Sarong Party Girls (12 page)

“We booked the usual room, Mr. Tay—­your colleagues are already here,” mamasan said, turning to walk up a wide grand marble staircase in the middle of the room. If it weren't for the gaudy gold lights and cheongsams all around, this place could perhaps pass as an old French palace, man. The ceilings were so high; everything looked so drama.

At the top of the stairs, mamasan led us down a long, wide hall, opening the door to a room that looked like a dark red nest. The walls were lined on three sides with plump cushioned seating and on the fourth wall, there was a big flat TV screen. Leslie Cheung, wearing silver sequined hotpants, no shirt and a tight white jacket with feathers sewn all the way down each sleeve, was dancing around onstage. Seeing this almost made me cry. So classic—­1980s Cantopop is really the best.

Everything in the room was red—­the walls were covered in shiny red wallpaper; the cushions were all covered in slippery red silk. Maybe the dim lighting wasn't red (I couldn't be sure) but it really looked that way since everything else was red.

Once my eyes adjusted I could see three ang mohs and one Chinese guy, who seemed to be busy mixing whiskey sodas. “Hey, thanks for hurrying so much to come and see us ah?” the Chinese guy shouted. “Boss, we were waiting for you until our balls were turning blue, man.”

“Sorry, sorry—­I had to pick this one up,” Kin Meng said, pointing over at me. “Jazzy—­meet the guys: Sam works with me in the Singapore office; Nigel and George came in from London; and Keith over here just flew in from Hong Kong.”

After shaking everybody's hand, I felt Kin Meng nudge me in the back to go and sit next to Keith.

Keith was quite a good-­looking guy in that slightly nerdy British way—­tall, clean-­cut and skinny; he even had a thin boyish face. (And since Kin Meng was entertaining him in Singapore's number one KTV lounge that means Keith must have money—­or at least must be quite important.) Aiyoh, so wasted. If only he liked girls! And this one is confirm true lah—­I could tell from how he didn't even look for one second at my tetek or backside that I'm not his type for pok-­ing.

“Hi,” Keith said, leaning close to me to whisper. “This is a little awkward, isn't it?”

I didn't know what to say so I just covered my mouth and giggled. Keith laughed too.

After Kin Meng settled in next to me, the mamasan got serious.

“Tonight, do you want butterfly or by the hour?” she asked.

Kin Meng looked at his watch—­it was 9
P.M.
“Not much time left in the early shift,” he said. “We'll do the hourly girls. Butterfly—­wasting time only.”

Butterfly? Kin Meng could see from my face that Jazzy here catch no ball so he came closer and whispered, “Butterfly girls fly from one room to another. Those girls split one hour among four rooms, so you only get each one for fifteen minutes. It's cheaper, yes, but not so worth it right now. The late shift is starting soon—­the girls, the drinks, everything gets much more expensive then. Better get our fun in quickly.”

“Mr. Tay, the girls—­the usual kind?” mamasan asked.

Kin Meng looked around at the guys—­he seemed to be mentally calculating something.

“Tonight we have a range of tastes—­just bring a variety so ­people can pick,” he said. “You know what kind I like, but also throw in one with big breasts, a tall one with very nice legs . . . eh, Sam, these days, what are you in the mood for?”

“Hmm—­you got new China girls?” Sam asked.

Mamasan nodded.

“OK, then China lah,” Sam said. “Madam!” he shouted after the mamasan as she started to leave the room. “Very young ones, OK?”

Mamasan disappeared, returning a few minutes later with ten girls, all of them looking cheerful and smiling, all of them wearing sexy shiny dresses. Mamasan was good lah—­the group had a few girls fitting each of Kin Meng's descriptions. Plus, the young China girls Sam ordered were wearing dark red lipstick and tight mini cheongsams with big slits down each side.

“Aiseh!” Sam said quite loudly, jumping up so he could inspect them closely, as if he'd never seen women in his life before.

Nigel got the big-­boobs one, George picked one with such long legs she looked like runway model and Kin Meng chose a Korean-­ish girl with the same look as the girls he had in his phone. (But later when she had to introduce herself to him I realized she wasn't one of his previous girls.)

Sam was taking quite long to pick from the three China girls. “How?” he said, turning to look at Kin Meng as if he was begging him. “Boss—­cannot take it lah. All of them also make me steam! How—­can I have two?”

“Don't even think about it—­as if you can handle more than one!” Kin Meng said. “Hurry up—­you're holding everyone up.”

So Sam just did an eeny-­meeny-­miney-­moe and ended up with the shortest smallest one—­so small in fact that she looked like she was about fourteen. The leftover girls quietly left.

Once the girls sat down next to their guys, they started mixing drinks for themselves.

“Come, come,” Big Boobs said. “Let's bottoms up!”

Everyone clinked their glasses and drank. Even though I never say no to free whiskey—­I'd already had a few at Front Page so I only drank half. When I put my glass down, I saw that Keith also only drank half.

The girls immediately noticed Keith's glass and started pestering him. “Wah, how can be like that? Must bottoms up!” They kept cho-­cho-­ing him until he agreed to bottoms-­up the whole thing. None of them bothered to say anything to me. Once Keith put his glass down, Big Boobs and China Girl made another round of drinks for everyone. Everyone except me, that is. Wah lao, guniang here was invisible.

Sam started frenching China girl the moment she finished making drinks. I could hear her giggling and saying, “Aiyoh! You're so naughty!”

“Come! Another bottoms up!” Big Boobs announced.

Everyone clinked their glasses again. (Only Keith clinked his glass with mine. Kani nah.) While China Girl started making another round, Sam got up to walk toward the door. Before closing it again, he looked back, nodded at Kin Meng and said, “Boss, I go toilet ah?”

As soon as we heard the door close, Kin Meng said to China Girl, “
Xiao
jie
—­sorry, but my friend's not feeling well.”

The girl actually looked angry for a second, then quickly went back to smiling. “No problem,” she said, smoothing down her cheongsam and getting up to leave. Now that her business in this room was over, her English suddenly sounded much more Singaporean than broken Chinese-­y. “I hope he feels better,” she said, not even looking back at Kin Meng.

As soon as she left, mamasan reappeared with three more young China girls—­none of them were the ones from before. First, she came over to talk to Kin Meng though. Mamasan's face was blank, but even I could tell she was irritated.

“Madam—­he just had a quick taste only, nothing serious yet,” Kin Meng said. “But if there's a problem, just charge me for her also. No trouble, OK?”

Mamasan nodded and went over to wait by her girls. Sam reappeared so quickly I could tell he didn't go to the loo. This time, he quickly picked one—­the one with the biggest eyes and fairest skin.

“What happened?” Kin Meng asked when Sam sat back down.

“Bad breath,” Sam said, picking up his glass and downing his drink, taking a long time to swirl the last sip around his mouth before swallowing. New China Girl grabbed the whiskey bottle to refill his glass even before he could set it back down.

Kin Meng just nodded and put his arm around his Korean girl again. When he saw me staring at him, he whispered, “It's always easier to have someone else get rid of your girl. More polite.”

Everything had happened so quickly once we got to Temple of Heaven that I was still trying to absorb what I had seen. I had heard what happens in KTV lounges of course, but to see it happen in front of me . . . young girls getting picked or rejected like chickens in a wet market? I am very open-­minded, but even I think maybe this is not quite right. Even though I didn't have that much to drink that evening—­usually I only start to get high after six or seven whiskeys and maybe feel sick after ten or so—­I started to feel something in my chest and coming up the back of my throat. Jazzy, I told myself, you'd better buck up! You promised to help Kin Meng out—­and you asked to tag along anyway. Don't be a spoilsport!

New China Girl had switched off the Leslie Cheung concert video and was starting to sing some Elva Hsiao song. That singer is a good choice lah—­although a lot of guys still think Sammi Cheng is damn pretty and has the better songs, hallo, she's forty already! Who wants to hit their own handgun while thinking about someone their auntie's age? So even though Sammi's songs are all very nice to hear and sing, in a KTV room, if you're one of these lounge girls, maybe it's better to choose a younger singer. Elva is not say that young but at least she's not antique.

Big Boobs was trying to instigate a few more rounds of bottoms up—­if the two bottles of Chivas quickly disappeared then she could try to persuade get Kin Meng to buy Veuve, after all. (Which is not more expensive than Chivas, but ­people always drink champagne much faster. So in the end, Kin Meng's bill confirm will be bigger.) George and Long Legs had disappeared god knows where and Sam was rubba-­ing New China Girl all over—­her backside, under her skirt, up her thighs—­as she sang. Kin Meng wasn't doing any of that shit—­I guess he meant it when he was telling me that one time that he only does naked Japanese baths with these girls; no hanky panky. But he had his arm around Korean Girl, her head on his chest, her right hand stroking his knee.

“I guess I'm supposed to understand why this has to be a part of doing business when I'm in Singapore,” Keith suddenly said, putting away his phone. He had been glued to it, texting, since the singing started. He was smiling at me though, so I guess he wasn't upset about the situation. “Are you OK, Jazzy?”

Am I OK? Usually, when I'm out like this, there's one person who asks me that question—­Sher. I suddenly wished she was there. Unlike me, she would have the balls to say something polite (but with attitude) to the guys and tell them she has to leave so that we could escape. But then again, why would I wish this kind of dirty scene on someone I care about?

“Yeah, I'm fine,” I said, smiling back at Keith. “I guess . . . it's just more shocking than I thought it would be. I've never been inside a KTV lounge before!”

“I can imagine,” Keith said, laughing. “You seem like a nice girl, Jazzy.”

That's when the shouting started.

“Aiyoh, aiyoh, aiyoh!” Sam said. He was standing up now, jumping up and down and pointing at the far darkest corner of the room. I couldn't really see what he was pointing at so I stood up also. I could sort of make out a small love seat and some movement.

But it turns out I didn't need to squint so hard because Sam took out his iPhone and turned on the flashlight, shining it at the corner. Long Legs was seated, her minidress bunched up at her hips, her legs spread wide open, dangling off the sides of the chair. And I guess she wasn't wearing panties because George was kneeling in front of her with his face in her you know where!

“My god, George! Why on earth are you doing that?” Sam shouted.

George had stopped and turned around now, looking a little embarrassed. Long Legs quickly closed her legs and sat properly, taking a tissue out of her handbag to wipe George's mouth, helping him off his knees and onto the love seat. Sam's light was still on them so we could see everything.

“KTV girls are the last kinds of girls you should do that with—­aiyoh, they are so dirty!” Sam continued. Kin Meng stared hard at him—­no matter what they thought of what we all had just seen George do, he was still their business client after all. He should never be insulted—­especially not in front of girls. Sam was really throwing away Kin Meng's face.

Sam tried to make it seem like it was a joke and started to laugh. Kin Meng quickly laughed along too. And once that happened the KTV girls also joined in, giggling along. Sam decided to try and say something funny to defuse the situation more. “Hey, George,” he said, “I don't know how your women treat you in the UK, but you come here to buy these girls so you don't have to do that kind of shit. You don't have to win these girls over by pretending you like that kind of gross shit!” He started laughing again. But Kin Meng didn't laugh along this time.

“Well, as a matter of fact, I happen to like it . . .” George said.

I could see Kin Meng's shoulders tensing up. He was probably worried that the clients would get upset.

“Sam,” he whispered, “quiet lah. You know these ang moh guys—­sometimes they just like this kind of weird shit. If he wants to do that, then just let him do it.”

Sam turned off his iPhone light. Kin Meng waved over to George and said, “Come, George, why don't you take . . . um sorry, I forget her name, somewhere more private?”

Kin Meng picked up the receiver of the plastic red phone in the center of the tinted glass coffee table in front of us. “Yah, hello, we want to dapao one—­yes, just one. For now. . . . What? Oh, yes, of course five-­star room. . . . Hmm, I don't know—­one? Maybe two hours? . . .” Kin Meng put the phone down so he could look over at George, who had Long Legs on his lap now and was violently frenching her.

Kin Meng quietly laughed and shook his head then picked the phone back up. “Just book it for the whole night. Thanks.”

In just a minute, mamasan appeared again. She smiled at Long Legs, bowed slightly at Kin Meng and then whisked George and the girl away.

New China Girl had stopped singing while all the excitement was happening, so all we heard now was the melody of what must be one of Elva's sad songs. (Not that I knew the song—­I only guessed this because Elva's face was on the TV, looking like she was going to cry.)