Tham Cheng-E - Surrogate Protocol

“Where’re we going?”

“Lavender Street.”

Arthur frowned. “The red light district?”

“No one’s going to ask questions, Arthur.” Hannah surveyed him, somewhat contemptuously, from head to toe. “You look far too mellowed for anyone to believe you’re an underage seventeen-year-old.”

In contrast to her earlier vivacity Hannah did not speak a word throughout the journey. They went along Lavender Street and turned into the red-light district of Jalan Besar. Hannah hooked her arm around the crook of Arthur’s. Her skin felt cool and smooth even in the humid equatorial air. “Sorry if this makes you a pervert,” she said, brushing hair from her face. “We’re less conspicuous this way.”

Arthur’s heart sank deeper. No one would be in the identity business if they weren’t swindling tramps. And if she was indeed one he would’ve done better to reject her offer right where they met at the warehouse and dispense with this stupid romantic charade. Now he couldn’t turn back because he didn’t like things turning ugly, not when it came to relationships. He hobbled on beside her like a leashed puppy and wondered if he should’ve just paid for a night’s worth of her services and been done with it. The thought repulsed him immediately.

The main street had the usual complement of shabby shophouses and wholesale businesses. But the Jalan Besar junction, with its garish lighting and hoary tenements, offered lewd prospects for the night. Shuttered windows were thrown open, where powdered women lifted their skirts and adjusted their stockings and nylon underwear.

Men—locals and tourists—shopped for the night’s company. And when they started taking an interest in Hannah, Arthur tightened his grip around her arm.

They turned a corner and a few tipsy sailors called out to her, “Hoy there tidy love, we got four huge willies looking out for ya and we’ll triple what he’s payin’ ya!”

“Too early to be drinking, twits,” Hannah replied. “You won’t last the night.”

They left the catcalls behind them and Arthur looked over his shoulder to make sure no one was following. “Why bother answering?”

“Oh, shut up.” Hannah dragged him into an alley where more pimps solicited business with their wares hidden behind closed doors. “We’re here.”

A peeling wooden door marked their destination. Hannah said something in Cantonese to a heavy-eyed door-man and took Arthur into a short corridor suffused in pink light. It led into a larger space fringed by more doors. Outside these doors were queues of men. An incense smoked at the elaborate altar in a corner, where a deity with a livid black face sat in an ornate shed. The space reeked of a sweaty, metallic odour.

A narrow stairway took them to a brighter room upstairs. Upon their arrival a beefy, muscled man emerged shirtless from an adjoining room separated by a beaded curtain. The beads rattled loudly in his wake. He was twisting off the cap of a liquor bottle when he saw Hannah.

“Oh, love!” he exclaimed, miming a dramatic expression of shock. “What is my beautiful dolly doing in a place like this?”

Arthur observed tension on Hannah’s face. “The usual,” she said. “ Immigrant .”

“Immigrant,” the man parroted, leaning sideways to catch a better look at Arthur and the brilliantine in his hair glistened. “An identity?” He grinned at Hannah and went to a bowl of noodles and took up where he left off. “The usual?” He slurped and chewed. “Or are you paying? You know it has to be official.”

“What’s official?” Arthur blurted.

Hannah squeezed his hand, hard. Then smiling forcibly she gestured at him, now addressing the gangster. “Arthur.” She turned to Arthur and said, “Arthur, meet Khun.”

They shook hands. In Khun’s grin Arthur could see flecks of green vegetables in his teeth. Khun returned to his noodles. “If it isn’t official you have to pay,” he said to Hannah. “There are rules.”

“A word with you in private?” Hannah passed behind the beaded screen. Khun got up, winked at Arthur and swaggered in after her and flushed out two skinny youths. They slumped into a couch and regarded Arthur scathingly. One of them lit a cigarette. Arthur spared them a wan smile, and looked at the wall of beads that now hid Hannah.

The first words out of Hannah’s mouth when the beads clacked behind Khun were: “You’re just a lackey for the Coterie,” she seethed. “Since when did you start charging for this?”

Khun tried to hold Hannah by her waist but she slid easily out of his grasp. He awkwardly scratched the side of his head. “I know what you’re doing with him,” he said. “You have to keep it that way before CODEX finds out you’re hiding him.”

“You know nothing. Official or not lies with me alone.”

“So you’re going to tag him?” Khun challenged. “Give him one of your kisses? Or have you already given him something more?”

“That’s none of your business. I come to you and you give him an identity. That’s all.”

“Not quite.” Khun waved a finger. “Why are you helping him?”

“I’m keeping him alive until I’m told what to do with him.”

Khun leaned close to her face and picked a morsel of food from his teeth. “Be careful, love. I’ve seen him, so don’t you get too close to this one.”

“Jealous?”

“Don’t test me, dolly.”

Hannah wrenched herself free and left the room. She drew up beside Arthur and waited for Khun, who parted the curtain and came sauntering out, still picking at his teeth.

“So what’s the deal?” said Arthur. He sounded thoroughly annoyed now.

Khun handed him a slip of paper. “Fill up whatever you want your identity to be on this and—” he gave him another slip— “look him up at Orh Kio Tau , he’s the man for the job. Don’t bother going into the kampong . Just ask for him.”

“Do I owe you anything for this?”

Khun gave a brassy chortle. “I admire your bluntness, but that depends where we’re going from here.” He glanced at Hannah. “Your friend will get in touch with you.”

After Arthur completed his part of the forgery Hannah took his arm and dragged him down the stairway without suffering another moment in the rathole. They fled to the street and drew in a welcoming draught of air.

“What are you paying him with?” asked Arthur.

“Are you being protective?” she teased. “We barely know each other.”

Arthur wasn’t smiling. “I don’t need this if it has to cost you something.”

“You’re an ass if you think I’d sell my body for someone I just met,” said Hannah. “It’s strictly business. It might not seem like it but I run part of it.”

“I don’t want baggage for any of us,” said Arthur. “I’ll accept your help only if you’re on top of things.”

“Of course,” Hannah reached out her hand. “Friends?”

He took it. “Friends.”

Arthur did not expect the handshake and he did not know what to make of it. Was she implying that they shouldn’t be venturing anything more than a simple, unadulterated friendship or was she alluding to something more? Hannah left him by the traffic junction. He watched her until he was certain that she did not enter any of the brothels that were visible to him from where he stood.

Upon reaching the bus stop Arthur sank wearily onto a bench scarred with cigarette burns. In the yellow light of streetlamps, he waited for the public bus and watched a rawboned old man pedal his trishaw alongside the sputtering rush of automobiles.