May 5, 1953
“People have always expected me to be bad and
thoughtless and shallow, and I do my best to accommodate their
expectations. I sink to their expectations, one might say. I think
it’s the ultimate suggestibility of most of us. We are social
beings. We live in a social world with other people and so we wish
to be as they see us, even if it is detrimental to ourselves.” She
laughs, lifting her face toward his. Her eyes, her skin, they glow,
distracting him. “What do you think?”
HE WOKE with a startle, then exhaled heavily in
the hot air, slowly noticed the fan moving sluggishly overhead as
consciousness surfaced. Perspiration covered his body and the bed
linens were soaked. Her voice was as clear as a bell in his head,
her sharp, vivid outline moving against a dark background. He had
forgotten how much she loved her own pronouncements, how she would
philosophize over a cold drink, how she was startlingly insightful
at the oddest times.
She was waiting for him, expecting him to save
her.
What would become his story now? he wondered. And
there was Claire, who had grown important to him despite himself,
in whom he saw his undeveloped self, nascent, with her silly
prejudices, her cherished ignorance, and, surprisingly, her moments
of clarity. Her naïveté was a salve to his battered expectations.
Wasn’t love always some form of narcissism after all? She came
unbidden to his dreams too, battling with the other woman, the one
who haunted him day and night. Claire, with her blond and familiar
femininity, English rose to Trudy’s exotic scorpion.
The black night beyond the window was velvet and
welcome in its anonymity. He got up and opened the windows. Hong
Kong’s warm, intimate smell came into the room, redolent of human
bodies and the ever-present sea, even at this elevation. It was
never crisp here, just moist and close, though not always
unpleasant. The darkness enveloped him. A lone light winked in the
distance—a boat? A fellow insomniac?
He heard her voice again. It sounded more desperate
now, more shrill.
He knew it was time to act.