How To Pick Up a Maid in Statue Square by Rea Tarvydas

Author:Rea Tarvydas
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781771871181
Publisher: Thistledown Press
Published: 2016-09-01T00:00:00+00:00

MARK

THE AMERICAN CLUB: a peach building that clings to the rocky shores. Mark wanders out to the poolside after his morning workout. Sunlight explodes off the deck in every direction and momentarily blinds him. He pats his pockets. Useless. His sunglasses are in the car, melting into the dashboard.

On the pool deck, expatriate women huddle over coffee cups, chat about maid troubles and difficulties obtaining airline tickets for their next home visit. The women dab at their upper lips and fan themselves. Their eavesdropping children alternate between paddling in the kiddie pool and hanging their tanned feet above the deep water pool. Waiting for the all-clear.

Off to one side sits a handsome woman in a blue bikini, suntanning. She hooks a finger through the nosepiece of her designer sunglasses, slides them down the long edge of her nose, and gives him the once over. Emerald green irises contrast sharp against the whites of her eyes.

“Hey, you’re new,” calls the woman and waves him over. “Where’re you living?”

“Stanley.”

“What complex?”

After a couple of months, Mark isn’t accustomed to Hong Kongers and their preoccupation with exactly which building you live in, right down to the unit. “Stanley Court,” he says and cheats her out of his house number.

She lifts one eyebrow. “Not bad, neighbour. Where are you from?”

“Canada.”

“A polite Canadian. Where’s your wife?”

“At work.” Debra, the dutiful daughter, is busy growing her father’s media empire.

“Kids?”

“Not yet.”

“Me, neither.” Emerald-tinted eyes disappear behind sunglasses.

The boys skitter across the pool, one after the other, stiff arms flashing. They must have received the go-ahead to enter deeper water. When will Debra send him a sign that it’s time to start a family? This question is followed by another that he’s been ignoring the last couple of months, about whether Debra really wants kids. She keeps putting off their appointment with the fertility clinic, insisting on letting nature take its course.

“Let’s have a drink,” says the woman. “I’m Mona, by the way.”

“Mark,” he says. “Uh. It’s ten-thirty in the morning.”

“C’mon. You’re not a prude, are you?”

Mark shakes his head and perches on an adjoining sun lounger. Does he look like a tightass? Maybe it’s the chinos. He’s self-scheduled to head back and check his investments, secure a few trades, make $500 US, and call it a day.

“It’s twelve o’clock somewhere,” says Mona. She waggle-waves her half-full glass and something citrusy that smells like gin sloshes onto her tanned thighs. “I’ll have another,” she informs the waiter. “And the Canuck will have a scotch-scotch.”

“A what?” asks Mark.

“A double scotch. Don’t worry. He understands my language.”

The morning crosses over to afternoon and they shift under the shade of the umbrella. Mona’s a talker. She tells stories about the people she’s met, the characters, the big shots and losers. “We’re here for a couple years,” she says. “And then, who knows?”

Mona drops her slender frame into the water and swims laps with brisk, firm strokes. Her turns are flawless. She darts to one side and surfaces in the middle of the boy pod.

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