7
Eleanor
•
SINGAPORE
After a few days of strategically placed phone calls, Eleanor finally nailed down the source of the disturbing rumor involving her son. Daisy confessed hearing it from her daughter-in-law’s best friend Rebecca Tang, who in turn revealed that she’d heard it from her brother Moses Tang, who had been at Cambridge with Leonard Shang. And Moses had this to report to Eleanor:
“I was in London for a conference. At the last minute, Leonard invites me down to dinner at his country estate in Surrey. Have you been there, Mrs. Young? Aiyoh, what a palace! I didn’t realize it was designed by Gabriel-Hippolyte Destailleur, the architect who built Waddesdon Manor for the English Rothschilds. Anyway, we were dining with all these ang mor VIPS and MPs visiting from Singapore and as usual Cassandra Shang is holding court. And then out of nowhere Cassandra says loudly across the table to your sister-in-law Victoria Young, ‘You’ll never guess what I heard . . . Nicky has been dating a Taiwanese girl in New York, and now he’s bringing her to Singapore for the Khoo wedding!’ And Victoria says, ‘Are you sure? Taiwanese? Good grief, did he fall for some gold digger?’ And then Cassandra says something like, ‘Well, it might not be as bad as you think. I have it on good authority that she’s one of the Chu girls. You know, of the Taipei Plastics Chus. Not exactly old money, but at least they are one of the most solid families in Taiwan.”
Had it been anyone else, Eleanor would have dismissed all this as nothing but idle talk among her husband’s bored relatives. But this came from Cassandra, who was usually dead accurate. She hadn’t earned the nickname “Radio One Asia” for nothing. Eleanor wondered how Cassandra obtained this latest scoop. Nicky’s big-mouthed second cousin was the last person he would ever confide in. Cassandra must have gotten the intel from one of her spies in New York. She had spies everywhere, all hoping to sah kah her by passing along some hot tip.
It did not come as a surprise to Eleanor that her son might have a new girlfriend. What surprised her (or, more accurately, annoyed her) was the fact that it had taken her until now to find out. Anyone could see that he was prime target number one, and over the years there had been plenty of girls Nicky thought he had kept hidden from his mother. All of them had been inconsequential in Eleanor’s eyes, since she knew her son wasn’t ready to marry yet. But this time was different.
Eleanor had a long-held theory about men. She truly believed that for most men, all that talk of “being in love” or “finding the right one” was absolute nonsense. Marriage was purely a matter of timing, and whenever a man was finally done sowing his wild oats and ready to settle down, whichever girl happened to be there at the time would be the right one. She had seen the theory proven time and again; indeed she had caught Philip Young at precisely the right moment. All the men in that clan tended to marry in their early thirties, and Nicky was now ripe for the plucking. If someone in New York already knew so much about Nicky’s relationship, and if he was actually bringing this girl home to attend his best friend’s wedding, things must be getting serious. Serious enough that he purposely hadn’t mentioned her existence. Serious enough to derail Eleanor’s meticulously laid plans.
The setting sun refracted its rays through the floor-to-ceiling windows of the recently completed penthouse apartment atop Cairn-hill Road, bathing the atrium-like living room in a deep orange glow. Eleanor gazed at the early-evening sky, taking in the colonnade of buildings clustering around Scotts Road and the expansive views all the way past the Singapore River to the Keppel Shipyard, the world’s busiest commercial port. Even after thirty-four years of marriage, she did not take for granted all that it meant for her to be sitting here with one of the most sought-after views on the island.
To Eleanor, every single person occupied a specific space in the elaborately constructed social universe in her mind. Like most of the women in her crowd, Eleanor could meet another Asian anywhere in the world—say, over dim sum at Royal China in London, or shopping in the lingerie department of David Jones in Sydney—and within thirty seconds of learning their name and where they lived, she would implement her social algorithm and calculate precisely where they stood in her constellation based on who their family was, who else they were related to, what their approximate net worth might be, how the fortune was derived, and what family scandals might have occurred within the past fifty years.
The Taipei Plastics Chus were very new money, made in the seventies and eighties, most likely. Knowing next to nothing about this family made Eleanor particularly anxious. How established were they in Taipei society? Who exactly were this girl’s parents, and how much did she stand to inherit? She needed to know what she was up against. It was 6:45 a.m. in New York. High time to wake Nicky up. She picked up the telephone with one hand, and with the other she held at arm’s length the long-distance discount calling card that she always used, squinting at the row of tiny numbers. She dialed a complicated series of codes and waited for several beeping signals before finally entering the telephone number. The phone rang four times before Nick’s voice mail picked up: “Hey, I can’t come to the phone right now, so leave a message and I’ll get back to you as soon as I can.”
Eleanor was always a little taken aback whenever she heard her son’s “American” accent. She much preferred the normal Queen’s English he would revert to whenever he was back in Singapore. She spoke haltingly into the phone: “Nicky, where are you? Call me tonight and let me know your flight information, lah. Everyone in the world except me knows when you’re coming home. Also, are you staying with us first or with Ah Ma? Please call me back. But don’t call tonight if it’s after midnight. I am going to take an Ambien now, so I can’t be disturbed for at least eight hours.”
She put down the phone, and then almost immediately picked it up again; this time dialing a cell-phone number. “Astrid, ah? Is that you?”
“Oh, hi, Auntie Elle,” Astrid said.
“Are you okay? You sound a bit funny.”
“No, I’m fine, I was just asleep,” Astrid said, clearing her throat.
“Oh. Why are you sleeping so early? Are you sick?”
“No, I’m in Paris, Auntie Elle.”
“Alamak, I forgot you were away! Sorry to wake you, lah. How is Paris?”
“Lovely.”
“Doing lots of shopping?”
“Not too much,” Astrid replied as patiently as possible. Did her auntie really call just to discuss shopping?
“Do they still have those lines at Louis Vuitton that they make all the Asian customers wait in?”
“I’m not sure. I haven’t been inside a Louis Vuitton in decades, Auntie Elle.”
“Good for you. Those lines are terrible, and then they only allow Asians to buy one item. Reminds me of the Japanese occupation, when they forced all the Chinese to wait in line for scraps of rotten food.”
“Yes, but I can sort of understand why they need these rules, Auntie Elle. You should see the Asian tourists buying up all the luxury goods, not just at Louis Vuitton. They are everywhere, buying everything in sight. If there’s a designer label, they want it. It’s absolutely mad. And you know some of them are just bringing it back home to resell at a profit.”
“Yah lah, it’s those fresh-off-the-boat tourists that give us a bad name. But I’ve been shopping in Paris since the seventies—I would never wait in any line and be told what I can buy! Anyway Astrid, I wanted to ask . . . have you spoken to Nicky recently?”
Astrid paused for a moment. “Um, he called me a couple of weeks ago.”
“Did he tell you when he was coming to Singapore?”
“No, he didn’t mention the exact date. But I’m sure he’ll be there a few days before Colin’s wedding, don’t you think?”
“You know lah, Nicky doesn’t tell me anything!” Eleanor paused, and then continued cautiously. “Hey, I’m thinking of throwing him and his girlfriend a surprise party. Just a small party at the new flat, to welcome her to Singapore. Do you think that’s a good idea?”
“Sure, Auntie Elle. I think they would love that.” Astrid was quite taken aback that her aunt was being so welcoming to Rachel. Nick must have really worked his charm overtime.
“But I don’t really know what she would like, so I don’t know how to plan this party properly. Can you give me some ideas? Did you meet her when you were in New York last year?”
“I did.”
Eleanor seethed quietly. Astrid was in New York last March, which meant this girl had been in the picture for at least a year now.
“What’s she like? Is she very Taiwanese?” she asked.
“Taiwanese? Not at all. She seems completely Americanized to me,” Astrid offered, before regretting what she’d said.
How horrible, Eleanor thought. She had always found Asian girls with American accents to be quite ridiculous. They all sounded like they were faking it, trying to sound so ang mor.
“So even though the family is from Taiwan, she was raised in America?”
“I didn’t even know she was from Taiwan, to tell you the truth.”
“Really? She didn’t talk about her family back in Taipei?”
“Not at all.” What was Auntie Elle getting at? Astrid knew that her aunt was prying, so she felt like she had to present Rachel in the best possible light. “She’s very smart and accomplished, Auntie Elle. I think you’ll like her.”
“Oh, so she’s the brainy type, like Nicky.”
“Yes, definitely. I’m told she’s one of the up-and-coming professors in her field.”
Eleanor was nonplussed. A professor! Nicky was dating a professor! Oh my, was this woman older than him? “Nicky didn’t tell me what her specialty was.”
“Oh, economic development.”
A cunning, calculating older woman. Alamak. This was sounding worse and worse. “Did she go to university in New York?” Eleanor pressed on.
“No, she went to Stanford, in California.”
“Yes, yes, I know Stanford,” Eleanor said, sounding unimpressed. It’s that school in California for those people who can’t get into Harvard.
“It’s a top school, Auntie Elle,” Astrid said, knowing exactly what her aunt was thinking.
“Well, I suppose if you are forced to go to an American university—”
“Come on, Auntie Elle. Stanford is a great university for anywhere. I believe she also went to Northwestern for her master’s. Rachel is very intelligent and capable, and completely down-to-earth. I think you’ll like her very much.”
“Oh, I’m sure I will,” Eleanor replied. So, her name was Rachel. Eleanor paused. She just needed one more piece of information—the correct spelling of the girl’s surname. But how was she going to get it without Astrid getting suspicious? Suddenly she had a thought. “I think I’m going to get one of those nice cakes from Awfully Chocolate and put her name on it. Do you know how she spells her surname? Is it C-H-U, C-H-O-O, or C-H-I-U?”
“I think it’s just C-H-U.”
“Thank you. You’ve been so helpful,” Eleanor said. More than you’ll ever know.
“Of course, Auntie Elle. Let me know if there’s anything I can do to help out for your party. I can’t wait to see your spectacular new flat.”
“Oh, you haven’t seen it yet? I thought your mother bought a unit here as well.”
“She may have, but I haven’t seen it. I can’t keep up with all of my parents’ property juggling.”
“Of course, of course. Your parents have so many properties around the world, unlike your poor uncle Philip and me. We just have the house in Sydney and this small little pigeonhole.”
“Oh, I’m sure it’s anything but small, Auntie Elle. Isn’t it supposed to be the most luxurious condo ever built in Singapore?” Astrid wondered for the millionth time why all her relatives constantly tried to outdo each other in proclaiming their poverty.
“No, lah. It’s just a simple flat—nothing like your father’s house. Anyway, I’m sorry to wake you. Do you need something to get back to sleep? I take fifty milligrams of amitriptyline every night, and then an extra ten milligrams of Ambien if I really want to sleep through the night. Sometimes I add a Lunesta, and if that doesn’t work, I get out the Valium—”
“I’ll be fine, Auntie Elle.”
“Okay then, bye-bye!” With that, Eleanor hung up the phone. Her gamble had paid off. Those two cousins were thick as thieves. Why didn’t she think of calling Astrid sooner?