The Oddfits (5 page)

As if the number of competitors wasn’t enough, there was also the problem of Singaporean stinginess. Ready-made food could be gotten so cheaply that many Singaporeans had stopped cooking all together, preferring to head to the hawker centres for all the family’s meals. If you knew the right places to go, you could pay as little as forty cents for a gloriously greasy prata with curry on the side; eighty cents for a fat popiah roll stuffed with radish, shrimp, egg, and lap cheong sausage; and two dollars for a giant bowl of fish-ball noodle soup. The older and wiser Shakti Vithani now knew that even though Singapore was a nation of food-obsessed individuals, it took something really special to convince the average Singaporean to go for the pricier option—to whip out the credit card rather than the change purse. Even the wealthiest CEO could be found boasting of the tasty bargain he’d just discovered hidden away in the corner of a dingy, no-name hawker centre.

The Spice Larder had been lucky. Shakti’s next restaurant attempt had been disastrous. In all probability, it was the most infamous restaurant in the entirety of Singaporean culinary history. Like its older sibling, the Colonial Table served Indian cuisine, but attempted to add a historical dimension to its diners’ experience by recreating the atmosphere of colonial India during the height of the British Raj. This involved all the waiters not only wearing the garb of Indian servants and addressing the patrons as “sahib” and “memsahib,” but also, if they weren’t naturally of a brownish hue, having their skin painted so from head to toe. Shakti
might
have been able to get away with even that, but applying white powder to the patrons’ faces upon their entrance into the restaurant sent the whole establishment tumbling into the abyss. The restaurant had been roundly condemned from all quarters as “insensitive,” “bigoted,” and “in poor taste.” She’d merely intended the restaurant to be “kitsch-chic” and hadn’t meant to offend anyone.

“I don’t see what the bloody fuss is all about,” she had said angrily to her husband over breakfast. She had just finished reading an article in the op-ed section of the paper about all the kerfuffle that the Colonial Table was causing. “You’d think we’d all be able to have a good laugh about colonization by now,
yaar
? After all, the sun
has
bloody well set on the bloody British Empire.”

Sweeping the pages of the newspaper off the table onto the floor, along with her teacup and saucer, she crossed her arms and sulked.

Mr. Vithani looked up from his breakfast. “Well, dear, I
told
you that the whole concept might be a bit insensitive.”

“Oh, shut up.”

Years later, Shakti still winced at the memory. She had dared to walk the fine line between tastelessness and fashionably risqué, and, with the Colonial Table, she had fallen on the side of tastelessness. A year later, she had attempted to play it safe with another restaurant venture—the Phoenix—only to produce a thoroughly insipid dining experience. The Phoenix was really nothing special: just one more unremarkable East-meets-West fusion restaurant among the many others. Like so many of its kind, its attempt to blend the wonderful, distinctive flavours of both worlds resulted in a mediocre mish-mash of taste that was neither here nor there.
The Straits Times
reviewer gave it three stars out of five, which wasn’t bad at all, considering the positively scathing review that appeared in the Singaporean high-society magazine,
Prestige
. “One can only hope,” concluded the
Prestige
reviewer, “that after its imminent closure, this Phoenix will not be rising from the ashes anytime soon.” It seemed inevitable that the reviewer’s prediction would come to pass: after taking a nasty tumble from its nest, the fledgling fine-dining establishment was barely clinging to life, fading further with each passing week. The poor thing was only being kept in existence by a twice-weekly busload of unwitting Japanese and German tourists—the victims of a deal Shakti had struck with a local tour-group company in exchange for a small share of the profits.

At the time, Shakti Vithani had been distressed beyond measure. But with the prospect of a second failure looming on the horizon, Mrs. Vithani had summoned all her energy and courage to yet again walk that fine line, and this time, found that it was indeed possible to find her balance. The idea for L’Abattoir’s signature
arena had come to Mrs. Vithani as she was sitting at the sushi counter of a Japanese restaurant at the Fullerton Hotel. Watching the sushi chef at work, deftly slicing up sea creatures, shaping rice, and rolling maki, it dawned on her that the Japanese were very clever people indeed—perhaps it was all the fish they ate, fish being good for the brain and all that. Instead of hiding the workings of food preparation away in a back kitchen, they had managed to make it an integral part of the dining experience. Not just the maki-rolling sushi chefs! Think of the knife-juggling, steak-dicing culinary acrobats of the teppanyaki grills! Chefs who could dice a carrot in midair and toss spatulafuls of fried rice into bowls blindfolded without spilling a single grain! The wheels of her mind began to turn. Then again, why resort to cheap circus tricks? Shouldn’t the diner rest easy about the freshness not only of his seafood, but of his poultry and red meat as well?

Inspiration overwhelmed her. Demanding the use of a notepad and a pen from a waiter, she began scribbling furiously, pausing only to take hurried and ferocious bites of her sashimi. Images of solemn executions flashed before her mind’s eye: the grandeur of the Roman Coliseum, the terror of the guillotine, the sinister Tower of London. She scrawled down phrases and words indecipherable to anyone but her: “One at a time.” “Executioners must wear black.” “What to do about excessive blood?” She sketched rudimentary variations of what she had in mind: a raised wooden platform in the middle of a medieval-style banquet hall, a miniature version of a Greek amphitheatre with the stage surrounded by glass panes. Finally, she arrived at something that would eventually evolve into the final blueprints that would make L’Abattoir
the preferred restaurant of the rich, the famous, the glitzy, the glamorous, and all aspirants thereto.

She had drawn that sketch six years ago. Six years before the restaurant became so adored by the crème de la crème
of Singaporean high society that it became known affectionately as “L’Abs.” Six years before L’Abattoir earned a place on the San Pellegrino World’s Fifty Best Restaurants list. Six years before Success with a capital
S
had finally scooped up Shakti Vithani, flopping and flailing about in her little pond, and deposited her in international waters to swim with the rest of the big-fish restaurateurs. And now, this very evening, it stood gleaming in the middle of her restaurant in all its glory: a circular arena about ten metres in diameter, walled in soundproof glass, surrounded by tables at which excited patrons perched on the edges of their black velvet chairs, craning their necks in anticipation of the evening’s grisly entertainment. The arena floor was covered in white sand. A heavy black curtain on one side of the arena concealed a corridor to the restaurant kitchen from which the players in the night’s performance could make their entrances and exits.

Even after all this time, Mrs. Vithani had not tired of watching the spectacle for which L’Abs was so famous. And now, with her calorie-free caffeinated beverage in hand, she sauntered over from the bar to the small table that was always kept specially reserved for her. The deep, rolling rumble of Japanese
taiko
drums, one in each corner of the restaurant, swelled, announcing that it was time for the show to begin. The restaurant grew quiet, and everyone turned their hungry eyes to the entrance of the arena. The curtains parted, and a tall, bony man clad in form-fitting black clothes strode in, a long, thin sword hanging at a sheath by his side. The bottom part of his face was covered with black silk wrapped snugly around his nose, mouth, and chin. The audience murmured appreciatively. It was the restaurant’s star butcher—the most infamous of L’Abattoir’s meat-slaughtering fleet. And he was not alone. At arm’s length, he held a flailing duck firmly by the neck. The soundproof glass rendered the whole scene mute—a silent film or a moving work of art on canvas, a visual narrative unfolding to the ominous reverberation of the drums.

For what seemed like eternity frozen, the figure stood motionless in the centre of the arena, head bowed downwards, hand outstretched. The only movements were made by the desperate duck, who was now beating her wings weakly and listlessly, as if her struggle were merely an obligatory gesture rather than an actual attempt to free herself. A few of the diners lowered their gaze or averted their heads slightly as the tension mounted. Shakti couldn’t tear her eyes away.

The executioner lifted his head and assessed his victim calmly and evenly. He looked long into her wide, terror-stricken pupils, which darted every which way in a flurry of motion. Mrs. Vithani held her breath. Everybody did. The drums swelled and subsided, swelled and subsided, like a great heart heaving, pulsing, throbbing. Faster. Faster. Faster. Then silence.

In one swift, seamless movement, the executioner threw the duck upward. A sword flashed from its scabbard and swung into an arc, severing her throat before she even had time to flutter. A streak of crimson lightning split the air and scattered into droplets on the white sand. The headless body fell at his feet, the head landing a metre to his left. An attendant, also clad in black, swiftly entered the arena, bundled the head and flopping body into a black basket, and exited just as quickly to present the chef with the fresh meat.

The executioner remained for a moment longer. Wiping his sword with a black rag that he then let drop to the floor, he made one solemn bow, turned sharply, and made his exit. Over the next few minutes,
the atmosphere of silent awe dissolved and the clink of silverware and light-hearted chatter prevailed once more. Or at least it would for the next fifteen minutes, until the black-clad minions now cleaning the glass panels and scooping up the bloodstained sand had prepared the
arena for the next performance.

The L’Abattoir waitstaff had been trained to never
ever
serve food and drink during performances, and like most of the other waitstaff, Murgatroyd had been standing against a wall to the side of the arena, watching the performance until it was over and service was resumed. Unlike his fellow waiters, however, Murgatroyd wasn’t really paying attention to what was going on in the arena. Instead, his mind was adrift somewhere else, dwelling on something that, unbeknownst to him, he spent the rest of his life forgetting: the revelation he had received at the age of nine. A period of sixteen years had made the revelation vaguer, dimmer, dustier, but it was still there, floating about like a little paper boat in the flooded subterranean caverns of his consciousness.
Something extraordinarily stupendous is waiting for me
. There it was. How could he have forgotten? Then the performance ended and life picked up where it left off. The other waiters resumed their activities, but Murgatroyd remained leaning against the wall for a few more seconds, staring abstractedly into the distance, holding the two plates of fig and rocket salad that the Tans had ordered.

A terrible screeching sound caused him to recall himself with a sudden jolt, and he looked up to see where it had come from: a Chinese woman sitting alone at a table, scraping her butter knife over her bread plate as if she were drawing a bow over the bowstring of a violin. She appeared to be completely absorbed in this activity, oblivious to everyone and everything else, including the scowling patrons around her. Yet, her other hand, as if acting with a mind of its own, pointed at him and beckoned him over with an impatient gesture.

Murgatroyd approached the table. “Yes, madam?” he asked politely, masking his shock as best he could. Only as he came closer, and only as she turned to look at him full in the face, did he see the black velvet patch covering her right eye, which seemed to accentuate rather than draw attention away from a startlingly green left eye, brilliant and garish, as if an emerald had been lodged there in place of the iris.

She put the knife down and took a sip of water. “Enjoying the show?”

There was nothing funny about the question, but he chuckled softly, as if she had made some witty joke. “Quite, madam. Can I get you anything?”

“Well, you could drop the ‘polite waiter’ persona.”

Murgatroyd coughed. “Excuse me, madam?”

The woman took another sip of water.

“Tell me something, Murgatroyd.”

He was getting a little nervous. Perhaps Shakti Vithani had told her about him. How else would she know his name? But how did she know
that
name? He was Shwet Foo to everyone except his parents. Even Shakti called him that.

“Erh. What, madam?”

“Do you belong here?”

“Where, madam?”

She fished an ice cube out of her glass with her fingers and began rolling it around between her palms. “Oh, you know. Here. Working in this restaurant. Living with your parents. Hanging out with your best friend. Every now and then, secretly dreaming that something will alter the course of your entire existence, like you were doing just now.” She looked up at him again. “Is this life where you belong?”

Her intimate knowledge of his life’s particulars startled Murgatroyd. “Hah? What’s wrong with it?”

“Nothing’s
wrong
with it, Murgatroyd.” The ice cube completely melted, she wiped her hands elegantly on her serviette. “Nothing at all. And I mean that. I’m just asking you if you’re happy.”

“I—I suppose I am.”

“Oh,” the woman replied. Then, hunching over her bread plate, she turned all her attention to shredding her bread roll into a pile of crumbs. Murgatroyd was utterly bewildered.

“So
. . .
” he ventured.

“So what?” she replied, not bothering to look up.

“Is
. . .
is that all?”

“I suppose. You just told me this is where you belong, didn’t you? Nothing more to say.” Turning towards him, she regarded him with her good eye. “However.”