Crazy Rich Asians (48 page)

“Ready for your carriage?” Nick asked, entwining his arm through hers in a courtly
manner.

“I guess so,” Rachel said, exhaling deeply. As they walked out of the bedroom, little
Augustine Cheng came racing down the corridor.

“Whoa, Augustine, you’re going to break your neck,” Nick said, stopping him in his
tracks. The little boy looked terrified.

“What’s wrong, little man?” Nick asked.

“I need to hide.” Augustine was panting.

“Why?”

“Papa’s after me. I spilled Orange Fanta all over his new suit.”

“Oh no!” Rachel said, trying not to giggle.

“He said he was going to kill me,” the boy said, shaking, with tears in his eyes.

“Oh, he’ll get over it. Come with us. I’ll make sure your father doesn’t kill you.”
Nick laughed, taking Augustine by the hand.

At the bottom of the stairs, Eddie was arguing in Cantonese with Ling Cheh, the head
housekeeper, and Nasi, the head laundry maid, while Fiona stood next to him in her
Weimaraner-gray evening gown looking exasperated.

“I’m telling you, this type of fabric needs to soak for a few hours if you want to
get the stain out properly,” the head laundry maid explained.

“A few hours? But we need to be at the wedding ball by seven thirty! This is an emergency,
do you understand?” Eddie shouted, glaring at the Malay woman as if she didn’t understand
English.

“Eddie, there’s no need to raise your voice. She understands,” Fiona said.

“How many laundry maids does my grandmother keep? There must be at least ten of you!
Don’t tell me you people can’t fix this right now,” Eddie complained to Ling Cheh.

“Eddieboy, even if there were twenty of them, there’s no way it will be ready for
tonight,” Ling Cheh insisted.

“But what am I going to wear? I had this tux specially made for me in Milan! Do you
know how much it cost me?”

“I’m sure it was very, very expensive. And that’s exactly why we need to be gentle
and let the stain lift properly,” Ling Cheh said, shaking her head.
Eddieboy had been a pompous little monster even when he was five
.

Eddie glanced up the staircase and noticed Augustine coming down with Nick and Rachel.
“YOU LITTLE SHIT!” he screamed.

“Eddie, control yourself!” Fiona admonished.

“I’m going to teach him a lesson he’ll never forget!” Incandescent with rage, Eddie
began to storm up the stairs.

“Stop it, Eddie,” Fiona said, grabbing hold of his arm.

“You’re wrinkling my shirt, Fi!” Eddie scowled. “Like mother like son—”

“Eddie, you need to calm down. Just wear one of the other two tuxes you brought,”
Fiona said in a measured tone.

“Don’t be stupid! I’ve already worn both of those the past two nights. I had everything
perfectly planned until this little bastard came along! Stop hiding, you little bastard!
Be a man and accept your
punishment!” Eddie broke free from his wife and lunged toward the boy with his right
arm outstretched.

Augustine whimpered, cowering behind Nick. “Eddie, you’re not
really
going to hit your six-year-old son over a harmless accident, are you?” Nick said
lightheartedly.

“Harmless? Fucky fuck, he’s ruined everything! The monochromatic fashion statement
I was planning for the whole family is RUINED because of him!”

“And you’ve just ruined the whole trip for me!” Fiona suddenly blurted out. “I’m so
sick of all this. Why is it so damn important for us to look picture-perfect every
time we walk out the door? Who exactly are you trying to impress? The photographers?
The readers of
Hong Kong Tattle
? You really care so much about them that you’d rather hit your own son over an accident
that
you caused in the first place
by screaming at him for wearing the wrong cummerbund?”

“But, but …” Eddie sputtered in protest.

Fiona turned to Nick, her serene expression returning. “Nick, can my children and
I ride with you to the ball?”

“Er … if you’d like,” Nick said cautiously, not wanting to further incite his cousin.

“Good. I have no desire to be seen with a tyrant.” Fiona took Augustine by the hand
and started up the stairs. She paused for a moment as she passed Rachel. “You look
amazing in that dress. But you know what? It needs something.” Fiona proceeded to
take off the sapphire-and-diamond choker she had just been given by Su Yi and placed
it around Rachel’s neck. “Now the outfit looks complete. I insist that you borrow
it for tonight.”

“You’re too kind, but what will you wear?” Rachel asked in astonishment.

“Oh, don’t worry about me,” Fiona said, giving her husband a dark stare. “I’m not
going to be wearing a single piece of jewelry tonight. I was born a Tung, and I have
nothing
to prove to anyone.”

Pasir Panjang Road

“Never, never let young people plan their own weddings, because this is what you end
up with!” Mrs. Lee Yong Chien fumed to
Puan Sri
Mavis Oon. They were standing in the middle of an enormous warehouse in the Keppel
Shipyard along with seven hundred other VIPs and VVIPs, utterly baffled by the Cuban
band dressed in forties Tropicana splendor on the stage. People like Mrs. Lee were
used to only one kind of Chinese wedding banquet—the kind that took place in the grand
ballroom of a five-star hotel. There would be the gorging on salted peanuts during
the interminable wait for the fourteen-course dinner to begin, the melting ice sculptures,
the outlandish floral centerpieces, the society matron invariably offended by the
faraway table she had been placed at, the entrance of the bride, the malfunctioning
smoke machine, the entrance of the bride again and again in five different gowns throughout
the night, the crying child choking on a fish ball, the three dozen speeches by politicians,
token
ang mor
executives and assorted high-ranking officials of no relation to the wedding couple,
the cutting of the twelve-tier cake, someone’s mistress making a scene, the not so
subtle counting of wedding cash envelopes by some cousin,
^*
the ghastly Canto pop star flown in from
Hong Kong to scream some pop song (a chance for the older crowd to take an extended
toilet break), the distribution of tiny wedding fruitcakes with white icing in paper
boxes to all the departing guests, and then
Yum seng
!
^†
—the whole affair would be over and everyone would make the mad dash to the hotel
lobby to wait half an hour for their car and driver to make it through the traffic
jam.

Tonight, however, there was none of that. There was just an industrial space with
waiters bearing mojitos and a woman with short, slicked-back hair in a white tuxedo
belting out “Besame Mucho.” Glancing around, Rachel was amused by the looks of bafflement
on the faces of the arriving guests decked out in their most ostentatious finery.

“These women really brought out the big guns tonight, didn’t they?” Rachel whispered
to Nick as she eyed a woman sporting a cape of metallic-gold feathers.

“Sure looks like it! Was that Queen Nefertiti who just walked by?” Nick joked.

“Shut your mouth, Nicholas—that’s Patsy Wang. She’s a Hong Kong socialite renowned
for her avant-garde style. There are dozens of blogs out there devoted to her,” Oliver
commented.

“Who’s the guy with her? The one in the diamond-studded jacket who looks like he’s
wearing eye shadow?” Rachel queried.

“That’s her husband, Adam, and he
is
wearing eye shadow,” Oliver answered.

“They’re married?
Really?
” Rachel raised a doubting eyebrow.

“Yes, and they even have three children to prove it. You have to understand, many
Hong Kong men revel in being fashionistas—they are dandies in the truest sense of
the word. How flamboyantly dressed they might be is no indication of which team they
play on.”

“Fascinating,” Rachel said.

“You can always tell Singapore men from Hong Kong men,” Nick chimed in. “We’re the
ones dressed like we’re still wearing our school uniforms, while they look more like—”

“David Bowie impersonators,” Oliver finished.

“Thanks, Ollie. I was going to go with Elton John.” Nick chuckled.

As if on cue, the lights in the warehouse dimmed and the loading-dock doors behind
the stage began to rise, revealing a line of sleek white ferries waiting harborside.
Flaming torches lit the way to the pier, and a line of men dressed in Swedish sailor
outfits stood ready to guide the guests onto the ferries. The crowd roared in approval.

“The other shoe drops,” Oliver said gleefully.

“Where do you think we’re going?” Rachel asked.

“You’ll soon see,” Nick said with a wink.

As the guests streamed onto the pier, Astrid made sure to board the ferry carrying
a mix of international guests rather than the one filled with her nosy relatives.
She had already been asked “Where’s Michael?” too many times and was sick of parroting
new variations of her excuse. As she leaned against the railing at the back of the
ferry, peering at the frothy waves as the vessel pulled away from the embankment,
she felt someone staring at her. She turned to see Charlie Wu, her old flame, on the
upper deck. Charlie flushed bright red when he realized he’d been caught staring.
He hesitated for a moment, and then decided to come downstairs.

“Long time no see,” he said as nonchalantly as possible. In fact, it had been almost
ten years since that fateful day when Astrid had thrown a Frosty in his face outside
of the old Wendy’s on Orchard Road.

“Yes,” Astrid said with an apologetic smile. She assessed him for a moment, thinking
that he looked better with a little age on him. Those rimless glasses suited him,
his gangly frame had filled out, and the once problematic acne scarring now gave his
face a finely weathered look. “How’s life treating you? You moved to Hong Kong a few
years ago, didn’t you?”

“I can’t complain. Too busy with work, but isn’t that the case with everyone?” Charlie
mused.

“Well, not everyone owns the largest digital technology company in Asia. Aren’t they
calling you the Asian Steve Jobs these days?”

“Yeah, unfortunately. Impossible shoes to fill.” Charlie looked at her again, unsure
of what to say. She looked more exquisite than ever in that chartreuse cheongsam.
Funny how you could be so intimate with someone for so many years, and yet feel so
painfully awkward around them
now
. “So I hear you got married to some hotshot army guy, and you have a son.”

“Yes, Cassian … he’s three,” Astrid replied, adding preemptively, “and my husband
works in the tech industry like you now. He had to run off to China at the last minute
to handle some huge system meltdown. And you have a son and a daughter, don’t you?”

“No, two daughters. Still no boy yet, much to my mother’s dismay. But my brother Rob
has three boys, which keeps her placated for the time being.”

“And your wife? Is she here tonight?” Astrid asked.

“No, no, I’m the only one flying the flag for my family. You know, they only invited
eight hundred and eighty-eight guests, so I hear that unless you were family, a head
of state, or a member of royalty, your spouse didn’t get invited.”

“Is that so?” Astrid laughed.
I treated Charlie horribly. He didn’t deserve to be chucked aside like that, but everyone
was putting so much pressure on me about marrying Wu Hao Lian’s son back in those
days
. There was an awkward silence, but they were thankfully saved by the gasps of astonishment
from the crowd. The ferry was fast approaching one of the outlying islands, and coming
into view was what looked like a crystal palace glowing in the middle of the dense
forest. Charlie and Astrid stared in awe as the full complexity of the structure became
apparent.

The cathedral-like banquet hall consisted of immense trapezoidal canopies of glass
that were seemingly integrated into the tropical rain forest. Trees grew out from
some of the glass panels, while others were contained within its dramatically angled
panes. Intersecting the main structure were cantilevered terraces of varying heights,
with a profusion of tropical vines and flowers spilling out over each terrace. The
whole place looked like a futuristic Hanging Gardens of Babylon, and standing at the
harbor promenade flanked by a row of travertine columns were Colin and Araminta, both
dressed in white, waving to the arriving guests.

Astrid took one look at them and deadpanned in a Latin accent, “Welcome to Fantasy
Island!”

Charlie laughed. He had forgotten her wacky sense of humor.

“I guess this is how you spend forty million on a wedding,” Astrid remarked drily.