Greg selected only tropical fruit from the breakfast buffet. Paw paws, mango, rambutan, banana, mangosteen, starfruit and oranges.
"You'd better not have that smelly one"
"Durian?" he smiled "Raffles wouldn't let us back in. One whiff and they'd send us packing. Durian is banned in most hotels in Singapore. They wouldn't serve it at the zoo to a bunch of tourists." He had noticed a large group of people milling at the entrance of the pagola.
"Darling go and sit down at the table with our stuff. I'll get the coffees" taking his plate of fruit and my toast and marmalade I went and sat down front row centre. The throng entered securing tables and hitting the buffet with the precision of locusts. Two elderly ladies who had not been fast enough to hold their own with the crowd wandered towards the one empty table. Just in front of us.
"Greg." I said.
But with a cup of coffee in each hand he was already with them. He explained whose the table it was and escourted them back to our table where he assisted them into the two spare chairs.
"How embarrassing?" said the older thinner one.
"Oh yes. You are kind" said her plump companion. They had very refined English voices and with their sunhats and long floaty dresses looked as though they had stepped out of a Merchant Ivory movie.
"How silly of us. Are you sure you don't mind us joining you?"
"Of course not," I said quickly not trusting Greg to answer.
"You're welcome" he said.
"They will have a story" he said as the two women went off get their breakfast. "Women that age don't travel to places like this unless there is a story."
The slender woman who introduced herself as Philippa had chosen fruit like Greg and her companion who was called Audrey had bacon and eggs. Greg collected a tray for them containing two pots of tea and cups and saucers, longlife milk, and slices of lemon.
Phillipa looked first at Greg and then at me. "Honeymoon?"
"Phillipa" said Audrey. "You are outrageous"
"How did you guess?" asked Greg.
"I didn't need to guess. Anyone can see the two of you are in love."
I had seen the way that Greg responded to old ladies before. Gentlemanly and flirtatious he seemed to see them as they understood themselves, treating them as though they had never grown old and were yet to see their thirtieth birthday.
A gasp went around the tables as Ah Meng the most famous Orang Utan in the world entered she was walking using three limbs a remaining hand holding onto the tiny baby slung over her shoulder. There were two keepers with her and as soon as she had sat on the chair at the table opposite us one of them served her with a breakfast. A plate of fruit almost identical to Greg and Philippa's chosen breakfasts.
"Who can doubt the Darwinian theory?" said Greg looking at Ah Meng in awe as she swung the tiny baby Orang to her lap. "Doesn't she make you proud to be a primate."
"Her name is Ah Meng" said Phillipa.
"She is regarded as a great ambassador of Singapore." added Audrey.
"Look at that baby. Isn't it just perfect." I said.
"She's a little girl. Are you getting maternal, darling?" Greg asked, not taking his eyes of the baby, while lifting my hand to his lips.
I laughed but it was no joke. For the last few months my biological clock had, not just been ticking it had, been chiming.
The tiny creature reached out a little hand to feel the shape of the star fruit Ah Meng was holding. Her round liquid eyes were filled with wonder and surprise. It was extraordinary to think that small cherub's face would broaden until the eyes looked small and close together or the smooth baby flesh would thicken and darken with tiny fingers curling into hard leathery hands and that in a few years she would weigh over two hundred pounds.
The keepers announced that people wishing to be photographed with Ah Meng should form a line.
"Women and children first" said Greg. Almost all the other tables were vacated as the tourists grappled for position in the queue. Phillipa looked at the tourists in mild amusement.
"Noel Coward said 'But why, oh why, do the wrong people travel, when the right people stay at home?'" said Phillipa "You two are probably to young to have heard of Noel Coward."
Greg smiled and quoted back at her "'I am over educated in the the things I shouldn't have known at all.' Yes Phillipa, we have both heard of Noel Coward"
"I apologise. When you are over eighty sometimes it seems as though you have to explain everything you say."
Greg put his hand over hers to indicate she had nothing to apologise for. Phillipa looked at his hand and suddenly had to blink away tears.
"Sorry," she said "Your hands remind me of my husband's hands."
Greg turned to me "Give me the camera I'll photograph you girls with Ah Meng and the baby" I handed him the camera and he turned to Phillipa "Okay. Phillipa you first." He guided her to the queue which was thinning out. As one of the keepers sat Phillipa down beside the huge Orang Utan Greg spoke to the other and Audrey explained her friends tears to me.
"Her husband died here in Changi prison camp in World War II. This will be her last visit to Singapore. She's dying now."
"She never married again?"
"She was never able to love someone as much."
If only I had remembered. If only I had just a part of Phillipa's wisdom. If only I had listened to Audrey when she said, "My dear, don't let anything or anyone come between you and Greg. You hold onto that dear man for life."
I was so arrogant then so self-confident. It didn't occur to me that anything or anyone could split us up but of course I didn't realise then that my love for Greg would become the instrument of our destruction.
In the middle of the night, at a Princeton Hotel in the bed I was sharing with my sick husband Mark Warner, a sob escaped my lips. I buried my face in the pillow and tried to cry silently. Mark put his arm around me not knowing I didn't want to be touched.
Thinking he was comforting me he said, "I'm fine."
"Don't say that" I screamed at him. "Don't use those words"
I hated him for unknowingly plariarising Greg. "I'm fine" were Greg's words. They were the words Greg had used to lock me out of his life. "I'm fine" were the two words I never wanted to hear again. They were the two words that could cut deeper than any blade and that I feared more than anything in the world.
"But I am fine. Really," said Mark.
"Shut up." I sobbed. "Just shut the hell up."
We would be seeing Greg in the next few hours and somehow I had to keep it all together.
"I'm an enormously talented man, and there's no use pretending that I'm not." - Noel CowardGreg signalled me to join him and handed me the camera. I was surprised.
"Didn't you think I'd want to do something this touristy?" he asked.
"No I didn't"
He gave me a wink then he joined Ah Meng and the baby. The Orang appeared so bored so utterly fed up with the tourists playing musical chairs beside her and the persistent flashes from cameras.
But then Greg started to speak in another language. Ah Meng looked at him. Was it surprise was it love? I didn't know but she reached out and very gently put her enormous arm around him. I was worried but the keeper smilingly reassured me.
I was so pleased I put the camera to my eye again because I clicked it at the exact moment that Ah Meng handed the baby Orang Utan to Greg. A gasp went around the tourists and then a breathless hush.
I tried to keep taking photographs but I just wanted to watch as the little fingers of the baby traced Greg's smile checked out his hair and felt his unshaven chin. She blinked as she looked in his blue eyes then she became fascinated with his fingers and hands picking up his right hand in her two small hands she sniffed it and then she seemed to kiss it. All the time Greg spoke to Ah Meng in the language she understood.
Greg nodded his head slowly and stopped talking. Ah Meng retrieved the baby and the keeper stepped forward and lifted Ah Meng arm from Greg shoulder so he could get up. Before turning to me he thanked them, shook hands with both the keepers and finally with Ah Meng herself.
Greg joined me putting his arm around me and pulling me to him. "I want to take Phillipa and Audrey back in our car."
I nodded in agreement "She's ..." I was about to tell him Phillipa was dying.
"I know." he said. And we went back to the table Audrey and Phillipa looked at him with admiration.
"I didn't expect you to speak Malay" said Phillipa.
"I don't really. I simply figured a Sumatran Orang Utan in Singapore would have much use for American English"
The keepers said goodbye to the tourist and Ah Meng got of the chair and taking the baby by one arm casually slung the little mite over her shoulder.
"Good Lord," said Audrey "that was less than gentle"
"That baby can take it believe me. She's strong" as the tourists started to vacate the pergola several of them came past our table.
"Geez that was the coolest thing, mate" said a kid from Australia "This is me girlfriend Keira"
"And this is Stacy"
"G'day Stace"
Then there was an Indian, formal in his assessment that holding the Orang Utan was an act of great personal courage. people shook his hand and others clapped him on the back. They were all heading for the reptile show and wanted us to go with them.
"Why don't we take the tram" said Greg feigning tiredness so Phillipa could keep up with him. The tram looked more like a toy train and Greg helped Phillipa on board and sat beside her while Audrey and I took the seat opposite facing them.
"Did you two come to the zoo in the tourist bus?" asked Greg.
Phillipa nodded. "It was very nice"said Audrey.
"We have a car and chauffeur waiting for us at the gates" I said and stopped not sure what Greg had in mind.
"We hoped you two would be our guests for lunch at our hotel. We're staying at Raffles"
"Raffles!" said Audrey as though she had just received an invitation to Buckingham Palace.
"Really. We couldn't impose it's your honeymoon you don't need a couple of old ladies hanging around" said Phillipa.
"We do. Really" I said.
"I'm not known for my social skills Phillipa you interest me. And besides we're staying in the Noel Coward suite."
Phillipa smiled "Then thank you. We would be delighted wouldn't we, Audrey?"
"Oh yes. You know Phillipa knew the Master."
"I was no more than an slight acquaintance. I doubt if he knew my name." said Phillipa correcting her enthiastic friend.
"Alright girls. What do you want to do? Go to the hotel or see the reptile show?"
Audrey shivered "I don't know about reptiles. Snakes frighten me."
Phillipa laughed "I rather like them"
It was Phillipa who put up her hand when the reptile handlers asked for a volunteer. She was fearless, holding all manner of snakes but Greg went to her aid the moment he saw the handler holding up a large python. "Phillipa you can't it's too heavy for you" and he took most of the weight of the huge South American boa constrictor. It was one of the best photographs I took all day almost as good as the ones with Greg and the baby Orang Utan. They were the happy photographs. He was right about Phillipa, she had a story. A daughter of the Raj she was in Singapore when it fell to the Japanese in 1942. She had been a prisoner of war. I watched fondly as Greg fell in friendship with that wonderful brave woman who was old enough to be his grandmother.
I had fallen in love with Greg because he could surprise me. I loved him so much. I really believed that we he would continue to surprising me even as we grew old together. If only I had been brave. If I had been I would have stayed.
"Trust your instincts. If you have no instincts, trust your impulses." - Noel Coward
Waking, it took a moment to realise I was in Princeton. Mark was up.
"What time is it?
Mark smiled like he had won a point "Nine thirty"
"Why didn't you wake me? We have that appointment at ten." I said scrambling out of bed wrapping the sheet around my body and pulling it after me.
"No we haven't. I've decided I'm not going" he said triumphantly.
"What!"
"I'm not going."
"That's just stupid. Don't you realise there are people all over the country who would pay anything for an appointment with Gregory House."
"That's why I'm not going? Who knows what your ex-lover's fee will be?"
"You are being ridiculous."
"I'll bet he'd expect me to watch." I hated it when Mark started to talk like that. The smutty conversation and sexual slurs were all part of the change in him. Part of the illness and, whatever that illness was, I knew I could trust Greg to work it out and cure him.
"Please don't be like that, Mark."
"Like what? Have you screwed him yet? Have you already paid the fee?"
"Shut up. Just shut up"
"Is that why you were out half the day yesterday?"
He shoved me down on the bed and held me there as he climbed on top of me.
"Mark. Stop it."
"Or what. You'll scream 'Rape' ... you're my God-damned wife Stace" He climbed off angrily and turned away from me.
"Bitch" he muttered.
I said nothing when he was like this there was no reasoning with him. All I could do was wait.
"So what is the great doctor like in bed? Better than me? Bigger than me?"
He knew I would never tell him however many times he asked. Sometimes I wondered if he had guessed the answer but I knew if I ever told him our marriage would end. Greg was the best lover I ever had before or since but that part of him did not return from the hospital after the infarction.
I picked up the sheet and, unnoticed by Mark, grabbed the cell-phone and headed for the bathroom.
"I need to take a shower" I said and with relief locked the door on his anger. I turned the shower on full belt and then dialled Greg's office. A woman answered giving her name as Dr Cameron. "This is Stacy Warner. May I speak to Dr.House please?"
I could almost hear her smile and she obviously took a certain amount of pleasure in saying "I'm sorry. Dr House isn't available at the moment, Mrs Warner. But I see he has your husband calendered for ten. Is there anyway I can help you?"
"We are going to have to re-schedule that appointment."
"Oh?"
I wasn't going to let the girl get away with that proprietorial attitude. I spoke in the sweetest tones but left her in not doubt about my place in Greg's life.
"If you could just let Greg know that we cannot make it at ten, Dr Cameron.' I said, "I'll be talking to Greg later and we can sort out another time then. Thank you for being so helpful. Bye now." I hung up deciding to call Greg at home. There was no way I was going to deal with his gatekeepers.
I stepped into the shower. Shutting my eyes I just let the water run over me and thought of Greg. We had always showered together he was so tall that in my bare feet the top of my head was only just above his shoulders. We would wash each other lovingly and carefully not missing a single crevice or fold. There was nothing I wanted to hide from him and nothing he wished to hide from me, I adored the feel of his body and he cherished mine. Finally he would shampoo my hair working it into a rich lather as he massaged my scalp with his long, strong fingers.
I couldn't get Phillipa out of my mind even when we stepped into the shower in the Noel Coward suite. Only ten minutes earlier we had farewelled Phillipa and Audrey on the front steps of Raffles we had organised for our chauffeur to drive them back to The Mandarin on Orchard Road where they were staying. "Why would she travel with someone like Audrey?" I asked.
"She's old, she's dying, she's has no one of her own and choices are few. She couldn't travel alone. Not anymore."
"How long has she got?"
"Not long. Days, weeks maybe a year." he paused as he poured a measure of shampoo onto my head and we sat together on the floor of shower as he massaged the liquid into a lather. "Darling."
I leant back into his chest using his thighs like armrests. "Yes."
"I think we should take her to Changi tomorrow. She will be saying goodbye for the last time."
"I was hoping you'd say that." I said turning my head around and snuggling into his chest. We didn't bother to dry off or go the the bedroom we made love on the cool marble floor of the shower as water from eight jets danced off our bodies.