Tash Aw - Five Star Billionaire

She thought, No, her soul mate was around the corner. This guy, he was just someone she could use.

“So, Mr. Chao, what do you do in Shanghai?”

He laughed. “Wow, straight to the point. Do you want to know how much I earn too?”

“Only if you want to tell me, but most guys lie about salaries.”

“First of all, could you call me Walter? And I will call you Phoebe. This isn’t a business meeting, is it?”

“Okay, Walter,” Phoebe said, pouring herself some San Pellegrino water. “What do you do in Shanghai? You seem evasive.”

He opened the menu and looked down at it. “I’m one of those people known to the rest of society as ‘an entrepreneur.’ Whenever anyone says it, it seems like a dirty word. No one’s sure what entrepreneurs do, except make money. Have you had a chance to look at the menu? I don’t know if you like this kind of food. It’s supposed to be Balinese, but it’s not really — just generic Indonesian and Malaysian food. There’s good curry, but Chinese people usually don’t like curry. I should have asked. I thought, though, the setting is so nice that even if we didn’t eat anything, we could enjoy the little lake, the plants, the sound of frogs in the middle of the city. It’s quite romantic, I think. Don’t you?”

Phoebe looked at the pond. The surface of the water was calm and still, the flames of the oil lamps reflected like the uncertain glimmer of stars in the night sky. She remembered the lake on the outskirts of the small town deep in the heart of the countryside where she had grown up, thousands of miles from here. The lake was deep and dark, and in the rainy season its waters rose and flooded the fields and scrubland around it. Many of the bushes would be half submerged, so you would see only clumps of vegetation here and there, as if it were floating in the water. When Phoebe and her friends walked to school through the fields that bounded the overflowing shores of the lake, they would let the floodwaters wash through their rubber slippers, warm and silty between their toes, stained with the color of red earth.

“If you are an entrepreneur, that means you are rich,” Phoebe said, laughing in the way she had often rehearsed, teasingly, flirtatiously. She knew that men liked that.

“Everyone is rich compared to someone else.”

“Are you married?”

“No.”

“Fiancée? Girlfriend?”

“I am single. I told you in my message — I just want … a companion.” He lowered the menu for an instant to look at her, then raised it, and Phoebe could not see the expression on his face.

Phoebe laughed again, but not in a sexual manner — not yet. “I’m teasing, having some fun.”

“What are you going to have? The curried river prawns are very good. Or the grilled lobster, if you like lobster.”

“I don’t know anything about Malaysian or Indonesian food — it’s all just curry, curry, curry,” she said, repeating what she heard Mainlanders say all the time. She was pleased with herself — it sounded natural, as if she really believed it.

He closed the menu and smiled. “Fine, I’ll order for us both.” He raised his hand to beckon the waitress over. She was Indonesian, dark-skinned, pretty. She began to speak in Chinese, her accent heavy, the words stumbling off her tongue. But then Walter Chao spoke to her in her own language, and her face became open, smiling. They shared jokes, the sound of their southern tongue filling the air with warmth.

“I’ll make the food not too spicy, in case the lady doesn’t like chili,” the waitress said in Malay, looking at Walter.

“It’s okay,” Phoebe said. “I like spicy food.”

Walter raised his eyebrows. “You understand what we’re saying?”

“Oh, no, I was just guessing. I had a Malaysian boyfriend once, you see. When I was much younger.”

Phoebe liked the fact that her dinner companion had ordered wine. Everyone knew that if a man knew enough about wine to study the wine list with attention, it was a sign not only of new wealth but also of education — and a foreign education. “So, Walter, I take it you are Malaysian. Tell me how a Malaysian guy like you ended up working in Shanghai.”

“The same way a girl from Guangdong like you came here. Tell me about yourself. Is business going well? Owning a whole chain of beauty spas must be tough work — where do you find time to socialize? You studied economics at university, right? There are so many questions I want to ask you.”

When men ask you questions, it is a seduction technique , Phoebe remembered from one of her books. They are not truly interested in listening .

Phoebe shrugged. “My life isn’t so special, you know.” But still, she began to talk. About the harshness of life in the city, about the aloofness of the Shanghainese, about the loneliness, about being far from home. She had made up a whole story about herself when they began to exchange emails, the usual story of coming from Guangdong province, about being a university graduate and a manager of a chain of luxury health spas in which she also owned shares. She had even said it was partly her business; she had set it up with a rich friend. She was so rehearsed in this that she did not have to pretend anymore; this history felt as if it truly belonged to her. But now, sitting by the edge of a lake under the eaves of a teak house, she found herself speaking also of how hard it was to make friends in this city, how hard it was to find someone special, someone to love. She could so easily have said, I am lonely because I am just like you; I am a foreigner. But unlike you I cannot go home, I must stay here: I am an illegal worker. She could have told him where she was really from, could have told him that only recently she was sitting in bars waiting to pick up men like him who might give her money for sex, that until one week ago the high point in her employment career had been as a receptionist in a spa.

But she did not say this. She said, “Life in Shanghai is so tiring. I think I will go to Hainan Island next weekend to get away from it all.”

When she finished speaking, she noticed that Walter’s gaze was still fixed on her; he had been listening attentively to every word she said. He was smiling but the corners of his eyes were pinched, and she could not tell if he was happy or just squinting in the dark. “I know how you feel,” he said. “Shanghai is a beautiful place, but it is also a harsh place. Life here is not really life, it is a competition.”

Phoebe nodded, trying to keep her poise by maintaining her perfectly straight shoulders, which she knew he would admire. But all of a sudden she felt so tired, as if speaking about being fatigued actually made it happen. Walter had shifted his position in his chair slightly, sitting low with his elbows hanging over the edge of the armrests, the way he might have done when relaxing at home.

“Yes, I think I will go away for the weekend,” Phoebe repeated, imagining the white-sand beaches and marble-floored hotels she knew she would never be able to afford. “Just to enjoy some sunshine and the nice hotels down there. It’s very luxurious in Hainan these days — I take many holidays there, all the time.”

Walter laughed. “You’re funny.”

“What’s so funny?”

“Nothing.” He shrugged, looking at her. He was definitely smiling this time. “I’m laughing because you are a total stranger yet you make me feel very comfortable. I usually don’t trust people much.”

“Weirdo,” Phoebe said, adjusting the top button of her shirt; the closed collar was a bit tight and was making her feel hot and uncomfortable, adding to her sense of weariness.

“If you need someone to travel with you to Hainan, let me know,” he said. He glanced away, out across the darkness of the pond once more, as if embarrassed to meet her gaze. “I’ve been feeling a bit lonely recently, so I could do with some company.”