Free Five Star Billionaire: A Novel by Tash Aw Page A

drinks of passersby. He ordered several unfamiliar cocktails that turned out to be too sweet and then began to order vodka. Throughout this time, he kept his baseball hat on, having decided that the sunglasses would be too ostentatious. It was a relief for him to be away from his hotel room, to hear music that he did not have to perform. He spent at least two hours in a spot near the windows, quietly sipping his drinks. He felt his cheeks flush with the alcohol and his temples started to throb, but it did not matter, for he was not alone.
    His discomfort began when he noticed a few of the Chinese waiters huddling together and whispering. They were trying not to look openly at him, but their curiosity was such that they could not resist glancing at him. He did not want to leave the bar. It was not yet one o’clock, and there were too many hours of darkness left ahead of him. And then the pleasant Australian couple sitting near him—who had just been holding hands and kissing—left, and their place was taken by a sweaty Western man, who tried to engage Gary in conversation. The man was drunk, but Gary did not feel like moving from his spot. Soon the man would grow tired and leave him alone.
    “What’s the matter, cat got your tongue? Don’t feel like speaking, eh? Jeez, you Chinese are so goddamn unfriendly. Hey,
look at me
when I talk to you.”
    Gary looked around. The bar was full and there was nowhere to move to.
    “Hey, I’m
talking
to you.”
    Gary turned and said, “Fuck off.”
    The reports that appeared the following morning were full of inaccuracies, as usual, and there were conflicting accounts from bystanders as to who had provoked the ensuing argument, what the altercation had been about, who had taken the first swing. What was in no doubt was that Gary had swiftly lost control and knocked the other man off his feet, even though the man was heftily built. The Internet was full of photos taken with camera phones—grainy and badly lit but clearly showing Gary standing over the man with his fist raised. The now-infamous video—again captured on a mobile phone and freely available on YouTube the next day—shows Gary swaying and unsteady on his feet, then bouncing up and down like a boxer ready for a fight, before stumbling toward the man on the ground and aiming a casual kick to his midriff, as if toe-poking a football. When the man shouts out an inarticulate insult, Gary attempts to pick up a bar stool, presumably to attack him with it. But the bar stool is fixed and doesn’t budge, so Gary turns his attention to a signboard that says WOW ! and he rips it off the wall, using it to attack the man. When some of the waiters attempt to restrain him, he fights them off and shouts, “Don’t touch me, do you know who I am? Do you know who I am?” The camera wobbles and cuts out, and when it starts to play again, Gary is seen surrounded by a group of consoling friends. The rest of the bar is emptying and the music has stopped. His head is in his hands, and his shoulders are heaving up and down as he sobs. In the gray-pink half-light of the video, he is briefly shown in profile, silhouetted against what seems to be a curtain made from shimmering glass beads that look almost electric in the way they sparkle. Although it is dark and his face is not properly lit, Gary’s features are unmistakable—the perfect straight nose that ends in a delicate point, the soft angle of the jaw, the hair that falls over his brow. His head is bowed, his shoulders hunched and defeated. It is this image that graces the cover of all the tabloid newspapers the following evening.

4.
FORGET THE PAST, LOOK ONLY TO THE FUTURE

    T HAT MORNING ’ S EMAILS BORE NO SHOCKS, ONLY POSITIVE DEVELOPMENTS . These days, there were no longer any brutish demands by creditors or feeble excuses from nonpaying clients, and the daily ritual of beginning with emails had become a pleasurable affair for Yinghui, to be carried out at an almost leisurely