Li Ang - The Lost Garden

Sticky saliva stuck to the man’s black chest hair, wet and twisted, as if a snail or a worm had just crawled over it.

Instinctively, Yinghong wanted to get up to leave, but a pair of powerful hands pressed down on her waist. They were Lin’s hands, and she gave up. She was reminded of the first time they met, at one of those typical banquets with the businessmen fooling around; Lin had also gotten her to stay by asking her to dance when she felt insulted.

With flirtation continuing at the table, the host watched quietly for a while before turning to Lin and beginning a casual conversation about a hillside plot with great potential.

They could open an amusement park on this plot of land, which was on the outskirts of Taipei, but reachable within an hour by car via the highway. It would be like Magic Mountain in the United States, with a roller coaster and other recreational features; it would please the Taiwanese, who were now rich enough to enjoy such leisure activities. It could be a new direction in their investment.

Yinghong had first brought up the idea. Though they might not manage a joint venture with an American amusement park, such as Disneyland, it could work with a smaller company as the first step toward international cooperation. Lin himself did not entertain any big ambitions for an amusement park, but with the development of a park like that, the land around it would rise in value, which would generate substantial profits, and this was what interested the two real estate tycoons.

They were making a preliminary evaluation of their financial investment, risk, and profits. It was not the first, nor would it be the last time they discussed the feasibility of the plan, for there would be endless, prolonged meetings. For the two major players, consensus on the fundamental issues needed to be reached first, and the raucous gathering in Beitou provided them with an opportunity to chat, during which they touched upon issues casually in order to get to know one another better and make an initial plan.

The flirting continued at the table, but by this time the man had stood up and pulled the woman over to fondle her full breasts. They were then all over each other, as they moved toward the paper door, which the man freed up one of his hands to open. Now Yinghong had a clear view of the next room, a smaller room with a tatami floor; bedding and pillows were strewn all over, an indication that they had already been used. She realized the convenience a simple paper door provided, which could be why Beitou had enjoyed popularity for such a long time.

“Impressive. Good going. He can go right back and do it again,” someone at the table jeered, but it was impossible to know who that was over all that noise.

The paper door was still open, but the man was already on top of the woman, who struggled to free one of her hands with red-lacquered fingernails to pull the two doors together, but failed to close them completely; from where she was sitting, Yinghong could no longer see what went on inside the next room.

Loud laughter erupted at the table, a sign that everyone was used to it, as they continued to drink and sing. Perhaps taunted by the fact that the girl could earn her fee twice in such a short period of time, the other girls took turns going up to sing popular love songs about waiting faithfully for their lovers to return, or “flowers opening up waiting to be plucked,” or “bees flying off after taking nectar from the flowers,” or “flowers waiting to bloom in the rain.”

One by one, the men took girls into another room with a paper door, and the racket at the table began to die down, until the drinking, finger guessing, and flirting came to an end. Lin seized that moment to say good-bye before leaving with Yinghong.

They were not the last couple to leave, but the owner walked them out to the entrance, where Yinghong cast a quick glance at the wall clock. It was past two in the morning. As they walked down the stone steps, the early spring night seemed to be much colder in the hot springs district. In the misty night, damp with dew and fog, he reached out and grabbed her hand.

“Come on, let’s go back inside.”

Though confused, she walked up the stairs with him and reached the reception desk, where Lin asked, with noticeable familiarity, for a room on the west. The mama-san, who obviously knew him well, replied with a big smile:

“Director Lin, the previous guests have only just left, but the room has been cleaned.”

They walked along the hardwood floor of the winding hallway to the room. When the paper door was opened, Yinghong let out a cry of wonder.

It was a twin of the previous room, but this one faced a corner of the courtyard, where ground-level lights in the Japanese garden softly illuminated an old cherry tree with many branches, all laden with flowers in full bloom. A tree full of red flowers evoked a dream that would be hard to wake up from.

He kissed her the minute they stepped inside. She closed her eyes, but the sea of red flowers seemed to remain before her eyes and crowded around her from all sides.

While kissing her, he began to undress her, but instead of taking her right away, he led her into a side room with a small pool filled with water from a hot spring. As they soaked in the water, he bit on her ears and whispered in a slurred voice:

“Let’s get a masseuse.”

Yinghong’s heart skipped a beat. She’d heard stories about young women giving massages in the nude and then sleeping with their clients, so she hesitated. But the heat of the bath created a different kind of dizziness; as the misty air enshrouded them, she felt that anything was possible, so long as it was a professional masseuse. Relaxed in the comfortable setting, she nodded.

The knock at the door came later than she had anticipated. Obviously, contrary to what she had thought, not every hotel had a masseuse waiting to be summoned. As she waited, she began to regret her decision, but she knew that Lin would be upset if she had a change of heart, and she didn’t want to displease him.

It was half an hour later when the mama-san came in with a blind, middle-aged masseuse.

“I’m sorry to make you wait so long,” the mama-san apologized in Japanese. “I wanted to get you the best, the master masseuse.”

She paused and glanced at Yinghong.

“Would the young lady like a massage also?”

Lin smiled and took out a thousand NT, which sent the mama-san away with a broad smile.

He was not used to getting massages while clothed, and removed her bathrobe as well. The room was brightly lit, and Yinghong felt shy and uneasy, even though she knew the masseuse was blind. He, however, lay down stark naked as the masseuse’s hands danced on his body, while he reached out to touch Yinghong tenderly with the clear intention of arousing her.

They tried not to make any noise, but the masseuse obviously knew what was going on, and yet she remained focused on her job, a true case of the blind working without seeing. Taking the lead, he touched her first and then asked her to pose in all sorts of ways for him to gaze at or for him to kiss her body while lying down. At first she was hesitant, but the silent movements gave new possibilities to the familiar interactions of their bodies; by guessing what the other was thinking and asking questions, they discovered a harmony that helped them truly know each other.

Little by little, she let herself go and started to respond and lead him on. Sometimes she sat on top of him; at other times she moved away, teasing him with her foot. As he was lying down for the masseuse to work on him, he could not move, forced to let her have her way with him, as he waited for an opportunity to grab her.

Yinghong was free to do what she wanted, for the third person, though present, seemed not to exist, due to her inability to see. For Lin, however, the masseuse’s every hand movement on his body appeared to arouse her, making it seem as if they were engaged in a threesome. It was not real sex and they were under some restraints, which helped stoke the fires, creating a different kind of sexual stimulation and carnal pleasure.