Free The Catherine Lim Collection by Catherine Lim Page B

a small wooden house at the
bottom of the garden.
    “My house,” said Michael proudly. “Nobody’s
allowed to enter. Nobody’s allowed to knock but you may come in, Grandma and
Uncle Bock. Come into my house!”
    “I ... want ... to ... go ... in ... see
Michael.” Uncle Bock’s voice was full of pleading. The words were uttered with
effort, painfully. “Oh come in, Uncle Bock,” said Michael. “Come in!”
    “No, please. Go away, Michael’s not well.
Come again another time. Okay, Ah Bock?”
    “Want ... to ... go ... in ... see Michael!
MICHAEL!” The comforting warmth that had enveloped him was being tugged away; a
sense of panic was mounting. His heart was beating faster. Something had gone
wrong.
    “Please go away, Ah Bock. I tell you
Michael’s not well. Go away now.”
    “Who’s there?” It was his mother’s voice,
shrill and sharp.
    “The idiot one. He wants to see Michael. I
don’t know how he found his way here; I’ve told him to go away – ”
    “Ah Bock, Michael’s not at home. He’s gone
out with Boon. Do you hear? He’s not in. Now go away, please – ” There was a
wail, and then a clamour of voices.
    With a tremendous tug of will, Michael
opened his eyes and blinked uncertainly in the afternoon light streaming into
his bedroom. “GO!” The voice had risen to an exasperated shriek. Then there was
the banging of the door. “Thank God,” he heard his mother gasp. “The idiot, the
imbecile. Luckily you saw him, Mooi Lan. Otherwise the idiot would have run upstairs
and disturbed the boy’s sleep. Oh, God, why do things like that happen to me?
Mooi Lan, I want you to keep a very close eye on the door from now onwards. And
I’m going directly to that wretched Ah Kum Soh to give her a good ticking off.
The fool! The fool!”
    Michael lay motionless on his bed.

Chapter 10
     
    You poor
thing, you miserable woman, but you are all like that,
thought Angela and shook her head in commiseration. She looked at the swollen
belly, round and firm as a melon, rising incongruously from flatnesses and
hollows lifting the sarong in front with its roundness. “How many months now,
Aminah?” she asked, wondering how on earth she had not noticed before. She must
not forget to ask Mooi Lan, “How come you didn’t notice either?”
    “Seven months, mem,” said Aminah, smiling
nervously, showing blackened, rotting teeth.
    “Mooi Lan,” said Angela briskly, “those tins
of condensed milk in the store room – put six in a paper bag for Aminah to take
back today. She needs proper nourishment now. How come you didn’t notice, Mooi
Lan?”
    “She’s like that every time – up it goes,
up, down, then up again!” the girl giggled. “I can’t keep count of her
pregnancies.”
    “But Minah,” said Angela patiently, “I gave
you those pills. Remember the little green pills in the plastic pack. I
purposely asked my husband to bring them back for you. Why didn’t you take
them?”
    The woman protested she did, then said
something about forgetting or losing the pills, then smiled again nervously.
“Minah, listen carefully,” said Angela, “you’ve got to listen to me. You can’t
be having a baby every year. You’ll die in no time. How many children do you
have now? 10? 12? Minah, you can’t expect men to co-operate. They’re animals.
Your husband wants his pleasure every night. He doesn’t think of you. So you
must help yourself. After the birth of this baby, Minah, will you let me take
you to hospital for an operation? A simple operation that will mean no more
babies? You can’t afford to have any more babies, Minah. Singapore today is
different from Singapore years ago, in your mother’s time, in your
grandmother’s time. Look at me, Minah. I’ve only three children. I can afford
many more but I’ve only three. So that I can take good care of them. Give them
a good education. Bring them up properly. Don’t you want that for your
children, Minah? Look at Mooi Lan here. When she