“People are looking,” Anthony tries to get her to lower her voice.
“Aiyah you! Always caring about what other people think!” Emily barks at him.
“You want me to be an accountant,” says Goldie as if she has waited so long to say this, birthed with new courage. “So I took up accountancy and gave it a go. But I hate it. I’m utterly bored and unhappy. Imprisoned by numbers and cooped up in the office. Can I now do what I wanted to do all along?”
“I don’t know why you can’t be like your two sisters,” Emily says, making the girls preen. “They’re younger than you but they are setting a better example than you. Winona is in medical school and will be a doctor like your grandpa. Andie is in law and takes after your paternal great-grandfather. And you, you want to be a professional scuba diver. Take after who? For what? Dive for pearls? Harvest seaweeds? Or waste your brains to be just a deep sea fisherman? You want to spend your entire life around old boats and smelly fish…?”
“Emily…!” Anthony says warningly.
“What? What? What?”
“Mum, I love the sea,” Goldie pleads. “Doesn’t my happiness count?”
Pansy is so delighted that her eldest granddaughter has inherited her and her family’s love for the sea. She is about to speak when Emily retorts:
“Wah! You think you take a job to be happy one! Young lady, you should take a job to earn money, to put food on the table, for you to get a nice condo, afford a maid, pay your COE for a car, join a country club, and invest for your retirement. You find a job that buys you prestige, a good name for yourself in society, attract a good husband, make your parents proud! You’re already scuba diving as a hobby what. Just keep it that way lah! No need to make it a profession!”
“Professional divers do play an important role,” Pansy says softly, not reacting to Emily’s caustic reference to fishermen. “Look at their efforts in the Korean Sewol ferry disaster. Without them, so many would not have been rescued…”
Goldie turns to look at Pansy, with the look of a kitten which has just been snatched away from a ferocious, barking dog. Her eyes shine with affection and she reaches out under the table to squeeze her grandmother’s hand. This gift of a touch is so precious to Pansy. It has been so long since she had this human connection that it almost makes her weep.
“Grandma, you are awesome!” Goldie whispers.
“Honey,” Anthony says. “Goldie has a point. She has given accountancy a good whack. Maybe now we can allow her to fulfil her heart’s desire…”
“How is she going to get enough money to buy herself a condo? Especially as she’s not showing signs of having any boyfriend, let alone a husband. Dressing like a lesbian does not help!”
“Emily!”
“Mum, sometimes your choice of words leaves very much to be desired,” Goldie says in an even tone. “What’s wrong with being a lesbian, in any case? Anyway, you don’t have to worry about me. I can take care of myself. I’ll soon be eligible to apply for my own HDB flat.”
“Are you a lesbian?” Emily almost shrieks.
“Mum!” says Winona in her sister’s defence. “You’re a hoot! In these modern times, a girl’s sexual proclivities are not such a big deal. Besides, it’s so old school to judge a person to be a lesbian by the way she dresses. What have you got against lesbians anyway? Are you going to disown me if I am one? As far as acquiring a home is concerned, a girl doesn’t need a husband for that these days.”
“Yeah, mum,” Andie joins in. “The reasons women in your time had to get married are no longer applicable for us these days. Today, we earn our own money and can support ourselves and buy our own home. We can even have babies through a sperm bank. No need to have a husband. Our government is so desperate for us to produce babies to plump up our zero-growth population that I bet you, before long, the government will also accept and support single unmarried mothers, like in the UK, Europe and the USA.”
“Aiyah! What nonsense!” Emily says. “This government will never tolerate unmarried mothers! You all modern girls talk such rubbish! A family unit will always be important. How can society exist without families?”
“Mum,” Andie says. “The government, as you called it, might try to call the shots but they can’t always succeed. Since 1983, our then prime minister has been trying to get graduate women to have babies. Today’s PM is still trying. So it is they who have to bend to societal changes. If they want babies, they will have to let us do it our way. The writing is on the wall for them if they don’t move with the times. I mean who would have thought that our PM would be on Twitter and have a Facebook account? Does this not show they know that the sand beneath their feet is shifting?”
“‘The confusion of marriage with morality has done more to destroy the conscience of the human race than any other single error.’ It’s a quote I saw on Facebook,” Winona says.
“Families can also be damaging, stifling the individual…” Goldie says under her breath, her mouth concealed by a giant rib.
“What did you say?” Emily demands.
“Anthony,” Pansy says, to divert the stream of conversation. “I wonder if you have time to drive me to our old place. I feel as if I must lay a ghost…”
“Lay a ghost? What ghost? This is not the Seventh Month of the Hungry Ghost what,” Emily asks. “Are you talking about exorcism? Aiyah! Bad luck talking about ghosts. What ghost ah?”
“It’s an English saying, honey,” Anthony explains. “It means that mum wants to go back to her old village so that she can let go of it.”
“Aiyoh, those houses on stilts have been gone so
