February, 2020

Janet Ming slowly shut her son's bedroom door. After more than a month of marriage, he had finally stopped sleeping on the floor, but there were still pillows dividing the middle of the bed. She had never heard of any young couple abstaining the way her son and daughter-in-law did. She stood here almost every night listening for the sounds indicating her son was doing his duty, and so far, either they were absurdly quiet or they were still virginal with each other.

Not that Wang Lina was turning out to be the daughter-in-law she was promised. The young woman was pleasant, but aloof. She did everything asked of her, aside from getting pregnant before the Lunar New Year, with a polite smile. But she never offered to do anything. She was never proactive.

The New Year was in a few days and Janet knew Lina wasn't pregnant, not even by an extra-marital lover: the maids had come tattling to her, horrified, a few days ago. Apparently, Lim went shopping and brought back multiple types of menstrual products, a bottle of red wine, an electric heating pad, a hot water bottle, and a huge box of chocolates. Even worse, when the maids asked why he bought them instead of Lina or a maid, Lim had answered, "Aren't husbands supposed to take care of their wives during this time? Besides, what man is embarrassed to purchase these? Almost half the population needs these every month; there's no shame in it. A man should be ashamed to be embarrassed by human biology, not by females getting their period."

She wasn't sure if she liked the idea of her son being so matter of fact about menstruation. Her boarding school back in England hadn't been so matter of fact and the school was run by and for women. It had been the other girls in her dorm who had explained what was going on and what to do. Her cycle had always been irregular and there had been more than a few occasions where she had been caught unprepared at business dinners; the Chairman had gotten quietly furious each and every time, even though she never asked him to leave with her. He, in all their years of marriage, had certainly never brought her a hot water bottle to ease the cramps nor brought home chocolate or wine to improve her mood.

Was it because Lim was gay that he was so solicitous of Lina?

Yes, Janet knew her son was gay. She also knew who had turned him that way: that horrible American boy, Michael Wu.

It had been a mistake to send Lim to Harvard. She should have insisted he stay in New York City at Julliard. There were plenty of excellent business schools in NYC, in China or even in the UK. There was no need to send him up to Boston where that boy lived. The Chairman had been adamant, however, once that acceptance letter arrived. He had been almost as ecstatic when the offer to stay in the QishanWen House came; it was obviously a move indicating their willingness to partner with SmarTek. Even her psychics had encouraged that move, saying that Lim would only meet his soulmate if he went to Boston.

Her psychics never mentioned that this soulmate was another boy. Not a single one of them thought that was important. 'He'll never reach his full potential unless he goes to Boston' they all said. It would have been far more helpful if they had said, 'his soulmate is an American boy'. She would have put a stop to his going to Harvard with that rather important piece of information.

Instead, she had, practically choking on vomit, watched her son and his lover kissing each other in public, holding hands and gazing lovingly into each other's eyes as they walked through the Disney park. She had meant to surprise Lim on his birthday and instead had been the one surprised.

They were far more discrete back in Boston. Her private eyes were unable to get photos of the boys showing any kind of intimacy. Even walking around the city or dining out at restaurants, they acted as nothing more than good friends. She assumed there was more going on in their bedroom, but her people were unable to see or hear inside. Or rather, the one time they had managed to get a camera installed on the neighbor's tree that could have seen into the windows, that creepy tongue-less ex-bodyguard had found it within minutes and crushed it with his bare hands. They had lucked out only one night: the last night Lim was in Boston. The audio recording of their hotel stay was as disturbing as it was nauseating: listening to her son and that boy calling out each other's names amid grunts and moans, hearing that boy pleading with her son to fuck him harder and deeper.

That had been her one consolation: that her son was the one doing that boy instead of the other way around. It gave her hope that one day her son would feel the need to relieve his urges and with his wife sleeping right next to him, it would be natural to turn to her. And once he was accustomed to asking Lina for sex, he would no longer feel anything towards that boy. All of his homosexual tendencies would be eliminated, and she would have her son back.

In the meantime, she would never reveal that she knew that Lina was not Lim's soulmate. Nor would she reveal that she was the one who insisted on a wedding instead of an engagement party. Not that the other parents had resisted her; mentioning that the engagement had unofficially been in place for more than two years already was more than sufficient to bring them over to her way of thinking. Having grown up in England, Janet had gushed about how romantic a Christmas Eve wedding was, and the others had wholeheartedly agreed. Not that any of them were Christians, or celebrated Christmas for that matter. But where the children had spent several years in the States where Christmas was important, for believers and non-believers alike, it was tacitly understood that the children would nostalgically look back on their wedding day and the grandchildren would sigh with how beautiful it was.

If only Lim and Lina would participate in this fantasy.

Lim went into the office each morning, did the work he was asked to do and sat idle when that was done. He showed no initiative towards his father, made no effort to ingratiate himself with the other directors. In fact, the only independent action he had taken was to tell the payroll department that his assistant would no longer be using the time card system. And he gave her a pay raise.

When confronted by other managers about her late arrival a few times and early departures on other days, Lim simply said that he knew exactly what she was doing during those times and he approved it. He then asked if they were just as concerned about the mornings where she came in hours early to work or the nights that she was still in the office past midnight? Or when she came in on her days off and received no additional pay? Or were they only concerned about the times during business hours when she wasn't sitting at her desk?

Her son was getting quite the attitude. It would be helpful once he took over the Chairman's position, but until then, he should be more deferential.

Especially since the marriage had detrimentally altered the negotiations with QishanWen. Lina's father was terminated days after the wedding for 'failure to follow direct orders from the Chairman' or something. And somehow those orders had something to do with the children. Which was ridiculous; why the Chairman of the QishanWen Medical Group would have any expectations towards the daughter of an employee and the son of a stranger, she had no idea.

With the negotiations stalled, what exactly did Lina bring to the marriage? A father who was fired? Apparently QishanWen was blackballing him to other medical companies with that 'failure to obey a direct order from the Chairman' thing. Employers didn't like it when employees disobeyed orders. They conveniently ignored that the order itself was about the employee's child and not work. The girl's mother brought no connections that the Mings could use. Lina ended up with every advantage and Lim got nothing. Not even a true wife, if the lack of interesting noises and the pillows down the middle of the bed were a valid indicator of their marital status.

February slipped into March and then April, and first China and then the world shut down. She wasn't sure which was more eerie: looking out the windows and seeing a fraction of the cars that normally clogged the streets or actually being able to look out the windows and clearly see the street sixteen stories below. The news from around the world was filled with the rising number of cases and the death toll. Hapless governments imposed lockdowns and mask mandates and imposed traveling restrictions. Nothing seemed to work except for isolation. Doctors raced for a way to save people while researchers looked for a cure.

Janet was going slightly crazy from the isolation and stories about this friend's father or that friend's sister catching the coronavirus. And then the disease hit home when her own aunt and uncle caught it and died. And then a cousin on her husband's side caught it and was ventilated for weeks before passing away. She wasn't sure which was worse: grieving a family member gone too soon or being unable to properly grieve and get closure.

Lim, forced to work from home, abandoned all pretenses that he cared about the company. He did any work requested of him, and then shut himself in his music room and played his violin until his fingers were raw and bloody. The Chairman was furious and on a tirade almost every day because of it. Lim would simply bow his head, accepting the verbal abuse for his lack of responsibility. And then continue to do exactly as he pleased.

Lina, unfortunately, found a backbone during the isolation. Janet graciously offered her art history books to study from. Lina had accepted them with a smile and effusive thanks back in January, but returned them in April with a polite bow and a firm refusal to study from them. "I will be a surgeon," she affirmed. "My husband agrees with me that this is my calling, and he will not allow me to study anything else."

Janet wasn't quite sure why everything was going wrong. Her psychics blamed it all on her stubbornness. "There is a price to pay for defying Fate," one claimed. Another wasn't quite as dramatic, but far more blunt: "You took your son away from his soulmate and forced him to marry someone else. And you expect him to be grateful and thank you for this?"

Janet had tried to justify her actions as 'parents know best'. But she, herself, had never agreed that her parents knew what was best for her….

She had been born in China, but within months of her birth, he father had been transferred to the London branch. Once there, her name had been legally changed to Janet to better fit in with the children there. At five she had been sent to boarding school where she was one of three Asian girls, the only one from China. At eleven, her father had been transferred to the Singapore branch and her parents left her at the boarding school. At twenty-two, after graduating from college, she had been brought back to China: to a culture she didn't know, to food she didn't know how to eat, and to a language she no longer spoke. After spending two years learning how to speak properly, she was married off to the Chairman and a year later became a mother.

Being a Chinese girl in an English school full of British girls was a daily lesson in scorn and humiliation. Her skin wasn't the right shade of 'white'. Her eyes weren't the right shape of almond, and missing an eyelid. Her nose was too flat, her hair too black and too straight. Her breasts weren't big enough, her hips not curvy enough. She had no British features at all, and so therefore was 'other' and therefore was 'less'. Her classmates never allowed her to forget this.

In college, she had been 'exotic' to the men. A little China doll to be wined and dined and then thrown away when she wouldn't let them do more than chastely kiss her cheek goodnight. It seemed like they expected that she would bring them back to her dorm (which, according to rumor, had walls hung with red silk like some low budget middle-eastern harem movie), she would change into a cheongsam that was slit to the waist, serve them tea, and then service their bodies. She developed two conflicting reputations: frigid ice princess (from the boys who got angry that she rejected their advances), and whore (from the boys who wanted to punish her for rejecting their advances). Interestingly, neither of those reputations kept other boys from pursuing her. They either wanted to be the first to break through the ice or they wanted to be another notch in her belt.

Marriage to the Chairman, at least, had been a straightforward transaction. He wanted access to her family's money and connections and was willing to overlook that she wasn't as beautiful as he would have preferred.

Janet expected that an objective observer might tell her she was being hypocritical: disliking the choices her parents made for her and yet expecting Lim to be pleased with the choices she made for him. Those observers would be wrong.

Even when her parents were stationed in London, she had only seen them a few times a year. Other girls went home during school holidays or their parents took them skiing in Switzerland or sunbathing on the Riviera. She, however, was only allowed to visit the London house during the Lunar New Year celebrations, but only if it was convenient for her parents. School holidays were spent in the dorms. Most years her mother would stop by the school on her birthday to give her a present. And she'd see them during parent weekends and fundraisers and once for a Christmas pageant. If she saw them four or five times a year, that was a lot. After they moved to Singapore, the fifth time she saw them was at her college graduation ceremony.

On the other hand, she had stayed by Lim's side all throughout his childhood. When he picked up the violin, she stood up to the Chairman, insisting that Lim have proper lessons and even encouraging him to apply to Julliard. She had willingly attended every recital, had a room in the apartment converted into a soundproofrd music studio, bought him better quality instruments as his proficiency increased. She even invested in multiple orchestras awaiting the day when her grandson would take over SmarTek, and Lim would be able to retire and achieve his dream of becoming a professional musician. Lim being able to attend classes at the Conservatory was also her doing.

Was it so wrong to ask that he show his gratitude for her efforts by diligently performing his duties, both at the company and in his bedroom?

Was it wrong for her to demand that he end this homosexual phase and give her grandchildren? He was twenty-one! Past time that he stopped dallying around with the idea that he was gay for that boy.

She knew he wasn't really gay because most of the girls at her school had experimented with lesbianism. With their bodies maturing, hormones raging, and wanting physical pleasure (especially after reading the juicy romance novels and erotic novels that were smuggled in and passed around from dorm room to dorm room with special pages dog-eared for ease of use) and the only people around being female, it was almost expected that the girls would develop physical feelings for each other. After graduation, however, the girls reverted to normalcy and had proper boyfriends and married men.

It wasn't completely unlike Lim's situation in Boston. Coming of age while rooming with a younger boy plus all the gay and lesbian acceptance news and pride parades? It seemed like the United States in general, and Boston in particular, was overflowing with rainbow flags and 'queer is the new normal' stuff. Plus that boy was supposedly his soulmate, so why wouldn't they develop physical feelings towards each other? But now, Lim was married to a woman, so that gay thing needed to stop.

June, 2020

Janet stepped into the music room and closed her eyes to further enjoy the piece Lim was playing; Mozart was one of her favorite European composers.

Ming Lim put down his bow, allowing the notes to fade into silence. "How can I help you, Mother."

"It's been almost six months since you married."

He bowed his head. "Yes, I know."

"My maids told me Lina is not pregnant."

"Please tell your maids to stop reporting about my wife's menstrual cycle. Just because I am not embarrassed to buy products for her does not mean she is not ashamed to have her bodily functions discussed by every other female here."

"We're all women," Janet dismissed Lina's embarrassment as irrelevant. "It's not like we discuss anything in front of your father."

"If your maids must talk, perhaps it would be best if they refrained from entering my room. Lina and I are more than capable of cleaning it ourselves and taking the trash out and doing our own laundry."

Janet frowned. "Perhaps it would be best if you did your duty and got her pregnant."

"Mother… are you telling me you want me to rape her? Or that you want her to rape me?"

"Who said anything about rape?" Janet fumed. "You're married. Get on with it and give me a grandchild."

Lim got up and carefully stowed away his violin. "One thing I learned in the United States is that only an enthusiastic and sober 'yes' from both parties means you should have sex. Neither of us is willing."

"The half-baked so called morals of the United States are not necessarily the morals of this family! Seduce her! Some alcohol, some flowers, romantic music…. Maybe some oysters…. I'll have the maids buy some ginseng. And I'm sure the herbalist down the street will have some medicine to help raise your interest. Or Viagra, if you want to stick to Western medicine... Take your time and she'll be enthusiastically consenting in no time."

"Mother, none of that would entice me to want to seduce her. Even a powerful aphrodisiac would be insufficient to make me want to do anything with her. She doesn't arouse me. Not my brain, not my body. And I don't hold any interest to her, either. You literally forced two people who have zero attraction towards each other to get married and then have the gall to get upset that we haven't fucked each other?"

"It's that boy, isn't it?" Janet spat out, so irate that she forgot she wasn't going to say anything about him. "Is he the reason you refuse to do your duty? I saw you, you know! I saw you two practically shoving your tongues down the other's throat." Janet was on a roll now, too caught up in her grievances to notice her son's face was dead white from shock. "I heard you, too! Would you like me to play back the recording for you? Would you like to hear him begging for you to do it harder? Disgusting! It makes me want to vomit just thinking about it!"

"Mother," he called out weakly. "You knew…"

"Yes, I knew about your gay friend. Why else do you think your engagement party was changed to a wedding? I had to protect you!"

"Protect me from what?"

"From that boy!"