Chapter Text
2.
I awoke without any memories of the night before, feeling quite drained and exhausted. How I had gotten home, I do not know, and a sudden fear had overtaken me. Had Sam brought me home? Had she met my mother? What did my mother think?
It was with trepidation and not a small sensation of fear and nausea that I moved from my bedroom to the bathroom. It was still early morning, the cool lavender-gray crossfade between night and day only beginning. The apartment was quiet. I wondered if I could simply avoid my mother. Get a shower. Leave for work very early, pass time elsewhere. My thoughts drifted to Mong Kok. To Sam Wong. I caught myself daydreaming, hand perched on the door of our bathroom, and jolted myself free. My stomach sank like it held a boulder. I’d never felt the need to be so secretive about things with regards to my mother. I felt ashamed.
In the shower’s solace I remembered glimpses of the night prior. Of the attacker. Of Sam’s rescue in that dark side alley. I remembered the smells of an evening in the city converging and wafting in through her apartment’s window, evening cooking and smoke and humidity.
I remembered her kiss, and like a dog chasing a rabbit my hand shot to where she’d kissed me, and I winced. Something felt tight, painful, and sore on my neck.
After finishing I looked in the mirror. I looked tired but refreshed. Today would be a long day. But then I saw what sat beneath my hand – a mark, just slightly purple with bruising and pink from the heat of the shower. I uncomfortably craned my neck, to put more light on it, felt it again, patted it with fingers. At its center sat two darker spots. I tried to see more detail, but before I could get a very good look, I jumped nearly out of my skin as thunder crashed against the bathroom door.
“Fong Ha Cheung!”
My mother. My eyes widened in panic. My mother couldn’t see me with a kiss mark on my neck, let alone one so deep. The thunderous hammering came again.
“Fong Ha CHEUNG!”
“Yes! I’m here!” I replied, stammering.
“You had better be!” My mother’s voice came.
I hastily wrapped my head in the largest towel I had, less for my hair and more to let it cover my neck. Throwing on my bathrobe I tentatively opened the door, and my mother was waiting on the other side, eyes staring daggers that cut deeper than anything else ever could or would.
“Where were you.” My mother asked.
“I was late at the office.” I said, repulsed at how fast I allowed myself to lie.
“Why didn’t you call? Does the office not have a telephone?”
“I was very busy, mother.” I lied again, guts twisting.
By her look, I could tell she was struggling to believe me. But I had never lied to my mother, or stepped so far out of line, but the severity in her face did not lessen even as she seemed to buy into my story. I felt on trial. My mother had that effect. “You look awful.” She said, offering no further condemnation, but offering little in the way of forgiveness either. “They shouldn’t be keeping you that late. You need your rest.”
And finally, her mother’s worry came through, and I felt as though the storm had passed.
“I’m sorry.” I finally offered. “I didn’t mean to worry you. I’ll call home if I’m going to be late again.”
My mother stood back, as if to allow me to go. And I did, rushing to my room. She had not brought up Sam, and that was proof enough that I’d been saved that difficult conversation. I wanted to cry, somewhere between tears of relief and shame. But I took the small victory and moved prepare to leave early for work.
I left from home in such a rush. My clockwork schedule had once again been disrupted and I found it frustrating. This time, instead of being rushed, I had an entire morning stretching in front of me. Work did not begin until nine o’clock, and I had arrived in downtown with nearly an hour to spare.
This should have afforded me some leisure and relaxation, but it only gave me time to ruminate on the guilt I felt for lying to my mother, and the reticence and uneasy regret and anxiety I had about the source of it all – Sam.
My fingers chanced at the lavender ribbon around my neck – I had covered the shameful mark with makeup, but in my rush I lacked confidence in how well I’d done so, and so I’d opted for a small scarf that went with my outfit. The weather wasn’t right for it, and it made my neck hot, but that was a small price to pay to avoid office embarrassment. I had a reputation, and while I’d never really concerned myself with it, or even acknowledge it before now, this morning had shaken me, alongside the uncertainty of the night that had led to it.
Sitting in a small plaza park between the building my office was in and the one across, I stared at the morning sky’s brightening haze. I thought about Sam. Why couldn’t I remember anything after her kiss last night? Had I fainted? I couldn’t have. Had I been drugged?
Stories of that were rampant these days – and it could explain how I could have come home without remembering. Suddenly I found my uncertainty and shame morphing into anger and disgust. I tempered this, not wanting to give an outburst in public. I wasn’t feeling great today, was it some sort of hangover? The pieces seemed to fit, and I stood up to walk around the small park as I ruminated and stewed on them more.
I had convinced myself that the -only- explanation could have been that. That Sam Wong was some wild girl who had tried to get wild with me. That I should be infuriated with Sam Wong for putting this stress on me, for making me lie to my mother when I heard someone call out to me from the direction of my firm’s office building.
“Hey! Aren’t you early?”
I winced visibly before turning. It was Joey again. I sighed inwardly. I was not in the mood for him. I pretended I had not seen him, and turned around, feigning obliviousness and looking at a billboard across the street, as if it held my interest when really I was still trying to force myself to believe that I’d been taken advantage of the night before.
I couldn’t make myself do it. Sam didn’t strike me as malicious. Maybe unreliable. Maybe frustrating in how carefree she seemed. But not that way. Not to do something like that. I couldn’t believe that she could be so scandalous and predatory. Perhaps I should, but I didn’t want to.
“Hey, Slippers!” Joey’s voice came again. This time faster, quickly approaching. I gave him a dirty look. “What?” He asked, his expression seemed genuinely concerned before realization dawned on it. “Oh right, sorry. I forget!” He gave a point and a wink. I didn’t return the smile.
Being reminded of previous embarrassments right now was the last thing I needed. Being reminded of them by Joey doubly so. It struck me in that moment how fake he felt. I was sure that he was a nice man. That he meant nothing mean by it. I remembered our lunch the other day. Our conversations about the times, about politics. Surface level things that everyone had passing knowledge of and pretended to care about for the sake of idle conversation. I had co-workers at work, I did not have friends at work. Joey was the sort to remind me of why sometimes that was by design. His approach had done enough to unhitch my thoughts from Sam, however and we headed into the building together. He chatted the whole way. I don’t remember a single word of what he said.
The day passed slowly, at a drag. I still felt tired and drained. When lunchtime came around, I went to my usual place. I found it blissfully empty. I ordered and waited and received my lunch but sat resigned before a bowl of food that simply didn’t appeal. The weather outside was humid and bright and sunny, and that seemed to take all the energy out of my body. Staring at my terminal screen at work, the bright lights. Everything seemed brighter. Thoughts of Sam drifted back into my head, and with them ponderances of what exactly had happened the night before.
Hungover. A migraine. Sick. All of these were alien concepts to me anyways. I had always been in fairly good health. I got plenty of rest. Lived a routine that saw me take good care of myself. I wasn’t used to feeling this unwell or this unfocused.
Back at the office I found myself making simple and avoidable mistakes, catching them but making them all the same. I did not like feeling this way. Every other thought rested on Sam Wong. On her face. Her tousled hair. Her carefully careless style of dress. Her body. Her voice.
The fluorescent lighting in the office hammered on me. When I wasn’t thinking of Sam, I was thinking of how much I dreaded going home. How much I dreaded seeing my mother. I had avoided fallout with her this morning, but I felt as if seeing her again would only be reinviting her to squeeze the truth out of me. I didn’t like the feeling of hiding something from her. I felt dirty for it. Before today I couldn’t remember ever lying to my mother. We had a strict relationship, yes, but it was respectful. I felt I had broken that respect now. It burned in the hollow of my chest and the pit of my stomach.
I hated Sam Wong for making me feel this way.
By the time I was pushing my last bit of paperwork into my boss’ inbox for the morning, I had gone back and forth about my thoughts. I was of two minds; part of me desired closure, to go and confront Sam, to ask her what had happened, what she had done. The other part of me thought it better to simply take this as a lesson about strangers, to simply go home and return to the routine of my life. I had narrowly dodged conflict with my mother. I hadn’t been found out by anybody at work. I could simply move on with my life, and nobody besides Sam and I would ever need to know.
On the metro home I reflected further. How luck was I to have scraped by so cleanly. The scandal of some sort of loose affair would have been enough to ruin me in the eyes of my mother, but the idea of being with another woman was even more scandalous. My mother was a conservative and traditional woman. My workplace was a conservative and traditional workplace. I felt cold fingers up and down my spine, making me shudder as I considered the ramifications of what public knowledge of the incident between Sam Wong and I could do to my prospects as a future wife, as an office lady.
The station stopped at the same place it had last night when I had escaped Joey. It was Mong Kok.
I stared at the train’s door, open and rushing with people, first out, then in. I thought of what I would say to Sam Wong if I saw her. People stopped filing in, and the metro car had gone from brimming to nearly empty to full again. The door closed. I let the thought slip away. The train moved onward, and I let loose a breath of relief that I had not gone with my instincts to seek her out.
I ate dinner with my mother, wordlessly. Usually we would talk about my work, or her day, but I still didn’t feel well, and I was afraid of prompting more discussion of my indiscretion the night before. Whatever conversation we had was superficial and brief. I was anxious.
We sat together in the den and my mother listened to Opera records while I pretended to read. It was several boring and agonizing hours. Normally I loved to spend the evening sat with a good book, my mother’s records or television programs giving a background of white noise. But tonight, much like today, I could not focus. My thoughts kept drifting to the uncertainty of the night before. To thoughts of Sam. I wrestled with it over and over in my mind. Why was it all so hazy?
I kept coming back to the idea that I’d been taken advantage of. That was all I could do to explain why I had no memory of coming home. It infuriated me, but it also perplexed me. Sam didn’t seem like that. Sam couldn’t be like that. I thought about the diner. About how she had come to my rescue.
I jumped with fright when my mother broke the quietude of the evening to let me know she was going to bed. That she had scared me seemed to startle her.
“Are you alright? You’re acting awfully strange this evening, Fong Ha.” She asked, head tilted, brows narrowed.
“I’m fine,” I replied, shaking the surprise from my face. “Just tired. Busy day today.” I lied again. Today had been slow, it was just that I had been too tired to function at my normal level. Inwardly I wondered when I became so hasty with dishonesty. I excused myself – I didn’t want to worry my her after all. “I think I will go to bed too though.” I said.
“Take a shower, you will feel better.” My mother said. Her gaze lingered on me a bit longer and she turned to leave. I watched her retire to her own bedroom, and I stood to go to mine to get some night clothes.
My mother had been right. A shower would make me feel better, but as I undressed in our bathroom, I pulled the scarf from my neck and remembered why it was there. I looked at it in the mirror, but the mark was still mostly covered by makeup. As I wiped it away, the bruising seemed to be completely gone, and the redness had all but faded away. Left though were two small marks, almost like scars, or even like birthmarks, just a few centimeters apart from each other.
While I was happy the overt mark had seemed to fade, the two small spots seemed to be even worse – almost as if I’d been tattooed. I felt them with my fingers – they were slight dips, but not open wounds, healed but not healed. It puzzled me and I rubbed at them as if to perhaps take more makeup off. It was still sore. I decided it too would heal, eventually, and went about my shower.
Afterwards I laid in bed, trying again to read, but finding it to simply be an impossible feat. I looked at the time – it was nine pm. A little earlier than I normally went to bed, but as I sat there, hugging a stuffed bear I’d had since childhood and staring out at the city’s evening lights, I resolved that the more distance between me and the day in question, the more distance I’d be able to put between myself and Sam Wong.
I turned out my light, and rolled over, staring at myself in the reflection of my window. I ran a hand over the mark she’d given me. I hoped it would heal. I’d never been given a kiss mark like that. I hoped it would fade and the constant thoughts of Sam Wong would fade with it. Before long, my eyes seemed very heavy, and the world closed down around me.
In my dreams I felt her lips on me. On my cheek, my neck. Felt her nip at me. I felt her strong grip at my hips. At my thighs. I saw her in the dark, outlined perfectly. I asked her what had happened, but she said nothing. I felt her grip on my thigh, her strength as she tried to pull it away from its partner. I resisted, I asked her again what she had done that night, but again she said nothing. When I tried to shout at her, I felt her lips lock with mine, felt her tongue in my mouth, felt her leg, strong and forceful, push its way in between my legs, felt it grind on my softer spot. I felt heat then. Heat and electricity and I felt a sharp pain at my throat that sent the dream into a haze of red.
When my eyes opened, it was still dark in my room. The sound of the fan in my ceiling the only low hum in the room. I knew I was alone, but I felt like I was being watched. I remembered the feeling from the night I’d met Sam Wong, walking home I’d felt a similar way. Like something watched me from afar.
This felt different though. The space in front of me felt much closer, like somebody was in the room with me. I sat forward, looked around my room, painted in cool tones from the dim city light coming in from outside. I was alone. I felt suddenly tired. Despite being a little frightened, I let my guard down then, laying back and feeling the world become heavy again.
As I felt myself drift off, I caught a glimpse of the world outside, and marveled in a dreamy haze at its nighttime beauty. As my eyes closed, it was again with the thought of Her. Where was she. What was she doing? Why couldn’t I stop myself from missing her? I tried to recall the dream I’d had just now, but that too had almost instantly faded away. I remembered pieces of it. I felt a shameful wetness between my legs. I felt stiffness under my night shirts. I felt dirty all over again. Dirty and ashamed. I couldn’t be honest with my mother, with my work and, now I felt as if I couldn’t be honest with myself.
As much as I tried to convince myself to hate her, I needed to see her again. I needed to be in her presence again. It was a growing feeling in me, a hunger that needed to be fed, to be sated.
As I faded once more from the world, it was with a sort of bittersweet reluctance, as if all the weight of the stress and anxiety that had loomed over my head during the day was still precariously placed over my head, waiting for a push one way or the other. I was afraid of the mess it would all make if it fell.
I rolled over once more and forced my mind to quiet. This would all be behind me tomorrow. Tomorrow would be a new day. I wouldn’t let this rule over me. My eyes drifted closed, and I entered a deep and slumbering sleep – one bereft of Sam Wong.