Aunty Lee's Deadly Specials (2 page)

Mark had objected to Aunty Lee serving her homemade barley water, soy milk, and tap
water instead of pointing people to his wine list. His wine dining events had been
his attempt to cultivate like-minded people who shared his love of fine wines. Cherril,
like Aunty Lee, preferred that people simply ate and were happy—and healthy.

Rosie “Aunty” Lee was a plump Peranakan supercook who divided her energies between
fixing meals for people and helping them fix their lives (whether they liked it or
not). As far as Aunty Lee was concerned, the two were different sides of the same
coin. How could you feed someone well unless you understood them? And how could people
appreciate her food if the rest of their lives was out of balance? It was no use simply
letting people decide what they wanted to eat because Aunty Lee had long ago realized
most people had no idea what foods suited them. They remembered dishes prepared by
loving grannies or shared in the first flush of romance and spent the rest of their
lives complaining that nothing tasted the way it used to. Aunty Lee also believed
Peranakan food was the best food in Singapore, possibly the best food in the world.
Her definition of Peranakan food had got her into trouble with Peranakan purists,
because as far as Aunty Lee was concerned, “I am Peranakan. So all food I prepare
is Peranakan food!”

Aunty Lee was the archetypal petite, slightly plump, and very precise Peranakan lady
of a certain age. She was familiar to most Singaporeans because her
kebaya
-clad image beamed brightly from jars of Aunty Lee’s Amazing Achar and Aunty Lee’s
Shiok Sambal. But today Aunty Lee was wearing her work outfit—a bright yellow
kebaya
top with pink and green embroidery over a lime-green T-shirt and dark green tai chi
trousers. She was also wearing a batik apron with multiple pockets she had designed
herself and had her maid, Nina, sew for her. Aunty Lee’s sneakers that afternoon were
yellow and white and worn over bright green socks. Aunty Lee believed in tradition
but she believed even more in comfort.

Her Filipina domestic helper, Nina Balignasay, was the opposite of Aunty Lee. Nina
was slim, dark, and minded her own business. But in Singapore it was Nina’s business
to keep Aunty Lee happy. Her already considerable powers of observation had sharpened
considerably in her time with this busybody aunty. She had also learned not to worry
that her employer would lose a finger or eye as she speed-sliced, diced, and waved
her chopper around to emphasize her points. After all, Nina, who had been trained
as a nurse, was nothing if not adaptable. Even if her nursing degree was not recognized
in Singapore, she would have been able to stanch the bleeding should Aunty Lee have
a slip of the knife. And she had learned it was dangerous—and pretty much impossible—to
stop Aunty Lee from doing what she wanted to.

Aunty Lee’s Delights kept Aunty Lee occupied after ML Lee’s death left her a (relatively)
young widow. Of course Aunty Lee always grumbled about the amount of work she had
to do on whatever budget her clients gave her. Cherril noticed that if a client increased
the budget, Aunty Lee simply upgraded her menu and went on complaining. Aunty Lee’s
grumbles were a way for her to disguise how much she enjoyed cooking for people. When
there were no clients, she cooked for free. She had managed fine on her own but she
seemed glad to have Cherril around.

Mark had not paid back the money Aunty Lee lent him to finance the wine business,
so the handover of the business should not have been a problem. But Mark still had
not signed the transfer papers or returned his keys. It was almost as though he was
reluctant to let go. Aunty Lee had given Cherril keys to the shop’s front entrance,
but there were no extra keys to the service entrances connecting the kitchen and wine
room to the alley behind the shop. Aunty Lee had hung the keys to these doors on hooks
beside them.

“And don’t forget that today’s people have not paid you yet, madam,” Nina reminded
Aunty Lee. “You must ask them right away or else later they will say, ‘I’m sure I
paid already.’”

Nina sounded uncannily like Niyati Fornell, who had given that excuse the previous
week. Aunty Lee gave a cackle of delighted appreciation but Cherril’s laugh was a
little weak. Nina was a skilled mimic. The thick Filipino accent she spoke with most
of the time was a token of subservience, designed to keep her invisible. Cherril was
very conscious of this because of the difficulties she was having with her own accent
and with standard English. The Hokkien-Teochew infused with Malay and English “loanwords”
Cherril had picked up from her parents was as despised by speakers of pure Amoy Hokkien
as her neighborhood-school “Singlish” was by her husband’s mission-school-educated
friends. Many of Mycroft’s friends affected British, American, or Australian accents
depending on where they had gone to study, and several had laughed at Cherril’s pronunciation
and grammar mistakes. One (who Cherril suspected had wanted Mycroft for herself) had
given her a link to the “Speak Good English” campaign website. Cherril, too practical
to be proud, had found the site very helpful. But the ease with which Nina adopted
voices and accents made her wonder if Nina mimicked Cherril’s “gahmen” school accent
when she was not around. And when Nina so mimicked her, did Aunty Lee cackle with
laughter as she was laughing now? Nina grinned at Cherril as she carried some food
out to the car. Cherril smiled back.

Nina Balignasay knew the wealthiest employers and clients could be the meanest and
stingiest when it came to not paying up. At least, thanks to her, Aunty Lee now collected
a down payment when taking on a job. Aunty Lee was too easily distracted by stories
and menus. It was a good thing she had Nina by her side and on her side. It was good
for Nina too. Though she had not known how to cook or drive when she arrived in Singapore,
she had since learned to do both proficiently. Aunty Lee considered her one of the
best investments she had ever made, one that had paid off handsomely. From the start
it had been Nina who kept the business grounded and the accounts balanced. If Aunty
Lee had a gift for making food, Nina had a gift for managing money. And, if unleashed,
she went after late payments like a loan shark.

That bright September Saturday morning Aunty Lee was happy as she followed Nina out
to the car. She had a catering job to occupy her and the prospect of looking over
an unfamiliar house to entertain her. Could life get much better than this? But of
course she was too much a
kiasu
Singaporean to tempt fate by saying so.

“Looks like it’s going to rain,” Aunty Lee said, looking up at the brilliant blue
sky with only a few light, white clouds. “Sure to spoil the food. Don’t know why these
people with big houses always want outdoor parties. You said it’s a big house, right?”

“A very big house, according to Google Maps,” Cherril said, joining them. “It’s not
going to rain. It looks like it’s going to be a beautiful day.”

“Then sure to be too hot to eat outside,” Aunty Lee said firmly. “Nina, better get
more dry ice.”

“Did you read in the papers about the Mainland Chinese woman that committed suicide?”
Cherril threw this in to distract Aunty Lee from imagining possible weather disasters.
Nothing tickled Aunty Lee’s mental taste buds so much as a strange death.

“Of course! But the newspapers never say everything. I can tell there’s some funny
business there!”

“Madam, the woman write a letter and say she is going to jump off the balcony and
then she go and jump off the balcony. Even you cannot say there is funny business
there!” Nina said firmly. Catholic Nina did not approve of suicides any more than
she approved of the murders Aunty Lee had a tendency to get herself involved in.

“The Chinese papers said her boyfriend phoned her right before the operation to tell
her that everything was going to be all right. She said she already knew something
was wrong because even over the phone she had heard angels singing.”

“The English papers didn’t report that.” Aunty Lee looked put out. “Nina, I wish you
would learn to read Chinese. Chinese news is much more interesting than English news.
What else did the Chinese paper say?”

“The Chinese papers interviewed one of the women staying in the one-room flat where
Bi Xiao Mei stayed. She said they pay five dollars a day to sleep there. Bi Xiao Mei
went out to search for her fiancé all day, then went back and cried all night. She
could not find any record of his death or of the operation. Because the operation
was illegal, she was afraid the people who did it did not bother to properly dispose
of his body but just dumped it somewhere.

“Anyway, the woman said that that night before she died they went to Bukit Timah Plaza
and Bi Xiao Mei said she heard the same angels singing as she did over the phone.
And then she died.”

“Did the woman also hear angels singing?”

“She only heard the
getai
people playing their music outside. There is an uncle at BTP with Alzheimer’s. When
people play
getai
music he will sit in his chair there and sing.”

“You don’t really know that China man is really dead,” Nina said. “Probably the guy
is not really dead. He didn’t want to go home, didn’t want to marry her, so got people
here to tell people back home he’s dead.” Nina’s previous experiences with men had
not left her with a very high opinion of them.

Aunty Lee’s lips pursed appreciatively. There was nothing she liked more than a good
gossip based on romance, betrayal, and death.

“The Chinese papers also said the fiancé Zhao’s father told reporters his son said
he was going to Singapore to work and save to pay for his wedding. The father was
sure his son would never have come here for an illegal operation.”

“That boy wanted to come here to work and earn enough to save money for his wedding?
He must be crazy! Here, every time you earn one dollar you spend two dollars on food,
three dollars on housing!”

“Not really, Nina,” Cherril said. She handed each of them a banana (so full of necessary
potassium, healthy fiber, manganese, and vitamins C and B
₆
). “Eat this to keep up your energy. I know this PRC guy who came over less than five
years ago. He rented an HDB flat—yes, illegally—then subrented rooms out. He did the
cleaning for them once a week when he collected the rent. Then he got a second apartment
and a third apartment . . . now he’s a millionaire!” Singapore’s Housing Development
Board had strict rules on the renting and subletting of the HDB flats, especially
where noncitizens were concerned. But new arrivals from the People’s Republic of China
seemed able to get around anything.

“I wonder how much you get paid for a kidney,” Aunty Lee said. She looked thoughtfully
at the portable food chiller Nina was filling with crab cakes and prawn patties, ready
to go onto the grill.

“Not worth the risk,” Nina said sharply. “That is illegal.”

“The girl’s family said she had been depressed since news of his death. And with the
baby coming, it must have made things worse. One of the letters they found was from
Zhao’s family telling her not to make any more trouble because they had accepted the
rest of the payment promised to Zhao for his kidney. Apparently the advance he got
was only enough to pay for his ticket to Singapore. That shows his family must have
known what he was going to do.”

“What we are going to do is serve food. Come,” said Nina firmly. The last of the food
and equipment in the car, she turned the sign to
CLOSED
and locked the door, wishing she had the time to go at the kitchen with a scrubbing
brush and mop after all the food preparation. People who came in and said how beautifully
organized everything in the shop was did not realize how much constant work it took
to maintain everything dust-free and functioning despite the stream of people passing
through.

“Isn’t that Mark’s car?” Cherril asked as they drove off.

“I already told him the shop is not open today,” Nina said firmly. “If he can’t remember,
too bad. He will have to come back.”

Aunty Lee was torn. Her
kiasu
(fear of losing out) side dictated that she leave immediately in order to arrive
at least thirty minutes early for the catering project, but her
kaypoh
side that made everybody else’s business her own wanted to stay and find out whether
it was indeed Mark Lee in the car and what it was that he wanted.

“Maybe he came to talk to me about the handover,” Cherril said.

“Sir Mark just wants to come and look at his wine bottles,” Nina said. “His precious
babies. He will stand there and talk to them, his precious wine bottles.”

Sung Office Law

GraceFaith Ang knew she was looking beautiful that Saturday morning. She always looked
good, but her new green dress with its flared skirt and bright blue and white stars
made her stand out even more than usual. As always, her hair and makeup were perfect
and she was aware of appreciative glances from her fellow Mass Rapid Transit commuters.
The best were the ones tinged with envy. GraceFaith found envy the best monitor of
her progress; as long as others wanted what she had, she had to be doing all right.

Of course, these days GraceFaith knew how well she was doing even without the envy,
but she still enjoyed it. The Caucasian man who had stood up to let GraceFaith have
his seat caught her eyes and smiled at her. GraceFaith returned the smile but lowered
her eyes modestly, blocking off further contact. As far as GraceFaith was concerned,
no man traveling on public transport was worth smiling at unless he was the Minister
of Transport (who was, incidentally, one of the better-looking ministers). Still,
she was not going to burn any bridges unnecessarily. Her eye fell on the newspaper
the man was carrying: another woman had committed suicide for love, apparently. Such
losers did not interest her. GraceFaith could well understand being driven to kill
in desperation. But it was not herself she would kill.