Page 11 of Behind Frenemy Lines
Charles
Loretta had made noodles for dinner when I got home from work. A week had passed since my ill-starred drinks with Kriya at the Cittie of Yorke.
Loretta was on a healthy eating kick, so she’d left out the seasoning packet and added cabbage. Soup tasted like water, but not as good. Poured out most of the soup while she wasn’t looking.
Ate the remainder on the sofa next to her, watching some anime thing on the telly. Cabbage was decidedly al dente.
Loretta angsting about her wedding, as per usual.
CG, crunching: “Why do you need to get married anyway?”
Loretta, waspish: “I don’t know, Charles, why do straight people get married?”
CG: “Because of societal convention. Their parents would get upset if they didn’t. But your parents are upset anyway, so why bother?”
Good thing I’d got rid of the soup. Loretta hit me on the arm, which would have resulted in a spill if there had been any liquid left in the bowl.
Loretta: “I know you’re an ally, but sometimes you talk like a dickhead.” Shook her hand vigorously. “Ow! Why’s your arm so hard?”
CG, swallowing a noodle: “I’ve switched up my arm workouts. I do cable lateral raises, four sets of twelve to fifteen reps, and a bicep superset of three sets of six to twelve reps EZ bar preacher curls, with standing dumbbell hammer curls at a weight I can normally do ten reps at, but for—”
Loretta: “It was a rhetorical question, Charles. Anyway, you’ve forgotten Hayley needs a visa.”
Loretta’s fianc é e is American. They met on some obscure gay social networking site called Tumblr.
CG: “She’s transferring to the London office of her company, isn’t she? Aren’t they sorting the visa?”
Loretta: “Have you seen the news about immigration policy recently? We need a backup.” She dropped her head back on the sofa, letting out a gusty sigh. “We should have eloped.”
CG: “Yes.”
Loretta: “It’s too late now. Only two weeks to go. We’ve spent all this money on the wedding, I owe you rent—”
CG: “I told you, don’t worry about it.”
Though I could have done with the rent, in all honesty. Mind went back to that exchange with Kriya over the bill, for the eighty-second time since that evening at Cittie of Yorke. Cringed down to my soul at the memory, again.
Should have thought of the fact we’d be expected to cover the students’ drinks.
Didn’t occur to me until Kriya said it, and then was too busy reeling from sticker shock to think of saying something sensible, like that I’d owe her the ninety pounds.
Would have been better than saying I wasn’t going to pay at all.
Problem was, I was skint. Transferred ￡ 25,000 to Ba the day before the drinks with Kriya. After putting aside money to cover the mortgage and lai see for the wedding, I had enough to see me through to the end of the month, but just barely. And I still had the next ￡ 25,000 looming over me.
But Loretta had enough stress to contend with from the wedding. Didn’t need me hassling her for rent. She’s a postdoc, she never has any money anyway.
Loretta: “I’m going to pay you back.”
CG: “I said you don’t have to—”
Loretta: “I’m mid-complaining, don’t interrupt. What was I saying? Oh yes, I can’t cancel the wedding now. Ba’s coming. That means so much to Hayley. Her parents always talk about wanting to meet my family.”
CG: “I would have thought the one advantage of being gay and Chinese is your partner doesn’t have to suffer the nightmare Chinese in-law experience.”
Loretta: “Yeah, I know. But she wants to. My parents live in Hong Kong and they’re scared of speaking English anyway.
What’s the most they can do to traumatise her?
She’s lucky. She’s only having to meet them now, when she’s well past her formative years.
Not like us suckers.” Gestured at me and herself.
CG: “What’s the latest with your mum? Is she coming?”
Loretta’s mum—my mother’s younger sister—has been one of Loretta’s chief sources of wedding stress. At the last count, Ah Yi has changed her mind about whether or not she’s attending the wedding five times.
Loretta: “Oh, that’s a new drama. Ba’s saying now the only reason why she’s reluctant to come is because she’s scared of upsetting your mum.”
That was a new one.
CG: “What’s Ma got to do with it? She’s not even coming.”
I offered to book Ma’s flights, but she gave some excuse about having to be at home because the neighbours were going to be away visiting their daughter in Australia and she’d promised to water their plants.
Don’t think she disapproves of the wedding. More that it’s delicate with Ah Yi. Ma knows about Loretta and Hayley, but the rest of the extended family don’t. Loretta’s parents keep it quiet.
Just as well Ma’s not coming. Couldn’t afford the flights now, with Ba’s bloody gua sha debts to pay off.
Loretta: “Brace yourself. This is the most fucked up thing you’ll have ever heard in your life.”
Made a non committal noise. Prepared for anything when it comes to Ah Yi. She’s bonkers.
Loretta: “Ma thinks your mum thinks I’ve turned you gay, and that’s why you haven’t brought a girlfriend home in a million years.”
CG: “It’s only been six years.”
Loretta: “That was not the important part of what I said!”
CG: “How are you supposed to have turned me gay?”
Loretta: “I don’t know. Osmosis?”
CG: “Osmosis is specifically the passage of water molecules through a semipermeable membrane. You’re thinking of diffusion.”
Loretta: “I’m thinking of homophobia, Charles.”
CG: “Right. Sorry.”
Loretta: “But I only have one mother. Even if she is insane, I want her at my wedding. Ba hasn’t travelled anywhere by himself in the past ten years, he’d probably get on the wrong plane without her.
And you know, having them both there at the wedding, it would make Hayley happy.
What’s the point of getting married if I don’t make my fianc é e happy? ”
CG: “Indeed.”
Loretta: “You have got to stop saying things like that, this is why you’ve not gotten laid in six years. Anyway, you want my wedding to go well, don’t you?”
Alarm bells went off in my head. Loretta looking smarmy, the way she does when she wants a favour.
CG, suspicious: “What do you want me to do?”
Loretta: “I have a plan. Before you say anything, I want you to bear in mind that this plan is for the advancement of family harmony, my marriage, and your love life.”
CG: “What is it?”
Loretta: “You need to bring a date to the wedding. A female date. Although if you are into men, I support you—”
CG: “I am not into men.”
Loretta: “If you’re asexual, that would be fine too. There’s a whole world of options out there other than ‘straight,’ you know.”
CG: “I am not asexual. We’ve discussed that.”
Loretta: “But you know it would be fine if you were gay or asexual. Or anything else. I would support you, like you supported me.”
She meant the time, almost fifteen years ago now, when her parents said they weren’t going to pay for her education anymore and she needed to come back to Hong Kong and be straight.
Loretta chose to stay in London and finish her degree, but she didn’t have anywhere to stay. And I happened to have a spare room.
CG: “That wasn’t—I needed someone to oversee the works to the flat.”
Loretta: “Why do you always have to pretend it wasn’t you being nice? The ‘works’ was one day while they replaced the carpet. You could have managed without taking me on as a tenant. Accept that you did a good deed and take the thanks.”
CG: “Technically you’re probably a licensee, rather than a tenant. You don’t have the right to exclude people from the property, as a tenant would.”
Loretta: “Forget about it, you win. The point I was trying to make is, if you’re still insisting you’re straight—”
CG: “I’m not insisting. I just am.”
Loretta: “Then this is the time to prove it. You need to bring a girl to my wedding as your plus one and do straight things with her. Like kiss and hold hands and, I don’t know, explain films to her. Get her to manage your social calendar. Rely on her to help you process your feelings…”
CG: “Remind me, are you asking me for a favour? Because it feels quite a lot like you are insulting me.”
Loretta: “Sorry.” Her apology was somewhat undermined by the fact it could barely be heard through the giggling. “What do you think?”
CG: “I don’t see the point. How does me bringing a plus one to your wedding help?”
Loretta: “It means I can tell my mum, ‘I haven’t turned Charles gay, he’s got a girlfriend. He’s bringing her to the wedding.’ And then she can tell your mum. And—another pro—your mum will be happy.”
CG: “Because I’ll have lied to her about seeing someone.”
Loretta: “You don’t have to lie to her. You could ask someone out.”
CG: “I’m not going to find someone to ask within the next two weeks. It’s not enough notice.”
Loretta: “So I had an idea about that. But you have to be open-minded. And not a gutless loser.”
CG: “What is it?”
Loretta: “You know how you’re sharing an office with Hot Lawyer Who Hates You now?”
Took me a moment. Then her meaning dawned on me, in all its horror.
CG: “No. No, no, no.”
Loretta: “Oh, come on! You’ve always fancied her. This is your moment. You guys are working at the same firm, sitting across from each other every day—”
CG: “It’s only for three days a week. Firm policy is for people to spend 60 percent of their time in the office. Most people don’t do more.”
Loretta: “For you, 60 percent of your work time is like 60 percent of your life. You’re already spending 60 percent of your life with her. It’s fate. It’s yun fan!”
Thought of Kriya’s expression when I’d said I wasn’t going to pay for everyone’s drinks. Felt like crawling underneath the sofa and never coming out again. “She really doesn’t like me. It wouldn’t go well.”
Loretta: “She doesn’t know the true you. You have to win her over, give her the chance to get to know you outside of work.”
Didn’t see how that followed. I barely knew me outside of work.
Saying that would only provoke an argument, though, so I tried a different tack. “Asking her to a family wedding is a bit much for a first date.”
Loretta pulled a face, but conceded: “Fine. Ask her as a friend. Explain the situation with my mum and your mum. She’s Asian, she’ll understand about family drama.
She’ll probably be up for coming along. It’s one day, free food and alcohol, and anything might happen with my mum.
Besides, I bet she’s never been to a wedding where the brides will be reading out Duke of Badminton quotes during their vows. ”
Duke of Badminton was the terrible anime of Loretta and her fianc é e’s heart, and indeed—or rather, not “indeed,” strike out the “indeed”—the anime that united their two hearts.
Over the years, I have watched far more of it than I personally would have volunteered for, through Loretta constantly having it on in the background.
I have not yet caught up with all 227 episodes, but I have had sufficient exposure to the dialogue that I knew its inclusion in the wedding vows was not a selling point.
Was about to point this out when Loretta said: “It would be cool to meet Kriya. You’ve talked so much about her over the years.”
CG: “Don’t tell her that!”
Loretta: “What am I, an idiot? I won’t say anything. So you’re going to ask her?”
CG: “No. I don’t want to make her uncomfortable.”
Loretta: “It doesn’t have to make her uncomfortable. Just make it clear you’d be going as friends, nothing more.”
Stared at the TV. Hadn’t really been watching, but the anime girl onscreen appeared to be turning into a car. Maybe it would have made sense if I’d been paying attention.
CG: “We’re not friends.”
Loretta: “Colleagues, whatever you want to call it. It’s not a big ask. Who among us hasn’t attended a wedding where you don’t know the people getting married, because somebody’s dragged you along?”
CG: “I’m not asking her, and that’s final.” Picked up remote. “Are you still watching this?”
Loretta snatched the remote from me. “Yes.”
I didn’t try to take it back. Best to pick your battles, living with Loretta. Could count myself lucky I’d won this one, for now.