Wen and Fang Wu had been polar opposites. Their parents had named them for the saying 文武双全 wen wu shuang quan, which meant that the contrasting qualities of learning and valour were needed to complete a man.  And aptly, the personalities of their brothers matched their names.

Fang Wen, the elder by two years, had been bookish and obedient, the scholar of the family.  Despite being the only sibling who went for higher education, he was the least travelled of the three. The farthest he had ventured from their childhood village was to study elementary education at Changsha Normal University before going back into the country as a teacher.

In contrast, the young Fang Wu had incessantly gotten into mischief, earning the nickname “孙悟空 Sun Wukong”, or the Monkey King, for his exploits. He had loved that moniker, which fit perfectly with his reputation for righteous disobedience. When Fang Ying fashioned a cudgel (the weapon that Sun Wukong used) for him by decorating a bamboo stick with gold paint, he’d perfected the art of twirling it within days, carrying it everywhere he went.

Despite a substantial age gap, Fang Wu had always raided his elder siblings’ toys and books, so Fang Wen had never doubted his brother’s intelligence. But at school Fang Wu had been incapable of sitting still and constantly gave the appearance of inattention. That had possibly been the reason why he’d been pigeonholed into playing football instead of being set up for university.

With hindsight and the knowledge from his teacher training, Fang Wen wondered if his brother might have been bored in school because he was ahead of his class, or if he might have suffered from ADHD. Possibly, it could have been a combination of both. Regardless, when Fang Wu had now made more of a name for himself than if he’d pursued a more conventional career path, perhaps his missed opportunity to go to university didn’t matter.

“二哥！ (Second Big Brother!)” Even with his hands full of packages, Fang Wu managed to hug his brother after getting off the bus.

“你还好吗？ (How are you doing?)” Fang Wen reached out to take some of the parcels from his brother’s hands.  For someone who had spent nine hours on planes and in airports just a day ago, Fang Wu looked great, but then he always did.

“还不错。 (Not bad.)”  Fang Wen was used to his brother’s studied air of nonchalance. Still, he wondered why Fang Wu had come all this way at the last minute, even with the direct flights being full.  If he had booked ahead for the March school holidays and gotten a nonstop flight, the plane ride to Changsha would have been just under five hours, instead of nearly double that.

Retirement from competitive sport had done his brother good, Fang Wen decided.  In time-lapse, he’d watched the mischievous child of the past grow into an ebullient young man, but after his brother rose into the Super League, a sort of hard edge had grown around him. Fang Wen had put it down to the need for a world-class striker to develop some degree of ruthlessness, so he hadn’t thought too deeply about it.

In his oversize rapper-style puffer jacket, the fashion of the cities, Fang Wu didn’t look any more like he belonged in this village than he had during his halcyon days at Shanghai Port.  Winters weren’t even that cold in the southern provinces, so Fang Wen knew that his brother was wearing it merely to look cool.

But sitting down to a simple bowl of home-cooked noodles with Fang Wen and his wife Huixian (惠娴) for lunch, Fang Wu appeared unusually content. In fact, Fang Wen hadn’t seen his brother appear so relaxed in more than eight years. To boot, a fortnight’s stay was much longer than any of his previous visits for over a decade.

And Fang Wu hadn’t lost his youthful sense of humour, nor his knack for buying the most hilarious gag gifts. From one of the biggest bundles he carried, he whipped out a life-size Ne Zha (哪吒) doll which was bigger than his three-month-old nephew currently.

“你会把孩子弄哭， (You’ll make the baby cry,)” Fang Wen predicted with a chuckle. The record-breaking Ne Zha animated series had been all the rage for several years, and he had to admit that the bratty demon child warrior somewhat resembled his younger brother.  But a big-headed doll that sent out voodoo vibes with its black-rimmed eyes was not what he nor Huixian would ever think of getting for their son, especially not at this age.

Apparently, little Shengwu (胜武) had more in common with his uncle (and namesake) than his father, because the child gurgled with laughter and batted at the doll when it was dangled in front of him.

“果然是未来的武林盟主， (As expected, [he’s] a future warrior chief,)” said Fang Wu, laughing.

“他的确很像你。 (He is indeed very much like you.)” Fang Wen treated his brother to an indulgent smile.

Though Fang Wen still thought it was sad that he and his brother had been deprived of many years of growing up together, he was thankful, not for the first time, that they had remained close, somehow transcending the barriers of time and distance.

~~~⚽~~~

Vi.vii – Fang Wu

Seeing his brother’s happiness ought to be enough. Fang Wu could have no other pleasure, when he deserved none.

Life was slow here, giving him much leisure and solitude for lamenting the blindness of his own pride and the blunders of his own calculations should he so wish. But there was a simplicity about his daily routine that offered him a welcome respite. Every day, he bought fresh produce from elderly street vendors, helped his brother and sister-in-law with laundry and diaper changes, and played with his baby nephew whenever the child was awake.

For the Winter Solstice, they made the traditional dessert of 汤圆tangyuan. The sense of companionship as they rolled the spherical rice flour dumplings by hand was worth this impromptu visit, Fang Wu decided. Had he remained in Singapore, he would most likely have been trapped spending the Winter Solstice and Christmas with Lele.  He hoped that with some weeks to cool off, it wouldn’t be so horribly awkward anymore when they inevitably ran into each other at the foot of their block.

Eid, or Hari Raya Puasa as it was called in Singapore, would fall on the 23^rd of December, two days after the Winter Solstice. A part of Fang Wu wished he could be there with Atiqah and her family to break their fast.  But he had been hasty and precipitate too many times when a more deliberate approach might have served him better. Rebounding from Lele to Atiqah in a pinch would look horrible and be respectful to neither of them.

Besides, after he returned to Singapore and ascertained Atiqah’s level of romantic interest in him, Fang Wu would still have to figure out how he fit in with her personal beliefs and choices. With the deeper insight gained from residing in a country with a substantial Muslim population, he could now see that Muslim life was more nuanced than he had previously believed.

In Singapore, Malay Muslims were a racial minority. But they were numerous enough to become a prominent pillar of society anyway. Malay was one of the four national languages, Muslim holidays were observed on the national public holiday calendar, and halal establishments were widely available.  Within a society that respected Muslims but wasn’t exclusively Islamic, observance of the Muslim faith was more like a spectrum than a binary concept. 

It was possible – and much more accepted in Singapore than in Spain – to wrap one’s entire life around Islam. Fang Wu had seen children who attended madrasahs (Islamic religious schools) instead of the mainstream local education system. Madrasah pupils were easily identifiable by their uniforms, which incorporated elements of Malay traditional dress. Some local families even dressed their daughters in headscarves at preschool age.

However, these were the minority among Singapore’s Malay Muslims. Far more of them, including Atiqah and her family, studied and worked in mainstream Singaporean society with nothing to set them apart except for the occasional donning of Malay traditional attire and their adherence to a halal diet.  If they prayed during the day, it was done so discreetly that hardly anyone else noticed.

At the hot pot dinner, Atiqah’s sister, Aizah, had mentioned that some Muslims drank alcohol. It didn’t mean that the rules of Islam were flexible, just that people’s private decisions on how they observed Islam (or not) varied widely. If Fang Wu were to convert, he was determined to show proper respect for the rules, but he hadn’t realised that the standards he’d set for himself might exceed those of some people who had been born Muslim.

From eight years ago, Fang Wu knew one thing: the 19-year-old Atiqah had been willing to consider his suit, if he would convert to Islam for her. Still, he didn’t know whether over the years, her views towards having a non-Malay partner might have changed.

But one thing gave him hope: despite her straitened finances, she’d been willing to pay extra to watch the Chinese Super League.

Which meant that most likely, she’d watched all his club matches. Was this for him?

Fang Wu stayed with his brother through Christmas, before he had to return for the start of the school year. The night before he left, he confessed everything.

In particular, it felt good to unburden one thing to his brother: his sense of guilt from having been unfair to Atiqah for so long. First through his overly precipitate offer of courtship eight years ago, and now for having been emotionally closed to her when he had the chance to reconcile.

“我亏欠她太多, (I’ve let her down too much,)” he lamented. “如果是你，你会原谅我吗？ (If it were you [in her shoes], would you forgive me?)”

“有时候，你也需要宽容自己, (Sometimes, you need to be more forgiving of yourself,)” Fang Wen replied. “告诉我，如果没有那种障碍，你还会那么做吗？ (Tell me, if you didn’t have that barrier [of religion], would you still have done things that way?)”

“绝对不会！ (Of course not!)” Fang Wu exclaimed, recoiling in horror. “我会好好地追求她。 (I would have courted her properly.)”

“当时你毫无选择，也不算是你的错。 (At that time, you had no choice, so it shouldn’t be considered your fault.)”  Fang Wen reassured him.

Hearing someone blame him less than he had blamed himself was an unexpected relief to Fang Wu. Perhaps he should have confided in his siblings sooner; he knew he would have, if he’d known they wouldn’t think less of him for his folly.

“但我想问你, (But I would like to ask you,)” Fang Wen continued, “中国女孩儿多的是，为什么你偏要选一位穆斯林人? (There are so many ladies in China, why would you insist on choosing a Muslim?)”

“她的天分绝无仅有，我一看就迷上了， (Her talent is so exceptional that I was bewitched at first sight,)” Fang Wu replied.

“生活对象，是凭天分来选吗？ (Do you choose a life partner by their talent?)” enquired Fang Wen, quirking an eyebrow.

It was a very good question, and this was the reason why Fang Wu needed his sensible big brother to counsel him.

Of course, Fang Wu had been dazzled by Atiqah because she was a prodigy. And yet he would give himself the credit for making every effort not to take advantage of her youth.

He hadn’t counted how many times he’d watched her training sessions before approaching her, but back then, he’d been content to admire her skills from a distance. Only when he couldn’t stand the injustice of her perennial loneliness had he stepped forward to offer his companionship.

With such lavish recommendations as her talent and character offered, he could not have possibly failed to fall in love. But now, all the sheen of the prodigy was gone. He had come to know her as a neighbour, someone who blended in the crowd, but still her best qualities shone through like a beacon of light.  If given the chance to defend her case, he wished nothing more than to make sure it was known that she was special.

“我还可以说， (And I will add,)” Fang Wu declared, “她是一位佳人。 (She is a [unusually] good person.)”

“那么，你要回去好好得追她， (Then, you must go back and court her well,)” Fang Wen advised enthusiastically. “你还在等什么？ (What are you waiting for?)”

“你觉得我还有机会吗？ (Do you think I still have a chance?) 好马不吃回头草 （A good horse doesn’t return to old pastures,）” quoted Fang Wu, referencing an old Chinese proverb.

“你可别忘记下一句， (You shouldn’t forget the next part [of that saying],)” Fang Wen reminded him. “浪子回头金不换。 (A prodigal who returns is more valuable than gold.)”

Under that starless sky, in the silence of a village far away from the hustle that Fang Wu had gotten used to since before his teens, the two brothers sat in silent acknowledgment. Clapping his hand on his brother’s shoulder, Fang Wen offered one last encouragement before he retired for the night.

“小弟，我祝你好运， (Little brother, I wish you luck),” he said.

Left alone once again with his thoughts, Fang Wu could not help but marvel at the sense of vindication that now surged through him. Eight was an auspicious number, but he would have denied that this hiatus of that many years was anything but untoward.  Except that now, he had come to learn how truly lucky he was.

He had been a prodigal. But he was on the cusp of his return.  This was his chance to make things right.

A prodigal who came back was worth more than gold. If he could be worth even half of that to her, he would call himself the most fortunate man in the world.

Chapter Text

The month of Ramadan - late November 2033 (Note: This chapter runs parallel in time to Part VI.)

Taxi drivers, Atiqah knew, considered her the bane of their existence.

She felt guilty for not taking Eusoff out more often to let him participate in society.  Our Tampines Hub, a mega-facility with sporting and community facilities for residents of all ages, had regular wellness and social activities for seniors.  But one kilometre was too far for Eusoff to walk, and Atiqah didn’t want him to trip and fall getting on and off the public feeder bus.

So, every time they went there, Atiqah would get a taxi or call a Grab, and deal with the driver’s chagrin at the short and unprofitable trip. Aizah gave her a stash of cash to tip the drivers to ensure they received fair compensation, but Atiqah still felt a stab of remorse over the justified surliness with which she and Eusoff were often greeted.

If on any occasion the taxi driver was kind to them, Atiqah felt even worse. It was hard to earn money in a world where the cost of living was spiralling up. Taxi and Grab drivers’ margins were razor thin. So, anyone who willingly gave up their profits to ferry an elderly man and his daughter was an angel.

During Ramadan, though, one was supposed to do good deeds. Atiqah hoped to be altruistic enough not to expect rewards, but it couldn’t hurt that virtuous acts were multiplied in this holy month.  That gave her an extra incentive to power through discomfort to do things which were unpleasant for her, but good for her father.

Zumba, cooking classes, brisk walking, and gardening were among the many activities available for seniors at Our Tampines Hub. At 55, Eusoff was younger than most of the senior citizens who attended People’s Association (PA) active ageing programmes. But with his unwillingness to use his prosthetic foot to its full potential, he behaved twenty years older than he really was.

Atiqah was used to standing out as the only young person attending the seniors’ activities. Or at least, the only one who wasn’t a domestic helper. Unlike the helpers, Atiqah participated zealously to encourage her father to enjoy himself.  Sadly, her efforts, which often felt uncomfortably performative, were often futile because Eusoff was perfectly satisfied to do nothing.

The volunteers often took pity on Atiqah and gave Eusoff extra attention to coax him to participate. Therefore, when another pair of brown hands came into her field of vision as she harvested worm compost for the Eco-Community Garden, she wasn’t entirely surprised.

Surely, this was the month when every Malay person was trying to do good, after all.

“Encik (Mister), come, let me help you,” said the owner of the hands, addressing her father even though he was taking the worm compost from her.

“It’s OK,” said Atiqah instinctively. “I can manage.”

In truth, she hated handling worm poop, but she accepted that this was the eco-friendly way to make fertiliser. And community gardening was one of the few activities that wasn’t too fast paced for Eusoff to fully participate in.

“I need practice, anyway,” the man demurred, taking over the task of harvesting from her. “I just started volunteering here – by the way, my name is Said bin Eusoff.”

Malays didn’t have surnames. Instead, their last names were their fathers’ names.  Therefore, sharing the last name of “Eusoff” didn’t mean Said and Atiqah were related in any way, only that they both had fathers named Eusoff.

“Are you volunteering for Ramadan?” asked Eusoff.

Atiqah couldn’t blame her father for being nosy when Said looked far too young to be a retiree. By her estimation, he was probably in his late thirties, at most about forty.  Global warming was making it increasingly uncomfortable to wear long pants in Singapore without air-conditioning, but he was decked out in hipster-style skinny jeans and a loose plaid button-down thrown over a T-shirt. Definitely overdressed for a neighbourhood community centre, though Atiqah was the pot calling the kettle black since, in the interest of modesty, she’d swapped her shorts out for jeans.

“I just sold my company, so I thought it might be nice to help out in the community until I get my next idea,” explained Said. “Just in time for Ramadan, not bad, right?”

“What type of company was it?” Atiqah asked. She was intrigued that Said had apparently made enough of a windfall not to work. It was far more common for the Chinese, who had a killer instinct for money, to strike it rich than the Malays, who preferred to take life slowly.

“We grew biomass in Indonesia. Quite a good business lah, every Singaporean wants to travel, right? This is the stuff that keeps planes flying even with the end of fossil fuels.”

Travel was only a theoretical notion for Atiqah.  Even when she’d lived in Barcelona, she hadn’t been at liberty to go elsewhere except for competitions. Aizah added to their growing collection of bric-a-bracs after every official trip, but even she travelled mostly within the region, and only for work.

Yet Atiqah knew that hers wasn’t the typical Singapore experience. Even at the neighbourhood primary and secondary schools she’d attended before going to Spain, she’d had classmates whose parents took them overseas twice a year or more. And those whose parents couldn’t afford to go on family holidays earned money through part-time jobs to do so after they graduated. Singapore was a small island, and people were naturally curious about the world beyond it.

Sometime in the distant future, perhaps Atiqah’s appetite for travel might change. But for now, she simply saw no point in coveting things that weren’t available to her.  That was a principle which she’d been forced to apply lately to matters other than travel, too.

“When my children have the money, I want to go on the haj,” declared Eusoff.  Atiqah knew he’d say that, because he’d been wishing for it since she and her siblings were children.

The haj was a pilgrimage to the holy city of Mecca in Saudi Arabia, the birthplace of the Prophet Muhammed. Every adult Muslim was expected to make this journey once in a lifetime if they were physically and financially able to do so.

“Actually, the haj was the first thing I did when I had enough money to travel,” Said acknowledged breezily. “It was my father’s dream, too. I was, like, 28, I think? Anyway, it was about a year after I finished uni.”

“So, you took your dad on the haj.” Atiqah couldn’t help smiling at Said.

She wasn’t fazed by Said’s admission that he had graduated at a later age than most. With two years of mandatory military service, men in Singapore normally got out of uni at 24 or 25. Rather, it impressed Atiqah that Said’s first priority had been to fulfil his father’s wish, above the many places that must be more interesting to people of their generation. When they set aside enough money to do so, she and Aizah aimed to do the same.

“Yah, that was his first time going out of Singapore. My first time, too.” Said grinned. “When I was young, we were poor. My father was a condo security guard his whole life. I never thought I could get a windfall and give my parents everything.”

Atiqah wasn’t surprised that Eusoff perked up upon hearing that Said had more in common with them than they might imagine.  Despite the equality of opportunity across the races in education and employment, the Malays were over-represented in the lower-income groups because they valued religion and community more than paper qualifications and money, unlike their Chinese and Indian counterparts.

Malays who rose above their disadvantaged circumstances and did well were highly estimable, and even more so when they honoured their roots and family ties.  Madam Halimah Yacob, the eighth President of Singapore, had been such.  Born to an Indian father and a Malay mother, Madam Halimah had grown up in the humblest of households. Her father had died when she was eight. The youngest of five siblings supported by their widowed mother, she had worked at her mother’s food stall since the age of 10.

The empowerment given to American children by telling them that they could become the next President rang hollow compared to witnessing a Malay woman who had grown up in a one-room rental HDB flat taking on one of the highest offices in the government. Although the Prime Minister, as the head of government, was responsible for all the major policy decisions, the President served as a ceremonial head of state and had custodial duties of the national budget.

It had been even more inspiring to see that at the time of her appointment to office in an uncontested election, Madam Halimah had still lived in a HDB flat. At the time, Atiqah had been an impressionable 11-year-old in Primary Five. She never forgot the sense of pride that she’d felt, all through her tween and teen years, at seeing her country represented by a woman in a tudung.

Every Malay rags-to-riches story – her former President’s, Aizah’s, and now Said’s – was a comforting reminder to Atiqah that social mobility in Singapore was very much alive.  Self-made success was something she liked to root for.

“Which condo?” asked Eusoff.

“Erm, I think it was called Kellynch Hall?” Said scratched his head. “Anyway, it was really far, my dad had to ride his motorbike every day.”

“Kellynch Hall? I was security guard there too! Ah, so your father was on the other shift, is it? Now I remember, he was also called Eusoff!”

Atiqah hadn’t seen her father crack such a wide smile since his diagnosis.  It had never entered her consciousness that he might miss his old life so much.

“Orr!” A look of comprehension dawned on Said’s face. “So, Pakcik, you are the other Eusoff! My dad used to talk about you, he said you rode a Vespa!”

“And your father rode a Kawasaki!” Eusoff hadn’t been this animated in years, Atiqah realised. She’d been so focused on her father’s physical needs that she hadn’t thought much about his emotional ones.  Surely, it was a gift from Allah to allow her father to reconnect with the family of his old colleague, especially in the month of Ramadan!

“We should visit your father,” suggested Eusoff. “You still stay in Tampines?”

“Yah, we stay on the other side, Tampines Street 41. I bought an exec maisonette five years ago,” announced Said with visible pride.

Surreptitiously, Atiqah checked the time on her phone. True enough, the hour was almost up – and surely, it had been rude of them to monopolise Said’s time.

“Said,” she interjected, “do you need to help other people?”

“S --!” Said swore, glancing at his smartwatch. “I should be helping to wrap up in a few minutes. Thanks for reminding me, I totally forgot about the time.”

“No problem.” Atiqah waved him off with a smile. “Sorry we held you up, please do whatever you need to do.”

“Do you all have transport later? I can give you a lift if you need,” offered Said.

“Wah, thank you so much! Where should we wait for you?” Eusoff’s ready acceptance of an offer of transport from a stranger surprised Atiqah. If he trusted people so readily, what kind of security guard had he been?

But then, Eusoff had worked with Said’s father. It was her to whom Said was a stranger, not her father, she realised. She’d still been in school when Eusoff had been working, so naturally, there had been no reason for her to cross paths with her father’s colleague’s son who was so much older than her.

And besides, Atiqah recalled, she’d once allowed someone to walk her back to her dorm on much less prior acquaintance.  All she had known about Fang Wu, at the very beginning of their relationship, was that he had played as a pro at the same club where she had trained, and that he was Chinese.  Those were hardly good reasons to trust somebody, yet she had done so instantly.

Surely, with Said’s business success and his current occupation as a People’s Association (PA) volunteer, there could be no doubt of his being a sensible man.  Ten minutes were enough to certify that.

And his black BMW X5 with M Sport coloured trim on its kidney grille was so extravagant that it made her jaw drop.  Prices of cars were so beyond her reach that Atiqah didn’t keep track of them, but she knew a luxury vehicle could outprice a small HDB flat.

“It’s second-hand,” rationalised Said with an apologetic attempt at modesty. “I don’t really need it now that I’m not in business anymore, but I might as well run out the rest of my COE (Certificate of Entitlement).”

Instead of dropping them off at their void deck, Said parked the car and helped Eusoff all the way to their front door. There had been only one other person who had done that in the recent past. Towards her father, Said’s manners were so exactly what they ought to be, so polished, so easy, so agreeable, that she could compare them in excellence to only one other person’s manners. They were not the same, but they were, perhaps, equally good.

Said didn’t address Atiqah directly until he left them at their gate. “You’re the daughter, right?” he asked, just before he took his leave.

“I’m the second daughter. My name is Atiqah.” Awkwardly, she wondered if she should extend her hand so he should shake it.  Western manners would dictate so, but Muslim conduct didn’t require it.

“Pleased to meet you, Atiqah.” She realised that Said wasn’t looking at her hand, but at her face. 

Honestly, with her tudung, her face was all that anyone might look at. Atiqah felt self-conscious that her loose long sleeve T-shirt and jeans were decidedly more casual than Said’s hipster outfit, even though it was evident that Said (while completely a gentleman in manner) admired her exceedingly.

“Thanks for taking care of my father.” Atiqah didn’t know why she found Said’s attention just as awkward as it was flattering.  At her age, she shouldn’t be unaccustomed to men admiring her. It was pathetic – it spoke of how little she went out into the world.

“No problem. Eh, I gave Pakcik my number, so next time you come to the CC (community centre), text me, OK? I can come and drive you.” Said waved his phone at her to say goodbye.

“OK.” Atiqah knew she ought to feel elated at this solution to her predicament. She could take her father to community activities without having to feel bad about making taxi drivers lose money.

So, why didn’t she? A filial, devout, kind, and rich Malay man had just befriended her father. There were so many aspects of Said that were worthy of respect, yet she hesitated at the prospect of becoming too beholden to him. Knowing that her reasons might not fully stand up to scrutiny, she avoided thinking about them too deeply.

~~~⚽~~~

“How many cans should we get?” Atiqah was shopping with Aizah at the NTUC (National Trades Union Congress) FairPrice supermarket opposite their block. Xixi’s and Xiaoming’s engagement photo, backlit with the sunset at Bedok Jetty, had just popped up on their Instagram feeds, which meant they needed to prepare a gift.

“There’s four of them, right? So, one can each will look stingy, but maybe we can do two cans each? Or three? There’s three of us working, so yah, let’s do four times three.” The supermarket shelf looked pitifully bare after Aizah divested it of twelve cans of abalone.

Four of them – of course. Atiqah had to get used to the fact that Fang Wu was nearly a part of Xixi and Lele’s family now. There could not be a doubt, to her mind there was none, of what would follow before long. When she only had to swipe left on Xixi’s engagement Instagram post to reveal a shot of the two couples feasting on chili crab by the sea, the prospect of one engagement engendering another was inevitable.

“Come, come, come!” Xixi ushered Aizah and Atiqah into her flat eagerly when the sisters arrived carrying two reusable bags with six cans each. “Wah, you didn’t have to spend so much money, this must have cost a lot!”

“It’s just a small gift,” replied Aizah modestly. Two hundred and forty dollars wasn’t a small amount to Atiqah, but she knew Aizah would consider anything less inappropriately stingy for a once-in-a-lifetime event like this, given the (theoretical) number of working adults in the family.  To keep up with her university friends, Aizah imposed upper-middle-class expectations on the expenditures which were visible to others.

“I’m so happy for you!” Atiqah exclaimed, throwing her arms around Xixi in a hug. 

“Come and hug me too!” Lele launched herself at Atiqah the moment she let go of Xixi. “I hope there will be another happy occasion soon.”

It was a relief, Atiqah decided, that neither of the gentlemen were visiting with Xixi and Lele at the moment.  How awkward it would be – beyond awkward – to congratulate them on this long-awaited engagement with the tacit anticipation of another!

Had the men been present, even hugging Xixi and Lele would have drawn up memories of what she might have once wished to do with one of them, even if they had never acted on that impulse.

Was it true, then, that a man and a woman could never be alone, because the third person among them was the devil?

Perhaps it was, because Atiqah could not speak the name of Fang Wu, and look straight forward to anybody’s eye.  She’d become so selfish that she couldn’t even offer anticipatory congratulations to Lele.

“We’re going home for Chinese New Year,” Lele barrelled on, thankfully not waiting for any response from her. “And this time, we’ll be staying for fifteen days. I can’t wait, it’s so exciting to show Xiaowu my home and my family!”

“And since Xiaoming is getting posted to Chengdu, Lele and Fang Wu can have this flat all to themselves!” squealed Xixi.

“Wah, Xiaoming got promoted? You’re so lucky, congrats!” Aizah pounced on Xixi, sparking off another round of enthusiastic hugging and joyful exclamations.

This flat, the one next to Atiqah’s, would almost certainly become the matrimonial home of Fang Wu and Zheng Xinle.  A few months hence, and it might be filled with all that was glowing and bright in prosperous love, all that was most unlike her!

It could be the last time she would feel comfortable visiting this place, Atiqah realised. For the past four years, her family and the Zheng sisters had gone back and forth between their flats, exchanging food gifts and simply hanging out to chat. She and Aizah had been trusted confidantes in every aspect of the sisters’ love lives.

But once Fang Wu and Lele were married, this chapter would have to close. Leaving their neighbourly relationship open, at least on her end, would be tantamount to inviting back the devil which never ceased to haunt her every moment in that gentleman’s presence.

This was goodbye, then, to the flat which would continue to exist, but which would never be the same again to her. It stood the record of many sensations of pain, once severe, but now softened; and of some instances of relenting feeling, some breathings of friendship and reconciliation, which could never be looked for again, and which could never cease to be dear.

Aizah’s, Lele’s, and Xixi’s voices continued in happy animation, completely oblivious to Atiqah’s quietness.

“Next time, please take a picture with Le Le for us, OK? I mean, Le Le the panda, not you!” Naturally Aizah, who so loved travelling, was beyond thrilled about Xiaoming’s future posting to Chengdu.

“Why not me? I’m not cuter than a panda?” Lele pretended to sulk in mock disappointment, but the perky lilt in her voice betrayed what she really knew. Of course, Lele was cute, and Atiqah was sure no man in the world existed who’d deny that.

“You got someone else to take pictures of you already,” Aizah teased, chuckling. “Don’t be so greedy, can or not?”

“I can’t help it if everyone loves me,” declared Lele. “And after both of us are married, we will find some nice Muslim guys for you! I mean, both of you. Atiqah, where are you?”

“I’m here.” Popping up from where she had hunched in a corner of the sectional while Aizah and the Zheng sisters were gathered around the dining table, Atiqah waved feebly to indicate that she wasn’t ignoring them.

“I was saying – Atiqah, are you OK?” Self-centred as Lele could be, she still had a kind heart. That was why the Zheng sisters were such good friends with Atiqah and Aizah. But much as she would have appreciated Lele’s friendly concern at other times, Atiqah wished that Lele could have remained oblivious to this.

“Yah, yah, I’m fine.” Atiqah forced a smile. “Did you say you’re going to the city of pandas? How cute!”

“Yes! Chengdu is the home of the pandas.” Plopping herself next to Atiqah on the sofa, Xixi scrolled through her phone to pull up a panda video. “It’s so sweet that they only mate with the one they love, just like me!

“We used to think they would go extinct, because it was so hard to breed them! People tried all kinds of ways to get pandas to have babies: they created ‘panda porn’ for the boy pandas, they did artificial insemination… Xiaoming told me the Le Le panda baby from Singapore was born that way.

“But then, when they let the pandas move around on their own, they found out pandas don’t really have such a low sex drive after all. They were so much better at having babies when they could find another panda they liked, instead of people choosing for them! And now, they’re not endangered anymore!”

Oh no, thought Atiqah, I’m a panda. And with an unavailable panda mate, the idea of such monogamy didn’t warrant the cutesy heart-hands Xixi was making over the subject.

It was utterly depressing that even a topic as innocuous as pandas could remind her of the hopelessness of her situation. Holding the phone that Xixi had handed her, she pretended to be engrossed in panda photos until Aizah tapped her on the shoulder and told her it was time to leave.

“I truly congratulate you,” Atiqah said to Xixi as they parted at the door. With some effort, she added, “Both of you.”

Lele deserved graciousness, for her well-earned and impending domestic bliss. Atiqah knew how long Lele had been waiting for a man who would commit, the way Xiaoming had to Xixi, and that Fang Wu would be the husband she deserved. For Atiqah had no doubt that Fang Wu would be a good husband for anyone.

“Thank you.” Xixi’s eyes were shining. “I can’t wait to invite you to the wedding dinner, we can do a no pork no lard table for you.”

“We’re looking forward to it!” Aizah’s effusiveness was enough for the two of them, Atiqah noted with some relief.

They left the flat then, and she left it all behind her, all but the recollection that such things had been. If Atiqah mourned at all for the briefness of her reconnection with Fang Wu – briefer even than their initial acquaintance in Barcelona had been – she could never show it. At her flat where she even shared a bedroom with her sister, there was no space for the tears that pricked threateningly at her eyes.

Her past with Fang Wu was a haram secret which Atiqah had never shared with her family because one’s sins were private. Perhaps it was a blessing from Allah, she decided, that things could be left to end like this. With Fang Wu married to her neighbour, everything would be safe enough. She would no longer bemoan the many anxious feelings she had wasted on the subject when forced to lock away the past and keep her eyes on the future.

Hadn’t she wished, just weeks ago, that she didn’t have to see Fang Wu falling in love with and marrying a Chinese woman? And yet, here she was grieving the loss of the scraps of friendship and kindness that Fang Wu had tossed to her. All this contradictory thinking made hardly any sense to her. Why couldn’t she just be logical and either accept him as an indifferent neighbour, or forget about him completely?

If trying to move on (though she would never forget) was the only way Atiqah could expunge her sin for good, she decided she ought to be thankful for it. 

~~~⚽~~~

Before Atiqah could plan for another outing to Our Tampines Hub with her father, Said texted Eusoff with an invitation to his flat to visit his parents.

“Ayah can’t wait to see you,” he said eagerly to Eusoff while helping him into the front passenger seat of his BMW. “He misses working, too.”

Everybody missed working – Atiqah certainly did, especially when her work had also been a sport she loved.  But to admit it would sound too much like a resentment of her filial duty.

Said’s block was on the other side of the town centre from theirs, close to Gongshang Primary which was the most over-subscribed school in Tampines. It was certain that his flat was worth more than S$1 million. Atiqah’s family home was not too shabby either – if they sold their flat, they would get S$800K at least – but cash-poor as they were, they’d never sell because it would be impossible to afford another place with the same combination of space and accessibility.

Nonetheless, the real indicator of Said’s disposable income was not the size and location of his flat, but the industrial-chic décor that could not have been achieved without the heavy hand of an architect and an interior designer.

Executive maisonettes, which were designed to give the illusion of living in a house instead of an apartment, measured 1,700 square feet and had two storeys with a balcony on the lower floor. With its bold black panel walls and fittings, every square foot of Said’s flat screamed “bachelor pad”.  Even the original stairs had been hacked away and replaced with a black metal spiral staircase.

Despite the relentlessly modern interior, Said’s parents, Eusoff and Fatimah, seemed highly traditional. They’d dressed in baju kurung (Malay traditional attire) even though this was a casual home gathering.  So had Eusoff and Atiqah, lending a strange air of formality to this meeting which was ostensibly a reunion between two former colleagues.

“Brother!” The two Eusoffs heartily exchanged pats on the back. Atiqah was heartened to see her father rekindle an old friendship. She knew he’d been isolated and lonely, especially after he lost his foot.

There were lots of things the two Eusoffs had to catch up on. They reminisced about their old motorcycles, discussed the changes in their neighbourhoods, and boasted about the achievements of their children.

“You know, my son was in the newspapers,” Said’s father said, pointing to a framed Straits Times article on the wall. “From zero to hero! You think N(T) (Normal (Technical) Stream) hopeless already, right? Who thought he can go university?”

Compared to the awkward and scruffy young man pictured in the newspaper cutting, Said had visibly aged. His underbite had gotten more prominent, and he had gained weight. Nonetheless, with maturity and success he had gained a sense of sophistication, too. Or was it simply that he now had the money to buy more fashionable clothes?

Either way, Said wasn’t innately handsome, but he looked much better now than before, thanks to the hipster vibe that he’d cultivated.

From her seat, Atiqah couldn’t read the fine print of the article, only the headline. But that was enough to see that he’d made the news for getting his Bachelor’s degree at age 27 after working his way up from the Normal (Technical) stream.

“Ayah, why must you always boast about this?” protested Said. “What’s there to be proud of about being in Normal Tech?”

The Normal (Technical) Stream, also known as “Normal Tech” or “N(T)”, used to be the secondary school stream for the lowest academic achievers.  Even Azlan, who never studied, had ended up one step higher in the Normal (Academic) Stream.

Working all the way up from the bottom was a trait which Atiqah deemed worthy of respect. Normal Tech students, who were channelled into the Institute of Technical Education (ITE) for vocational training after secondary school, had to prove themselves through multiple academic promotions to enter university. Said’s road to success couldn’t have been easy, even though Atiqah was shocked that his primary school results had apparently been worse than Azlan’s.

“I think you should be proud of what you’ve achieved,” said Atiqah, surprising herself with her willingness to speak up for Said. “It means everything you have is from your own effort, because nothing was handed to you.”

“It just means I was a pai kia (Hokkien for gangster) when I was young,” remarked Said, brusquely waving Atiqah’s comment away.

“My daughter was in the papers too,” Atiqah’s father chimed in, eager to show that his family was by no means inferior. “She got a football scholarship to Barcelona when she was 14 years old only!”

“Ah, that’s why you look so familiar!” A glint of recognition came into Said’s father’s eyes. “Which team were you?”

“Tampines Rovers, 2026 to 2031,” Atiqah rattled off almost mechanically.

“So, you went to Barcelona in 2022?” Said’s mother, Fatimah, counted off the years on her fingers with creased eyebrows.

“2021, actually,” Atiqah corrected. “It was the year I was in Sec 3.”

“2021 was also Said’s graduation year,” Fatimah pointed out. “Encik, our kids made the newspapers in the same year!”

Fatimah made it sound like some crazy kind of kismet, but when she did the arithmetic, Atiqah found it meant that Said was 40. That was the uppermost part of the age range she’d pegged him in.

Perhaps the age gap was enough to explain Atiqah’s lack of reciprocity to Said’s attraction. Was that reasonable, or was it wrong to practise age discrimination? Every positive thing she learned about Said added to the pressure Atiqah felt to desire something more than friendship from him, and when she didn’t, she couldn’t stop second-guessing herself.

“So, are you married?” her father asked Said.  Atiqah could only presume that he’d been doing the maths too and found Said’s apparent singlehood at this advanced age hard to believe.

“Not yet,” replied Said. “I spent most of the last 10 years almost living in Indonesia. To make a successful business, you need to eat, sleep and breathe it, where got time?”

“Now you better hurry up, ah,” urged Said’s father. “40 years old already, still wait for what?”

“Ayah, don’t worry lah.” Rightfully, Said seemed just as eager to shut down this tangent of conversation as Atiqah felt. “Marriage is serious, cannot rush one.”

Every opinion Said uttered was either technically or politically correct. Even with his parents pushing him towards insta-love, Said was still giving Atiqah space, despite being attracted to her.  The force of unspoken expectations, Atiqah realised, could be more crushing than if those obligations had been stated out loud.

“That’s enough about me,” continued Said, deflecting the conversation. “Pakcik, how will you be celebrating Hari Raya?”

It couldn’t be denied that Said was very socially adept.  He saved the afternoon from spiralling into a nagging session about marriage by turning the conversation toward his business and the renovations in his flat. Everything he said painted Said in the best light: he had interesting and extensive knowledge about Indonesia, he was a canny entrepreneur, and his aesthetic tastes were perfectly on-trend for an affluent Millennial.

Atiqah never doubted that Said was a great guy. When he talked about how he’d cobbled together money from various odd jobs in his last year of uni to fund his parents’ haj, she had to call him a good Muslim, too. But still, in many ways that mattered, he was everything she wasn’t.

They left Said’s flat at 5 PM, late enough to give Atiqah stress about getting dinner ready in time and being late to pick up the boys from preschool. Deftly, Said put those concerns to rest by making stops at Tampines Central for them to pick up dinner, and at the boys’ preschool to take them home. He didn’t even complain about the boys leaving greasy handprints on his shiny leather seats.

Much as Atiqah was obliged to feel grateful to Said, she couldn’t help worrying that a policeman might pull them over for ferrying two preschoolers without child seats. Within a five-minute car ride, Aziz managed to defeat the purpose of being belted in by wriggling free of the adult shoulder belt. Meanwhile, the only way Atiqah could keep two-year-old Yusuf safe was to hold him on her lap, but that wasn’t legal.

Said carried Yusuf up to their flat while Atiqah held Aziz by one hand and her father by the other.  With some dread, she expected him to try to catch her eye again when he said goodbye, yet she didn’t know what to think when he didn’t.

He left them with an invitation to break their fast on Hari Raya at his flat with his family, all seven of them.  It was incredibly generous – it led Atiqah to consider that maybe he might not be interested in her after all, but simply in reconnecting their families. Perhaps she had fallen into the trap of over-thinking.

Grow up, Atiqah told herself. There was no denying that Said’s friendship would be good for her father. Having such egotistical thoughts as to believe Said was attracted to her because of just one look was an unnecessary over-complication of the situation.

She’d made the mistake once of assuming that a man and a woman couldn’t develop an attraction beyond the boundaries of race, language, and religion. Now, she wouldn’t fall into the reverse trap of assuming that because those barriers didn’t exist, romance must follow.

Atiqah might have lost all hope in one relationship, but it didn’t have to mean that she had to jump into love with the next man who came along. Said could be her friend. She could do this. He might speak of things that were beyond her world, but he was still easy to talk to.

And now that Atiqah would be losing the company of Xixi and Lele in a few months, perhaps having a new friend might be as good for her as it was for her father.

~~~⚽~~~

“It’s over,” sobbed Lele. Resting her crossed arms on the coffee table, she buried her face in them and dissolved into tears.

Lele had nearly beaten down their front door while Atiqah was tidying up the bedroom. At first, Atiqah had wondered if anyone next door might be sick or injured, but now she realised why Lele had come here, instead of going home.

Xixi and Xiaoming must be in the thick of wedding planning, especially since it was Saturday. If Lele and Fang Wu had just broken up, a blissfully engaged couple would be the last thing Lele would wish to see, and she wouldn’t want to taint their joy by inflicting her grief on them.

“Who broke it off, you or him?” asked Eusoff. “If it’s him, I can scold him for you.”

“I did,” replied Lele, her muffled voice breaking up between sobs. “I broke off with him.”

“Why?” Atiqah was perplexed. She knew Lele was eager to be in a relationship, and she hoped that Fang Wu would know his own mind early enough not to be endangering the happiness of anyone or impeaching his own honour.  Unlike Atiqah’s own situation eight years ago, there were no obstacles to a blissful marriage between Lele and him.

Putting an arm around Lele’s trembling shoulders, Atiqah grabbed a tissue and handed it to Lele under the table.

“Thanks.” Lele took the tissue, but didn’t raise her head for a very long while, though Atiqah could feel the shaking of her shoulders slowly subsiding.

In a tiny voice, Lele said, “It… it’s hopeless. He’s never been warm to me.”

The truth of that statement hit Atiqah like a sledgehammer.

She had, several times, reflected that the dynamic between Fang Wu and Lele did not yet look like love. He was friendly and jovial, and bantered with Lele in Mandarin as if it was their own secret language.

But Atiqah hadn’t seen Fang Wu discussing anything truly personal with Lele. Of course, she assumed that such conversations would probably take place behind closed doors, out of her earshot, so she couldn’t be sure that what she didn’t see wasn’t happening.

To know that such interactions had never happened left her divided between sympathy for Lele and, if her conscience allowed it, something very much like relief for herself.

Atiqah scarcely dared to keep the conversation going, unsure if she was helping Lele to achieve closure, or if she was seeking it for her own sake.

“Why do you believe that?” she finally asked, after a long period of hesitation.

Dabbing at her eyes with the tissue that Atiqah had given her, Lele raised her head, then her shoulders, straightening up and lifting her chin.

“I asked him to come with me to visit my parents for the New Year,” she said, a measured air of injured dignity creeping into her voice. “But he refused.”

“Going to meet parents for Chinese New Year is for when you want to marry already,” lectured Eusoff. “You so impatient for what? Marriage cannot be rushed - our Azlan dated Farah for two years before they got married! Why don’t you wait one more year and see?”

“It’s not even about marriage.” Lele sighed. “I taught him the phrase ‘ai stead mai’ to get him to say it to me. But he won’t even say that.  He doesn’t love me, when I loved him so much!”

“You must have,” Atiqah affirmed, though she felt blindsided by Lele’s statement. Had she been deceiving herself with her conviction that Lele hadn’t behaved any differently with Fang Wu than with all the other men who had dated her?

Or did Lele believe it was love simply because Fang Wu had stuck around the longest?

“I mean, I know a lot of girls would find him easy to love,” Lele continued. “He’s smart, he’s handsome, and he was a football celebrity back home.

“But… I thought… I was better than that, I had a chance to see the person he is inside. In Chinese, we say 正人君子 zheng ren jun zi, you know, a true gentleman?

“That’s what he is. It’s what makes him so special. Remember the time he carried your nephew back after the hot pot and made your brother help with the other one? He wouldn’t let the ladies carry the kids when the men are there to do it!”

That incident had stayed with Atiqah, too. She, Aizah, and Farah were inured to the reality of having to wrangle the boys, while also helping their father, whenever the family ventured out of their flat.  With a ratio of four adults to two rambunctious children and an amputee elder, nobody was spared from pitching in.

If Azlan was with them, he did his duty by handling one of his children. Atiqah gave her brother the credit for that. Still, it was far from enough to spare the women from physical labour.

Azlan’s kids weren’t Fang Wu’s responsibility at all, not by a long way. Yet, he was the only person who not only stood by the belief that it was unfair to make the fasting women carry the boys but also acted on it.

He’d even taken the bigger child, the one who was injured, because he’d seen Azlan bump Aziz’s shoulder by accident before.  Ending the evening with a four-year-old’s meltdown would have ruined the mood for everyone.

That was why Atiqah had such difficulty putting Fang Wu out of her mind.  And she’d given Lele far too little credit for her ability to appreciate Fang Wu’s full worth.

“Lele, do you believe in fate?” Atiqah asked. She wouldn’t speculate on why Fang Wu couldn’t commit to Lele, but she could draw some cold comfort from one thing: she and Lele were now in the same boat.  There would be no need for her to stifle any jealousy for her neighbour.

“I don’t want to,” replied Lele staunchly. “Do you know why the Ne Zha film broke so many records? It’s because he says, ‘我命由我不由天 wo ming you wo bu you tian’. My fate is up to me, not to God. Everyone wants to believe that. I want to, and I did. But maybe you’re right; some things are just not up to me.”

“Lele,” Atiqah pulled her friend into a tight hug, burying her face in Lele’s shoulder. “I think all of us need to accept that there will be things not meant for us. It isn’t anybody’s fault.”

“I know.” Lele hugged back, and Atiqah could feel Lele’s tears soaking through her T-shirt. “Now I do.”

Atiqah wished that she could let her own tears fall.  But just as it had been Lele’s prerogative to love Fang Wu when Atiqah couldn’t, Lele now had the right to openly display her heartbreak, which Atiqah never had.

~~~⚽~~~

Said didn’t wait for Hari Raya to hang out again. Immediately after the two Eusoffs met, they set up a WhatsApp group chat for both families. The first post on that chat came from Said, requesting permission to come by that Sunday to meet all the siblings, which was willingly granted.

Eusoff had described the visit to Said’s flat so vividly that Aizah and Azlan were full of curiosity about their wealthy new friend. While Aizah was intrigued by the possibility of conversation with someone as educated as she was, Azlan cared more about the down-to-earth matter of raiding Said’s video library.

Azlan: “do u hv netflix?”

Said: “sure do. netflix, hulu, everything”

Azlan: “can bring laptop anot?”

Said: “np”

Said was an immediate hit with Atiqah’s siblings, but most of that was due to cupboard love.

Streaming wasn’t in the family budget since they were already paying for local cable TV on Starhub. When Atiqah started buying the Sports+ package to watch Chinese Super League, Aizah gave up HBO so their total cable bill wouldn’t increase. It mattered little to Aizah, who got her HBO fix from hotels during work trips, but Azlan complained constantly about not having access to American programmes that ‘everybody’ was talking about.

Hulu, which wasn’t locally available in Singapore, was too unattainable for them to even dream of. When they were already pinching pennies on cable, getting a VPN was far down the list of non-essentials.

“Have you watched Ramy?” Said asked the sisters, while Azlan browsed the video library on his laptop.

“No,” said Atiqah, “but I’ve always been OK without streaming. I only need Channel News Asia and football to make me happy.”

“I’d like to,” said Aizah, “and since you have Hulu, why not?”

Watching an American drama whose opening sequence showed people standing in line at a mosque was a transformative experience. Local TV aired Malay programming on the free Suria channel, but this was the first time Atiqah saw a Western TV show depicting Muslim life in such detail.

It was refreshing to see Muslims portrayed as everyday people on Western media, instead of being stereotyped as terrorists. Yet, this story was nothing like her lived reality.

“I think Ramy is a horrible person,” Atiqah blurted out at the end of Episode 1. 

Almost immediately, she regretted saying it, in case she hurt Said’s feelings.  She needn’t have worried, because Said agreed enthusiastically.

“I think so too,” he said. “Will you tell me why?”

“Because he got the seriousness of the sins wrong!” Atiqah threw up her hands in exasperation. “How can he call himself a practicing Muslim when he thinks nothing of committing the second worst sin and sweats all the small ones?

“Just because he commits it with non-Muslims doesn’t mean HE isn’t committing it! What a hypocrite!”

At the end of Atiqah’s diatribe, Said gave her a hearty round of applause.

“I agree with everything you said. Yes, he’s a hypocrite. But do such hypocrites exist? I think you know the answer as well as I do.”

They were talking about zina (fornication), but of course, none of them would speak the word out loud. It was the second worst Islamic crime next to murder.

Participating in American hookup culture, for Muslims, was a crime that was technically punishable by 100 strokes of the cane.  In Singapore, just like in the West, the punishment might not be meted out, but Atiqah didn’t think it possible to justify hooking up without a crazy amount of moral whiplash.

“I think Atiqah has a point,” said Aizah. “When Crazy Rich Asians came out, everyone was up in arms about what it meant for Chinese representation. If this is supposed to be Muslim representation, I agree it isn’t our story.”

Atiqah knew Aizah would be just as proud and happy as she was that this wasn’t their story.  Watching Ramy left her with a deep sense of just how privileged she was.

Malays were indigenous to Singapore, and Islam was respected and supported, but not militantly enforced.  Atiqah and her family were able to practice her religion freely with neither draconian punishment for their sins, nor discrimination from non-Muslims despite being an ethnic minority.

This supportive environment was why Atiqah could spend the four most impressionable years of her life in Spain, and yet not be tempted into the permissiveness of the local culture.  She had come home with her faith intact.  That ought to be a justifiable reason for pride, she felt.

“No, it’s not,” agreed Said. “But this is American TV. People like to watch trainwrecks.”

“This is definitely a trainwreck,” said Atiqah, “but we’re still paying money to watch it.”

“That’s because nothing is seen until it’s seen by the US,” observed Said. “Why did you think I bought my VPN?”

“But you agree,” said Atiqah with a smile, “that a good Muslim is one who truly believes in the principle of what they are practicing and makes their best effort to avoid sin?”

“That isn’t a good Muslim,” replied Said. “That’s the best. A good Muslim just needs to fast, pray, and repent his sins.”

“I’m a good Muslim,” Azlan chimed in. “I married the first girl who made me want to jerk off, so I never sinned.”

“You?” Aizah playfully swung a cushion at her brother. “Come on lah, how can you call yourself a good Muslim when you can’t even support your own kids?”

“I can,” protested Azlan. “Who pays for all the toys?”

“And who pays for all the food?” retorted Aizah.

“You do,” admitted Azlan. “But the amount Farah and I pay every month is just as much as you.”

That was true, too. Raising kids in middle-class Singapore was highly competitive and came with staggering costs. As the person who did the accounts in the family, Atiqah knew that Azlan and Farah’s monthly expenditure exceeded the total of everyone else’s.

If they hadn’t had children, Azlan and Farah might have been able to squeak by. But when private tuition bills would replace preschool fees after the boys started primary school, it would be a long time before they’d be able to contribute anything meaningful to the household at large.

“Brother, you’re not bad already,” Said reassured Azlan. “I couldn’t support my parents until I was 30.”

Men valued their support to the family in terms of the money they raked in, but what about the work Atiqah did to keep the house running? What was the value of that, when with no formal earnings (only a spending allowance from Aizah), its worth on paper was nothing?

As if he had read Atiqah’s thoughts, Said jumped in to defend her case.

“Actually, I think giving money is taking the easy way out,” he said. “We need to give more credit to the women who do the heavy lifting.” He raised his can of Coke Zero to Atiqah in a mock toast.

For too long, Atiqah had been accustomed to her contributions being overlooked because of their lack of monetary value. The men patted themselves on the back whenever they raked in a dollar (look at Azlan!) but the hard physical labour she did every day was taken for granted, even by her family who loved her.

Though Atiqah couldn’t fully agree with Said’s sense of patriarchy and could not believe in their having the same sort of piety, she was pleased with him for acknowledging her sacrifices for her family.  Her conscience also admitted that while Said spent too much money chasing American culture, it was more than excusable in the light of the worldliness he needed to make it in business. At least, he saw the disconnect of compromising one’s faith to fit into Western Millennial culture as clearly as she did.

“Hey, women can be the breadwinners, too!” protested Aizah, giving Said a playful whack with the sofa cushion she’d been hugging. “Look at me!”

In retrospect, Atiqah would eventually see that this was the closest her sister had come to physically touching any man in her presence. But in that moment, she was too caught up in Said’s praise to realise it.

~~~⚽~~~

By the time the two families met to break their fast on Hari Raya Puasa, Said was nearly a fixture in Eusoff’s and Atiqah’s lives. 

Not only had they seen him at a few more community activities, but he also dropped by regularly at their flat to watch TV.  Because of his familiarity with Western pop culture, he was considered a firm friend of all the family members from her generation, including Farah.

Said was incredibly skilful at pleasing everybody. Azlan forgave Said for knowing nothing about video games because he generously streamed the Western TV shows they didn’t normally get to watch.  Eusoff overlooked the permissiveness portrayed in those shows because, as an international businessman, Said had the right to be worldlier than them. And Said only needed to buy McDonald’s Happy Meals for the boys to turn Farah into putty.

Aizah continued to flirt subtly at Said, but Atiqah supposed that Said didn’t notice because she was hardly at home. In any case, Said was just as friendly to Aizah as he was to the rest of the family, but not more, and he didn’t flirt back.

For Hari Raya, Said and his parents had prepared a real spread.  Or rather, most of the work had been done by Said’s mother Fatimah, which the men gave her due credit for.

There were several variations of curry: beef rendang and the vegetable curry sayur lodeh were staunch favourites. They had ketupat, which was rice cubes wrapped in woven coconut leaves, and stir-fried prawns in sambal sauce too.

Everything was laid out on the floor, where they ate sitting cross-legged. With the furniture moved aside to create a large eating space, Said’s spacious living room looked positively cavernous.  The traditional patterned woven rug they spread out on the floor to sit on clashed with the bare stone industrial-chic flooring but gave it a splash of warmth.

Said’s pointed efforts to draw Atiqah out in conversation were painfully obvious. She wondered why he wished to single her out, when surely her sister would have more intelligent things to say. Being a university graduate, Aizah was so much more matched to Said in education than Atiqah felt herself to be.

“Did you watch Aksi Mat Yoyo when you a kid?” he asked. When the show hadn’t been called that since the 1990s, the question immediately underscored his age.

Atiqah didn’t remember which children’s programmes she’d watched. All her childhood memories were about football.

“Oh, you mean Mat Yoyo!” Aizah answered instead. “Yoyo and Yaya were so cute! Yah, I watched it in Malay and English.”

“Tell me more about Europe.” Lots of people had asked Atiqah that when she first returned, but by now that was old news. “How many countries did you visit when you were there?”

“Most of the time, I didn’t leave Spain,” said Atiqah. “I was a student, so I only travelled to compete.”

“Did you know Europe is my favourite? I go there at least once a year. Scenery, culture, history, all that cannot be beat!”

That had to be expensive again, another indication of the wide gulf between their habits and expectations.

“Oh, you did? I went Switzerland once,” said Aizah excitedly. “Geneva, for WTO (World Trade Organization) meetings. I had such bad jet lag, six o’ clock I wanted to sleep already!”

“Switzerland was interesting,” agreed Said, “but it’s so disciplined, I feel like I’m still in Singapore. Guess it means we got the Swiss standard of living! I prefer France or Italy, to rent a car and drive in the countryside.”

His lived experience of Europe was miles away from hers. Despite having lived for more than four years in Spain, Atiqah had never ventured outside the cities and had never seen snow.

“I really like the art,” said Atiqah, marvelling at her ability to speak of anything relating to that fateful summer with a considerable portion of apparent indifference and calmness.  “Barcelona is so open and expressive… the opposite of Singapore, where everything is about efficiency.”

“You’re so extraordinary,” observed Said. “When you went there, you were so young. But you still knew how to appreciate the culture, without being overly influenced by it.”

To be so highly rated by a sensible man and held up thus as a model of female excellence, was a charm which Atiqah could not immediately resist.  Said had hit upon the one thing she was immensely proud of and given her due appreciation for it.

“You know,” whispered Aizah, “he’s right. I think Said likes you.”

“No, lah!” denied Atiqah in a fierce whisper, though she felt her cheeks burning with embarrassment.

She hoped Said hadn’t overheard their exchange. No, he was engaged in a conversation with Azlan about Netflix’s Adolescence. That was another thing she couldn’t reconcile – how Said openly admired her virtue while gravitating towards all the “trending” Western TV shows that displayed highly toxic behaviour.

Could it be true that Said was interested in her? But if so, why didn’t she feel any warmth in the way he spoke to her? Was it that her feelings were still adverse to any man save one, or was it merely an availability bias? Because Atiqah was the sibling who always accompanied their father, Said saw her the most.  It couldn’t be anything else, when they’d barely known each other for a month.

Or perhaps, the answer was simply that she was a panda.

Chapter Text

Viii.i – Atiqah

A month into her acquaintance with Said, Atiqah was getting used to the increased mobility his lifts gave her and her father. Now that Ramadan was over, they could stop at the food court after their activities at the community centre. Besides, there was so much to explore, such as the three shopping malls at Tampines Central, and the sizable Tampines Regional Library. 

Even without leaving the 20 square-kilometre (8 square mile) space that was Tampines New Town, Atiqah felt that her horizons were expanding.

The shops which Said frequented were too upscale for Atiqah to have visited before.  He enjoyed all things foreign, and didn’t hesitate to patronise the non-halal Japanese food establishments, so long as he enquired about the pork and alcohol content of the food he was buying.

Royce chocolates, originating from the northern Japanese island of Hokkaido, were a weakness of Said’s.  He said that he started getting into Japanese food and confectionery after going for ski trips at the famous Niseko ski resort on Hokkaido Island, which teemed with Singaporeans during the year-end school holiday months.

Atiqah had never ventured to the Royce shop at Tampines Mall previously. The chocolates were expensive, and some of them contained alcohol.  Besides, Eusoff was supposed to be limiting his sugar intake.

“That doesn’t mean you should deprive yourself,” insisted Said. “You won’t be able to find anything else like this.”

Right in the shop, Said opened the box of chocolates he’d just bought and speared one of the neatly cut cubes with the plastic pick that came with it.

“Come, have a piece,” he offered. “Open your mouth?”

Letting Said feed her a piece of chocolate, especially in public, felt too much like coupledom for Atiqah’s comfort. Instead, she reached out to take the pick from his hand. At the very moment when their fingers brushed, to Atiqah’s horror, she descried, most decidedly and distinctly, Fang Wu entering the mall.

From the vantage point at which the Royce shop was angled towards the mall entrance, she could see everyone who entered and exited the sliding glass doors to the building.

Her start was perceptible only to herself; but she instantly felt as if she was the greatest simpleton in the world, the most unaccountable and absurd! For a few minutes, she saw nothing before her: it was all confusion.

Popping the chocolate into her mouth, Atiqah dropped the pick into the open box that Said held.  Any attempts at civilities with a full mouth would be unbearably awkward, but there was a decent chance that, caught up in the steady stream of people walking through the main corridor of the mall, he would pass by without seeing her. Soon, she convinced herself, he must be out of sight.

To her utter surprise, she was sent back, in a moment by the entrance of Fang Wu himself.  Royce was a crazy expensive shop, and much as Fang Wu liked to enjoy life, he didn’t normally do things that were crazy expensive.  Why did he have to pick this shop to come to, at this time?

Fang Wu saw her immediately and waved, while she waved back. He was more obviously struck and confused by the sight of her than she had ever observed before; he looked quite red.  Despite having a mouth full of chocolate, for the first time in their acquaintance, she felt that she was betraying the least sensibility of the two.

She had the advantage of him in the preparation of the last few moments. All the overpowering, blinding, bewildering, first effects of strong surprise were over with her. Still, however, she had enough to feel! It was agitation, pain, pleasure, a something between delight and misery.

“How was Hari Raya?” he asked her, just at the same time as she swallowed the last of the chocolate and asked him, “How was the Winter Solstice?”

An awkward silence ensued, where he briefly turned away to look at the colourful boxes that lined the shelves.  The character of his manner was embarrassment. She could not have called it either cold or friendly, or anything so certainly as embarrassed.

“Hari Raya was good,” said Atiqah. “We reconnected with my father’s old colleague.”

“I… my sister will be coming in two weeks,” Fang Wu said rather absently, still studying the chocolates. “Which chocolates would you recommend I get for her?”

“Actually, this is the first time I’m here,” admitted Atiqah. “Some of the chocolates have alcohol.” Immediately, she felt extremely gauche.  Fang Wu didn’t need to avoid alcohol, and she felt stupid for displaying her inexperience with non-halal shops.

“Try one,” suggested Said, holding out the open box. “You are…?”

Another awkward moment ensued as Atiqah and Fang Wu responded to the question simultaneously.

“I trained with Atiqah at the same club in Barcelona,” he said, while she replied to Said’s question with, “Fang Wu is our neighbour on the eighth floor.”

“I’m Said, a friend of the family.” Pointing to himself and then to Atiqah, he added, “Our fathers used to work opposite shifts at the same condo.”

“I see.” Fang Wu took a piece of chocolate from the box that Said held out to him. “These are good.”

“I know, right?  They spoiled all other types of chocolate for me. If you ever get a chance to go skiing in Hokkaido, it’s even better. There, you can find all kinds of special flavours which aren’t available in Singapore.”  Said grinned cockily as he said it, and Atiqah’s heart sank at the boast.

It did not surprise, but it grieved Atiqah to see Said showing off like this, especially to the man who would keep score at every snub she and her family might seem to give him. 

It was already awful enough that some local Singaporeans treated new transplants from China with wariness due to the stiff competition they posed at work and school.  In chat forums such as HardwareZone which were laced with Singaporean slang, the derogatory term “ah tiong”, which came from the Hokkien dialect, was often used to refer to the mainland Chinese, effectively insulting them in their own language.

Atiqah hated that her family, and now Said, had been tactless with Fang Wu at one point or another. Worst of all, everything they said or assumed about China and the new wave of mainland Chinese job seekers flooding Singapore was somewhat grounded in truth.

China had indeed been playing catch-up to the developed world until the latter 2010s and the 2020s. They didn’t number amongst the great nations of football, not yet at this point in history at least. And the average Singaporean could afford to take more overseas leisure trips than the average mainland Chinese.

Because all the statements were true, they would undoubtedly hurt all the more.

Said took a step towards Atiqah and whispered, with a conspiratorial tone, “I cut one piece in half to share with your father.”

“Thanks,” said Atiqah mechanically, although her eyes were on Fang Wu rather than on Said.  She scolded back her senses, telling herself that Fang Wu couldn’t care less if it looked like she and Said were a couple. Still, the optics didn’t sit well with her.

Mutely, Fang Wu gave her a thumbs-up, and Atiqah managed a weak smile.

“I think we should make a move,” she said, to end the uneasy silence. “We need to pick up dinner before we go back.”

“It’s raining.” Fang Wu shrugged his backpack off one shoulder and unclipped the side strap to which he’d fastened his collapsible umbrella. “Take this, or I can call a Grab for you.”

“That’s OK,” replied Said on Atiqah’s behalf. “We have a car.”

Glancing from one to the other, Fang Wu could only utter a confused “Oh, I see,” while he re-attached the damp umbrella to his backpack.

 “Come.” Said didn’t exactly put his hand on Atiqah’s back, but she could feel the uncomfortable warmth of him hovering too close for comfort. Craning her neck at an awkward angle, she barely got a backward glance before he ushered her out of the shop, heading directly to the lift that led to the underground carpark.

~~~⚽~~~

Viii.ii – Fang Wu

Fang Wu’s nerves were shot the moment his China Eastern Airlines flight touched down at Singapore Changi Airport in the wee hours of Tuesday, 27^th December 2033.  At any moment from now onwards, he might run into Atiqah.

He expected that such a meeting might happen at the void deck of their block, just as he might be equally likely to run into Lele there. It was still too soon after his breakup with Lele to specifically seek Atiqah out, but the Lunar New Year on the 19^th of February 2034 would create an opportunity for him to socialise with her and her family.

Xia Jian had called him on WeChat to let him know that he and his family would be coming to Singapore for the extended festive season associated with the Lunar New Year, arriving two days before the eve and staying through the first weekend after the festivities.

The Chinese school winter break was a five-week affair that started more than two weeks before the Lunar New Year and ended after the fifteen-day festive period, known as the Spring Festival (春节). Hence, this was one of the best times for Xia Jian to take a long vacation with the kids.  It would be their first trip out of China, not counting the three-day visit to Hong Kong that the Xias had made before the birth of their third child.

Beyond the fact that it was a long-awaited adventure for the Xia family, this visit showed that Xia Jian saw Fang Wu as a brother. By tradition, the Lunar New Year festive season revolved around connecting with extended family. Xia Jian had specifically chosen to come here for Fang Wu’s first year in Singapore to ensure that he would have the atmosphere of reunion even while building a new life in a foreign country all alone. Fang Wu was extremely touched by this gesture that went beyond mere friendship to near kinship.

And his sister and brother-in-law were coming for far longer than he’d initially expected. Cai Ying and Lao Cai would arrive in the middle of January and stay until past the fifteenth day of the Lunar New Year, i.e. till the beginning of March. Partly, it was to make up for their inability to spend much time with him while they had served in the Navy.  But they also needed to plan the next phase of their lives, and it was conducive for them to do so in a place where he could provide them with free housing.

Inviting Atiqah and her family to join their reunion would create an opportunity for him to connect with her, in the company of the most significant people in his life.  He hoped that it would help her understand his world better and give him a clearer indication of what she thought of him.  Privately, he was confident that she would hit it off with his friends and family without a hitch, regardless of whether she regarded him romantically or platonically.

Half a year in Europe had made gourmands of Cai Ying and Lao Cai. They photographed all the food they ate and posted it on WeChat and Weibo.  That was why, in the waning days of the year-end Singapore school break, Fang Wu prowled Tampines Mall, Century Square, and Tampines One to scout for high-end foreign snacks to buy for his sister and brother-in-law when they came.

Chocolates seemed like a good bet, when the Europeans were well known for it. Cai Ying and Lao Cai had made Paris the first stop of their trip because Paris, and the Eiffel Tower, were so often romanticised in East Asian pop culture that they couldn’t miss a chance to take a photograph in front of it.  They’d taken several days to wend their way through central and southern France by trains and buses to get to Irun, the starting point for the Camino del Norte, sampling numerous varieties of wine, cheese, pastry, and chocolate along the way.

The Royce shop was one of the last places where Fang Wu would expect to run into Atiqah. Not only was the establishment not halal-certified, S$17 for a box of their signature Nama chocolates was a whole lot to pay for something that Eusoff shouldn’t over-indulge in.

And yet, she was there – with a Malay man whom he didn’t recognise. 

Fang Wu had lived long enough in Singapore to realise that rich Chinese outnumbered the rich Malays, but somehow, he’d managed to find Atiqah with one. Worse still, this wealthy Malay man was enough of a snob to imply, at first glance, that going to Hokkaido to ski was beyond Fang Wu.

That man was correct, and that was what made this blow the deadliest of all.  Upper-middle-class Singaporeans, regardless of ethnicity, were inordinately obsessed with overseas travel. Typically, Japan, Europe, and the US ranked among their top destinations. Unlike Cai Ying, Lao Cai and himself, Singaporeans treated long-distance holidays as a habit, rather than a once-in-a-lifetime experience.

Yet, Fang Wu considered himself at least as widely travelled, if not more so, than most Singaporeans, even the affluent ones. He’d been all over Australasia playing in the AFC Asian Cup, made a much-dreaded return to Spain (in addition to Portugal and Morocco) for the 2030 World Cup, and gone to parts of China that 999 out of 1,000 Chinese Singaporeans wouldn’t dream of visiting.

More of it had been for work or family than for leisure, but still, he didn’t deem himself at all deprived in his experience of the world.  Going to gritty places and experiencing real things gave a person more insight than flitting from one fancy tourist destination to another, after all. 

But of course, the rich didn’t think that way.

It might be more correct to refer to Said as nouveau-riche rather than rich, since his father apparently had worked as a security guard like Eusoff. Regardless of how long he’d had his wealth, Fang Wu could see that Said flaunted it. He didn’t wear a single thing that wasn’t branded, for example.

The more important question was, were Atiqah and Said dating? He thought he saw Said putting a hand on Atiqah’s back when they walked off to the carpark lift together, but that wasn’t allowed, even between Muslims, unless they were married. Based on his understanding of Atiqah thus far, she wouldn’t normally permit such liberties, especially in front of her father.

It was so easy for Fang Wu to indulge in jealous thoughts.  What would it take for Atiqah to stop being such a stickler for the rules?  Well, if she was truly in love with Said, she wouldn’t. At the worldly age of 27, with her father almost certain to approve the marriage, it would be ridiculous for Atiqah to object to an action of physical touch that was perfectly normal for non-Muslim couples in public.  She’d allowed those rules to lapse once, for a brief couple of minutes, at 19, and who wasn’t to say that she loved Said more than she had loved him?

But with his newfound resolve not to let anger cloud his reason, Fang Wu also saw that Atiqah’s demeanour at the Royce shop didn’t match that theory. If she was blissfully dating or engaged to Said, she would have felt happy, rather than awkward. In fact, she had been painfully embarrassed, perhaps even more so than himself.  And if Said was so secure of her affection, he wouldn’t have to guard his territory as pointedly as he had.

Therefore, the only conclusion that made sense was that Said was trying his luck, and Atiqah had not yet accepted him.  If that was the case, Fang Wu decided he still had a chance. And for as long as he was still in the running, this time he wouldn’t give up.

~~~⚽~~~

Viii.iii – Atiqah

For a whole week after the chance encounter at Tampines Mall, Atiqah stewed. She wondered if she’d imagined Said almost touching her back. But after Said came by her flat nearly every day to watch TV with her and her family without any errant hands, she decided that she must have been imagining things.

But more to the point, she couldn’t banish Fang Wu from her mind. She knew now that he and Lele were over, but what did that mean? She could not understand his present feelings, when everything was so contradictory.

Even though Fang Wu and Lele hadn’t worked out, he must have had some hopes to pursue that relationship in the first place. The question of whether he were really suffering much from disappointment occupied more space in her brain than she liked. Till that point were settled, she could not be herself.

Every trip out of her flat became an incessant and fearful sort of watch for him in vain. Atiqah couldn’t decide if she wished to risk running into him at the void deck or not.  Should she plan her trips specifically to avoid the times when he might be heading home from work? Anyway, even if they did run into each other, what sort of meaningful conversation could they possibly have while waiting for the lift?

Atiqah had barely convinced her errant subconscious mind that it was making a mountain out of a molehill when Fang Wu showed up at their door on the first Friday evening after the January 2034 school term started.

“Hello Pakcik!” He waved cheerfully. “Is this a good time?”

“Yah, yah, yah, sure, come in,” Eusoff waved him in enthusiastically. “We just had dinner and we’re about to watch TV. Come, watch with us for a while!”

“I actually wanted to invite you…” It was the same awkwardness from the Royce shop again, but Atiqah fancied that she saw some renewed spirit, a little smile, a little glow, when he made his invitation.

“My family and friends will be coming for the Chinese New Year,” Fang Wu continued, with somewhat more confidence than he had begun with. “We booked a seaside resort for the Golden Week, and all of you would be welcome to join us for the reunion dinner and our celebrations.”

“Really? You wouldn’t mind?” The words burst out before Atiqah could contain them. Inwardly, she chastised herself for her undignified display of puppy-dog enthusiasm.

“It would be an honour for you to join us,” Fang Wu replied. “My friend, Xia Jian, is bringing his three kids – I think you’ll have fun playing with them.”

“Aziz and Yusuf can play with them,” Azlan chimed in excitedly. “We can go arcade!”

“All of you young people need to go out more,” said Eusoff. “Thank you, you are such a good boy!”

Being called a ‘boy’ at age 31 was an unfortunate but necessary reality when dealing with Asian parents. Prone as she was to embarrassment these days, Atiqah felt this as an insult on behalf of Fang Wu, albeit an unintentional one. She couldn’t understand why she was even more hyper-sensitive after his breakup with Lele than before it. How could she believe that anything she or her family did would matter to his impression of her, or that she still had a chance?

“We were just going to watch Ramy,” said Azlan. “Fang Wu, why don’t you watch with us? It’s the first American comedy that’s all about Muslims!”

Atiqah thought Fang Wu would decline; in fact, she was expecting him to go every moment. However, to her astonishment, he seemed in no hurry to leave her.

“That sounds interesting,” he said, plopping onto the tired pleather sofa between her and Said.

Season 1, Episode 6 of Ramy, titled “Refugees”, proved to be anything but a comedy for Atiqah.

The opening sequence, which featured an Egyptian father giving The Talk to his preteen daughter, was so horrifically vivid that Atiqah didn’t know whether to laugh or cry.

Muslims were taught that if a man and a woman were alone together outside of marriage, there was always a third person with them: the devil. Atiqah had grown up knowing this in a theoretical way, like how a child might memorise a lesson. It had never felt real to her until her jealousy of Lele put diabolically selfish thoughts in her head.

Certainly, her father had never had a conversation with her on the topic. Even now, Eusoff retreated into his room at the very mention of the word “sex”.  Had her mother lived to see her into adulthood, Atiqah wasn’t sure if she would have had that discussion with her and Aizah either. The subject was indecently taboo, and Atiqah knew her parents had both been of the view that the less the girls thought about it, the better.

Watching such a discussion unfold disastrously onscreen didn’t make her regret that her parents had never broached the subject. Surely, being nagged by a parent about how anticipating one’s marriage vows would make a woman damaged goods forever was worse than not mentioning it at all.

As the onscreen father switched in a flash from enumerating the evils of premarital liaisons to lecturing his prepubescent daughter about buying too many Pokémon cards, Azlan burst into laughter.  Atiqah had to admit that if that scene hadn’t been so relatable that she could imagine it happening to her, she might have found the irony funny, too.

But that was the point of this episode, wasn’t it? Theoretically, the same rules applied to the sons and the daughters, but it was always the daughters who suffered from strict enforcement while the sons got away with paying lip service.

The episode continued with the daughter, now a 25-year-old graduate student, wishing to experience dating and relationships in the same way as her American friends did.  She had a crush on a fellow student working as a barista in her campus coffee shop, who drew intricate pictures of landscapes from his backpacking travels on the paper cups he served her coffee in.

Atiqah thought the effort that the young man in the show took to woo his lady was incredibly romantic. It reminded her of all the little gestures from Fang Wu in Barcelona, each of which she still treasured like a cherished gift, especially how he had painstakingly cooked for her.

Even if Fang Wu had never existed, Atiqah would still have known that romance could be a beautiful thing.  There was too much literature and art paying homage to it for her to think otherwise.

Yet, accepting that love and romance could only come with marriage hadn’t been difficult for Atiqah.  She had never been tempted to experiment with teenage hookups when she’d always believed that the payoff of a happy marriage and stable family, with the one love of her life, were worth waiting for.

The family-centric values depicted in the English- and Malay- language TV shows that Atiqah had watched as a child fit perfectly in line with the value system she’d been raised with. As she got older and found the local dramas trite and boring, Atiqah gravitated to watching sports, news, and documentaries instead. She enjoyed the occasional Hollywood film, but the social and cultural mores expressed in them were so different from hers that she didn’t see her life reflected in them at all.

Before this, Atiqah hadn’t realised that the reason why she neither craved nor was influenced by Western media was because she hadn’t seen herself in it. Now, she felt the whammy from the double-edged sword of cultural representation. It was devastating to identify personally with the characters onscreen, only to have the narrative show that the world saw them – and by extension, herself - very differently from how she did.

Atiqah was horrified at how she could have ended up like Dena, even though she’d never known what it was like to be twenty-five and more curious than besotted. (That was because she’d become besotted before she reached the point of being curious.)

It turned out that Kyle, the young Caucasian man in the show whom Dena crushed on, had never been truly in love with Dena at all. All he wanted was to date exotic, foreign young women because he thought they would make his life more interesting. The moment Kyle asked Dena to give him pillow talk in Arabic and she wouldn’t because she was more fluent in English than Arabic, the air of romance fizzled out like the day-old Coke used as a metaphor in the opening scene.

And Dena had been almost willing to commit zina, only for this!

Atiqah didn’t realise when her tears started falling. She knew that when she was in Spain, at a much younger age than Dena was depicted at, the peer pressure, social mores, and potential temptations had been startlingly similar.

This wasn’t Atiqah’s story, but it could have been. If Atiqah had ended up this way at sixteen or seventeen or eighteen or nineteen, it would have been a tragedy. She would have been disillusioned about love all her life, instead of sadly but faithfully clinging to it.

Which young woman could resist a handsome young man’s efforts to charm her, despite all the exhortations from her family and community that love must wait for marriage? It was human nature; and as this episode of Ramy reminded Atiqah, biology. How thin was that line between happiness and misery, when encountering someone new was always a gamble?

Whether it was the kindness of fate, the strength of her intuition, or the integrity of Fang Wu’s character, Atiqah knew what it was like to be loved before she fell in love. Yet, fearful of betraying her religion, she’d walked away from it. While that was painful, it was still infinitely better than to fall in head over heels, then end up being used.

This show hit home the message to Atiqah that being in love in a Western country could have resulted in her committing zina, only to be consumed by lifelong regret afterward. But she’d been fortunate enough to find someone whose value system matched hers enough to steer her away from zina, instead of towards it.

How could Atiqah ever have believed that she was saving both herself and Fang Wu from sin by throwing that away?

“What an a--,” remarked Azlan flippantly as the ending credits rolled. “Kakak, you should be happy Ayah never did that to you.”

With her train of thought broken by Azlan’s words, Atiqah became conscious of the wetness of her cheeks. Now, everyone would see that she’d been stupid enough to cry over a TV show!

She must have let out an audible sob or sniff, because Said reached over from two seats away, across the person between them, to hand her a tissue.

Dabbing at her eyes, Atiqah could barely muster the courage to glance at the man sitting next to her. The very man whom she had cast out, when he would never have discarded her.

Perhaps Atiqah couldn’t have been sure of that eight years ago. After all, there were too many women in China to deny the possibility that Fang Wu might leave her for one of them. Now, after several months of associating as neighbours, things were different. Atiqah was dead certain there wasn’t one moment that she could be in the same room as Fang Wu without him seeing her.

He’d been the one who had referred to her by name first, in the shock of their chance meeting. Even when it was incredibly awkward to talk to each other because of their undeniable and yet unspeakable past, he’d noticed every instance when she needed assistance. Furthermore, no matter how much it might have pained him to do so, he’d rendered it.

The past half hour was the first time Fang Wu was in Atiqah’s company without paying attention to her every move. Oblivious to everyone else, he sat stock still on the sofa, looking as if he was in physical pain.

Atiqah knew that the only reason why Said saw her tears, while Fang Wu didn’t, was because he was still seeing her reflection in the show. They were both equally aghast at how things could have turned out if they hadn’t met and fallen for each other. Or if they – and the other – hadn’t been the people that they were.

The implications of that were overwhelming. For the first time, Atiqah allowed herself to believe that their past might still haunt him as much as it haunted her.

~~~⚽~~~

Viii.iv – Fang Wu

Whatever Fang Wu might have expected from watching a show claimed to have ground-breaking representation of Muslims, it wasn’t to be completely traumatised at scene one.

The father-daughter talk was absolutely barbaric; to him, such beliefs belonged in the Middle Ages, not the 21^st century. He wondered if that was what Eusoff had told Atiqah, and got his answer when Eusoff, who normally moved as little as he could, immediately shuffled to his room when the word “sex” was uttered.

So, Atiqah would have heard this, or some variant of it, not from her parents, but probably from a religious class at some point in her childhood.  That was infinitely worse, when a good parent would temper the starkness of that statement with context and explanations, but a preacher wouldn’t.

He and Atiqah had spent so much time alone together in the summer of 2025. If this was what she had been led to believe, did she regard their entire relationship as being tainted by the devil?

The revelation gave Fang Wu a whole new layer of understanding to the level of terror Atiqah must have felt after he expressed his wish to make their relationship romantic.  Even now at age 31, framing things in such a paradigm was shocking to him; what more for a young person of 19?

It wasn’t any better to see a reflection of what-could-have-been playing on the screen, reminding him just how vulnerable Atiqah had been as a teenager all alone in Spain. He’d been highly impressed at the way she integrated her faith with her life with hardly any support from the local community.  Atiqah might have been only 19, but he’d seen less self-possession in people who were over 21.

At the tender age of 14, Atiqah had researched and selected her mosque all on her own. Throughout her stay in Spain, she’d arranged her school and training schedules to ensure she never missed her Friday prayers. By the time Fang Wu met her, she was an expert at finding and preparing halal food, never wavering from that no matter how busy she was.

Fang Wu was accustomed to leading a life of strict discipline, but this level of focus and steadfastness exceeded anything required of him.

No, Atiqah would never have ended up like Dena, craving a one-night stand out of lust and curiosity. But it was natural for humans to seek companionship, and what could have happened if someone had befriended, then charmed her, only to betray her trust?

Visualising that scenario left him devastated. He didn’t even have to do much imagining when it was being acted out right in front of him.

The scenes with Kyle and Dena gave Fang Wu a new appreciation of the enormity of his responsibility to Atiqah during that summer, and the depth of the trust she’d placed in him. She wouldn’t have agreed to spend so much time alone with him if she hadn’t believed, with perfect faith, that he’d never do anything to threaten her chastity. They had never explicitly discussed this; it would have been taboo in both their cultures to do so. And yet, that tacit compact had pervaded every interaction of theirs.

Before this, Fang Wu had never needed to think about the peer pressure that he and Atiqah could have faced in Spain.  Of course, he’d occasionally watched Hollywood movies and knew how liberal people could be in the West, but he’d never considered that lifestyle in relation to himself. In China, there was no Netflix or HBO, and he’d never obtained a VPN to access Western media when China Central Television, Hunan Television, and Dragon TV (from Shanghai Media Group), supplemented by TenCent, Youku and iQiyi streaming, satisfied his entertainment needs very well.

It wasn’t that Chinese society was prudish, either. From childhood, he’d seen period dramas featuring kings with many concubines. As he got older, he’d watched movies like Raise the Red Lantern and Lust, Caution which made no secret of the ways in which men might exploit women. There was no shortage of Chinese romcoms and dramas that acknowledged the existence of premarital and extramarital sexual relations.

But there were many more Chinese films that became hugely popular without featuring sex at all. Accepting the existence of sex, and the fact that not all of it happened inside of marriage, didn’t come with the need to glorify or obsess over it. And with the bedrock of family-centric Confucian values forming the foundation of ethnic Chinese social fabric, saving oneself for marriage was considered desirable, even though Gen Z no longer deemed it strictly necessary.

Thus, Fang Wu had never gotten The Talk from his parents either, but he’d never felt lacking in any guidance when societal expectations filled in the gap.  The prevailing norms, driven as much by pragmatism as by Confucian philosophy, had left him with no reason to question his approach to his love life.

Dating in high school happened, but it was a rarity. Most parents told their children to avoid romantic relationships while they were in school, so as not to be distracted and jeopardise their futures.

Chinese society was heavily collectivist and family-oriented: the wisdom of 修身，齐家，治国，平天下 xiu shen, qi jia, zhi guo, ping tian xia (i.e. cultivate yourself, establish your family, serve your country, and bring peace to the world) had been handed down the generations for more than two millennia.  It was tacitly expected that one would prioritise becoming a productive citizen and forming a stable family unit over exploring one’s sexual possibilities at the expense of such.

When he was merely a product of the environment he’d been raised in, Fang Wu wouldn’t claim credit for having the self-control to preserve the chastity of his relationship with Atiqah. Rather, he blamed himself for his ignorance, which had led to his blunder of admitting to romantic intent before it was appropriate.

Knowing now that what Atiqah had been taught about abstinence was stricter and more archaic than he’d imagined, Fang Wu felt that there had been no good solutions in the summer of 2025. If he hadn’t hung out with her, she would have been lonely, and even more vulnerable to anyone else who might prey on her. And if he hadn’t stated his intent to convert for her, he would have forfeited any chance to remain in her life after he left, without even putting up a fight.  At least he’d fought and lost, rather than never making any attempt at all.

Did he regret approaching Atiqah and befriending her? If Fang Wu was completely honest with himself, he did not.  Yet, he regretted putting her in a position where his being with her could be construed as sinful.

But that had been the past. This was the present, where they had the opportunity to reconnect in the presence of her family and his. Now, they wouldn’t have to face the dilemma of having the devil come between them – not that he believed it, but all that mattered was that Atiqah, or anyone who could judge her, might.

Dimly, he became aware that Atiqah was crying. No longer trying to hide that fact, she was dabbing at her eyes with a tissue. That could only mean the episode had dredged up as many unhappy memories and conjectures for her as it had for him.

He wished he could offer her a hug for comfort but was completely powerless to do so when it was forbidden to them both. All that was left was to hope and wait.

~~~⚽~~~

Viii.v – Atiqah

When cultural representation made you feel bad, did it mean that it was bad?

Ramy was billed as a drama-comedy, and Atiqah supposed that the main character, Ramy Hassan, was intended to be likable. Judging from the way Azlan, and sometimes Said, found his antics hilarious rather than appalling, there had to be some aspect of Ramy that Millennial and Gen Z Muslim men considered relatable.

But even though Atiqah thought Ramy was a moral trainwreck, she couldn’t peel her eyes away from it. Her father hid whenever he didn’t feel comfortable with what was portrayed in the show; why didn’t she?

Season 1, Episode 6 gave Atiqah her answer. Much as she didn’t like to acknowledge the fact, she couldn’t stop watching Ramy because she saw herself in it. At the same time, she couldn’t stop hating it because it forced her to see her culture from the outside, in a way that amplified the dissonance between her life and what the West normalised as the mainstream Millennial and Gen Z experience.

It was uncomfortable to witness how Ramy and Dena were willing to cavalierly rationalise zina, despite identifying as Muslims.  While it gave Atiqah a sense of self-satisfaction that she would never cave in to sin like that, she bristled at the implicit message that someone her age was expected to do so if they wanted to be part of the contemporary social fabric.

A Singapore film would never show Ecstasy-laced parties in palatial New York penthouses.  Atiqah had avoided drinking and been steadfastly blind to the existence of drugs during her years in Spain because she had believed unambiguously in the wrongness of these things.  Ironically, it had been simply her refusal to drink, rather than the much more dangerous threats of hookups or drugs, that had left her very lonely as she matured into her late teens.

Seeing something that you always believed to be wrong being represented as normal wasn’t a good feeling at all. And when that happened on a TV show that received industry accolades, it was a clear sign that many people didn’t agree with how you were thinking.

During the episodes that focused on Ramy, Atiqah didn’t need to confront this head-on. But when the lens turned to Dena, starkly showing Atiqah how the social conditioning she had never questioned since childhood looked from the outside, it hit home too starkly for her to ignore.

For days after she watched that episode, Atiqah couldn’t stop thinking about her choices against the options society thought she had.  And how the environment that she was in shaped the definitions of morality, and vice versa.

At nineteen, Atiqah had believed in absolutes. Now, at twenty-seven, she realised that they didn’t exist.  And it was all because her mind was now capable of enough nuance to critically compare the messages in local media with those from the West, instead of classifying them into mutually exclusive buckets of “right” and “wrong.”

Seeing the choices that she didn’t make, and how those choices might be considered as normal by others, exposed the holes in the choices that she did make.

In Ramy, the narrative didn’t punish Dena as much as it did Kyle. Even though the choice had been in Dena’s hands as to whether she called Kyle’s number, the story didn’t harp on the immorality of her choice to sin. Rather than censuring Dena for wanting to experience Western dating even though she knew it might result in a one-night stand, it blamed Kyle for reducing her to an object of exoticism.

Seeing things framed with that lens reminded her that she and Fang Wu had done nothing wrong.  That even though their summer together was technically considered an Islamic crime, he had held himself to much higher standards of moral duty – and cultural respect for her – than she could reasonably have expected from their Western environment.

Of course, they weren’t in Europe anymore, but in Singapore. The goalposts of what society deemed as moral behaviour had changed.

Still, what was legally permitted was more liberal than what Islam allowed.  In neighbouring Malaysia, Sharia law was the law for Muslims, and punishments could be enforced by the Islamic courts where they wouldn’t have applied in civil law.

As a secular country, Singapore was different. In the eight years since her return, Atiqah had attended enough weddings amongst her former secondary schoolmates and football teammates to have a better idea of the legalities of marriage than she’d had at nineteen. She was dimly aware, but never paid much attention previously, that civil marriage and Muslim marriage were administered by separate registries in Singapore. Now, she realised that this meant a marriage outside of the Muslim faith could still be valid in the eyes of the law.

If she had waited for Fang Wu to come to her in Singapore after the 2030 World Cup and married him in a civil ceremony, which wouldn’t require him to revert to Islam, neither of them would need to change their cultural identities. To Atiqah, such a solution was messy and uncomfortable, because it still meant that she would be committing zina for the rest of her life, but legally, it wasn’t wrong.

Was it morally wrong, though?  How could she reconcile that against the magnitude of zina as it was seen through Islamic law?

The hard fact Atiqah had to face was that regardless of whether they had a civil or Islamic marriage, the authorities would recognise the racial identity of any child between her and Fang Wu as Chinese. Children followed the races and religions of their fathers, although parents now had the option of giving their mixed-race children double-barrelled races in their birth certificates.

Marrying within Islam to ensure that she didn’t breach any rules wouldn’t take away the need for them to navigate their dual racial and cultural identities while raising a family.  Atiqah’s default religion was Islam because she was Malay, but a child born half-Chinese ought to have the right to choose.

Atiqah hoped she wasn’t rationalising by making this decision. But their last meeting had been most important in opening his feelings; she had derived from it a delightful conviction.  She resolved that if he ever were to be interested in rekindling their relationship, she wouldn’t let the matter of religion come between them. 

He would, of course, offer to revert, but she would let him know that if deep down inside he didn’t feel ready to do so, she would be willing to accept a civil marriage instead of a Muslim one.

Such a choice would have been unimaginable to Atiqah in her early twenties. While her friends wouldn’t ostracise her, the real risk was in her father and relatives might think.  It wasn’t as bad a transgression as, for example, going into a friends-with-benefits relationship with no intention of marriage, or outrightly renouncing her faith. Both of those actions, at that age, would have unambiguously gotten her disowned.

If Atiqah had thought of this option when she was younger and acted on it, she was certain her father wouldn’t have approved. She’d be lucky if he ignored her the way he avoided the sex scenes on Ramy, giving all the negative of great astonishment, great coldness, and great silence.  Over time, her father would have softened if she observed all the other customs of Islam and Fang Wu didn’t eat pork in front of them, but falling in love with and marrying a non-Muslim would have been construed as a major act of rebellion.

Now, regardless of whether Fang Wu were to become a revert or not, Atiqah felt ready to weather any objections her father might have to their potential relationship. She was his primary caregiver, so Eusoff had no reason to distrust her filial piety, her judgement, or her sense of responsibility. Furthermore, Eusoff strongly approved of Fang Wu’s character. With Atiqah remaining unattached for so many years, it would be irrational for Eusoff to disapprove of their marriage – if it did get to that stage – simply because Fang Wu hadn’t been born Muslim.

They were not boy and girl, to be wantonly playing with their own happiness.  Atiqah decided it was time that she trusted her moral compass enough to separate ethics from religion. She would engage in a two-sided discussion with Fang Wu on how they would integrate their cultural backgrounds, if he were ever to show an interest in pursuing her romantically again. She would ensure both their voices were heard and respected. All he had to do was speak.

Chapter Text

IX.i – Fang Wu

Welcoming his sister and brother-in-law to Singapore gave Fang Wu a much-needed distraction to his agonisingly long wait for the Lunar New Year.

As they had with all the countries they visited, Cai Ying and Lao Cai settled rapidly into the local lifestyle. By the second day of their arrival, they discovered the nearest coffeeshop and the FairPrice supermarket. That was enough to make them sufficiently at home in Fang Wu’s flat to cook up a storm.

This was how they had lived for the past six months with only the packs on their backs, carrying not much more than two changes of clothing.

Through slow travel on buses, trains and a ferry, they had made their way from Paris via Spain to Casablanca. Then they had taken a flight to Rome to explore Italy, Malta, and Greece.

Upon the expiration of their 90-day Schengen visa, Lao Cai and Cai Ying had flown to Istanbul and then Dubai, exploring Turkiye before using the United Arab Emirates as a base to visit Qatar, Bahrain and Oman. Their last stop before arriving in Singapore was the Maldives, where they had spent a month staying at an Airbnb and enjoying the slower pace of life.

Fang Wu had been broadly aware of Cai Ying and Lao Cai’s travel itinerary via the photos they posted daily to their Weibo pages and the siblings’ WeChat group, as well as the souvenirs they shipped to his place. With their flat in Sanya rented out for a year and the limited space in their backpacks, Cai Ying and Lao Cai had no choice but to treat Fang Wu’s flat as a home base of sorts.

Now that they were here, Cai Ying and Lao Cai liked nothing more than to talk at length about their travels, providing detailed stories for every photo and every item they bought. The highlight of their trip had been the Camino in Spain, because travelling on foot from one small rural town to another was a uniquely intimate local experience.

In the six weeks or so they had taken to trek across northern Spain from east to west, then travel by train from north to south, they had picked up a respectable number of phrases in Spanish. More than Fang Wu had from several months of living in Barcelona, in fact.

Before moving to Singapore, Spain had been the place where Fang Wu had spent the most time outside China. But he didn’t feel equal to rhapsodizing with his sister and brother-in-law about Spain’s signature delicacies, namely sangria and jamon (cured ham).

He had abstained from those two things for most of his first sojourn there in 2025. Then on his second trip there for the World Cup in 2030, he’d binged on them because he might as well do so, since converting to Islam (and marrying Atiqah) were off the cards. Rather than improving his mood, the binging only served to stoke his bitterness at the future denied to him. 

Neither was he ready to share his photos of Barcelona when so many of them featured Atiqah, and his fate with her still hung in the balance.

It was a miracle that those photos still existed at all. Due to the blocking of Google in China, they had sat ignored in the cloud for eight and a half years.  Fang Wu had, in fact, clean forgotten that he never deleted them. A simple act of omission was now a great mercy, preserving memories that were more precious than he dared to admit.

“除了干活，人生还有很多重要的事，(Besides your career, there are many other important things in life),” Cai Ying commented when all the things Fang Wu said about Barcelona were about football. “一辈子不长，你不追求幸福就太可惜了。 (Life is short, if you don’t pursue happiness, it would be such a pity.)”

“你放心，我会全力以赴，(Don’t worry, I will do my best,)” he assured his sister. And though Cai Ying would have no idea, he was putting a lot of effort into figuring out how to fit Atiqah’s cultural needs into his.

The first challenge was, of course, preparing for the Lunar New Year celebrations. Sourcing for vegetarian and halal versions of the traditional delicacies required a good deal of legwork and research.

For example, bak kwa (or rougan 肉干as it was called in standardised Mandarin), a popular New Year snack of heavily seasoned barbecued meat, was commonly made with pork.  While halal versions using beef or chicken were available in Malaysia, the local customs laws didn’t allow them to be transported to Singapore.

Instead, he had to order dendeng, a similar Indonesian snack, which was available online from local vendors. But it wasn’t a perfect substitute because the meat was sliced and seasoned differently.

Unbeknownst to everyone, he was also reading the Quran every night.  If Atiqah were to accept him, he would go for Islamic classes, but in the meantime, he wanted to understand her beliefs in a way that wouldn’t just scratch the surface.  And he had chosen the English rather than the Chinese translation, to facilitate discussion with Atiqah or other members of the Muslim revert community in Singapore should the opportunity arise.

Little did Fang Wu realise that he wasn’t the only one leaving things unsaid.  The more they recounted their travels, the more he learned about his sister. And he’d believed that he was among the people who knew her best!

He hadn’t expected that the inspiration for the first part of their trip had been the movie Casablanca. The last time he’d lived with his sister for an extended period, they’d been simple village kids. When had she become so erudite in Western films, art, and history?

One of the biggest ironies of their trip, according to Cai Ying and Lao Cai, was that the easiest way to get from Europe to Morocco by boat was to take a ferry from Spain, and yet that would have been politically unthinkable in the times when that film had been written.  They especially felt the poignance of being able to traverse seamlessly across Europe in a way that would have been untenable less than a century ago, even as the world was developing new fault lines.

Although they had seen the film countless times, the first thing they did when he said he’d never watched it was to stream it for him.

It would be so easy, if Fang Wu wished to entertain his ego, to think that the film had been written at him.

He knew what it was like to be bitter and to come face to face with the woman who had left him heartbroken.  The power of closure and a heartfelt conversation to unleash his nobler instincts was very relevant to his current situation.

How tempting it was to insert Atiqah and Said into the roles of Ilsa and Laszlo while seeing himself as Rick! And the superstitious part of him wondered if this film was now being thrown at him to portend his future.

Blinking back tears, he could see that his sister was less adept at suppressing the urge to cry than he was.

“你不懂，他每一次出差我有多难过, (You won’t understand how awful I felt every time he went on deployment,)” she wailed, her arms firmly wrapped around Lao Cai.

“盈盈，没事的, (Yingying, it’s OK,)” soothed Lao Cai, rubbing her back. To Fang Wu, he explained, “我们每次看这部电影，她都会哭。(Every time we watch this movie, she will cry.)”

“没办法，我就是这样善感。(What can I do? I’m such an emotional person.)” Cai Ying rubbed her eyes. “至少这一辈子，我们将会永不分离。(At least for the rest of our lives, we’ll never be separated again.)”

“We’ll always have Paris,” quoted Lao Cai. “现在，巴黎也带给了我们很多美好的回忆。(Now, Paris has also given us many beautiful memories.)”

Truth be told, at thirty-eight, Cai Ying was too young to retire. With twenty years of dedication to the Navy, nobody would begrudge her the wish to take a break. But with more than a decade separating her from Lao Cai, there had been technically no reason why she couldn’t carry on for another ten years either.

As he saw how they went about their days, treating their stay in Singapore as an opportunity for simple local living the same way they had done in all the other countries they’d stopped at, Fang Wu could understand why Cai Ying had decided to retire and backpack the world with her husband.

There was, of course, the wish for them never to be separated again.  Strong and cheerful as Cai Ying always was, Fang Wu had no idea how badly their military deployments had affected her until he saw her crying over Casablanca.

He hadn’t remembered his sister being this emotional before.  For that matter, it was surprising that Cai Ying and Lao Cai, who used to be constantly on the move, had chosen to do a year of slow travel. There was something behind that, more than just frugality, environmental consciousness, and the wish to fully experience the local cultures of the places they were visiting.

But he couldn’t put his finger on it, until his sister got to the point in their travelogue when they went from Dubai to the Maldives.

India had been initially on their list, because they were curious about the most populous country in the world. But due to the absence of e-visa and tourist visa options, they were forced to bypass India and find another destination between the Middle East and Singapore to hold them for a month before coming.

The Maldives happened to be a serendipitous choice. Never having had a proper honeymoon due to the lack of money and time, a full month spent going nowhere except their lodgings and the beach had been heavenly, or so they said.

Could this trip be their last-ditch attempt to conceive a child?  Fang Wu knew very little about fertility treatment, but his intuition told him that it might probably make a person more emotionally volatile than usual.

Just as he couldn’t speak of his hopes about Atiqah in case they were dashed, he didn’t expect them to divulge a wish that had gone fifteen years unfulfilled. They would keep their secrets, and time would tell.

All they could do was to inch closer to hope, day by day. As Fang Wu had predicted, it took barely three days for Cai Ying and Lao Cai to find a project to keep them busy.

In a stroke of inspiration, Lao Cai decided that they would make a 70-metre-long dragon kite to surprise the Xia children with when they came.  Even better, they would spread the environmental message by creating the kite entirely from old plastic bags.

Within hours, Cai Ying and Lao Cai had sliced open every supermarket plastic bag in Fang Wu’s flat and started taping them together. The pile of plastic sheets could make perhaps half a dragon, but just a glance could tell him that what he had was far from enough to fulfil their vision.

It was as good an excuse as any, he decided, to text Atiqah. Before he could change his mind, he had typed “Can you help me?” into an SMS and hit the “send” button.

~~~⚽~~~

IX.ii – Atiqah

Normally, the only SMS that Atiqah received were phishing messages. Everybody else she knew used WhatsApp.

The new development that Fang Wu was now voluntarily texting her signalled a change in his friendliness, even if not necessarily a change in his intentions.  Once upon a time, he had known how to use WhatsApp, but he must have deleted it after going back to China. Since all his family and friends from China used WeChat instead of WhatsApp, which was banned there, most likely he had no use for it now.

He was asking for as many plastic bags from her flat as she could spare, as well as advice on where to buy the other materials, such as string and balsa wood.

And if she was interested and could spare an hour or two a day to come over, he said, she was welcome to come over and help his sister and brother-in-law to build the kite.

“I can drive you all to Spotlight,” suggested Said, when he arrived at the flat for their nightly TV session and heard Atiqah’s explanation for the pile of folded plastic bags in the living room.

Spotlight was an Australian retail chain specialising in home goods and crafting materials. Its two outlets in Singapore were not in their immediate neighbourhood. The nearer one to them was at the upmarket shopping area in Orchard Road, twelve MRT stops away.

Although they could get there in about 45 minutes using the feeder bus and the MRT, it made sense to accept Said’s offer. Furthermore, Atiqah was in the presence of her family, who would think her incredibly rude if she didn’t.

Hence, Atiqah and Said showed up at Fang Wu’s flat the next day to drop off a pile of plastic bags from both their homes and pick up Cai Ying and Admiral Cai for the shopping excursion.

Previously, Atiqah had barely dared to look at the photo of them in Paris which Lele had projected from Fang Wu’s laptop on her TV. She expected that a retired naval admiral would be fierce and aloof.  But Admiral Cai looked younger than Atiqah had imagined, despite the touch of white in his hair and the crow’s feet that were visible when he smiled.

Cai Ying was as tanned as the Admiral was, the consequence of her having been almost as much at sea as her husband. Though neither tall nor fat, she had a squareness, uprightness, and vigour of form, which gave importance to her person.  Despite looking older than her thirty-eight years, her self-confidence came across as the poise of one who had no distrust of herself, not the bossiness of a middle-aged “auntie”.

With true naval alertness, the pile of plastic bags that Atiqah and Said brought were set aside, and two steaming cups of green tea set in front of them.  The tea, Cai Ying and the Admiral explained, was a local variant from Hainan Island, and they had carried a canister of it halfway across the world and back to drink whenever they missed home.

This was the first time Atiqah had ever been in any of Fang Wu’s living spaces. She couldn’t help looking about her in curiosity. Nor could she refrain from watching for a likeness in his sister, and if it failed her in the features, to catch it in the voice, or in the turn of sentiment and expression.

Based on what Atiqah saw of Fang Wu’s flat, he had hardly changed in the eight years that had passed. He had never pinched pennies, even when he was younger, but he spent for his own enjoyment rather than to show off to others. Despite having much more money now, he wasn’t any more ostentatious than he used to be.

This flat didn’t have a slick interior design job, unlike Said’s. But it was well-situated on the second highest floor in the block, with a pleasant breeze dispersing the muggy air.  Because the unit was rented, there were no pictures on the whitewashed walls, but everything was immaculately neat, and the floor was spotless.

Cai Ying and the Admiral proved to be as down-to-earth and friendly as their brother was.  After Said drove them to Plaza Singapura, they comparison-shopped at Spotlight and Art Friend very efficiently, buying the required materials with minimal fuss.  Then they insisted on treating Atiqah and Said to coffee and cakes at Muji Café before going home, to thank them for the lift.

In the ensuing days, as the kite took shape under their hands, Atiqah came to regard the Admiral and Cai Ying as firm friends.  After it was completed, they went to East Coast Park with Azlan and the two little boys for a test flight.  Under the Admiral’s good-humoured notice, Aziz and Yusuf were much better-behaved than they were at home.

“You can let go now,” called the Admiral to the two little boys holding the tail of the dragon. The moment they released it, the dragon soared into the sky, billowing in the wind.

Atiqah was accustomed to her nephews’ disobedience and mischievous pranks.  Whether it was the novelty of the kite, the natural way with which the Admiral and Cai Ying commanded respect, or simply that there were no screens to distract them, the little boys were not only more cooperative, but also happier than usual.

“Uncle Cai, we don’t want you to go,” the boys clamoured, clinging to the Admiral like an old friend at the door of their flat.

“We’ll be going to Malaysia and Thailand for a week,” Cai Ying explained, “to break up our stay so we don’t exceed the 30-day visa-free limit.”

“Uncle, can you bring us to Malaysia too? Please? We can hide inside your pockets!” Aziz said to the Admiral, pulling his hand.

“How can such a big boy as you fit into a small pocket?” the Admiral explained jovially, turning his jeans pocket inside out to show Aziz. “When you’re a bit older, you can ask your papa or your auntie to bring you.”  He smiled at Atiqah.

She wished she could tell the Admiral and Cai Ying that she didn’t want them to go, too. A twinge of regret surged through her that the acquaintance which this visit began was not to proceed far at present.

Instead, she mustered a smile and wished Cai Ying and the Admiral a pleasant trip.

“I look forward to seeing you for Chinese New Year,” were her parting words while ushering the boys into their flat, giving Cai Ying and the Admiral a final wave.

“Of course,” replied Cai Ying with a smile. “And while my brother is here, I hope we will have many occasions to come back.”

The implied invitation that Cai Ying’s future visits might bring a continuation of their friendship could either mean too little, or too much.  Atiqah didn’t suppose Fang Wu would let on any of their history to his sister, for her sake as much as for his own. But if Cai Ying and the Admiral wished to remain friends with her in their own right, nothing could be more in accordance with her own wishes.

~~~⚽~~~

IX.iii – Xia Jian

Xia Jian thought he had contrived excellent accommodations within his 1,000 sq ft three-bedroom flat. Usually, the shelving he built into every spare nook and cranny managed to contain the mountain of clothing, artwork, handicrafts, toys and books that came with having three children under the age of eight and a bookish almost-brother living with him.

Despite making use of every inch of vertical real estate in his flat, now he couldn’t escape the lack of floor space when large suitcases lay open in every room. His children had pulled out all their stuffed animals and thrown them in a pile in one, insisting that every member of their menagerie needed to see Singapore. A stack of disposable diapers for his youngest took up a good amount of space in another.

Travelling with a seven-year-old, a four-year-old, and a nine-month-old was arduous enough without adding his permanent limp to it all. Yet, Xia Jian believed the inconvenience was worthwhile. Ever since they first met as teenagers, he and his wife had longed to see the world together but never had the money to do so. And they believed that widening their children’s horizons would make them better members of society in future.

It would buck tradition for them to spend the Spring Festival overseas, but all generations of the Xia family agreed that this was for the best.  When Fang Wu had lived in Guangzhou between the ages of 15 and 23, the Xias had always included him in their family reunion dinners to make up for his loneliness as an orphan separated from his siblings.  Now that Fang Wu was on his own in Singapore, it felt natural to bring the reunion to him, since he didn’t have enough off days to travel back to China for the holiday season.

Furthermore, it would be a distraction from the tragedy in their family which they had not yet fully banished into the past.  Every day that Xia Jian’s younger sister, Xia Min, had lived had been a gift.  Born with cystic fibrosis, Xia Min had never taken her health for granted. Still, with the help of modern treatments, regular exercise and a high-calorie diet, they had harboured high hopes for her to enjoy a full life in adulthood.

Xia Min had been a loved and happy member of the household. With a firstborn son already, the elder Mr. and Mrs. Xia could easily have resented having a daughter, especially when the one-child policy had been strictest in the cities. Yet they had borne the financial burden of the fines to register her in their household, and the medical costs to maintain her physical well-being. 

Reluctantly, Xia Jian acknowledged that he’d sometimes envied his sister too, because their parents had spared her the pressure that they had unrelentingly put on him to do well in the 高考 gaokao (high school final examinations).

It didn’t matter that by age seventeen, Xia Jian had decided to play pro football instead of going to university.  Every parent wanted their children to have as many backup options as possible in a cutthroat employment market, so his parents had insisted on him studying hard for the gaokao anyway.  Focusing on the gaokao was the single reason why so many teenagers in China were forbidden from dating by their parents until they were done with high school, and Xia Jian had been no exception to that rule.

But due to her health condition, Xia Min was exempt from the pressure to over-achieve. When at age sixteen, she and her high school classmate, Li Yi, had fallen in love, both sets of parents decided to close one eye so long as Li Yi’s school results didn’t suffer. It was a double standard, but their parents knew that there was no guarantee Xia Min would live into adulthood, so it felt needlessly petty to be too concerned about her school results or her future career prospects. All that mattered was that she was happy.

Ironically, Xia Min had done much better in the gaokao than Xia Jian, Fang Wu, or Xia Jian’s now-wife, Jiayi, had.  She and Li Yi had naturally loved books, so their dating had helped, rather than hurt, their school results. And when her lack of physical energy meant that most extracurricular activities weren’t an option for her, she had spent most of her spare time drawing and reading.

Against everyone’s expectations, Xia Min had graduated university alongside Li Yi, both accumulating stellar academic results. Instead of pursuing stable but boring corporate or government careers, they decided to open a café, which they named “诗情画意 shi qing hua yi”, or “Poetic and Picturesque”. The poetry represented Li Yi, who gave himself the English name “Byron” because he enjoyed reading literature and poems, while the pictures represented Xia Min, whose art adorned the walls of the café.

It had been a huge financial risk and capital investment, but the café had brought much joy to Xia Min and Li Yi.  Unlike conventional salaried jobs, this business allowed them both to participate in ways that brought them the most pleasure. Li Yi determined the menu and created new cakes in flavours and themes that matched Xia Min’s paintings. Every season, they switched up the artwork and the assortment of cakes in the café.

The fact that every cake had a painting with a story behind it, as well as their signature milk coffee, made Xia Min and Li Yi’s café popular from the beginning. Still, it was a long slog for them to break even on their initial investment. Of course, before they could turn a profit, marriage had been out of the question.

Even after a year or two of waiting for fortune, they’d achieved financial success relatively young. By age 25, they had covered their expenses and were starting to make profits. That was the time when they started planning for marriage in earnest, except that Xia Min didn’t live to see their wedding day.

Such was the fragility of Xia Min’s life, that with proper care for her condition, the hope that she would live into her sixties had been real. Yet, she had also faced the risk that an infection could carry her off anytime. The knowledge that this possibility always existed didn’t lessen the grief that the Xia family and Li Yi felt when Xia Min did indeed succumb to a bout of pneumonia in the summer of 2032, a couple of months after her 25^th birthday.

Since then, Li Yi had carried on running the café. As a symbol of his mourning, the menu featured only the muted flavours of matcha and black sesame, replacing the cheerful fruit-flavoured cakes based on Xia Min’s paintings.  Although her artwork still filled the walls – he would never take it away – Li Yi was convinced that without Xia Min, the happy epoch of his life was over. No matter how much his patrons clamoured for the return of the fruit-flavoured cakes in their comments on his social media, he insisted he wasn’t ready to bring them back.

Meanwhile, Li Yi had moved from his parents’ home into Xia Jian’s flat on the day originally scheduled for his wedding, as planned while Xia Min had been alive. Xia Min had lived with her brother since starting university. Not only had she wanted a taste of independent adult life, but her sister-in-law was also a trained nurse who could care for her more expertly than her parents could. Rather than pouring more money into an apartment of their own when their business had just come into the black, Li Yi and Xia Min had decided that he would move in with her after marriage.

Even after Xia Min’s untimely demise, it had made sense for Li Yi to move in with the Xias. He had looked forward so eagerly to establishing his independence that it would be cruel to delay that milestone because of his fiancé’s unforeseen death.  And Xia Jian was equally pained to see his sister’s empty room. Nothing could fully replace Xia Min’s role in either of their lives, but at least, Xia Jian and Li Yi could live as brothers in grief.

This was the second Lunar New Year season after Xia Min’s passing. Last year, the Xia household had closed itself off to all visitors because they were in mourning. But this year, the elders would be expected to decorate their home in red and receive members of the extended family again.

Xia Jian might have forced himself to get through it all, if the opportunity to visit Fang Wu hadn’t come at a time that spared him from it. Furthermore, he thought, a change of environment would benefit Li Yi more than it would him.

At least, the needs of his family kept Xia Jian from wallowing too much in despair. Li Yi had spent the past year and a half tending his café, surrounded by the artwork of his late fiancé, creating bittersweet dessert concoctions that expressed his sorrow to all and sundry.  Surely, it was unhealthy to be stuck in that loop, even if Li Yi couldn’t visualise a life outside it.

Seven-year-old Xianxian and four-year-old Guangguang didn’t call their dad “Superman” for nothing. Somehow, hobbling among the sea of suitcases, Xia Jian managed to turn chaos into order and cram his family of five plus Li Yi, with everything they needed, into two taxis headed to Guangzhou Baiyun Airport on the day before New Year’s Eve.

Navigating through one of the world’s biggest and busiest airports with his limp was exhausting, but Xia Jian had avoided asking for wheelchair assistance because they wouldn’t let him bring a lap infant with him if he did.  To ensure that he and his family lived life to the fullest, he was willing to put up with any amount of personal suffering.

“爸爸，你看，我们飘到云上面了！(Papa, look, we’re floating above the clouds!)” Little Guangguang excitedly jabbed at the window next to his aeroplane seat.

How little it took to make the children happy! Sometimes, Xia Jian wished he could have provided his family with more luxuries. By the standards of an urban middle-class Chinese, seven years felt too long to be the first time he took any of his children on a plane.

Yet, for every family that could take overseas travel as a matter of course, there were many more which could never dream of a trip like this. Xia Jian only had to go back one generation to know that what he provided for his children far exceeded what his parents had ever thought possible for him and his sister.  Growing up, they’d only travelled on the green trains (绿皮火车) between their city and their grandparents’ hometown, never on planes.

In the row behind them, Xianxian was eagerly peering out the window too, with Jiayi in the middle holding infant Mingming in her lap, and Li Yi taking the seat by the aisle.  Life was perennially a tight squeeze, both at home and on the road.

Still, Xia Jian wouldn’t have it any other way. After being a once-rising football star, he was now all but forgotten. In public, he drew more glances of pity than admiration.  But as long as he was a cherished husband, father, and friend, he found his life very much worth living.

~~~⚽~~~

Xi.iv – Fang Wu

“方叔叔！方叔叔！(Uncle Fang! Uncle Fang!)” The two elder Xia children swarmed Fang Wu the minute they ran through the sliding glass doors from baggage claim. With their two huge luggage carts and a baby in a stroller, the three adults lagged far behind.

“你们现在这么大了！(You’ve grown so big now!)” That was the standard refrain Fang Wu uttered every time he saw the Xia kids while stooping to hug them.  Of all his old friends from high school, Fang Wu met Xia Jian the most frequently, but the kids grew so rapidly that even a few months’ absence meant leaps and bounds in their development.

After the party emerged to the landside area, Fang Wu relieved them of one of the luggage carts so that Xia Jian could relinquish the baby stroller to his wife, then led the way to the taxi queue.

The Xias had taken a family room at D’Resort in Pasir Ris, a local seaside staycation venue, for their weeklong visit because it was much more affordable than hotels in town. In addition, Cai Ying and Lao Cai had booked a two-storey duplex room there with a kitchenette for the two public holiday nights, to host their reunion dinner and all-night mahjong parties.  Aside from the festivities of New Year’s Eve and the first day, Li Yi was to stay at Fang Wu’s flat, together with Cai Ying and Lao Cai, to give Xia Jian some much-needed quality time with his family.

Preparations for the celebration were already under way. Food pickup and preparation would take up most of 18^th February 2034, the eve of the Lunar New Year. Thankfully, it was a Saturday, so Fang Wu had the full day off instead of just half a day.

The most expensive of his food purchases were two portions of pen cai 盆菜, an elaborate arrangement of braised seafood, vegetables and meat in a claypot costing over S$300 for a pot serving 10 people.  Typically, he would order roast pork to go with it, but for the sake of Atiqah and her family, he had to substitute that with roast chicken. And since store-bought glutinous rice would contain Chinese pork sausages, he and his sister cooked it at home instead.

If Cai Ying or Xia Jian thought he had gone crazy, neither of them was saying it.

Truthfully, Fang Wu wasn’t sure if he might be crazy, either. Cai Ying and Lao Cai had told him about how Said and Atiqah took them to Spotlight.  Given that they were not prone to gossip, he had to give some weight to their inference that the two might be dating.

Knowing that Said had a car was enough to send Fang Wu’s inferiority complex rearing its ugly head.  Being told that it was a Beemer, which meant it had cost at least S$300,000, sent that same inferiority complex tearing off at full speed.  While Fang Wu had enough cash at his disposal to buy a car if he wanted to, he didn’t see the need to burn up his cash just to show how much of it he had. Not when a piece of paper giving you the right to own one for ten years cost over S$100,000.

Inviting Said to his reunion dinner had not been his intention at all. Even so, he had no idea whether Said considered himself included in the invitation. Excluding him expressly from it had been impossible, when Said seemed to practically live with Atiqah’s family. What other explanation could there be for his hanging out at their flat after dinnertime?

Well, at least Fang Wu didn’t need to care about doing a precise head count. It was good etiquette to provide more food than was needed, so it wouldn’t make any difference to his arrangements whether Said showed up or not.

His relief that Said didn’t accompany the Eusoff family to dinner that evening was short-lived, when Said was the first topic Atiqah mentioned upon her arrival at the duplex.

“Who wants to go Wild Wild Wet on the second day of Chinese New Year?” she asked. “Said is treating, so he asked me to do a roll call for him.”

“Me! Me!” Like a child in school eager to be the first to answer the teacher’s question, Azlan waved his hand vigorously. “And of course, Farah and the boys too.”

“Wild Wild Wet is for kids,” said Aizah. “I haven’t been there since secondary school. But if you all are hanging out at the mall afterwards, I can meet you there.”

“I think we will stay home with the baby,” said Xia Jian, “but if you can bring Xianxian and Guangguang with you, I’d be much obliged.”

Fang Wu knew this request was directed at him. The two elder children adored him, and whenever he visited Xia Jian, his friend entrusted the kids to his supervision for any active pursuits.  Normally, he loved hanging out with Xia Jian’s kids. If only Said weren’t involved! But he wouldn’t deprive the kids of  a fun outing, so there was no way around this except tacit acceptance with a nod.

Of course, it rankled that Said was showing off his wealth again. Tickets at Wild Wild Wet, the water park that was part of the resort complex in Pasir Ris, ran at S$20 to $30 for kids, and S$30 to $40 for adults.  If everyone were to accept, Said would have needed to shell out almost S$600, just for a few hours of playing on water slides.

“You should go and enjoy yourselves,” said Lao Cai. “We’ll take care of things here, right, Yingying?”

“After we check out, we can even keep Uncle Eusoff company if you need,” offered Cai Ying. “Don’t worry about coming back early.”

Li Yi seemed startled at having all eyes turned upon him. Up to this point, he had all the appearance of being oppressed by so many strangers, which wasn’t a surprise to Fang Wu (nor Xia Jian). Anyone who had seen Li Yi during his high school days would know that without the support of his girlfriend, Li Yi was hopelessly introverted in crowds.

“夏大哥 (Big Brother Xia), you won’t mind if I stay behind, will you? I mean, there’ll be enough people to watch the kids?”

“I think we should be OK,” Atiqah assured them. “Azlan and Farah will be there with their kids, so I can help with Xianxian and Guangguang. So, I guess we can confirm 5 adults, 3 kids, and 1 toddler?” She typed furiously on her smartphone, presumably texting Said with the final head count.

Doing the mental arithmetic, Fang Wu arrived at the sum of S$282. It was less than he’d shelled out for their reunion dinner, but still a princely sum for what amounted to a few hours at a glorified public swimming pool.

Once they sat down at the table, conversation flowed with a liveliness that surpassed Fang Wu’s expectations. He and Xia Jian led the talk on one side of the room, and by recurring to former days, supplied anecdotes in abundance to occupy and entertain the others.

But the topic of the West fascinated the group just as much as the topic of China. Soon, Fang Wu found himself listening to an interesting debate about the relationship between dialects, language and culture in various parts of the world.

“I went to international school, so most of my lessons were in English, but I picked up a little bit of Spanish and Catalan,” said Atiqah. “In Barcelona, the locals love it if you can speak Catalan. But I’m sure I’ve been butchering it.”

Despite delivering that self-deprecating statement with a smile, Atiqah still said a few phrases of Spanish and Catalan anyway. To Fang Wu’s admittedly untrained ears, she sounded reasonably fluent. And everybody was blown away by her explanation of the differences between the two languages.

When he had been in Barcelona, Fang Wu hadn’t discussed the Spanish language, or Catalan, with Atiqah at all. But then, they hadn’t been in the mindset of integrating into the local culture at the point when they met. Rather, they’d been fixated on their future pro careers and going home.

“We walked across quite a few regions of Spain,” said Cai Ying. “The one I remember most is the Basque County in the north, and then Galicia, where our destination at Santiago de Compostela was. Like the provinces of China, they all have their unique kinds of food and dialects.”

“Yingying, we wished we knew how to order hot water in Galego, didn’t we?” chuckled Lao Cai.

“There were so many languages to learn, I wonder how we survived on our trip.” Cai Ying shook her head gently and smiled. “Spanish, Arabic, Italian… I have a new respect for opera singers now.”

“How many Catalan speakers in the world are there?” asked Xia Jian.

“Maybe seven to nine million?” Atiqah looked thoughtful. “I believe the population of Catalonia was about eight million when I was there.”

“Well, there are more than 100 million people in Guangdong, but only seven and a half million people preserving the Cantonese language as the default,” said Xia Jian. “When Hong Kong has been more protective of my native tongue than my homeland, I wonder how a language can last for generations with less than ten million people speaking it.”

“It’s one thing to preserve a dialect, but what if they want to break off just because they speak a different language?  The world is becoming a cruel place for smaller countries, and the Catalans are seeing that, aren’t they?” boomed Lao Cai.

“If they really believe it’s better for them, they’ll still break off,” said Aizah. “Singapore is an example, and nobody can say we haven’t survived.”

Fang Wu marvelled at how, with perfect accord, the group fell silent. One more comparison, one more analogy, and that conversation would fall into highly sensitive political territory. He liked to question assumptions, speak his mind, and stand up for his convictions, and his circle of friends self-selected to bias as such. Still, for two groups of people from different races who were just getting to know each other, the level of intellectual curiosity and cultural awareness in this gathering surpassed his wildest expectations.

After a brief pause, Cai Ying steered the discussion in another direction.

“Being in the Middle East during Ramadan was interesting,” she said. “It was the first time in Asia that I felt I had more in common with the laowai 老外 – the Westerners – than the locals.

“We felt bad for eating during the fasting hours, even though we tried to be discreet and respectful to the locals. When there were restaurants that drew the curtains and didn’t play music, it made us feel like we were doing something wrong.”

“I think the difficulty of fasting while everybody else is eating is overrated,” said Atiqah. “After a while you will get used to it, and your body forgets it’s supposed to do anything else.”

“What happened when you played a major match? Did you still have to fast?” asked Li Yi.

With a pang of guilt, Fang Wu realised it was the first time Li Yi participated in the conversation. He should have done more to draw the young man out, but he had been too engrossed as a listener rather than a speaker himself.

“Yes,” replied Atiqah matter-of-factly. “You don’t get out of fasting because you’re an athlete. Only children, the elderly, pregnant women, and people with illnesses are exempt.”

“Much as it’s admirable to know one’s limitations, it’s even more so to overcome them!” Li Yi exclaimed.

That statement undoubtedly applied to Xia Min, but in this context, it could be taken to apply to Atiqah, too. Fang Wu had believed it impossible for a man to be more attached to a woman than poor Li Yi had been to Xia Min, because despite her considerable physical constraints, he had been devoted to her since the tender age of sixteen.

Had Li Yi simply wanted someone to date, he could have chosen anybody. The level of sacrifice he had made to care for Xia Min and give her every happiness, at a stage of life when most people were highly self-centred, had shaped Fang Wu’s ideal of love without him even knowing it.

It was very humbling to admit to learning about love from a teenager at 21, but at that time of life, he and Xia Jian had been football savants and idiots about everything else in life.

Did sharing the inclination to sacrifice for love in the same vein as Li Yi make Fang Wu an idiot or a sage? Or possibly neither? The Romeo-and-Juliet aura that had pervaded the doomed romance of Li Yi and Xia Min was both emotionally moving and pragmatically disastrous, as Li Yi’s current state illustrated.

After they cleared away the dinner plates, the party broke up into groups. As Aziz and Yusuf were too young to stay up till midnight, Azlan and Farah decided to head home, together with Eusoff and Aizah.

“You don’t normally get to talk to other football players, so you should stay,” Aizah told Atiqah. “Don’t worry about Ayah, I can take care of him.”

Xia Jian and Jiayi put their children to sleep in the upstairs bedroom, because tradition dictated that they would pay respects to their parents at midnight to bring them longevity. At their age, the kids couldn’t be reasonably expected to remain awake all night, but with enough beds in the duplex for three people, the kids could have a nap and be woken up later.

Meanwhile, Cai Ying set up the mahjong table downstairs.  She loved to play the game, but during her years in military service, she’d seldom had the chance.  Even though the men of the family found mahjong highly tedious, Fang Wu had dutifully sat down to round after round whenever he visited his sister in Sanya. Those were the only times when Cai Ying could make up a table of three, the minimum number possible to play mahjong.

With more potential players tonight, Cai Ying would have high hopes to create a full table of four. Although Xia Jian was every bit as bored with mahjong as Fang Wu was, Jiayi was highly fond of the game. And inevitably, Lao Cai would be resigned to his duty.

“来，打个通宵！(Come, let’s play all night!)” called Cai Ying, waving her younger brother to the table.

Fang Wu exchanged a quick glance with Xia Jian. Tonight, the duty didn’t need to fall on him alone. There were three of them to take on the rotation between holding the baby, making up the fourth place at the card table, and keeping Atiqah company.

She was nicely settled in front of the TV with Li Yi, watching a documentary on Channel News Asia. For much of the evening, Atiqah had done what Fang Wu had overlooked to do, engaging Li Yi in conversation about any topic sufficiently remote from the Xias, Guangzhou, high school and uni life, and his café to avoid triggering painful emotions.

In a surprising tableau of domesticity, she had even offered to carry the baby, who slept through the muted tones of the TV and its flickering screen.

“小健，代替我一下，(Xiaojian, take my place for a while,)” he half-ordered, although he knew it was rather dastardly to do his best friend in.  But this was one of the few chances he had to converse with Atiqah, and not even one-on-one at that.

“方武，你太可恶了，(Fang Wu, you’re too horrible,)” grumbled Xia Jian half-jokingly. In a rather pointed way, he rubbed his bad knee and refused to budge.

It didn’t escape Fang Wu that now that he was fully retired, something in their dynamic had changed. Li Yi legitimately addressed Xia Jian and Fang Wu as “big brother” because he was five years younger than them. But even though they were the same age, Xia Jian used to do the same to Fang Wu, owing to his seniority on the pitch. On this trip, he’d stopped doing so.

Over the course of the last six weeks, Fang Wu’s pride had taken a beating in more ways than one.  Not only had he paid penance for his faux pas with Lele, but also his friends – and Atiqah – were proving to be wiser than he had given them credit for.

“Atiqah, do you want to play?” asked Xia Jian. “If you’re interested, my wife can teach you.”

“No, I don’t play cards,” replied Atiqah. “Please go ahead.”

That was to be expected; as Fang Wu knew, Muslims weren’t supposed to gamble.  Cai Ying frowned on gambling too, which was why she kept the stakes so small that any wins and losses were merely symbolic.

“My sister only pretends to gamble,” Fang Wu explained. “So, if you’re curious to try, I can tell her not to play with money at all. But you used not to like cards, so if you still don’t, I understand.”

“As you can see,” said Atiqah, gesturing to the TV, “what I like and dislike has not changed.”

Channel News Asia. That was what they’d watched together at her dorm in Barcelona. Her interest in current affairs and her desire to remain connected to her home country had been among the many things he had admired about Atiqah – and still did.

What did it mean that her likes and dislikes were the same? She had liked him – more than liked, that was an understatement. If there were no Said, her meaning would be unambiguous, because he now had the ability to bridge the gaps of distance and religion that had separated them in the past.

Inescapably, Said did exist. And as such, another possible interpretation could be that Atiqah was still as fervently loyal to Islam as she had been before. Fang Wu knew it wouldn’t matter to Atiqah that Said might be richer than he was. But she might care that Said was more Muslim than he’d ever be.  That was a fact of birth, the single circumstance that no amount of hard work could redress.

In any case, Li Yi reminded him that they were not alone, and that this was no time to ponder that statement.

“方大哥 (Big Brother Fang),” Li Yi piped up, “I think Atiqah has some very good suggestions. She said if I don’t feel in the mood to celebrate the New Year, I can spend some time to explore the cultures of the different races who live here. Even the TV programs” – he also gestured toward the screen – “show what a melting pot Southeast Asia is.”

Cai Ying, Lao Cai, and the Xia family would certainly wish to watch the New Year variety show at midnight. If Atiqah didn’t want to play, and Li Yi didn’t wish to celebrate, Fang Wu thought it might make sense to take them home instead. That would also provide the opportunity for Xia Jian and Jiayi to get on WeChat with their parents to pay their respects.

Though Atiqah protested gently at the cost, he insisted that running them home in a Grab was no trouble at all. Instead of getting off at the fourth floor where she lived, Fang Wu was surprised that Atiqah followed them up to the eighth.

“Fang Wu, can I ask you something?” At the lift landing, Atiqah waylaid him. “Would it be very awkward for you if I introduce Byron to Lele?”

That had not been a suggestion he expected. He bore no grudge against Lele, but he also hadn’t thought much about her since their breakup. Since Lele and Atiqah were next-door neighbours and good friends, Fang Wu knew that their paths would cross again at some point, but he didn’t want to spend time dwelling on it.

“No, I don’t mind,” he replied. “I have no hard feelings about Lele. But why do you want to introduce them?”

“I just thought they might enjoy creating something new together,” said Atiqah. “With baking, I mean. Byron showed me pictures of his cakes, and I was thinking, if he tried making something totally different from what he usually does, maybe that will help take his mind off things.”

“It’s worth a try. Do you need his number?” offered Fang Wu.

“Thanks, he already gave it to me. I guess I ought to go,” Atiqah replied, glancing in the direction of Li Yi who was waiting outside Fang Wu’s flat. “Good night.”

“Good night,” he replied. Realising that it was closer to midnight than they thought, he added, “And Happy New Year, too.”

She smiled and returned the greeting before stepping into the lift.  “Happy New Year,” she said, “and we’ll see you tomorrow.”

~~~⚽~~~

IX.v – Byron Li Yi

Byron Lee, otherwise known as Li Yi to the acquaintance of his childhood and youth, slept in late on the first morning of the Year of the Tiger. 

Swimming through his days for the past year and a half, Byron had no idea how burnt out he was until now. The café and the bustle of a flat with three small children in it gave him no room to truly process anything in his mind.

Which was fine, Byron had told himself, because for the remainder of his days he’d be merely existing rather than living. Except that just one night of uninterrupted sleep in a place that didn’t remind him incessantly of the past left him with an unfamiliar sensation of clarity and energy.

He hadn’t felt this good since before… before Xia Min had passed.  Those days were tinged in soft focus whenever the memories flitted through his mind, as if they didn’t quite belong to reality.

But this was real: the sunshine that cast a golden hue on the pale ceramic floor, the smell of freshly made congee with shallots, the peace and quiet. From a distance there was the faint sound of voices, not quite near enough to disturb Byron when he was used to the Greater Bay Area where people were literally stacked on top of each other.

This oasis of calm was Fang Wu’s flat, and the congee must be the breakfast that Fang Wu was making for them.  It hadn’t been till yesterday, when Fang Wu and Cai Ying had prepared the glutinous rice, that Byron knew Fang Wu was such a good cook.

On a day-to-day basis, Xia Jian was the person whom Byron regarded as a big brother, because he didn’t have one of his own.  Because he’d only been a high school student in the days when Fang Wu had been teammates with Xia Jian, he only had a hazy recollection of those days of their friendship. 

Like all big brothers did, Xia Jian and Fang Wu had nagged him to study hard and given him nuggets of advice about surviving the gaokao. With nothing to boast of except being the resident xue ba 学霸 (swot) in his class, Byron had rebuffed them, saying his results would blow theirs out of the water.  In retrospect, he’d been annoying and obnoxious, but then, all insecure teenagers were.

Fang Wu hadn’t held that against him. He’d been in Spain when Byron and Xia Min’s gaokao results were released, but he’d given them a treat at his favourite noodle shop to congratulate them during his brief visit back.

And when Fang Wu had learned of Xia Min’s passing, he had hopped onto the very next flight from Shanghai to Guangzhou, not even applying for a leave of absence to his team until after the fact.

For the darkest week of Byron’s and Xia Jian’s lives, Fang Wu had stayed with them. Throughout the five-day wake before the funeral, Byron had insisted on keeping vigil overnight, outlasting even Xia Jian in his ability to go without food and sleep. 

Needless to say, Byron had been completely helpless in assisting the Xia family. Without Fang Wu and Jiayi tirelessly taking up rotations to watch the kids, serve the visitors water and peanuts, and shuttle the family members between their flats and the funeral home, Byron didn’t know how he and Xia Jian would have gotten through that week.

Before that period, Byron hadn’t known how to appreciate Fang Wu’s presence in his life as a surrogate elder brother. But now, he did.

“方大哥，新年快乐, (Big Brother Fang, Happy New Year,)” he greeted, passing by Fang Wu on the way to the common bathroom after he emerged from his room. Although he felt rejuvenated, the idea that this ought to be a festive season still felt surreal.

“新年快乐。(Happy New Year.)” Fang Wu dished out two bowls of congee as he replied. “来，一起吃饭吧。(Come, let’s eat together.)”

“好的，谢谢。(I will, thank you.)” For the first time since the tragedy, Byron cracked a shy but grateful smile.

After breakfast, Byron and Fang Wu headed back to D’Resort to reunite with the Xias and the Cais. As tradition dictated, they were all decked out in red, except for Byron, who decided that not wearing black was concession enough to the festivities.

Byron didn’t expect Cai Ying and Lao Cai to give him a red packet alongside their brother, but he appreciated their gesture to ensure he didn’t feel left out.  He couldn’t help recalling, with a twinge of pain, that if Xia Min were alive, this would be the first time they would give red packets to the little Xias as a married couple.

“李叔叔，你可以跟我们唱一首歌吗？(Uncle Li, can you sing a song with us?)” beseeched Xianxian. “我们好久没唱了。(We haven’t sung in a long time.)”

For weeks, Xianxian and Guangguang had been skipping around Xia Jian’s flat belting out the New Year songs they’d been taught at school and kindergarten. Byron felt guilty, knowing that he had shut them out emotionally and physically. Every time he heard a New Year song, he’d retired to his room and closed the door, saying he was tired.

To some extent, it had been true. Lunar New Year was the noisiest holiday of the year for a reason: legend had it that the colour red and the loud noise of firecrackers and lion dances would scare away the monster that came to eat the people of the village every year.  Just as importantly, the New Year symbolised the transition from winter into spring.

Byron had spent the last twenty months buried in a deep winter. When Xia Min would never see another spring, he hadn’t wanted the permafrost to thaw. But out here where the tropical sun would not allow for frost, he could see that slowly, Xia Jian and his family were venturing into the light, leaving him behind.

冬天已到尽头 真是好的消息  The winter is over, indeed it’s good tidings

温暖的春风 就要吹醒大地       And the warm spring breeze will get the earth awaking

Little Xianxian and Guangguang were too young to understand the full history and significance of this much-loved, age-old New Year song. Yet instinctively, they’d picked just the right song for this point in Byron and the Xias’ journey.

《恭喜恭喜》(Congratulations) had been written in 1945, when China and the rest of the world were emerging from the shadow of World War II.  Physically, the Lunar New Year was the time when the snow melted, welcoming the first blossoms of spring, and metaphorically, the surrender of the Japanese ended years of darkness, fear, and torture.

皓皓冰雪融解 眼看梅花吐蕊  The white snow has melted, we see blossoms blooming

慢慢长夜过去 听到一声鸡啼  Slowly night has faded, the rooster is crowing

恭喜恭喜恭喜你呀，恭喜恭喜恭喜你! Wishing you a happy new year, Happy New Year to you!

While singing the song, the little Xias skipped around the room, shaking their clasped palms at the adults to send their New Year wishes. They were so cute and innocent that Byron couldn’t resist their pleas for him to sing along.

“再来一遍！(One more time!)” shouted Guangguang.

All the adults joined in, clapping their hands to the rhythm.  It was strange to Byron that acknowledging the onset of spring left him feeling less guilty than the realisation that he’d been unconsciously pulling the Xia children away from it.

Perhaps it was the nature of humankind to recover, just as it was the world’s nature to throw curveballs at people. Just as wounds healed, hearts did too. Before this, Byron hadn’t wished it, but he had to admit that it felt good to be back.

~~~⚽~~~

 IX.vi – Lele

“我们都是避年族 (We’re both escaping the New Year),” was how Byron Lee introduced himself, with a wry smile.

Lele had to admit that she wasn’t sure hosting a friend of Fang Wu’s for the Lunar New Year was a good idea, but she couldn’t resist Atiqah’s appeal to her better nature. Baking was a thing she did very well, and this was a baker whom, Atiqah said, needed a respite from his grief.

The story of Byron’s sorrow had rendered him perfectly interesting. And he wasn’t bad looking either, with his pale face, soulful eyes, and his hair highlighted in streaks of brown, hanging in floppy, curly bangs down his forehead.

“避年有什么关系？一起创作，也可以玩个痛快！(What’s it to me if we skip the New Year, By creating together, we can still enjoy ourselves!)”

Lele knew her tone of defiance was forced.  She’d felt the loneliness of spending the New Year by herself more than she’d anticipated. Hopefully, Byron didn’t notice the red rims under her eyelids. It would be shameful to admit, in the face of genuine legitimate mourning, that she’d been crying her eyes out over the consequences of her own wilfulness.

They rolled their sleeves up and got to it, taking a thorough inventory of the ingredients in Lele’s fridge and pantry and exchanging notes on their respective techniques. 

Usually, Lele prided herself on replicating French style pastries faithfully. Authentic European delicacies commanded a premium among the Caucasian expatriates, as well as rich Singaporeans who aspired to the Western style of living.

On the other hand, Byron catered to the market of up-and-coming young urban Chinese who enjoyed dabbling in Western art, food, and culture, but wanted it adapted to familiar sounds and tastes. He laced his cakes and pastries with distinctly Asian flavours and took his influence from Western-style Japanese cakes rather than the Americans or the French.

Somewhat ignoring that they were subverting their own avoidance of the festivities, Lele and Byron got it into their heads that it might be appropriate to come up with a brand-new New Year cake for the season. Conveniently, there was a pile of mandarin oranges in the fridge, too; in a Chinese-majority country, nobody could escape the sea of red and the deluge of seasonal produce that came during this time of year.

The imagery behind this cake, Byron declared, was the theme of the rising sun. Lele didn’t know where he got his ideas from, and didn’t know if she should ask. But having lived her life thus far pragmatic to a fault, it was intriguing to have a touch of poetry in it.

 ~~~⚽~~~

IX.vii – Fang Wu

There were a lot of reasons why Fang Wu ought to look forward to a day at Wild Wild Wet.

First of all, he was very fond of swimming. And this would be the first chance he had in more than eight years to see Atiqah in swimwear.  Besides, Xianxian and Guangguang sorely needed an opportunity for active outdoor play. They had too few of those, with a father who couldn’t keep up with them physically and a mother who worked long shifts as a hospital nurse.

If only Said hadn’t been the one paying for this outing, everything would have been perfect.

He could withstand the sight of the BMW with its tricoloured striped grille.  When Cai Ying and Lao Cai were given to understatement, of course the vehicle would be even showier than they had described. 

Sport modifications on a luxury car were the most redundant use of money in Singapore. With such limited road space, the speed limit all around the island never exceeded 90 kilometres per hour. And hood ornaments that showed you had these fancy bells and whistles were simply a way to scream out your wealth.

His forbearance could last for as long as Azlan took to shepherd Aziz and Yusuf into a stall in the men’s locker room and get them changed into swimming trunks.  Guangguang was independent enough that it didn’t take him very long to help the little boy, in addition to getting ready himself.

Atiqah, Farah, and Xianxian were dressed more for practicality than vanity, in sleeved wetsuit-style swimming costumes of navy blue, black, and pink respectively.  Their attire served double duty for modesty and to guard against overexposure to UV rays from the sun.

There wasn’t any disappointment there. This was exactly how Atiqah always dressed for swimming.  She didn’t have to show a ton of skin for him to admire her beauty.

Then, what was the problem?

Of all the sights in the world, the one that Fang Wu decided he should not have to withstand was Said strutting around in a Speedo.  How could it be so unfair that Atiqah and Farah had to cover themselves up while Said could get away with wearing as close to nothing as possible? Out of respect for Atiqah’s modesty, Fang Wu had always worn knee-length loose board shorts when they went swimming together.

Worse still, Guangguang flew right to his sister’s side, listening raptly as Said pointed out each of the water slides and explained which ones they would be taking. Right there and then in the kiddie pool, Atiqah and Said started up a water fight with the children. If one were to ignore the differences in race, that tableau could very well be what they’d look like if they married and had children of their own.

Nobody could give Fang Wu any amount of money to stand here feeling superfluous like this. Heading back to the locker room, he changed back into his street clothes and rummaged in his wallet. Fang Wu wasn’t in the habit of carrying cash because in China, he could pay for anything using WeChat Pay or AliPay on his mobile.  But he didn’t have Said’s number to reimburse him via the PayLah! app that everybody used in Singapore.

His ticket had cost S$39, and he had exactly one S$50 note.

Edging as close to the side of the pool as he could in his sneakers, Fang Wu waved for a good five minutes before he caught Atiqah and Said’s attention.  Atiqah was the one who saw him first, wading over to the poolside while the giggling kids poured a bucket of water over Said’s head.

“Fang Wu, I thought you were going to join us?” she asked, rather quizzically.

Fang Wu dithered. It would be painful to deny her his company – if indeed that was what she was asking for – but did he want to stay and see her flirting with Said in a Speedo?

No, that wasn’t fair. Atiqah never flirted on purpose. But then, surely the mere act of showing up in a Speedo meant that Said intended to flirt with her.

He could feel his brow furrowing as he tried to take in the situation. Everybody else at this overpriced water park was having so much fun that he only served the purpose of a wet blanket and a spoilsport.

“It’s the second day of the New Year. Since the kids seem to be doing well with you two, I ought to spend more time with Xia Jian and my sister.”

“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to take you away from your family during the holidays.” Atiqah sounded so contrite, it made Fang Wu feel bad. He hadn’t meant to imply that this was her fault in any way. “It was just that Said thought this was a good time to come, because it’s less crowded with everyone going visiting.”

“No worries.” The words sounded cold to Fang Wu, even as they came out of his mouth. He was about to give Atiqah the $50 for Said, but that felt unnecessarily ungracious and cruel.

“I’ll be back in three hours’ time to pick up the kids,” he said instead.

“Are you sure you don’t want to stay?” asked Atiqah. It had to be Fang Wu’s imagination that she sounded like she was pleading with him. Why should she have any reason to do so when just a few minutes ago, she and Said had been having so much fun?

“No, I don’t think there’s anything worth staying for.” Shoot, that came out horribly wrong, but Fang Wu couldn’t take it back. Surely, he couldn’t say that Said, not Atiqah, was the person not worth staying for, in the presence of the man himself?

On his way out of the premises, Fang Wu stuffed the $50 note into the crack between the door hinges of the locker that he believed was Said’s. It protruded enough to be conspicuous for anyone who might want to steal it, but on top of the indignity of losing to Said in love, Fang Wu couldn’t stand the notion of being financially beholden to him in any way.

~~~⚽~~~

IX.viii – Atiqah

Atiqah could guess that the Xia kids didn’t get to do this very often. She had no idea how long they spent at Wild Wild Wet, but everybody’s fingertips were shrivelled like prunes. Furthermore, she’d lost count of how many times she had rounded everybody up to reapply their sunscreen.

Azlan and Farah had lost steam and gone home long ago, not least because they had to change Yusuf’s swim diapers.

Fang Wu was already waiting by the poolside by the time she succeeded in cajoling Xianxian and Guangguang out of the water. They launched their wet selves straight at him, oblivious to the fact that they were soaking his street clothes in chlorine.

They said something to him in Chinese, and he said something back, and then he disappeared with Guangguang to the men’s locker room.

“Uncle Fang will bring us to McDonald’s for ice cream,” Xianxian explained to her.

“That sounds nice,” replied Atiqah absently, ushering the little girl into the ladies’.

When she emerged from the women’s locker room with Xianxian in their street clothes, she found herself accosted by Fang Wu, in a reserved yet hurried sort of farewell.

“The children asked for ice cream,” he said, “and I don’t want to get it too close to their dinnertime. I hope you don’t mind if we make a move first.”

Seeing the Xia children skipping off with Fang Wu, Atiqah couldn’t help feeling a little left out. She had hoped so much to have this opportunity to enjoy a day of swimming with Fang Wu. Even if nothing else came out of it, she could relive a shadow of the joy they’d once experienced on the beaches of Barcelona.

Twice, she had asked Fang Wu to stay, and yet she’d been rebuffed. If not for the need to look out for the kids, she might have been even more obvious than that.  But she couldn’t possibly leave Said to handle two kids on his own in the pool. The difference between his present air and what it had been at the reunion dinner, or even when they’d watched Ramy together, was strikingly great. Why was it?

“Sayang (Darling), where would you like to go next?” asked Said.

Wait, where in the world did that come from? Atiqah was so appalled at Said’s presumptuousness that she froze momentarily, unable to give an immediate reply.

“Please… I didn’t mean… I’m sorry if I gave you the wrong impression…” she stammered, after a long, awkward silence.

“Erm… sorry.” Said looked hurt, and Atiqah felt a sense of déjà vu. Hours ago, she’d seen the exact same expression on Fang Wu’s face. “I didn’t realise… I mean, I thought… Never mind, I won’t force you if you don’t feel that way about me.”

“I think of you as a friend,” Atiqah said, feeling horrible for having the need to conduct this conversation. “A good friend, but a friend.”

How had Fang Wu picked up on vibes that she’d missed? In the light of what had just transpired, jealousy of Said was the only intelligible motive for Fang Wu to have looked grave, and seemed irresolute, all day long. Could she have believed it a week ago; three hours ago!

For a moment, the gratification was exquisite. But, alas! There were very different thoughts to succeed.

To add to the extreme awkwardness of the situation, everyone else had gone off, leaving Atiqah and Said completely unchaperoned.  Technically, this was supposed to be taboo. But this was Singapore – in practice, nobody would bat an eyelid. If any Muslims wanted to judge them, they would not voice it aloud.

Should she walk to the bus stop, or follow Said to his car?  Knowing Said, he would assume that he was driving her home, and it would be rude if she rejected whatever implicit offer he might make. But did it still hold after what they’d just discussed? It would be unworthy of her to think Said was so petty. Still, wasn’t he just a man? Pettiness was human, and perfectly forgivable, in such a situation.

“I can - ” she said, only for him to also utter the same words in unison.

“You first,” offered Said. His chivalry did nothing to lessen Atiqah’s sense of guilt.

“No, please go first,” Atiqah insisted.  She didn’t want to say anything further to hurt his feelings.

“I’ll give you a lift.” Said forced a wry smile. “No strings attached.”

“Thank you.” Atiqah hung her head, unable and unwilling to countenance how badly she had disappointed Said.

Said tuned his car radio to Warna 942 on the way home, filling the gaping silence. The elephant in the proverbial room – or rather, the car – was humungous.

Of course, there was guilt. Undoubtedly the children had enjoyed themselves, but nobody could deny that this was a horrible end to what ought to be a perfectly good public holiday for the adults. Bigger than the guilt, there was the worry. Yes, even while sitting in Said’s car, Atiqah’s thoughts were with Fang Wu.

How was such jealousy to be quieted? How was the truth to reach him? How, in all the peculiar disadvantages of their respective situations, would he ever learn of her real sentiments?

When Said pulled into the open-air carpark near her block, Atiqah looked around her warily. Good, no one she knew was anywhere in sight. She hoped Said didn’t notice the sigh of relief she heaved. 

It was misery to think of all the assumptions she might have incited. From now on, there would be no more – but the evil of the ones which had already taken hold were incalculable.

Chapter Text

Friday, 24^th February 2034, ended a gruelling workweek for Fang Wu that felt extraordinarily long, even though the public holiday had shortened it.

The Spring Festival (well, the two days of it that were recognised in Singapore) had come and gone. To his chagrin, he was no closer to figuring out whether he had any chance romantically with Atiqah.

She’d gotten along fantastically with his family and friends, continuing to hang out with them after he went back to work.  Cai Ying and Lao Cai sang her praises to no end after she’d helped them build the dragon kite. Xia Jian was thrilled at the gift and sent Fang Wu a video of them flying it at the Marina Barrage. 

Furthermore, Fang Wu and the Xias were infinitely grateful for Atiqah’s attempts to draw Li Yi out of his shell. Surprisingly, she’d gotten him to spend an entire hour explaining the mechanics of making pineapple tarts on the first day of the New Year.

After that disastrous trip to Wild Wild Wet, Said hadn’t joined the group again for the rest of the week. But Farah’s parents, Mahmud and Zubaida, had sprung for a trip to KidZania on their off day, bringing the Xia kids along with their two grandchildren.  Everybody, it seemed, was eager to use this visit as an excuse to pony up for overpriced kiddie attractions.

Xia Jian had been thankful for a quiet day alone with his wife, but less so about the mixed reports he received from that outing.

Azlan had been miffed that Xianxian and Guangguang spat out the mee siam (vermicelli in tamarind sauce) he’d bought for them. But Xia Jian and Xia Jiayi had been unimpressed with Azlan implying that their kids were not at all nice children.

Cantonese food was the least spicy of all the Chinese cuisines. Therefore, the mistake had been Azlan’s. Why should he give the hottest, tangiest noodle dish in Singapore to a seven- and a four-year-old who weren’t accustomed to spicy food, when they hadn’t asked for it?

In contrast, Mahmud and Zubaida had been highly impressed with the little Xias. Xianxian had explained all the activities to the younger kids and helped them count their play money. Even though Guangguang was only a month older than Aziz, he had treated Aziz and Yusuf like younger brothers, letting them stand ahead of him in the queue and sharing his prizes with them.

Such extravagant treats were rare occurrences in Xianxian’s and Guangguang’s lives. Three days after the outing to KidZania, they were still on a high.  It was even enough to change their lifelong career ambitions.

“我要当机长！(I want to be a pilot!)” Guangguang declared when Fang Wu met the Xias at D’Resort that Friday.  That was surprising, when unlike most four-year-olds, Guangguang didn’t change his professed dream job every week. For the past year, he’d been saying that when he grew up, he wanted to be a drummer.  No amount of convincing could make him agree that wasn’t a very practical career choice, but then, he was four. There would be years ahead for him to figure this out.

“我要做太空人！(I want to be an astronaut!)” said Xianxian.  Before this, she’d always said she wanted to become a nurse like her mother.

Oh, how ironic that when one had roots, one wanted to travel! Fang Wu couldn’t remember when he’d last been as excited as the little Xias about roaming the seven seas (or the skies).  For too many years, either his permanent displacement or his heartbreak had left him jaded.  There was no need to distinguish one from the other when they might be two sides of the same coin anyway.

Tonight, Cai Ying and Lao Cai were babysitting so that the young adults could have an evening of karaoke. The next morning, the Xias and Li Yi would fly back to China, arriving in Guangzhou in time for dinner with their parents to mark the seventh day of the New Year.

Karaoke, or KTV as it was typically called, had been the way Fang Wu and his friends let off steam since they were teenagers. Chinese KTV lounges offered semi-soundproof private rooms, so everyone could sing without having to be proficient enough for a public performance.

Feeling that he ought to pay for something when others had been taking his kids out on their dime all week, Xia Jian had extended an invitation to Eusoff’s family and Said. Only Atiqah had accepted, with the rest declining because they didn’t know any Chinese songs.

Atiqah didn’t speak any more Chinese than a typical Malay Singaporean, i.e. enough to pepper a few Mandarin and Hokkien words into their Singlish, but not to string together a full sentence. Not that Fang Wu held that against her – Mandarin was one of the most difficult languages to learn, and the dialects were even worse. 

Yet, Atiqah was willing to spend an evening watching them sing in a language she didn’t understand. Was this a reason for hope?

~~~⚽~~~

With a heavy convectional downpour in the late afternoon, Atiqah was held up in the crowd while picking the boys up from preschool. She rushed to take a public bus to Pasir Ris, where she was to meet the Xias, Fang Wu, and Li Yi at Jewel Music Box. It was a surprise to her that she was still the first to arrive; the party being even later than she was.

“I’m so sorry for the delay,” Xia Jian apologised, hobbling over to where she stood by the reception counter. “We were creating an Instagram account for Byron’s café, so he can post his creations for an overseas audience.”

“Does this look OK?” Fang Wu showed the group an Instagram post of a dome-shaped mini chiffon cake in a light orange hue, bearing a caption in Chinese.

Lowering his voice, Fang Wu added sotto voce to Xia Jian, “I muted the red in the background. Sorry, I took so long because I was trying to figure out how to retouch it.”

“I made a new cake for the festive season,” explained Byron, handing Atiqah a small cardboard box. “Here’s a sample for you to try.”

She took it, and accepted Byron’s suggestion that she eat it before they went in so that they wouldn’t breach the rule of no outside food.  The cake tasted good – fluffy and light, with a pop of flavour from the mandarin orange filling in it.

“It’s very nice,” she complimented him. “I hope you enjoyed the process of creating this.”

“I did.” Byron looked like a different man from when Atiqah had first seen him on New Year’s Eve. How had a mere week done so much to ameliorate nearly two years of sorrow?

The notion that it might not just be the process of creating, but whom he had been creating with, which had pulled Byron out of his depression crossed Atiqah’s mind. 

At twenty-six, Byron was younger than she was; perhaps younger in feeling, as well as in fact. His love for Xia Min had burned bright for ten long years, withstanding illness and death, which was highly commendable given the fleeting nature of many teenage relationships. Could he be blamed for not having a more sorrowing heart than she had?

Nobody ought to begrudge Byron, Atiqah decided, if his collaboration with Lele was his first step towards moving on. One week did not make a romance, and she would not conjecture what might happen after Byron went back to China.

But Lele was a Chinese citizen; if she and Byron wished to correspond and eventually develop a relationship, they would have no difficulties to contend with at home, no opposition, no caprice, no delays.

In short, if Byron and Lele eventually got together, Atiqah saw every reason to hope it would be a very happy match. When there were, on both sides, good principles and good temper, who had the right to object? All it would mean was that they were luckier than she was.

~~~⚽~~~

The Sound of Silence (Simon and Garfunkel), performed by Byron Li Yi

Xia Jian didn’t have a ton of money, but he’d always been a consummate host.  With Atiqah in the party, it would be rude of them to only sing in Chinese, so he suggested that they start with a round of English songs.

Usually, Byron wasn’t the first to take the mike. But today, if he wasn’t reading the situation wrongly, everybody seemed preoccupied. Before, Byron had been oblivious to awkward silences, so why did he now feel so compelled to fill them?

The answer, Byron realised, was that he was tired of melancholy being the default of his life. Guangzhou was overflowing with people, but that had only exacerbated his sense of isolation. Being jolted out of his usual routine had shown him that old muscle memory wasn’t immutable; he simply needed new sights, sounds and experiences to conquer it.

Hello darkness my old friend

I’ve come to talk with you again

Byron’s sonorous bass voice filled the room, bouncing off the walls with an echo.  Xia Jian wondered how the quiet, serious and retiring youth had gained such a sense of presence. The words were melancholy, as much so as Byron had invariably been. But Byron had never been performative about his gloominess; usually, he preferred to fade into the background.

Because a vision softly creeping

Left its seeds while I was sleeping

And the vision that was planted in my brain

Still remains

Within the sound of silence

Fang Wu wondered what he’d missed. True, before this trip, he hadn’t seen Byron in over half a year. That was a long time in the life of a young mourner. Still, it was hard for Fang Wu to reconcile the image of the utterly broken youth he’d seen at Xia Min’s wake with the voice that now lifted, letting hope creep into it.

This was the voice of a man who was starting to fall in love, not that of one who despaired of ever loving again in this life.  The concept of visions, after all, could only signify romance.

Perhaps, thought Fang Wu, he was merely projecting. Being hyper-aware of his still being in love, with the knowledge that it would not change for the rest of his life, might be driving him to imagine love in everybody else.

~~~⚽~~~

My Way (Frank Sinatra), performed by Fang Wu

Fang Wu knew everybody expected him to take the mike next. Although his singing was far from professional, the sincerity of the feelings he expressed more than made up for it.  Whether fairly or not, he was known among his circle of friends as the best, or at least the most willing, singer of the lot.

Every time Fang Wu sang, his emotions were at their most transparent.  But ‘hopelessly in love’ was not a feeling that he wanted to parade in front of the Xias and Byron. Or, for that matter, Atiqah – at least, not until he knew she returned her feelings for him. Otherwise, to be rejected again, publicly in front of his friends to boot, would absolutely destroy him.

What else could Fang Wu sing about? The only thing he had, other than his love for Atiqah, was his career. An illustrious career that he had recently retired from.  Could there be a more honest and appropriate song for him than Frank Sinatra’s My Way?

And now, the end is near

And so, I face the final curtain

Dang, how was it that just the first two lines could nearly make him cry? Fang Wu was sure everyone else noticed his voice wavering. His career might have been chosen for him before he was old enough to know his own choice, but he’d enjoyed the sense of mastery in doing something he was very good at. Thinking of the moment when he’d walked off the pitch for the last time was bittersweet.

Of course, these two lines could also be about something else. He was running out of chances to figure out where he stood with Atiqah before she sealed the deal with Said. In fact, he supposed the only reason why he hadn’t heard a definitive announcement that they were dating was because they couldn’t talk about it until they were engaged. Which would, of course, be too late for him to do anything.

Regrets, I’ve had a few

But then again, too few to mention

I did what I had to do

And saw it through without exemption

Was that true, though? Fang Wu had only one regret, but that one was far from inconsequential. And he hadn’t done everything in his power to remedy it. He could tell himself that before this, the right chance hadn’t arisen, but that would be self-deception. No single situation was perfect. The imperfect opportunities were the ones he hadn’t grasped.

I’ve loved, I’ve laughed and cried

I’ve had my fill, my share of losing

And now, as tears subside

I find it all so amusing

To think I did all that

And may I say, not in a shy way

Oh, no, oh no, not me

I did it my way

Upon hearing these words sung by the person who embodied them to her, Atiqah was more aware than ever that warmth and enthusiasm did captivate her still.  She prized the frank, the open-hearted, the eager character above all others. How much of Fang Wu’s career had she missed? Watching him play on TV was a poor substitute for being able to experience the joys, the glories, and the disappointments with him on and off the pitch.

For what is a man, what has he got?

If not himself, then he has naught

To say the things he truly feels

And not the words of one who kneels

The record shows I took the blows

And did it my way

To make these words true for him, Fang Wu would have to go for broke. He had done it once and taken the backlash.  After he’d come back, he had been cautiously observing the situation, absorbing all the hints – favourable and unfavourable.  But the fact was, he hadn’t yet said what he truly felt. If he did, and was forced to his knees again, he didn’t know how he could continue to exist.  Yet if he didn’t, he wouldn’t be the man he truly wished he was.

Lingering on the last note that he clung onto for as long as his breath could take it, Fang Wu opened his eyes to find that his performance had transfixed everybody. As if in time-lapse, everything stayed suspended for a long minute before he was showered in applause.

There were so many things Fang Wu had done, in the past, that had drawn adulation.  Stealing the show wasn’t a new experience to him. And he had soaked up every moment of it, just like he had said in the song.

So, why was it that this time, after doing it yet again, he still felt that his job was unfinished?

~~~⚽~~~

Life Story (Dick Lee), performed by Atiqah

The unchanging identity that best described Atiqah was that she was a daughter of Singapore.

Apart from those few years in Barcelona, all her days had been lived here. Even the years she’d spent abroad had been in service of her country, training to be the best and brightest in Singapore football. She was just the girl next door; someone who led a very ordinary life.

Her song would be something local. Something unremarkable yet embodying of the life of every Singaporean. 

Prior to this, Atiqah had never been to a KTV lounge. Karaoke was the pastime of the ethnic Chinese. Whenever a new Chinese-language pop song was released, the official MTV was also formatted for karaoke, with large lyric subtitles that had animated shading to show you what to sing.

The quality of English-language KTV videos, on the other hand, was patchy. Most of them featured boring footage of random scenery that looked like it came from the 1980s. That was because few English-language MTVs and live performance videos gave rights to be produced for karaoke. And when genres like rap and rock weren’t easy for ordinary people to sing, most of the English songs available for KTV were oldies.

It was no wonder that Aizah, Azlan, and Said weren’t interested in going for karaoke. Atiqah wouldn’t have cared for it either, if Fang Wu wasn’t part of the group.

But if she was to sing, Atiqah knew which song was uniquely her. When it was representative of just about every Singaporean, perhaps it was fitting that she had been born on National Day.

Atiqah’s song was Dick Lee’s maiden composition Life Story, written when he was only seventeen.

Born today some years ago

And had a happy childhood

But I fell in love and out

Nothing changed

Lived a life of nothing much

But then how much can one expect?

So there you are

My life has gone

But I’m the same

Just my life story

Minute by second a story

That goes on forever with each breath that I take

This is my life story

Uneventfullest story

That ages with each year and birthday cake

Everything in those words had been true. The immutability of her existence over the past eight and a half years had at times felt stifling.  Singapore had gotten less conformist as its population got richer, but the widely accepted path still fell within the straight and narrow. One went to school, got a job, and took care of one’s family. The less drama one’s life had, the better it was deemed to be.

But was this the life Atiqah really wanted? It was a fallacy to say that she had fallen in love and out, when she had never stopped. She hoped that Fang Wu wouldn’t read too much into the lyrics. This might be what she was now, but she didn’t feel comfortable with how the song implied that she wanted it to stay that way. Yet, this was just a song… wasn’t it?

Thinking back

I like to dream of things I would have done

If I were braver

Then again, I’m not

What’s there to do?

Conservatism was a quintessential characteristic of Singaporeans.  Many stuck to what was tried and true, because… why, really? Two generations ago, it had been a matter of necessity.

When the stakes had been about carving a place in the world for a tiny island with less than two million people, there had been no room for dreams or risks.  People were digits who grew the population, the industries, and the GDP.  A narrow definition of success and socially acceptable choices was essential to keep everybody focused on driving growth and living in harmony within a small space.

Eight years ago, when Atiqah called off her de facto engagement with Fang Wu, she had believed herself to be doing the safe and sensible thing.  Despite their youth, they had been mature enough to realise that throwing away their careers to be together was neither wise nor feasible.

But to wait in limbo for an indeterminate number of years on both sides carried the risk of disappointment, too. He had said he would come for her after the World Cup in 2030, but what if he failed to achieve his dream at the first try and wanted another shot? What if he regretted his promise to convert because he found an easier path to happiness? What if their employment prospects never allowed them to be in the same country?

With the geographical separation that Fang Wu’s return to China created, there was no risk of them anticipating their marriage vows, even if they had been so tempted. In any case, that had never crossed their minds because of the cultural taboos around it.

So, the only risks that Atiqah had faced in keeping the engagement had been emotional, not financial or physical. She had anticipated that in the worst-case scenario where they wished to break things off, it would be too painful to cling on for years, only to still let go.

She’d thought that she was doing it for him. That if Fang Wu were to eventually regret it, she didn’t want to be the cause of his pain. But now, she realised that her decision had been for herself, too. Just as she didn’t want to cause him pain, for her own sake, she hadn’t wanted to witness it.

All that was moot now. These words might have been Atiqah’s truth once, but they weren’t anymore.  But how could she get the message across?

Maybe if I had another chance

I’d go into my past

And make my life a better one

For me and you

That wasn’t quite strong enough for Atiqah’s liking. It was true that she might do things differently if she could return to the past, but in the present, that wasn’t useful.

And yet, a Singapore song didn’t give her the latitude to be bolder. Stepping out as an independent country in 1965, with just six hundred square kilometres of land, had taken up most of Singapore’s boldness. Life Story, written in 1974, had been an ode to a people who were simply trying to survive.  In those times, the ordinary had been aspirational.

When it’s time

And I must close

I’ll write a book

And sign it X

And send it to some true romance type magazine somewhere…

So my life story

It’s self-explanatory

Won’t you please start from page one

And do go on

Till I am done

Atiqah didn’t think she was ever going to do that. During the years when she had been active in football, her name had graced the newspapers regularly. But for the last two and a half years, she’d been just another Malay face in her neighbourhood.

Did she wish for her story to be bigger and bolder than Dick Lee’s Life Story? Did it even need to be?

The song faded out just like an everyday Singaporean life. Unlike My Way, there were no big proclamations, no dramatic notes to hit at the end. Yet, the applause Atiqah’s rendition drew was no less enthusiastic than that given to Fang Wu.

“You didn’t sound like this is your first time singing karaoke,” Xia Jian complimented her. “Just like our dear friend here, you’re a very sincere singer.”

“Thanks.” Atiqah felt shy at the praise.  No one in the room except him might know how the lyrics related to her own life story. But for him especially, she didn’t want to leave the misconception that this was the truth she still subscribed to.

She would have to find another song, something more decisive and definitive.  Or else, there needed to be a better way than hinting at their feelings (or not) through song.

~~~⚽~~~

Moon River (Audrey Hepburn), performed by Xia Jian and Xia Jiayi

It had been a long time since Xia Jian and Xia Jiayi last went for karaoke together.

They had married in the summer after Jiayi graduated university and started her nursing residency training.  A year later, they had their first child. Two more kids later, they barely went anywhere without the children – not that they minded that.

Moon river, wider than a mile

I’m crossing you in style someday

Oh, dream maker, you heart breaker

Wherever you’re going, I’m going your way

Fang Wu hadn’t heard Xia Jian and his wife sing duets in karaoke since before they were married, back when she was in university.  As was the case with many couples, they had learned a wide repertoire of Mandopop and Cantopop duet songs.  But, as befitting a pair who had been friends since high school, they came across as comfortable, rather than romantic.

The three of them had been part of a big group of friends who hung out after school and during holidays in senior high.  As sons and daughters of ordinary families, they all had been forced into prudence in their youth. Getting through the gaokao and having good careers had been the be-all and end-all. When there hadn’t been much room for flights of fancy, romance had been out of the question.

It had taken Xia Jian six years to work his way up to asking Jiayi out on their own.  In the first couple of years after high school, their group of friends had met up every term break. But as time passed and people dropped off, Xia Jian found himself organising a lunch that only Jiayi could attend.  And rather than wishing to cancel, he’d found himself looking forward to it being just the two of them.

“你说这算是约会吗？(Do you think this can be considered as a date?)” Xia Jian had asked.

At 21, Fang Wu hadn’t known anything more about dating than Xia Jian had. In the end, it had been Li Yi, all of sixteen years old and in his second year of senior high, who had spoken up.

“你为什么不问她？如果她说是就是，(Why don’t you ask her? If she says it is, then it is,)” he’d said.

“你这样约我妹吗？(Do you date my sister like this?)” Xia Jian had asked half-jokingly. 

“我哪里有钱约你妹？(Where do I have money to date your sister?)” Li Yi had sallied back. 

Though they called themselves a couple, the two teenagers’ dates had primarily consisted of him taking her to and from school on the back of his bicycle whenever her energy level allowed. Other than that, they hung out at each other’s homes to study and read, because they didn’t have the money to do anything else.

“看我能不能猜穿你的绝招，(Let’s see if I can guess your master tactic,)” Fang Wu had said. “这里有两本限量版漫画给你。(Here’s two limited edition comic books for you.)”

“谢谢方大哥！(Thank you, Big Brother Fang!)” Li Yi’s face had lit up as he took the books.

That had given them all a good laugh. No matter how intellectually highbrow they tried to be, Xia Min and Li Yi had been teenagers after all.  Like any other high school students, they couldn’t resist a well-drawn manga, especially collectible editions.

Back then they had been young and poor, but happy.  And so terribly innocent!

The way Xia Jian and Xia Jiayi looked at each other when they sang this song, as if he might sweep her away to the ends of the earth any minute, was so different from Fang Wu’s memories of the high school students they’d once been.

When had their prosaic, practical natures become so fanciful and romantic?

Two drifters, off to see the world

There’s such a lot of world to see

We’re after the same rainbow’s end…

Moon river and me

Fang Wu didn’t think Xia Jian and his wife had time to practice singing in harmony.  The way their voices came together in the end, he could barely believe this was an impromptu performance.

“I hope this is the first of many times we’ll see the world together,” said Jiayi, her luminous eyes gazing radiantly into her husband’s.

“I’ll try my best,” Xia Jian promised. “But I think this is a great start.”

~~~⚽~~~

《永不失联的爱 (Unbreakable Love)》(Eric Chou), performed by Xia Jian and Xia Jiayi

Xia Jian had entered all his songs into the system at one shot, so the next song to come up on the screen was his and Jiayi’s as well.  Like the previous song, it was the first time Fang Wu heard the Xias sing this song at karaoke too. When had they branched off from conventional duets to interpreting other songs as a dialogue of their own?

亲爱的你躲在那里发呆   My dear, where are you hiding in your grief?

有什么心事还无法释怀  What’s troubling you, keeping you from finding peace?

我们总把人生想得太坏  Life’s always too cruel in our belief

像旁人不允许我们的怪  Like passers-by who look at us askance

This situation sounded far more like Fang Wu’s own past with Atiqah than Xia Jian’s story.  Through the past six weeks of self-flagellation, Fang Wu hadn’t thought objectively about why he had been more optimistic than her about the possibility of a future together, eight years ago.

He hadn’t been blind to the reality that converting to Islam would involve major changes to many aspects of his daily life. That as a lifelong agnostic, adopting a religion would mean a huge mental shift. Most of all, like the song said, there would be people who would judge his choices.

There wouldn’t be anything visible that would mark him as a Muslim, but inevitably, it would become obvious through his avoidance of pork and alcohol.

Chinese Muslims typically belonged to the Hui ethnic group. Huis were visibly indistinguishable from Hans and spoke Chinese, but adopted Islam because of Central Asian, Persian or Turkic lineage in their family trees.

If he converted, Fang Wu would need to be prepared that whenever he might out himself as a Muslim, people might either assume he had been born Hui, or question why he was doing this to himself.  He might not be ostracised from society exactly, but whenever he met someone new, he’d potentially have to answer more curious questions than he might wish for.

Despite knowing the difficulties, Fang Wu had been willing to forge ahead.  For years, he’d wondered where he’d failed in convincing Atiqah about his confidence in dealing with the risks.

Before watching the episode of Ramy, Fang Wu had no idea how starkly Atiqah’s risk profile had been the exact opposite of his. Before he converted and they married, she was the one who might be subject to significant backlash if he didn’t or couldn’t follow through.  He’d been sanguine in the prospect that this would resolve itself after they married in Islam. But for as long as they were hanging in limbo, the person whom others might look at askance, if they knew, was her, not him.

Xia Jian, who had married his high school classmate born and bred in the same city as him, knew nothing of such difficulties. So why had he chosen to sing this song?

我们都习惯了原地徘徊  We’re too accustomed to the same old ways

却无法习惯被依赖            But not the habit of being leaned on

The words brought Fang Wu back into those months of agonising stalemate, where he’d convinced himself that he didn’t need closure with Atiqah, but his subconscious had sought it anyway.

Fang Wu hadn’t been able to resist giving Atiqah assistance, even if he believed her indifferent to him. No other words could apply more to him, when he’d shrunk away from analysing that circumstance.

Xia Jian had always enjoyed teasing him through song. At karaoke, they had established a repartee where Fang Wu would sing 《梦醒时分 (Awakening Moment)》, a song about never meeting the right people, and Xia Jian would reply with 《心太软 (Too Softhearted)》, which was about holding on to an unsuitable relationship for too long.

Because Xia Jian had no idea about Atiqah, Fang Wu had let Xia Jian believe that this was about all the casual app dates he’d gone on that had never gone anywhere.  Those dates had merely been lip service to the social expectation that he should find a partner, and the result that they’d all come off as bland as water had only added to his sense of disillusionment.

Fang Wu could never have shared the true reason for his perennial singleness with Xia Jian when he had never admitted to it himself. And Xia Jian would never be cruel enough to sing his life back to him, if he had any inkling of the painful truth.

Therefore, there had to be a reason why Xia Jian, who had never experienced a breakup, considered this song relevant to himself.  Could it be that even the most happily married people were not spared from doubts, insecurities, and misgivings?

你是我这一辈子都不想失联的爱     You are the love that in this life I’d never wish to lose

何苦残忍逼我把手轻轻放开           Why must you be so cruel as to forsake me

请快回来 想听你说         Please come back now, I wish to hear

说你还在                      That you’re still there

On the surface, these words were about Fang Wu, all over again. But Fang Wu knew that even though Xia Jian and Jiayi had never broken up, there had been a time when Xia Jian had come very close to losing her.

During their years in high school, they’d never thought that their group of friends would ever be separated. After the gaokao, Fang Wu and Xia Jian had been utterly unprepared for the void left by their classmates going to university.

Even though Jiayi never left Guangzhou, she spent her days with other people now. People whom Xia Jian believed to be smarter and more educated than he was.

Jiayi came from a humble background, the daughter of two factory workers who had migrated from the rural areas to the city in the 1990s.  When Xia Jian’s parents were white-collar office workers, there was no reason for her to consider his family status inferior to hers.  In fact, he was still the one who spoke with a more polished accent, even after she’d gotten her Bachelor’s degree.

But Xia Jian had feared that at university, she would meet men who were more intellectually suited to her than he was. If he hadn’t decided to play pro football, Xia Jian’s gaokao results could have gotten him into university, but his ranking in their class had always been middling. His inclinations tended towards practical pursuits rather than academics, and his proficiency at science and technical subjects was offset by his subpar scores in languages and the humanities.

On the other hand, Jiayi had known what she wanted since childhood. Set on pursuing a career in nursing, she had worked hard to overcome her parents’ deficiencies in education. While she hadn’t been a top student either, she had consistently ranked above Fang Wu and Xia Jian in her academic results.

That sense of self-doubt had kept Xia Jian from pursuing Jiayi for three long years, until his income made up for his lack of confidence. Eventually, Xia Jian’s savings from five years of playing professionally had been the reason for his ability to marry Jiayi at age 23, when their classmates who had just finished university still had nothing to call their own.

走过陪你看流星的天台  Past the verandah where we watched the sky

熬过失去你漫长的等待 I wait for your return as days slip by

…

没关系只要你肯回头望 Don’t worry if you just look back at me

会发现我一直都在           You’ll see that I’ve always been there

Fang Wu thought he remembered nothing of that first visit he’d made to Guangzhou after the wedding of Xia Jian and Xia Jiayi, but this verse, sung in Jiayi’s soothing soprano, brought it all back to him.

While sulking in the back of Xia Jian’s car, he’d tried to block out the happy laughter of the newlywed couple, retelling all the shenanigans of their wedding celebrations. Convinced that he’d never get to experience their bliss, he’d let all their talk wash over him in a blur.

But these words rang a bell, reminding Fang Wu of a long-buried thing he’d heard Xia Jiayi say. Laughing wryly at the irony of it all, she’d related that during her wedding speech, she’d let slip that if Xia Jian had only declared himself to her then, she would have been willing to date him at 18, right after they finished high school.

“你让我白等了三年，你知道吗？(You let me wait for three years, didn’t you know?)” she’d said, playfully giving Xia Jian a light smack.

Could it even be possible…

~~~⚽~~~

《桃花诺 (Peach Blossom Promise)》(G.E.M.), performed by Byron Li Yi

“At least he remembers,” said Xia Jian to Atiqah with a sigh, indicating Byron who was taking up the mike. “She wouldn’t have forgotten him so soon.”

“I’m sure he does,” replied Atiqah. “Surely, you wouldn’t expect him to stop celebrating the New Year forever?”

“No.” The rueful expression on Xia Jian’s face deepened. “But the sunrise – that was the last painting my sister made before she passed.  He was supposed to create that cake in yuzu flavour for her.

“The caption that he made us put on Instagram which says, 大地回春 da di hui chun – spring has returned to the land – it’s a common New Year expression, but I don’t even know if I’m ready to feel that way yet.

“This song is about a pair of lovers who were permanently separated by a political marriage but never forgot each other. Every year for many years, they promised to meet under the same peach blossom tree. And they continued to love each other, all the way until he sacrificed his life for her.

“I’m not asking Byron to go to that extent. But if in twenty years, he still thinks fondly of my sister from time to time, that would be enough. If I were in his shoes, I would.”

“I’m sorry,” said Atiqah, “and as for your sister not forgetting him, that I can easily believe. No woman could.”

初见若缱绻  誓言  风吹云舒卷  First love’s a binding promise amidst wind and clouds

岁月间   问今夕又何年  Through the years, how many now have passed?

Xia Jian knew he had no reason to call the veracity of Li Yi’s love for Xia Min into question. It had been the perfectly spontaneous, untaught feeling of a teenager who had nothing to gain from loving a girl with a chronic illness and yet thrown himself into it anyway.

Whatever foresight Xia Jian had at the time could not have predicted that Li Yi’s and Xia Min’s teenage relationship would see them into adulthood. But over the past decade, Li Yi had become such a fixture in the Xia family’s life that now, he couldn’t remember a time when he hadn’t regarded Li Yi as almost a brother.

He was sure that Li Yi would always carry fond memories of his sister. But the sense of betrayal that Li Yi had created a new cake based on his sister’s final painting, in collaboration with someone else, hit Xia Jian hard.

Perhaps Li Yi had chosen this song to remind himself never to forget Xia Min. It might even be that he knew he was on the cusp of moving on, and that was why he needed this song.

To Xia Jian’s utter astonishment, the next thing that happened was that Fang Wu picked up the other mike and sang along.

这一世牵绊   纠结   触动了心弦  Our ties in this life bind us touching our hearts

下一世  不知可否再见                     In the next, what is our destiny?

留一片桃花  纪念  了却浮生缘    Let this peach blossom keep our memories of love

眉目间 还有我的思念                      In your eyes my remembrance remains

What reason did Fang Wu have to throw himself into a song about a love doomed by fate? Could it be – surely it couldn’t – that Xia Jian had gotten the wrong end of the stick about Fang Wu’s situation all these years?

All the little details, each one of them inconsequential, now added up.

With its storied history of football greatness and an unfettered passion for the game, the saying “football is a religion in Spain” summed up why Spain was the ultimate dream destination for every football player.

Xia Jian had expected Fang Wu to come home from his stint triumphant, with plenty of tales to share. Instead, he’d pulled the hood of his sweatshirt over his head and curled up in a ball in Xia Jian’s back seat, oblivious to anything Xia Jian and Jiayi had said.

He’d seemed to recover after they got back to Xia Jian’s flat, taking Li Yi and Xia Min out for an afternoon of food and arcade games to celebrate their gaokao success. The teenagers had later reported that they’d never seen Fang Wu lose so many games in a row, but Xia Jian could believe that had been due to jet lag.

That evening, Xia Jian had rounded up all their former teammates for a session of karaoke. No Mandopop fan who ever set foot in a KTV lounge could get by without ever singing a sad love song, but that was the first time Xia Jian had ever heard Fang Wu sing one in such bitterness.

It hadn’t even been because that song was the trend of the moment. 《尘缘 (Worldly Fate)》by Roman Tam was an archaic period drama theme song belonging to their parents’ generation, not theirs.

After that song, Fang Wu hadn’t sung again for the rest of the night, until he led them all in a rousing round of Zhang Zhenyue’s 《再见 (Goodbye)》. That song, which was de rigeur at school graduations, reflected not only the permanent nature of Fang Wu’s departure from Guangzhou, but also that none of them were guaranteed to ever meet again.

我会牢牢记住你的脸      I will not ever forget your face

我会珍惜你给的思念      I will treasure all our happy days

这些日子在我心中          This time will remain in my heart

永远都不会抹去               Not to vanish through eternity

Belting out those words, Fang Wu had regained some of his old verve. Of course, celebrating these years of comradeship would bring the fire back to his friend’s eyes, Xia Jian had thought.

And thus, three years of training and playing together had come to a permanent close. Indeed, as the song said, Fang Wu and Xia Jian had never seen some of their former Guangzhou F.C. teammates after that.

At the time, Xia Jian had thought the reminder of their team’s separation following its January 2025 disbandment could have been the reason for his friend’s unusual level of melancholy. Now, another explanation was starting to make sense.

The amount of effort Fang Wu had put into modifying all the Lunar New Year food for Eusoff and his family had been puzzling.  Xia Jian didn’t find it surprising that Fang Wu would be friendly with his Malay neighbours after he learned that Atiqah had trained at the same club as him in Spain, but he did wonder why Fang Wu didn’t choose another occasion that didn’t involve a near-complete food overhaul.

Even something as innocuous as pineapple tarts, which symbolised prosperity, had to be alternatively sourced to ensure they weren’t baked with lard.

Well, Fang Wu’s stint in Barcelona had been eight years ago. That was when he had met Atiqah.  After he’d come back acting uncharacteristically gloomy, their cycle of karaoke banter about Fang Wu’s disastrous dating life had started.

How could Xia Jian have been so mistaken about his friend? If his current theory was accurate, he felt horribly remorseful about how he’d unconsciously been rubbing salt into the wound.

This was a song about a love where neither party knew if they were fated to meet in their next life but still waited for each other through the years. Byron had been in love with Xia Min for ten years, but their love had been thwarted by fate for only less than two. On the other hand, if this had anything to do with Atiqah at all, Fang Wu’s unrequited longing had seen eight blooms and fades of the proverbial peach blossoms.

Furthermore, Byron only needed to get out of the routine that constantly stoked his grief to start moving on. Whereas Fang Wu had assiduously avoided anything to do with his stint in Barcelona but was still unable to extricate himself from the disappointment that haunted him.

Even something as tiny as Fang Wu’s absence from a picture in a Weibo post from seven years ago took on new meaning. His Yunnan Yukun teammates had made a day trip to Shadian, a small town in Yunnan that was solely inhabited by Hui Muslims and housed one of the biggest mosques in China.  Xia Jian had remembered that instance because Fang Wu usually embraced every opportunity to explore a new place. This was the one time, in all those years, that he’d skipped out of an interesting trip.

Why would someone who now had all the halal versions of Lunar New Year traditional food down pat avoid visiting a Muslim town? The only explanation was that this had been one of numerous efforts Fang Wu had made to forget… and still failed.

It was clear to Xia Jian now who was more invested in this song between the two men who were currently singing it.

一寸土  一年木  一花一树  一贪图

情是种  爱偏开在迷途

忘前路 忘旧物  忘心忘你忘最初

花斑斑 留在爱你的路

“That is the saddest thing anyone could sing,” said Xia Jian to Atiqah. “To translate, the couple feels a yearning every time the peach blossoms bloom.  They know that they are asking too much, that they aren’t fated to be together.

“Their feelings are like a seed, except that the love it grows has only a dead end.  They try to forget, to pretend they had never experienced the beginning of love, and yet they hope the peach blossoms will pave the road to show their love, year after year.”

“And you think this should apply to Byron in relation to your sister,” remarked Atiqah.

“I think it applies to all the people who choose to sing this song,” hinted Xia Jian. “To your earlier point, I don’t think women are the only ones who don’t forget.”

“But judging from the original singer,” countered Atiqah, “this song was written for a woman.” 

The Hong Kong singer Gloria Tang, also known as G.E.M., was prominently featured in the MTV, which was why Atiqah didn’t need to know the song to be aware of this.

“That may be so,” Xia Jian acknowledged, “but as you can see, the two men who are singing this song right now do sound like they really mean it.”

~~~⚽~~~

Half Moon Serenade (Naoko Kawai), performed by Atiqah

Surely Xia Jian could not know what he was implying!  Atiqah could believe that Byron’s love for Xia Min had been real, just like Fang Wu’s love for her had been.

But the premise of loving longest, when existence or when hope was gone, must only apply to her side of this relationship. She couldn’t possibly expect Fang Wu to speak again, when the religious divide would always need to be surmounted.

Which song could she sing that might make her position known? During their time in Barcelona, Fang Wu had explained the difference between Cantonese and Mandarin to Atiqah by sending her two songs on WhatsApp.

Initially, Atiqah had thought the songs were merely for the purpose of language education. Only after his departure had she looked the lyrics up on Google Translate.

The two songs spoke of love through separation: the first about an eternal longing in the absence of all hope, and the second about a love locked in the past, only growing warmer through the years. Undoubtedly, both were incredibly romantic.

That had been when it truly hit home to Atiqah that Fang Wu had wished their relationship could be more than platonic well before the day he was to fly off to Shenzhen.  He’d held it all back until the very last minute because he’d known she was young, inexperienced and unready.

And he had been absolutely prepared for his effort to be doomed.  That she had said ‘yes’ at all must have sent him into heights of euphoria that could only make it ten times worse when it crashed right back down again.

《月半小夜曲 (Half Moon Serenade)》, sung in Cantonese by Hacken Lee, had been the first song.  It had been all about loving someone unattainable, without any vestige of hope.

仍然倚在失眠夜   望天边星宿          Still in all my sleepless nights, where the stars repose

仍然听见小提琴  如泣似诉再挑逗 I still hear the violin teasing my tears that still flow

为何只剩一弯月 留在我的天空  Why does just a crescent moon remain within my sky

这晚以后 音讯隔绝                           After this night, we are no more

人如天上的明月 是不可拥有  He is like the sky’s bright moon, unattainable

情如曲过只遗留 无可挽救再分别 Like an ended song, our love is unsalvageable

….

但我的心每份每刻  仍然被他占有 But in each moment all my heart only belongs to him

他似这月儿 仍然是不开口 Yet he’s like the moon, remaining silent within

提琴独奏独奏着 明月半倚深秋 The solo violin plays with the half moon in the fall

我的牵挂 我的渴望 直至以后 All my concern, all my yearning, will outlast all

Atiqah couldn’t pronounce the words in Cantonese. But she knew that the Chinese version was a remix of the original in Japanese. Surely, she could use her phone to get the Japanese romanised lyrics and read off them. Fang Wu knew the song. He’d figure out what she was trying to say.

“Xia Jian,” she said, “can you please select Half Moon Serenade for me?”

~~~⚽~~~

《在水一方 (The Unforgettable Character)》(Chiang Lei), performed by Fang Wu

Fang Wu had not expected Atiqah to remember.

More specifically, he knew that she remembered that summer in Barcelona, but he had not expected her to recall precisely that he had sent her “Half Moon Serenade”. Neither had he ever dared to hope that she would know what it meant.

He didn’t understand the Japanese lyrics, but that didn’t matter when he was immensely familiar with the Cantonese translation. Since Cantonese and Mandarin had the same written script, he didn’t need to be fluent in the dialect to comprehend every word.

If Atiqah knew what the song meant, she might well have guessed that eight years ago, he had been dreading their separation. That he’d known that it would break him. Perhaps, from the way that she was singing it practically to him alone, she might be hinting that this was how she had felt too at the time. How she still felt, if he took the nuance of the song to its greatest extent.

Had she figured out the meaning of the other song he’d sent her?

《跟着你到天边 (To The Horizon With You)》had been the voice of hope in a situation that had been half hope and half agony right from the beginning.  It was the theme song of the Zhang Yimou film 《归来 (Coming Home)》, which was about a man returning to his family after a long imprisonment during the Cultural Revolution. By then, his best memories with his wife were long past, but he was committed to rekindling their love despite her losing all her memories of him.

Eight years ago, Fang Wu had been immensely conscious that only in the best-case scenario would they have the chance to grow old together. He had dared to dream of it and to pursue it. But Fang Wu’s 23-year-old self could not have foreseen that as he grew older, this song could only be truer to his feelings.

容颜变  岁月迁  Years go by, our faces age

心中的温情永不减 The warmth in my heart will never fade

At 23, Fang Wu had believed he might feel like this decades in the future, after many years of happy marriage. He hadn’t expected that in a mere eight years, this sentiment would no longer be theoretical.

Still, this wasn’t the right choice to give an answer to Atiqah’s song. It was too oblique to cut through all the ambiguity that plagued them. Since Atiqah remembered “Half Moon Serenade”, he was confident that she would instantly make the connection with “To The Horizon With You”. But if she had Googled the lyrics, she would take home the wrong message because most of the song described a love that belonged to the past.

There was another song that he could sing to let her know that his love was very much in the present.

The only challenge was, he had to figure out a way to make sure that she understood it.

Typing furiously into his phone, he sent her a few lines to put into Google Translate before grabbing the remote. He didn’t have much time before she finished to queue in his song.

Atiqah finished, to a round of applause just as enthusiastic as the one that he had garnered for singing My Way.  Fang Wu barely remembered to clap, so nervous he was about the next thing he was going to do.

“Wow, Atiqah! Is there anything you can’t sing?” asked Byron, his voice brimming with admiration.

“I can’t sing in Cantonese,” was Atiqah’s reply. She hardly dared to look at Fang Wu, but he caught her meaning. She was confirming to him that the song she had just sung, and its message, was indeed intended for him.  That this was no coincidence, no accident.

Knowing he hadn’t read Atiqah’s intentions wrongly didn’t stop Fang Wu’s hand from shaking as he picked up the mike that she had just put down.  He had communicated with her by such means as were within his reach. Now, he was completely at her mercy.

绿草苍苍 白雾茫茫   Green grass looks grey amidst the fog

有位佳人 在水一方    A beauty stands beside the shore

….

我愿逆流而上            I will swim against the tide

依偎在她的身旁      Just to be by her side

无奈前有险滩           Even though dangers abound

道路又远又长           And the road is far and long

我愿顺流而下          Down the river I drift

找寻她的方向          Looking for where she is

却见仿佛依稀          But it seems that as before

她在水的中央          She’s right in the water’s midst

Just before Fang Wu had picked up the mike, Atiqah’s phone vibrated twice.

“Please put this in Google Translate,” the first text read.

The next text was a wall of Chinese words:

对于我们的过去，我深感歉意，后悔莫及。

这首歌献给你，表达出我的真情。

你不仅是佳人，并且是我一生一世的伊人。

希望我能在水一方，再一次遇见你。

While she copy-pasted the SMS into Google Chrome, Fang Wu was singing.  He had to, as the only person who hadn’t yet picked a Chinese song (or sort of).

Although the words made no sense to her, she caught the tone of his voice, bathing the entire room in warmth.  Hurriedly, she read the text that appeared on her Google Translate screen.

With regards to our past, I deeply apologise. My remorse knows no bounds.

This song is for you, to let you know how I truly feel.

You are not only a virtuous beauty, but also the one and only person I will love for life.

I hope I can be reunited with you, down by the water.

The revolution which one instant made in Atiqah, was almost beyond expression.  While supposed to be singing to the group, he was only addressing her! She noticed that he was singing with his eyes closed, as if to shield himself from the reactions as he threw himself heart and soul into the song.

After he put down the mike, Fang Wu hastily excused himself with a hurried, agitated air, which showed an impatience to be gone.  Their hour of karaoke was up, to be sure, but he didn’t even wait for the reaction of his audience to go off with not a word, nor a look!

To that, there was only one answer that Atiqah could give. From his note, she knew where she might find him.  Making her own excuses to the Xias and Byron, she hurried out of the building, toward the river that led to the sea.

~~~⚽~~~

She found him sitting on a park bench, facing the sea. When he saw her, he rose, but as if irresolute whether to join her or pass on, said nothing, only looked.  Knowing this was her time to speak, Atiqah could command herself enough to receive that look, and not repulsively.

“Last time, you said you might come to Singapore or Malaysia,” she said. “They… they’re not the same. In Malaysia, if you’re a Muslim, your law is Sharia law, but in Singapore, the civil law is the only law that applies to everybody.”

It was horribly oblique, but that was the only way that Atiqah could indicate how she might accept a proposal that had yet to be given.

For a few seconds, Fang Wu froze, trying to take in what he had heard. Had Atiqah just alluded to his first de facto proposal, and given her implicit acceptance?

As the words sank in, the cheeks which had been pale now glowed, and the movements which had hesitated were decided. He walked by her side.

They would have to head back in the direction they had come from, towards the commercial complex at Downtown East. Cai Ying and Lao Cai had given the children an early dinner and were bringing them over for dessert while the karaoke group dined.

“In those days,” said Fang Wu, “I would like to say I knew what I was doing. At 23, I considered all the lifestyle changes. At 25, I was concerned about how I might be accepted by society.

“But only now, I realise it’s much more than that. Becoming a Muslim means letting my entire life be governed by the Sharia law.

“Still, I’d rather do that than make you live a life of sin. That’s guaranteed to end up in regret.”

“At 25? That’s two years after - ” Atiqah trailed off, speechless. She could barely imagine what he had implied. What he was now saying. It was too good to be true.

“Yes, at 25. I was just traded to Shanghai Port, and I realised Shanghai is such an international city, it’s possible to live there without knowing the Chinese language. I didn’t know about your father, but if I had, I’m sure there’s a way for him to follow you. Tell me, if I had written to you then, what would you have done?” he asked.

Atiqah had never considered the possibility that she could have moved to China.  She would never have wanted to represent any country other than Singapore, but she’d hardly have been the first footballer to play club football in a different country than her own.

If things had happened that way, she and Fang Wu might even still be actively playing now. With two incomes, they would have been able to afford a domestic helper to take care of Eusoff.

“If that happened,” she replied, “I would have given your number to my father.”

He sighed. “Then,” he said, “I can only say I have been my worst enemy.”

Chapter Text

Xi.i – Eusoff

Unfortunately for the Singapore population and birth rate, seldom was it when any two young people might take it into their heads to marry, that they were sure by perseverance to carry their point. 

Skyrocketing housing costs deterred the ones who were ever so poor, and the surfeit of online entertainment was more appealing than finding a mate for those who were ever so imprudent. 

Some heeded the Government’s call to start families and settled with whomever was available when they hit their thirties, be they ever so little likely to be necessary to each other’s comfort.  But by and large, the convenience and cost of modern urban life was rendering marriage optional for an increasing percentage of the population.

Regardless of whether this was bad morality to conclude with, most of Singapore society believed it to be truth.  Eusoff despaired that the children who were an asset to his household were not marrying and giving him grandchildren, and the only one who had done so was a financial drain.

Therefore, Eusoff ought to be forgiven for being completely blindsided when Fang Wu and Atiqah came to him to ask for his blessing to marry. With the advantage of maturity of mind, consciousness of right, and one independent fortune between them, they might in fact, have borne down a great deal more obstacles than the religious barrier.  But blinded by the differences of language and culture, Eusoff had never even remotely foreseen the possibility of any of his children marrying someone who wasn’t Malay.

Well, at least, this explained one thing. Eusoff had been puzzled at Fang Wu’s enthusiasm to involve him and his family in the Chinese New Year celebrations. They weren’t even Chinese!  And it hadn’t been so long ago when Fang Wu had been dating Lele.

“How come you can decide so fast?” was Eusoff’s bewildered reaction.

“It wasn’t fast,” was Fang Wu’s awkward response.

“In fact, if we could, we wanted to be together 8 years ago, in Barcelona,” added Atiqah.

“In Barcelona? You already pak tor (dated) in Barcelona?”  Atiqah was Eusoff’s most obedient daughter, the one who always followed the rules. How had things gone to this extent, where his then-teenage daughter had dated a non-Muslim man, without his ever having an inkling of it? “If I knew that would happen, I would never have let you go.”

A torrent of realisation surged over Eusoff then.  The strange way in which Fang Wu and Atiqah had tiptoed around each other at the beginning of their re-acquaintance as neighbours had not escaped Eusoff’s notice. But he had dismissed it as over-imagination on his part because he couldn’t conceive of a situation where his Chinese-speaking neighbour might have anything more than a passing acquaintance with his daughter.

More than the religious gap, the language gap had dismissed any possibility of Fang Wu and Atiqah being a couple in Eusoff’s mind. Why, he even taught at a school in their neighbourhood where there were practically zero Malay pupils because Chinese, not Malay, was the mandatory mother tongue taught there! That was a reminder that even though they all conversed in English, the language of their deepest thoughts and most visceral reactions would never be the same.

Even the appearance of compatibility between Fang Wu and Lele had been driven by language. When they spoke in Chinese, to the exclusion of Eusoff and his family, they had seemed more intimate than they had really been.  With all the visual and auditory signals telling Eusoff that Fang Wu and Lele belonged together, he hadn’t any reason to doubt the mutual felicity of that pair until their breakup.

“But Ayah,” protested Atiqah indignantly, “you can see I did – we did the right thing.”

The young people looked utterly miserable. Eusoff did not miss the grimace that appeared on Fang Wu’s face when Atiqah professed that they had done the right thing all those years ago. And he’d never seen his daughter look and sound so desperate before.  Even with everybody trying to do right, the situation still felt very wrong.

Eusoff felt driven to do a thing that Asian parents hardly ever did. He apologised.

“Sorry,” he said. “I’m sorry, OK? Anak (child), I know you always do the right things.”

It was probably useless to worry about a thing that had never happened.  Eusoff couldn’t go back a decade in time now and pull his then-teenaged daughter out of Spain.  The questions of whether the young Fang Wu and Atiqah had dated in Barcelona, and how his daughter could allow herself to fall for a non-Muslim man, were moot when that man was now converting to Islam to marry her.

“Since you are willing to masuk melayu (become Malay) to marry my daughter, you must really love her,” Eusoff said, addressing Fang Wu.

“Ayah, not every Muslim has to be Malay,” Atiqah gently corrected him. “It’s possible for Fang Wu to convert to Islam and still be Chinese.”

“Are you sure you can take it or not? For the rest of your life, you can’t eat pork.” Eusoff sensed that the hole he was digging for himself was getting deeper and deeper. Yet even though he didn’t exactly disapprove of the current state of affairs, he couldn’t deny that it gave him severe mental whiplash.

“I already started with Chinese New Year,” replied Fang Wu. He didn’t seem fazed at all. “For people to believe it, I have to do it.”

“Then, I welcome you to the family.” At least one thing was clear – Eusoff never had to doubt Fang Wu’s commitment or sincerity because his actions always spoke louder than his words.

Despite his initial shock at his most obedient daughter marrying outside their immediate cultural background, Eusoff was very far from thinking it a bad match for her. 

On the contrary, Fang Wu was kind and respectful to their family, shared Atiqah’s interest and talent in football, and was willing to follow-through on an attraction that had withstood eight years. What more could Eusoff ask for?

Eusoff’s first gift to his new prospective son-in-law was a handmade songkok (a traditional Malay hat worn for prayers and special occasions), purchased from an artisan shop in Penang.  It was the first trip to Malaysia that Eusoff’s family had taken for some time, granting his two grandsons’ wish to have a holiday outside Singapore.

Thus, the marriage of Fang Wu and Atiqah was met with no want of graciousness and warmth from either side of the family.  In fact, Eusoff realised, the gap in their cultures and values wasn’t as wide as he had originally believed.  There was nothing less for him to do, than to admit that he had been pretty completely wrong in his prejudices, and to take up a new set of opinions and hopes.

~~~⚽~~~

Xi.ii – Byron

Byron returned to his café on the eighth day of the Lunar New Year. A pair of 春联 chunlian, or traditional New Year couplets, hung at the door. He didn’t recall if Xia Jian had hung them for him, or if he had done so at Xia Jian’s behest. At that time, Byron had felt none of the New Year mood but simply gone through the motions because custom required them.

In hindsight, Byron realised, burying his head in the sand hadn’t helped. While displaying traditional New Year’s wishes outside his café had originally been solely for the sake of his customers, now he felt they were a useful reminder of how it was time for him to make a fresh start.

For the last two years, Xia Min’s last painting had sat in a corner of Byron’s bedroom in Xia Jian’s flat. He’d turned it to face the wall because he couldn’t bear to look at it. It depicted a sunrise, the beginning of a new start. That only served to emphasize all his dashed hopes when his future had ground to a halt with the end of her life.  When there would be no more new beginnings for Byron, only decades ahead to live with the ending of his love and his dreams, the imagery of the sunrise had felt like a mockery.

Crouching on the floor, Byron took the painting and turned it around for the first time in nearly two years. Fingering the delicate brush strokes made by Xia Min’s hand, he admired how the streaks of yellow and orange shone through the gloom of the still-dark sky. In her too-short life, Xia Min might have lacked the opportunity to experience life as fully as she ought, yet there was no doubt that she had seen immense beauty in her world.

Along the left side of the painting, against the yellow hue of the sun’s rays, three vertical rows of tiny black dots ran down from the top corner. Byron had never noticed them before, perhaps because in the gloom of Xia Min’s final illness, his mind had kept no room for the sunrise.

“青梅竹马是人生最美妙的时刻 (Young love is the most wonderful time of life),” it read. “白头偕老只不过是奢望，上天不赐给我们的，也不能强求。(To grow old together is but an extravagant wish; we cannot force what is not given to us by fate.) 但愿你会找到下一个日出，创下新的未来！(I wish you’ll find your next sunrise and create a new future!)”

Tears flowed down Byron’s cheeks as he read the three sentences. All along, Xia Min had been fully aware of her mortality. Even though she hadn’t known exactly when she might be struck down by a fatal bout of illness, this was her way of giving Byron permission to move on after her, to remind him that he should not feel guilt at seeking a future that didn’t include her.

She had forgiven his moving on, far before he even harboured the thought. The painting was still not quite complete, with a vast empty patch on the right. It was clear that Xia Min had added the brush strokes to this painting bit by bit over the years, moving from the top left to bottom right, not quite knowing when she would finish. In fact, she’d purposely kept it unfinished for as long as she lived, waiting for her brother and Byron to discover it as her last painting after she died.

Things didn’t have to be complete to be beautiful. Byron would never see his love of Xia Min to its natural conclusion, but that didn’t make those fleeting moments of their shared youth any less colourful.

A painting like this, the constant reminder of a life truncated, was too private to display in the dining area of his café, but he decided to hang it up in the office area where he printed out his marketing flyers and did his accounts.  Before embracing his future, Byron wanted to make a statement that Xia Min would always be a part of him.

Byron launched the new cake in his café immediately, making it with mandarin oranges for the remainder of the Spring Festival season and transitioning to his originally intended yuzu flavour after that. It was his first menu item that was permanent rather than seasonal.

Lele should know how successful the cake they’d created together had become, Byron decided. After announcing the first new fruit-flavoured cake in nearly two years on his Weibo and Xiaohongshu accounts, a flood of welcoming comments came in from his most loyal customers.

Everybody was happy to welcome the old Byron back. Even Xia Jian’s attitude shifted from rueful regret to acceptance and encouragement after he saw his sister’s painting in Byron’s office.

Byron had put up a Weibo post with a photo of the painting in his workspace, chronicling his period of grief after his fiancé’s death and expressing that his new cake based upon the sunrise wasn’t just a symbol of his own fresh start. In fact, he was making that cake his first permanent menu item as a way of bridging his past and his future. 

Xia Min, whose painting had been the original inspiration for the cake, would always be a part of his life. Putting the cake on his permanent menu was Byron’s way of making a public statement about that. But just as importantly, Byron creating this cake wasn’t just about her. He’d gotten valuable input from “friends in Singapore” to make it distinctly different from his prior creations.  This was also symbolic of his new start.

One week passed, and then two. Byron hoped Lele would see his post, but he wasn’t sure whether she still used Weibo after spending so many years in Singapore.  And although Fang Wu was helping him post updates to Instagram, baring his soul like this to an overseas audience who didn’t know him personally felt like oversharing.

Finally, after Byron had lost all hope, Lele’s name appeared among the growing string of commenters to his post.

“Byron, 加油！你一定能克服一切！(Come on, Byron! You can overcome everything!)” she wrote.

“谢谢你 ：）（Thank you）” he replied. The smiley emoji in his post reflected the smile on his face.

They had only spent a few days together, but Byron felt strangely drawn to the young woman who had helped him turn this cake into a reality.  Baking, to him, was an intensely artistic process, involving the experimentation of different flavours and textures. Exchanging ideas, tasting the results, and brainstorming suggestions held all the intensity of an intimate conversation, the communion of two creative minds.

Although Byron and Lele had exchanged WeChat contacts before he left, he had feared it might be overstepping to text her directly. But now that she started the ball rolling, Byron decided there was no harm keeping in touch. After all, there wasn’t any need to read too much into it. They could simply be texting back and forth as friends.

“你还好吗？(How are you?)” Byron typed, and before he could second-guess himself, he hit “send”.

~~~⚽~~~

Xi.iii – Lele

Xixi and Xiaoming’s impending marriage and move to Chengdu disrupted Lele’s life more than she would have wished or expected. While she was happy for her sister, it made no sense for her to remain in the three-bedroom flat all alone after they moved. 

If Xixi and Xiaoming had stayed in Singapore after they married, at least Lele would be able to visit them frequently. Lele had to admit that one of the reasons why she had hoped her sister could convince Xiaoming to buy a new flat had been selfish; it would give her the chance to stay with them until she got married too.

The sense of finality from them all packing up made Lele feel lonelier than she liked. Xixi and Xiaoming would keep their Singapore mobile phone numbers and roaming SIM cards to stay in touch with their Singapore-based university friends via Instagram and WhatsApp. Taking on that extra cost made sense when they could afford it, and because they would need those mobile numbers again when they returned to Singapore.

However, Lele, who would be going back to her parents’ home in Changsha, didn’t have a plan to return.  She felt completely unmoored because she would have to start up her business all over again in her hometown. Although she had some modest savings, building up an income from scratch meant that she would be financially dependent on her parents for quite some time.

Through it all, Byron was the person who kept texting. He praised – and critiqued – her pastry creations, while sharing his new cakes with her on Chinese and international social media.  When Lele knew it would be harder for her to stay in touch with her Singaporean friends after she went back to China, she often felt that Byron was the only person she was moving towards, rather than away from.

The final two weeks of Xixi and Lele’s stay in Singapore went by in a blur. Eusoff and his family, as well as all their university friends in turn, treated them to a slew of farewell dinners. Fang Wu was there, of course, as he was practically a member of Eusoff’s family, and Lele was a little surprised that they could exchange well wishes as dispassionately as they did.

Atiqah was Lele’s good friend, and Lele sincerely wished her the best of happiness. When she’d learned that the pair had been in love ever since they were in Barcelona, Lele realised that she’d never stood a chance with Fang Wu, no matter what she did.  Not crying over spilt milk helped her save her dignity, as well as her sanity.

Back in Changsha, Lele found that although her material needs were well taken care of, she struggled with adjusting to the environment she’d left for the last seven years. All of Lele’s adult life had been lived in Singapore. While it was still an Asian country with a large ethnic Chinese population, by necessity, the society there was more cosmopolitan than in Changsha, despite Changsha’s growing international reputation.

Her years in Singapore had made a difference to everything: her views, her tastes, and her opinions about work-life balance. Lele found that re-establishing her life among her parents and her high school friends still left her feeling isolated because they now thought she had changed. 

It seemed crazy, when she’d never left Asia and willingly spoke fluent Chinese whenever the situation required, to call herself Westernised, but that was how Lele felt. She was sure everyone in her hometown saw her as such. 

Lele was perfectly capable of looking and sounding local. She’d spent the first eighteen years of her life here, after all. Rather, her sense of not quite belonging anymore came from the tiny, almost invisible things: nitpicking the authenticity of local Western-style food, constantly using her VPN for the large slice of her social media life that took place on WhatsApp and Instagram, and automatically thinking of Google and Reddit when searching for information on the Web, rather than Baidu.

She’d moved back in June, and by the time August came around, Lele was already restless. Thankfully, it wasn’t difficult to convince her parents to celebrate the Mid-Autumn Festival in late September with a trip to Hong Kong and Guangzhou.  They doted on her and would do anything to make her happy.

Thus, before Lele ever had the chance to bring a man home to meet her parents, she ended up taking her parents to meet a man.  One of the many stops the Zheng family visited on their comprehensive tour of the Greater Bay Area region was Byron’s café.

Mr. and Mrs. Zheng were impressed with the volumes of Western and Chinese poetry that Byron kept in a small shelf for patrons to read as they whiled away the afternoons on the premises.  Lele was unusually touched to see a special section of Byron’s bakery display case stocked with her pastries.  Several months before, she’d shared her recipes with him and given him permission to add them to his menu.

It was a pleasant surprise when Byron turned up in Hong Kong to accompany Lele to the Mid-Autumn Festival lantern carnival at Victoria Bay. A high-speed train ride cost about 200 yuan (US$30) and took less than an hour, but Lele hadn’t dared to presume that, with his hectic schedule, Byron would take that time out just for her.

Opening his backpack, Byron unfolded a small paper lantern and lit a candle to set in it. The beautiful rose-pink colour, Lele thought, matched her favourite shade of lipstick perfectly.

Then, Byron unzipped a small cooler bag to unveil a little square cardboard box. Presenting it to Lele with a flourish, he asked her to open it.

Inside was a heart-shaped strawberry cake, topped with a sheet of white chocolate on which Byron had inscribed a note with edible markers.

“我的心非你莫属 (My heart only belongs to you),” it read.

They had been corresponding for seven months – that was longer than Lele had ever waited for any man! But Byron was the first man Lele had befriended after reaching university age with no expectation of any romantic involvement.  She couldn’t ask for any of his love when Xia Min had taken ten years of it, knowing that he mourned her still and would do so for the rest of his life.

“真的吗？(Is that really so?)” Lele asked, searching for the answer in his eyes.

“千真万确 (It’s absolutely true),” Byron replied.

Before this, Lele had been accustomed to thinking of men as status symbols. In her quest for the perfect husband, she had looked for career success, striking good looks, and a dynamic personality, in that order of priority.

To Lele’s former self, Byron Lee would have been too piano for her. But the last few months of loneliness and displacement had taught her to treasure companionship and connection over the trappings of social status.

Besides, the way Byron asked her to be his girlfriend, on a quiet evening amidst the glow of lantern light, was romantic beyond Lele’s imagination.

Lele took the cake box in her hands. “我怎么舍得吃呢？(How can I bear to eat this?)” she quipped with a radiant smile.

“还有 (Also),” she added, “我的心也属于你。(My heart is yours, too.)”

~~~⚽~~~

Xi.iv – Said

It took a long while for Said to stop considering Atiqah’s rejection to be his life’s worst embarrassment.  That was really saying something, when being posted to the Normal (Technical) Stream in secondary school was supposed to be the most humiliating fate of any student in Singapore.

Nevertheless, Said kept up his friendship with Eusoff and his family. Doing otherwise would let his own father down; he could see that the two elderly men craved companionship. How could he selfishly cut off their reconnection for his own sake?

Besides, Said still had his duties as a community volunteer to think of. He couldn’t back off from seeing Eusoff and Atiqah when he was committed to his grassroots work, and they were part of the neighbourhood where he served.

It seemed that the awkwardness was only in Said’s mind. Atiqah had no problems keeping her countenance around him, especially after her engagement with Fang Wu became common knowledge among everyone she knew.

Said’s father was the one who thought of holding a joint birthday celebration for the two Eusoff’s, exactly halfway between their respective dates of birth. Since Said had been planning a big birthday celebration for his father anyway, it would make things doubly meaningful for the two old friends to celebrate together.

Surprisingly, Aizah was the only member of Eusoff’s family to perk up at Said’s suggestion of a buffet dinner at Carousel, one of only a handful of fully halal hotel buffets in Singapore. Most hotels could accommodate no-pork-no-lard catering, but not many of them would cater specifically to the Muslim market at the expense of the much larger Chinese population.  Royal Plaza on Scotts, the hotel at which Carousel was situated, did because it was owned by the royal family of Brunei. So was the Grand Hyatt Hotel across the road.

An international buffet at a luxury hotel off Orchard Road was beyond Azlan’s imagination. Fang Wu and Atiqah, to Said’s horror, had been planning to celebrate Eusoff’s birthday by cooking at home. Only Aizah, who was accustomed to dining at world-class hotels during her work travels, appreciated this treat for what it was.

Could Said have been going after the wrong sister all that while?

It wasn’t surprising, Said reflected, that Atiqah was the first daughter of Eusoff’s to catch his attention.  After all, she was the one he saw the most frequently, because she accompanied her father to the community centre all the time.  And nobody would fail to surmise that her filial piety to her father was the best indication of her future devotion to her husband and children.

Atiqah had many good qualities, and even after she rejected him, Said still appreciated those. But as he got to see how she and Fang Wu regarded these little luxuries as unnecessary extravagances, Said realised that he and Atiqah would never have been truly happy together.  He would have pushed her into a more glamourous lifestyle than she felt comfortable with, and her frugality would have made him feel guilty.

Aizah and he, though, were of the same mind. Wealth hadn’t come easily to either of them. They had both started with the same humble beginnings, but after studying and then working their way into high-paying white-collar careers, they had acquired an appreciation for all things bourgeois. It was their way of celebrating their arrival to the yuppie class of Singapore society.

 And Aizah had carried a torch for him long before he noticed it. But then again, due to the nature of her work, Aizah was hardly ever around.

Fervently, Said wished he had paid more attention to Aizah when he had the opportunity. Even though everyone now knew why he and Atiqah could never have been a possibility, it still felt extremely awkward to go after her sister when he had been once been noticeably interested in her.

Thankfully, Aizah was the one who took the initiative. Now that it was clear her sister could never have been interested in Said, Aizah didn’t hesitate to make her move by inviting Said to join her weekend gatherings with her uni friends.

Said had plenty of business contacts, but his personal friends had dropped off the radar since his mid- to late- thirties. Most of his contemporaries were too busy to catch up because they had kids, and those who didn’t were buried in work. Until he’d sold out his business, he’d had barely any time even for his parents too, let alone his friends.

This group of young people, on the cusp of thirty, would probably end up like that in the next few years. But while they still had the bandwidth to prioritise social get-togethers, they were an interesting and eclectic group, with careers spanning government, the financial sector, and industry.  Spending time with them made Said feel young again.

Gradually, the fit between Said and Aizah became so obvious that nobody remembered how he and Atiqah had once been presumed to be dating. All that remained was to set a wedding date.

If it sounded rather hasty that Said found himself proposing less than a year after the two Eusoff’s reconnected at Ramadan, he decided that his age was a sufficient excuse.

Furthermore, to enable Atiqah to return to the workforce and eventually pursue a degree, Fang Wu and Aizah were sharing the cost of a full-time domestic helper for Eusoff.  Their combined incomes weren’t inferior to middle-income young parents who did the same, but Said could see this was an area where his help would relieve some stress for everyone. It strengthened his resolve to act without delay.

Though Said’s decision to propose was driven as much by practical reasons as anything else, he was determined to still make it a memorable occasion for himself and Aizah.

Tucked within the Singapore Botanic Gardens, The Halia restaurant was tranquil, yet classy and luxe. Better still, it was halal certified. Said and Aizah were such experts at making Muslim-friendly choices in any fine dining establishment that this didn’t really matter, but it was still a nice and apt touch anyway.

It was the first time – and also the last – that Said and Aizah ventured out alone together as an unengaged man and woman.  There was no going on bended knee and no engagement ring, and they went there in broad daylight rather than the much more romantic twilight hour.

But Said and Aizah had known, all their lives, that when this moment came, they wouldn’t be having a traditional-style Western engagement. Merely sounding her out with his intentions and getting her personal consent was a nod Said was giving to their modern, and admittedly Westernised, sensibilities before going ahead with the traditional Muslim marriage proposal rituals.

If they adhered strictly to traditions, it would have been Said’s father, not even himself, going to Eusoff’s home to find out whether Aizah would be agreeable to the marriage. Of course, in a modern world where they already knew each other well, that was unnecessary. But still, the proposal itself would happen in the presence of both their families.

After all, in a culture where marriage was more a family and community affair than an individual one, Said felt lucky to be granted enough space to make his personal choice as well. He might have stumbled, but in the end, what mattered was that through his mistake, he understood and went after the best fit for him.

~~~⚽~~~

Xi.v – Fang Wu and Atiqah

“Ai stead mai?” Such a simple question, which many Singaporeans took for granted. A question that could have saved Fang Wu and Atiqah nearly eight and a half years of heartache if they’d had the freedom to ask it. 

But when they already were a non-traditional couple by race, they wouldn’t chance things further by deviating from the textbook way of doing things.  Their way of declaring their mutual love had been terribly oblique, and after that, they proceeded into a traditional Muslim engagement ceremony after Fang Wu officially became a Muslim revert, with Lao Cai and Cai Ying representing the groom’s family.

It wasn’t until after their wedding day, when they posted a montage of photos from their Malay and Chinese ceremonies on social media, that they captioned it with that line. Of course, both the question and its answer were massive understatements of their level of love and commitment.

The alacrity with which Fang Wu and Atiqah wed was only possible because they had the luxury of dispensing with the two major hold-ups in the life of a young Singaporean couple: applying for a new government flat, and the long wait for a Chinese wedding banquet venue. 

Buying a government flat wasn’t on the cards when only Atiqah’s name could be on the loan because Fang Wu was neither a citizen nor a permanent resident.  And why would they need to be in a hurry to buy, when Fang Wu already had a rented flat in the same block as Eusoff?

Having a big wedding banquet was highly impractical with the makeup of Fang Wu’s family, no matter whom he married.  There was no single location where he could gather everyone nearest and dearest to him without his guests incurring colossal travel costs and logistics. Flying Cai Ying and Lao Cai in for a Chinese tea ceremony was the most practical way of acknowledging Chinese traditions at their wedding. 

He would have liked to fly his brother in too, but the lack of overlap between school holidays in China and Singapore made it impossible, when they were both teachers. Instead, Fang Wu and Atiqah made plans to visit everybody in China during the December school holidays.

Much as their eight years of separation made Fang Wu and Atiqah loath to prolong their wait further, the compelling practical reasons were equally instrumental in getting them to marry quickly. Fang Wu earned more than Atiqah would in the workforce with her ‘A’ Level education, so it was his income, when added to Aizah’s, that made it possible to have a full-time Indonesian domestic helper for Eusoff.

Hiring help didn’t make everything easier immediately. The responsibility still fell to Atiqah to train the helper and label all the medications with simplified instructions.  For the first month after she moved out and started working, she called Eusoff to personally remind him every time he needed to take his medicine.

Marrying at 28 was well within the norm – in fact, below the average age – for a Singaporean woman, but Atiqah faced the added challenge that, while starting a family, she had to catch up on her education.  Getting a degree hadn’t been a priority when money was tight and she had her hands full as her father’s caregiver, but now, through her husband’s savings, she could afford the fees for a Bachelor’s in Physiotherapy.

Atiqah and Fang Wu had no idea how they got through those early years of school and pregnancies and babies and toddlers.

Sure enough, it was convenient that they lived just four floors above Eusoff and could drop their children off with the helper at Eusoff’s home when they needed to. Said and Aizah, who had decided to remain child-free, pitched in whenever they could as well.

But especially after Fang Wu secured a coaching job with the top local football club, the Lion City Sailors, their schedule became just as punishing as it was exciting.

The ability to reduce Atiqah’s one-hour bus commute to a mere 15-minute drive was reason enough for Fang Wu to cough up a six-figure sum to procure a cute little BYD Dolphin electric hatchback after she started classes at the Singapore Institute of Technology.  Azlan had something to suffer, perhaps, in seeing his elder sister driving a car when he only had an e-bike, but Fang Wu rebuffed his complaints very effectively.

“You can borrow it if you satisfy three criteria,” he told Azlan. “Number one, you need to get a driving licence. Number two, you must pay for your own charging. And number three, I bought this car for Atiqah to go to university. To be fair, you can only use it for commuting when you go back to school to get a degree, and when she doesn’t need it.”

“Go university? No way, that’s so difficult!”  Azlan couldn’t even imagine applying himself enough at academic pursuits to even pass the ‘A’ Levels. And that was the end of the subject.

Other than that, Atiqah and Fang Wu had to admit that Azlan was stepping up to meet their (admittedly low) expectations. With both of his sisters marrying and moving out, he had to take up the role of a family breadwinner for the first time.

No longer could he rely on Aizah to pay for food and household maintenance, when she and Said had their own home to look after. And no longer could Atiqah pick up the childcare tasks he neglected, when she had university and work, then her own children to see to.

Thus, Azlan’s days of gaming with impunity ground to a halt.  His sisters moving out created a forcing function for him to manage his time around his children’s preschool schedules and clock enough delivery hours to meaningfully supplement the family income. 

Being fully on their own also forced Azlan and Farah to evaluate their finances more critically and transfer their boys from private to public preschool.  When they already had the benefit of living in a flat that they wouldn’t have been able to afford on their own, they had no excuse not to make ends meet.  Cutting down on the excessive toys caused many tears, but this time, Azlan and Farah had no choice.  Nobody was left to bail them out if they didn’t live within their means.

Determined though they were to focus on the present and not waste time regretting the past, Fang Wu and Atiqah sometimes still wondered if their lives might have been easier if they had kept their first engagement and settled down in Shanghai six years earlier.

It might have prolonged both of their active football careers. Fang Wu readily admitted that if he hadn’t been burdened with the feeling of shame from Atiqah’s rejection, he might not have been so vain about his playing career to compensate.  And Atiqah would have had a longer time frame to space out the priorities of professional football, having children, and going back to university to start a second career after her playing days were done.

But nothing could have taken away the need for them to develop a higher level of maturity, communication, and mutual tolerance than their peers in same-race marriages.  In this, they had the upper hand now, with the confidence and wisdom to question assumptions, candidly state their views, and find workarounds.

Fang Wu’s willingness to accept Sharia law was seriously challenged when he learned about its provisions for inheritance.  It dictated fixed shares of the family estate for specific family members, such as parents, spouses, and children. Taking away his ability to determine his own estate was a hard pill for Fang Wu to swallow, but worse still, Sharia law specified that sons were entitled to twice the amount as daughters.

“This is why it took Azlan so long to get his act together, right?” Fang Wu observed. “There never was any doubt the flat would go to him.”

Atiqah could only nod. She knew it was unfortunate and unfair, but she and Aizah had accepted this reality without question because they had no power to change it.

Patriarchy was a touchy subject for them both. Modern Singapore had come a long way in gender equality, with women having equal rights to education and employment, and a substantial share of women in the Cabinet and in Parliament. But the heritage of traditionally patriarchal practices was still sufficiently written into the people’s collective memory to drive unconscious double standards in daily life, such as the ones that existed between the sisters and Azlan.

Concubinage had been outlawed in China for barely a century, if even that. Just about any Chinese period drama was testimony that before the mid-20^th century, it was commonplace for women to be treated as pawns and property. 

Few people still living had personal recollections of that period, but many remembered how patriarchy often reared its ugly head during the one-child policy era.  The lengths to which people would go to get a son drove the Chinese government to relax the policy in rural areas. Fang Wu knew that all too well – it was how his sister and brother had come about, with a five-year age gap between them.

And Muslim society across Southeast Asia allowed legalised polygyny, even in Singapore.  Sharia law stipulated that a Muslim man could have up to four wives, so countries with significant Muslim populations had to provide for this in their legal frameworks.  While Fang Wu never considered making use of this legal provision (and very few Muslim men in Singapore did), it was still a reminder that institutionalised gender inequality might never fully go away.

Fang Wu and Atiqah knew that in their early twenties, they would have swept the issue under the carpet rather than naming it and discussing what they would do about it. They couldn’t change how Sharia law required them to divide their estate, but they could raise their sons in a way that discouraged a sense of entitlement and put extra effort into empowering their daughter financially and educationally during their lifetime.

They were also grateful that Singapore was an easier society for their mixed-race children to develop a sense of belonging than Shanghai might have been. 

With the growing number of interracial marriages, declaring a double-barrelled race on a child’s birth certificate had been allowed for more than two decades. Fang Wu and Atiqah took full advantage of this to register their three children as Chinese-Malay.

Also, in Singapore, there was no question of their children fitting in as locals. Enrolling their kids in the local education system was a no-brainer for Fang Wu and Atiqah.  In Shanghai, they would have had to navigate the labyrinth of public, private, or international school.  None of the three solutions could present a perfect balance of costs, academic pressure, and local identity for half-Chinese, half-Malay kids who didn’t fully fit in as locals in China, but by virtue of having one Chinese parent, were more attuned to their Chinese identity than the expat kids who attended international schools.

In short, any path Fang Wu and Atiqah might have taken would have thoroughly tested their resilience, though nothing would ever be untenable so long as they could be together.  Determined as Fang Wu and Atiqah were to reclaim the happiness that had eluded them, choosing to be thankful for their lot was scarcely a burden.

~~~⚽~~~

Xi.vi – Lele and Byron

2034 and 2035 were the years when Lele learned to fully appreciate the generosity of her parents.  The considerable amount of money they spent – on two daughters at once – could not have been easy for their cash flow, no matter how willingly they did it.

Xixi and Xiaoming did not need help with housing or engaging an ayi, because Xiaoming’s Cost of Living Allowance allowed them to lead a comfortable expat lifestyle. But Mr. and Mrs. Zheng couldn’t allow Xiaoming’s parents to bear the cost of two wedding banquets in Singapore and in Changsha. Not only did they pay the cost of their tables for both banquets, they also firmly declined Xixi and Xiaoming’s offer to reimburse them from the red packets given by the Zheng family’s guests.

“别为我们操心 (Don’t worry about us),” they said, “钱是给你们年轻人用的，你们收下吧！(The money is for your generation to use, please keep it!)”

At the same time, Byron decided to set up a second branch of his café in Hong Kong. Several weeks before she left Singapore, Lele had gotten the local press to feature her home baking business in the lifestyle section, to generate a final burst of publicity and orders. After her media interview, she tipped the press off about Byron’s Instagram account and suggested that they could consider mentioning Shi Qing Hua Yi (the café) if they ever ran a tourism piece about Guangzhou.

Some months later, Byron did get a call, and he agreed to have his café featured in an online Channel News Asia travel article. The result was that a steady stream of Singaporean tourists started visiting, followed by Malaysian and Indonesian ones as word-of-mouth spread.  Soon, Byron started thinking of expanding his business.

Setting up a new outlet in Hong Kong would serve two purposes: Hong Kong was more popular for tourists than Guangzhou, and being there would allow Byron and Lele to build something entirely their own, untouched by the spectre of Xia Min. Byron would never allow Xia Min’s artwork to leave the walls of Shi Qing Hua Yi’s Guangzhou branch, but the Hong Kong branch was his and Lele’s blank canvas to decorate.

The capital investment needed for the second branch hit Byron and Lele less than a year after the Zhengs had sprung for Xixi’s and Xiaoming’s wedding festivities. Given the one-two punch to their wallets, Mr. and Mrs. Zheng could be forgiven if they’d wished the men whom their daughters were marrying had come from wealthier families. But it was in the Zhengs’ nature to do everything to confer happiness to the younger generation. They didn’t hesitate to loan Byron some cash, while also helping Lele move to Hong Kong.

Byron and Lele were both self-taught bakers. That wasn’t unusual among university-educated professionals who chose to branch off into the food and beverage industry. In fact, Gen Z had the tongue-in-cheek term “career imposter” to describe people who followed their passion to make a living in a field other than the one they went to university for.

But when going to culinary school could give Lele a way into Hong Kong and increase Shi Qing Hua Yi’s legitimacy in the long run, why wouldn’t that be a solution? Lele was forever grateful to her parents for helping her with fees and rent to make that possible.

Before those watershed years from 2033 to 2035, Lele had believed her life to be easy. She had worked hard at her two degrees and then her two jobs, but nothing she wanted had ever been truly out of reach. Now, in her life with Byron, Lele realised that she had never really craved a life of ease. Unlike her sister, excitement and challenge were what made her wake up in the morning. Xixi’s life was smoother, but Lele wouldn’t find her sister’s path more interesting than the one she’d chosen.

To make it easier to visit his Hong Kong café (and of course, Lele), Byron rented an apartment in Shenzhen and commuted using the MTR (Mass Transit Railway). Every week, he still visited his Guangzhou outlet via high-speed train at least once and went there to dine with his parents and the Xias on weekends, but over time, more of his life gravitated to Shenzhen and Hong Kong.

After she finished culinary school, Lele moved in with Byron because housing across the border was much more affordable than in Hong Kong. Just as they had done for Xixi, the Zhengs contributed their share towards two wedding banquets for Byron and Lele, one in Guangzhou with his family and friends, and the other in Changsha for theirs.

Joining the legion of over 40,000 daily cross-border commuters between Shenzhen and Hong Kong made Lele’s life even more challenging. She and Byron were often exhausted, and they had no idea how they would have managed without the advantage of having supportive parents. After they had children, their parents took turns to stay over at their Shenzhen flat during the weekdays to supervise their ayi and take the children to and from school.

Xixi’s life as a stay-at-home wife on an expat package in her home country and then a white-collar office job in Singapore, was much calmer but also, to Lele’s mind, much smaller. Why, Xiaoming’s alma mater, which was one of the top primary schools in Singapore, was merely steps away from their apartment block!   Their jobs were a mere fifteen-minute ride away on the MRT (Mass Rapid Transit) trains that came practically to their doorstep.  And the crowds on Singapore’s public transportation were nothing compared to the long queues at the immigration checkpoint in Luohu (罗湖), the entry point for the MTR to Hong Kong.

Still, the bustle of Hong Kong suited Lele. She felt it captured her spirit well – both Chinese and Westernised at the same time.  With the help of the Xia kids, who recorded and sent her videos on their father’s smartphone to teach her new words and phrases, she picked up Cantonese in no time. 

While she was living in Singapore, Lele hadn’t felt any peer pressure to adopt an English name, although many of her locally born ethnic Chinese friends had them. Among the people like her who moved from the PRC to Singapore for work or study, that practice was uncommon; amongst Chinese, there was no reason to go by anything other than their Chinese given names. However, in Hong Kong, giving oneself an English name to use at work was nearly an imperative. Ostensibly it was about making it easy for the foreigners and tourists who frequented the café to remember her.  But a part of it, just like how it was in Singapore, was because as a former British colony, there was still some cachet associated with being conversant in English and using an English name at work.

In Singapore, the parents who gave their children English names tended to stick with conventional Christian names, even though the more fanciful ones such as Aloysius for a boy, or Chloe for a girl, were more popular than in Western countries. But some of the names Hong Kongers gave themselves were utterly crazy in the eyes of a native English speaker. This was the place which had celebrities named Noodle Cheng and Edison Chen, after all.

Even the people who knew Lele best were surprised when she didn’t choose a distinctive name to go with her strident personality and opted for the relatively conventional “Louisa” instead. After all, Byron had made the bombastic choice of naming himself after a famous poet to match the branding he wanted for his café.

“如果我登报 (If I end up in the papers) ，” Lele justified, “我才不想变成人家的笑柄! (I don’t want to become a laughingstock!)”

In any case, Byron and Lele juggled their multiple identities with ease. They were Li Yi and Zheng Xinle to everyone in Guangzhou and Changsha who had known them while they were growing up.  No matter how old they got, Xixi and Lele still addressed each other by their pet names, as did their parents.  Only at their café chain were they Byron and Louisa Lee, the restaurateurs who provided a poetic place of repose for their customers.

And over the years, Lele came to fully appreciate the nerves of steel beneath Byron’s introverted exterior. Running a business was never easy. In a big urban centre where Instagrammable cafes were a dime a dozen, Byron’s commitment to maintaining a unique identity in the face of ever-changing fads and trends was laudable. Despite his repeated assertions that “我是个很内敛的人 (I’m an introvert),” a large part of his popularity came from the honesty and authenticity of his social media posts.

Lele had always been so light-hearted that it was easy to overlook her intellectual capacity. In this regard, Byron engaged her like nobody else did. They offered different menus in their Guangzhou and Hong Kong branches and experimented extensively with tailoring their cakes and pastries for the local tastes at the two venues.

“How French should we make this?” was a question that frequently sparked lively debate between them. And how that answer might be different in Guangzhou as opposed to Hong Kong or Singapore – or Changsha – was a topic of infinite interest.

Guangzhou and Hong Kong were a mere 140 kilometres apart, both parts of the same Greater Bay Area linked seamlessly by high-speed trains. Yet they were two different worlds, spanning the past and the future, East and West, for Byron and Lele. And they embraced the plurality of inhabiting both.

Perhaps it was natural that with the passage of time, Zheng Xinle would mature from the exuberant young girl she had once been, the livewire of every party, into the polished and sophisticated Louisa Lee in the South China Morning Post’s lifestyle section.  For it was merely a matter of time, as Lele had predicted, before the Hong Kong branch of Poetic and Picturesque became popular enough to warrant a feature from the press.

Now that Lele was living her destiny, she was long past the notion that Fang Wu had any place in it.  For it was infinitely more satisfying to carve a path to recognition and glory of her own, than to bask in the fame and accomplishments of someone else.

~~~⚽~~~

Epilogue – June 2047

The days were counting down to a momentous date: 1 July, the 50^th anniversary of Hong Kong’s return to Chinese sovereignty. But for the day-to-day existence of the people in the city, not much was changed, nor did they expect it to be.

Fang Wu and Atiqah, along with their three children, were there for a momentous occasion: the first trip to Disneyland for everyone in the family.  Despite starting their married life with a substantial nest egg, the demands of their growing family led to ever-increasing expenses.

Having to upsize their housing before Fang Wu got his permanent residency meant that they had to get a private condo instead of a public flat if they wanted to share the mortgage loan. The four-bedroom premium unit they bought at Parktown Residence, a mixed-use development about 2 km away from Eusoff’s flat, set them back by more than S$3 million. 

With the arrival of their second child, they also had to trade their subcompact hatchback for an Xpeng X9 electric MPV which cost more than Said’s BMW had. For all his professions that he was hanging onto the BMW just for the remainder of its COE (Certificate of Entitlement), Said found it impossible to downgrade after having had the taste of owning a luxury car and duly forked out the cash needed to extend his COE for another ten years after it expired.

In a flash, nearly thirteen years had passed, and their eldest son, Firdaus Fang Chen (方晨), was on the cusp of finishing primary school. They squeezed in this trip right before the end of the June school holidays as a treat for everyone after the gruelling hours of practice and selection trials for the Singapore Sports School.

If he got in, Firdaus would be following in the footsteps of his father, leaving the family home to pursue his sport at the young age of 12.  But unlike Fang Wu’s situation in the past, Singapore was small enough for Firdaus to come home easily every weekend even if he ended up staying at the Sports School as a boarder.

Meanwhile, Fang Wen’s son, Shengwu, had blossomed into a talented badminton player.  Now a lower secondary student, Shengwu chose to remain in his hometown with his parents and younger sister Shihan (诗晗), rather than to be recognised and take his skills to the next level by training in the city.  The family knew that this might cost him the chance to be a national level player in the future, but being together was still their choice.

Fang Wen and Huixian believed in embracing every year they could keep their children by their side. Regardless of where their talents lay, Shengwu and Shihan would need to leave for boarding school anyway when their high school years came. They were already very lucky to have a local lower secondary school in addition to a primary school, when village schools were closing due to dwindling birth rates and rampant urban migration.

Having missed out on each other’s formative years, Fang Wu and Fang Wen were not prepared to let their sons be separated from the family at a very young age for the sake of cultivating their sporting talent. And thankfully, the next generation had enough options to not need to make the sacrifices that their generation had.

They had saved up enough to splurge on a trip to anywhere – and Fang Wu and Atiqah had been determined to let the children pick which Disneyland in the world they wanted to visit. To their immense surprise, and Fang Wu’s secret joy, the three children unanimously chose Hong Kong.

“You don’t have to worry about helping us save money,” Atiqah had felt obliged to say. She knew Fang Wu would be overjoyed at going to Hong Kong Disneyland because it meant they could also make a side trip to visit Xia Jian, but she felt obliged to make sure the children’s true preferences were heard. “If you want to go to Disney World in the States, we can make it happen.”

“But Hong Kong is where we really want to go,” insisted their 10-year-old daughter, Zainab Fang Xia (方霞).

“We want the kor kors (big brothers) and jie jie (big sister) to take the rides with us,” piped up their youngest son, 7-year-old Sufyan Fang Xi (方曦).

Miraculously, Fang Wu and Xia Jian’s friendship carried on into the next generation, despite the physical distance that separated them. Every year when Fang Wu and Atiqah brought the children to visit their aunts and uncles in China, they made a stop in Guangzhou to catch up with Xia Jian as well.  The young Xias enjoyed bringing Fang Wu and Atiqah’s children to all the kid-friendly spots and kept their friendship up on WeChat outside of the Fang family’s annual visits.

Being closely acquainted with their cousins and the young Xias meant that Firdaus, Zainab and Sufyan were very aware of how lucky they were.  They knew only a world where Guangzhou was more technologically advanced – and much bigger – than Singapore, but they could see from their uncles’ and aunts’ living conditions that not all of China was that way.

After completing their year of round-the-world backpacking, Cai Ying and Lao Cai settled in Guizhou, the province where Lao Cai had grown up.  Living in a rural village reduced their cost of living, while rapid digitalisation with 5G wireless Internet meant they still felt sufficiently connected to the outside world.

Although the Cais never succeeded in their quest to have children, doting on their nephews and nieces more than made up for it. Since Guizhou was adjacent to Hunan, the Cais visited Fang Wen and his family often.  They might not have the convenient transport infrastructure of the cities, but the Cais had plenty of time on their hands and were able to afford a modest compact car.  And once a year, they made an extended visit to Singapore, bunking in the guest room at Fang Wu and Atiqah’s apartment.

Village life was a world away from what the little Fangs were used to in Singapore.  There were no air-conditioned malls and eateries, no modern high-rise housing, and their aunts’ and uncles’ homes boasted traditional Chinese kitchens rather than the modern Western ones that every flat in Singapore had.

Seeing the extended family get together and be happy despite not having the trappings of urban wealth that were so prevalent in Singapore was the best foil Fang Wu and Atiqah could give their children against the materialistic culture they lived in.

Firdaus and Zainab were aware that, despite the slower pace of life in the countryside, their cousins spent twice as much time in school as they did.  Primary school classes in Singapore were dismissed at 1:30 PM. Compared to how Shengwu and Shihan went to school from 7 AM to noon, and then back again for the entire afternoon, Singapore’s “pressure-cooker” education system felt downright liberal.

Neither Fang Wu nor Xia Jian believed in piling their kids with tuition. Still, coming from an education-obsessed society, they invariably compared their children’s exam papers when they visited each other’s homes. 

Firdaus was the only one of the Fang kids who was old enough to be curious and take a peek. When all the Chinese words on Mingming’s old primary school exam scripts made his eyes swim, he decided the PSLE (Singapore’s Primary School Leaving Examination) couldn’t be that bad after all. At least, all the papers except for mother tongue would be in English.

This visit was special for the young Xias too, because Guangguang had just finished the gaokao in early June.  In a flash, Xia Jian had morphed from the role of “Super Dad” to the role of “Cool Dad”, and the best indication of his success was his children’s willingness for their parents to go with them on their first taste of nightlife.

And it wasn’t just because the parents were picking up the bill – Xianxian had made it a point to give her parents a treat when she got her first salary last year, and Guangguang said he would do the same when he started working too. Now 21, Xianxian was working as a dental hygienist after pursuing a 2-year diploma course.

Fang Wu, Atiqah and their kids went to the Air BnB in Kowloon where the Xias were staying overnight, to keep 14-year-old Mingming company while Xia Jian, Jiayi, Xianxian and Guangguang went bar hopping in Lan Kwai Fong. The little boys were excited at the idea of spending a whole night playing video games.  Whether it was enforced by their parents or, in the case of the young Xias, government-mandated screen time restrictions for minors, marathon gaming sessions like this only happened once or twice a year.

Zainab was more interested in watching Jiayi and Xianxian apply their makeup than in gaming.  Dressing up to go to a bar was something she saw people on TV doing, but which none of her family members would ever do when alcohol was haram. At 10, she didn’t think drinking wine could possibly be more fun than going to an amusement park, but she wondered if she might ever have an occasion to look as pretty as they did someday.

On Xia Jian’s way out, Fang Wu assured him and Jiayi that watching Mingming for the evening was no problem at all. The boys’ raucous laughter accentuated his point.

“以后就多亏你了 (Next time I’ll be much obliged to you),” Fang Wu added.

The two friends exchanged a meaningful look. What was left unsaid, yet went poignantly through both their minds, was the acknowledgement that parenting invariably involved an element of surrender.  If any of Fang Wu’s children decided when they came of age that they wanted to experience the bar scene, it would be Xia Jian and Jiayi who would have to accompany them because as devout Muslims, Fang Wu and Atiqah could not.

Fang Wu had made the huge step of converting to Islam to marry his wife. Their children were born and raised as Muslims. Yet, they couldn’t take it for granted that the next generation would carry on the cultural and religious traditions they had made a point to build for their family.

Choosing Islam had made sense for Fang Wu and Atiqah. It wasn’t always easy, but it was the only respectful choice to preserve the moral and religious precepts which Atiqah had been raised with.

For their children, it would be different. Ethnically, they were half Chinese and half Malay. It was their birthright to have a free choice of which identity they wished to adopt when they reached adulthood.  At this age, nobody would know how the three kids might go about it.

Thus far, the little Fangs accepted that others addressed them by their Chinese names when speaking to them in Mandarin and their Malay names when using English or Malay. 

They went to Poi Ching, the Special Assistance Plan (SAP) school in their neighbourhood, where they studied Higher Chinese as the compulsory mother tongue. But when they visited their Malay family members, everybody made it a point to speak to them only in Malay. 

Since they had known nothing but this plurality of cultural identities for all their lives, they were blissfully unaware of all the choices they would need to make in the not-so-far future.

Fang Wu had never taken up Singapore citizenship because neither the People’s Republic of China nor Singapore allowed dual citizenship. What he didn’t wish to give up had made that choice for him, overriding any consideration of what he wished to seek after.

When they reached the age of 18, the children would need to choose which passport they wanted, too.   And if the boys wanted to keep their Singapore citizenship, they would need to go through National Service (a 2-year compulsory military conscription).

Nobody could guarantee that any of the Fang kids would opt to identify as Malay rather than Chinese, nor that they would continue in Islam after they grew up. Whether they ended up falling in love with someone who was Chinese, Malay, or Indian, or some other race altogether, was most likely to influence their respective outcomes.

This was a sacrifice Xia Jian was thankful he didn’t have to face. For all the ways that Fang Wu had been luckier than him in career, wealth and health, Xia Jian knew his best fortune was in the rootedness of his family.

“没问题 (No problem),” he promised as the four eldest members of the Xia family went out the door.  For all these decades, Hong Kong had been their playground, the place they escaped to whenever they wanted a touch of something different and foreign yet still packaged in an environment that was comfortably Cantonese. And tonight, they would paint the town red.

THE END