Surrogate Protocol by Tham Cheng-E

Author:Tham Cheng-E
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Epigram Books
Published: 2018-08-02T16:00:00+00:00

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It was almost midnight by the time Arthur got to Hannah’s rented room in a shophouse along Petain Road. Arthur crouched low and duck-walked along the sidewalk with the child in his arms until he got behind a tree. In the tenebrous light of a streetlamp he watched Khun light a cigarette and the hungry glow of its tip and the stream of grey-blue smoke. He felt dastardly; there was no reason why he should be hiding from the pimp. He just didn’t want to deal with him any more than he needed to.

Fortunately Khun did not linger. After his Beetle passed beyond sight Arthur ran across the road and pattered up the narrow stairway that led to a single door at the top of it. His steps resounded so loudly that the door flew open before he even got to it. Hannah, dressed in a modest set of nightclothes, stood at the doorway and regarded him with displeasure.

“What on earth are you doing here?” She folded her arms. Her hair, straight and parted at the centre, was bound low behind her nape.

“You leaving me out here with a baby?” Arthur panted, as he pushed past her.

He came to a small room sparsely furnished with a bed, a couch, a hardy little shelf with a few books and a small closet. He sank into the green and white cushions of the couch and allowed the toddler to doze in the crook of his arm. From a record drifted the words of a song softly playing:

I’m discontented with homes that are rented

So I have invented my own

Darling this place is a lover’s oasis

Where life’s weary chase is unknown

Far from the cry of the city

Where flowers pretty caress the stream

Cozy to hide in, to live side by side in

Don’t let it abide in my dream

Arthur wagged his finger beside his ear. “Something very familiar about that song.”

Hannah closed the door behind her. “I told you not to come here.”

“You said to see you right after I got the papers.”

“Not here. You could’ve called.”

“I met your guest on the way in,” Arthur said. “Was it because of him?”

Hannah rolled her eyes but made no reply.

“Did you sleep with him?”

“That’s audacious of you.”

“Did you?”

“It was business.” Hannah’s gaze was icy and unflinching. “You read too much into our friendship.”

“Then why are you helping me?”

“Sympathy,” said Hannah. “I was also a vagrant once.”

“Vagrant?” said Arthur, his tone dripping with disdain. “You don’t know me, Hannah.”

“And you don’t know how to stay out of things.”

“Can I date you?”

“No.”

“Why?”

Hannah’s eyes flitted down to the bundle in his arms. “What’s with the baby?”

“From an earlier marriage.”

“Not in the mood for jokes, Arthur.”

Arthur told Hannah about how he had found the child at the fire and that he had decided to keep him because the crèche didn’t want him.

“That’s stupid of you,” said Hannah.

“You don’t know children, Hannah.”

“I don’t like children.”

“Poor thing.” Arthur gently rocked the bundle. “When death becomes imminent we prepare ourselves for it. Children cry their eyes out till death takes them.

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