[Blue Jacaranda] 蓝花楹 - Chapter 8 何木屋语2021-10-02 07:19:09
Chapter 8
澳洲：何木
Peter, we are going to have a beach party this saturday, do come,” Melody texted in Wechat.
“This saturday?” replied Peter, “I have to work all day till late on every weekend, the busiest time.”
“What a pity,” Melody replied. “Can't you just ask for a leave? We haven’t gone out for weeks!”
Just then, the doorbell began to buzz. Peter saw a man’s face turning up in the CCTV camera, so he quickly ended the Wechat session, “Talk to you later Love.”
His job, though paid handsomely, was not admirable by societal convention. It was a massage parlour, another name for a low-end brothel in Sydney. So he had never told anyone about his new job. Melody was still thinking he worked in a Yum Cha restaurant. But that job was canceled three weeks ago and while going through the ads in a Chinese newspaper, he came across a Receptionist Wanted at a Massage ‘shop’. He had heard about this type of indecent business but at that moment his curiosity overcame his aversion and at last, after a minute of hesitation, he dialed the number.
The boss was a Chinese Australian, a nice middle-aged woman, particularly kind, praising his good English, saying ‘there is nothing wrong with the job, really’. So her smiles, pretentious or not, had earned his trust, cleared much of his remaining concerns. Three weeks had now passed and he had earned the amount of money he would have had to work for months on other types of jobs.
Safety was the key consideration in running the business. Rose, the boss, had trained him extensively on how to tell the ‘good’ and ‘bad’ faces apart.
The one in the camera was rather typical. A little timid, shifty, anxious, daring not to look around but keeping alert for any passing eyes or sounds.
Without further scrutiny on the man, Peter pressed the button, and with a buzz, the heavy, metal-framed security door clicked to open.
“Welcome, Sir,” Peter greeted him politely with a smile, “How may I help you?”
The man muttered, “Well…”
Peter, now certain he was not coming for any other purpose, beckoned him through the corridor, “Follow me please.”
Inside the room, Peter said to him, “Take a seat and wait a second,” and made his exit.
Three girls, then free and available, were in the living room watching TV. After being noticed they all arose, and after throwing off their outfit, filed into the room where the man was waiting. Peter stayed at the doorstep, while the girls lined up, in their bikinis, waving ‘Hi’ and their names one after another to the customer.
When they were out of the room, Peter stepped in. “So, what is your choice, Sir?”
The man on the sofa, handling a colourful magazine, one of the pornography piles on the table, looked up and said uncertainly, “Ehmm...the left one?”
“The left one? Kathy?”
“I didn’t fetch her name.”
“Yes, that must be Kathy,” said Peter, “So what service, 30 minutes for $90, or 60 minutes for $160.”
“30 please.”
The man was then led to another room, and Peter went out to inform Kathy of her new business.
An hour later, the man leaked out. Kathy had been clever enough to persuade him to have an extension.
As the receptionist, Peter’s job was answering calls, greeting customers and managing possible disputes. So far so good, the only disadvantage was that he couldn’t find enough time with Melody. Since their trip to Hunter Valley, he had grown more in love with her. Her ‘spirit’, her active body, and of course her ‘wealth’, had combined to become a magic to him. With her, he was never bored, with plenty of her ideas and adventures, as well as his own that would also run more readily under her stimulation. And he wondered why he had not discovered this earlier in their first dates. And how absurd it had been that he could have disliked her simply because of her ‘make-up’.
But he couldn’t spare time as freely as Melody, who didn’t have to work. All she thought about was enjoying life, making love, going to an art gallery, doing all sorts of things that could help inspire her artistic creativity.
He had to admit that when he saw those ladies in the shop, half-naked, he did have a man’s ‘instinctive’ reaction, but instead of wanting them, he always wanted Melody. “Does this prove my true love for her?” he wondered. His experience with her was so sweet and unforgettable that it had consumed all his sextual imagination, and he felt he couldn’t have enough of her.
Sometimes, the girls even ‘flirted’ with him, who in their eyes was still a student, framed in a pair of innocent glasses. But no matter how erotic their figures were, he couldn’t get rid of the feeling that they were somehow ‘stained’.
“Peter, come over,” Kathy was calling.
Peter left the desk and went to the room. Kathy was asking him to help tie up her bra from the back. He had ‘helped’ her for quite a few times, and he knew that she had never given up seducing him.
Facing her sleek back and full and round buttocks, Peter gained the laces to meet at the tiny locks. Then just as Peter was about to leave, Kathy turned suddenly, grabbed one of his hands and placed it straight onto her hairy field.
“Kathy …” Peter laughed off, battling the Good and Bad sensation of the soft and rough, her wildly grown turf. “I need to watch the camera closely or Rose will fire me on the spot.”
And Kathy, giggling, her body in tremors, pushed him away.
Kathy was a girl never quite serious. She was from Vietnam, coming to Sydney as a tourist. She had creamy skin, with a fleshy waist-round and sizable breasts. She had once told him that she had a boyfriend in Vietnam who had been with her for four years.
“Do you still love him?” he asked. “Why hadn’t he accompanied you to Australia?”
“Of course I love him and we are planning to get married this spring,” she spoke now in a more serious manner. “But now I wish I could stay in Australia, and later find a way to bring him over.”
“That would be very difficult?”
“Yes, very,” said Kathy. “I may have to get someone to marry first, and then divorce, and then I can sponsor him.”
“That would take many years?”
“Yes, it is really hard, isn’t it?”
“Well, good luck,” Peter said, wishing her all the best in her better-life seeking endeavours.
One night after his evening shift, in Melody's car, the only love-bed of theirs for the last three weeks, Melody asked him to quit his now ‘unusually busy restaurant’ job. “We couldn’t get away travelling because of it,” she said unhappily, who was bodily connected on his lap, at the back seat.
With his hands Peter cupped her head and pressed it down so that he could glide his lips from her nipples along her neck up toward her lips. In her car, it was the best position after many of their experiments, with intimate eye contact of their connectivity.
“You know, Melody,” explained Peter. “I have vowed to my parents to become independent when I get to university. My stubborn father had often argued that I was a boy much spoiled by my mother and more so by my grandparents. I have therefore resolved to change the way he was thinking of me. See, Melody, I can’t do without a job, of all types, and the current one, although with long hours, has extremely, extremely big wages.”
Amused by her favourite ‘Extremely’, Melody deliberated a jerky move that shot Peter a gasp and he had to squeeze her buttocks hard for a stop-signal.
“Extremely big wages?” Melody patted his face, “At a Yum-cha house?”
“Yes,” Peter decided to stick to his lie. “It is unusually good, isn’t it? But still it is just a kind of job. I have been trying many things, fruit picker, kitchen hand, office cleaner, even having learnt how to make cocktails so I can be a bartender.”
“Well, how could you get good pay at a restaurant? I have heard that Chinese bosses often pay less than the minimum wage to students. You are not telling me the truth, are you?”
Peter was hesitating. Could he possibly hide it forever from her, as smart as she is?
Of course not. “Okay, okay, but you promise you won’t get overly surprised.”
Melody’s spirit went up, shaking him, “Oh my god, you do have secrets from me, what, what, quick, quick...”
“Well, I am a receptionist, in a Massage.”
“Massage?” her eyebrows twitched. “Is it an honest massage, or for something else?”
“Something else.”
“Oh my god,” Melody exclaimed, her body giving such a twist that his member nearly slipped out of her. “You really work in that place?”
“Calm down, Melody,” Peter begged, stabilizing her, now regretting having told her of his secret, “It is nothing but a kind of job, taking phone calls, greeting customers, that is all.”
“But you see those girls?”
“Of course, but that is nothing, I don't feel a thing.”
“I don’t believe you,” she said, “aren’t they beautiful, and sexy?”
“Well, sexy, of course, otherwise they may not have their job? But beautiful? I don’t think so. Think for a moment, how can they be beautiful, considering they are doing that with so many men.”
“So you think they are...they are ‘dirty’?”
“Well, sort of…”
“Oh, so interesting, I wonder how they can handle it?”
“You don’t need to wonder, Melody, you are rich, never lacking money, and you have a free and strong mind, and never have to do anything you don’t like.”
“Are there girls from China?”
“Kind of a mix, mostly from Asian countries and also occasionally Europeans,” said Peter whose worry had now eased by many of her questions, and he added one more report intending to please her, “There was once a journalist from Britain who, in my view, was the most beautiful western woman I had ever seen.”
“Ah?” Melody stared intensely, “So you ...”
“Oh, no, no,” denied Peter in haste, “How come, I am just a receptionist, Melody!”
Melody laughed. “But a receptionist has the potential to turn into a client, as convenient as you are. Anyway, tell me how beautiful she is.”
“Well, hard to describe, just like the face and figure of some movie star.”
“Why would she do such a thing?”
“Well, I heard from other girls that she needed money for her holiday, and also she found it a good way to know more about men and the general society, as the need of her profession of journalist, serving multiple purposes.”
“Oh, such a novice but terrible idea,” said Melody, “But could it really be a way to understand men, and society?”
“Well, it must be,” Peter said, “at least to her.”
“Are you sure you have not … with her?” Melody pinched his ears. “If you tell me another lie, I would…” she began to nibble his lips.
The moment his mouth was set free, Peter went on explaining, “Melody, you should have faith in me, see, to me, she was only like a clothes model or a kind of good looking sculpture. I can only have a real desire for Asian girls, as I have realized after seeing her...”
Melody cut in swiftly, “Seeing her, whom? Seeing her what?”
Peter knew he had made another blunder. Now he had to reveal more to complete the whole picture. “Well, in addition to taking calls and receiving customers, I also need to check and clean up things after they have finished, and oftentimes the girls are still naked, putting on their flimsy things. But, don’t allow your imagination to go off the track, I am all acting Professionally, and it is forbidden for me to have any affairs with them.”
“So, you see her naked?”
Peter answered with a hard kiss. And just at that moment Peter had lost his control and, seizing her with all his might, he emptied his body and soul into her, who had sucked him like the black hole of the sun.
The next day, Melody sent a message, “Peter, can I visit your shop?”
Peter was alarmed, “Why?”
“Don’t panic, I am only curious, I just want to know what it is like.”
“Oh, my god, I thought you were so impressed by that journalist, and ..”
“Peter, what are you thinking about, in no way I would do that.”
“Melody, listen, I won’t let you come near the place,” Peter said, unusually firm.
“Why?”
“No reason, just no, no, no, I don’t want you to have the least trace of that feeling.”
Her next text came a little late, showing the rare retreatment from her strong-headed ways, “Okay, may I have another easier ask then, can you introduce one of the girls, preferably Chinese to me?”
“Why?”
“Just have a chat, you see, I want to know more about Them.”
“But I don't think they would like to talk to you. Even myself have little chance chatting with Chinese girls,” said Peter, “It is understandable that they avoid any possible encounters that may lead to their exposure.''
“Try your best anyway, I will double the price paid to them, telling them I mean no harm.”
“Really, double price?” Peter was amazed, and stopped short of saying ‘you could just pay me for that sort of information’. “Melody, don’t waste your money. What I have already told you is not enough for you?”
“Certainly not, I need the perspective from a woman, and they won’t tell you a man everything in that nature. See, I am not bold enough to try it myself like that Journalist, hahaha...”
“Melody, you are either crazy or really bored to death.”
“Come on, Peter, I just want to have a chat. That is all.”
“Well, I may try but I can’t guarantee.”
“Bingo, I am Waiting for you.”
And Peter knew what her ‘Waiting’ really meant.
Three days later a meeting was arranged for Melody, and Mellisa who was a sophomore university student as she had revealed to him for the first time. The place was in a German bar at Rocks, only ten minutes of walk from the Opera House.
Peter accompanied them to the bar, and, after downing a one-litre jug of the German beer, he left them alone, so that the two girls could retain their female’s privacy.
“Mellisa, thank you for agreeing to see me,” began Melody, very much in the tone of a journalist.
“Never mind, and thank you as well,” returned Mellisa, who in her jeans looked as natural and innocent as any other girl of her age.
“You know, since Peter told me he worked at the place, my curiosity was so strong that I even conceived the idea of doing it for one or two days myself, for the sake of a lifetime experience. I know this sounds exceedingly crazy, but you know, I sometimes can't resist that kind of fantasy.”
Melissa, amused and much relaxed by Melody’s ‘fantasy’, burst into laughter.
“Sorry, no offense,” she apologized for her outburst, “But yes, it is exceedingly crazy. And my advice here is, you should never ever contemplate the idea, even if you are desperately in need of quick money like me before, which is clearly not in your case. See I should never have started it in the first place.”
“But Peter told me that there had been a British journalist who were quite okay with gaining such experience.”
“You mean Natalie?” said Mellisa, “but how could we Chinese compare to her? They have a very different culture, living their own life, individualist as they are. But we tend to live in a close-knitted community, we don’t have the option not to care about other people’s opinion.”
“Well, I can’t entirely agree with you. We are after all China's new generation. People on the planet are not much different from each other, save for the environments in which we are brought up,” Melody paused to sip her dark beer, forked a short piece of German sausage and sent it to her mouth. “I just want to know how one may feel, I mean, doing it with a great number of total strangers.”
“Well, that experience is not fun at all if you must imagine… sorry, what is your name again?”
“Melody.”
“Melody, trust me, it is absolutely not fun at all. Most of the girls are just for the quick money, only very very few who might take it as a kind of lifestyle, even for the more open westerners.”
“Would you mind then telling me how you felt about it, especially at the beginning?” said Melody, going straight to the critical part of her interest.
Mellisa drank her beer, as if borrowing some courage from it in order to revisit her past. “My first time was a real shock, though somehow I felt amazed as much as disgusted. The man was a very fat man, nearly three times my size everywhere. I had never seen such an enormity, in its naked form, with flesh wrapping and creasing in every place. During the process, I was half-dazed, kind of smothered, and molested by a slow-moving and panting monster, and I was not exactly able to feel what he was doing to me.”
“How? You couldn’t feel?”
“I guessed I had been super nervous, you know, for the first time, and it was not at all like what I had pictured in the scenarios. And later, like most first timers, I kept washing my body, a hundred times, but that kind of feeling will never go away. It is not about the actual stuff, dirt as such, rather than the mind and memory.”
“So have you been feeling any better, or worse, since then?”
“How could it be better? Even if you are not as nervous, you then have your full attention back to your physicals, that is when you feel repulsed by the very intrusion, you feel you are a toilet.”
“Oh, what a word...” Melody couldn’t help but be amused, “So .. have you had any pleasure at all, I mean even the mere physical response, under some rare circumstances?”
“No, no, never to me, ‘pleasure’ has never been a word for me. Some other girls told me they had feelings occasionally, but not me. I couldn’t have any kind of positive feelings in it. It was a monetary transaction, I was a machine. I just wanted it to finish quickly.”
“Not even when the man is very good-looking, or say, has a great athlete body with six-packs?”
“In that case, your mind would be busily wondering about this strange man, and couldn’t relax even if you had wished so. Your mind is in contradiction with your body, like oil and water, not compatible. Sometimes your body might be caught unawares by what they did to you, and so provoked, but your mind was always ready to suppress it.”
“Oh...how could you separate your mind and body?”
“Well, you force it, until it becomes a habit. The body is not thinking, yet still alive to feel things. So I must rally my mind to fight against it. This is not like when I am with my boyfriend, where they can be on the same page.”
“You have a boyfriend?”
“Yes, he is also a student here.”
“Ah?”
“Yes, it is surprising, isn’t it? But he would never know about it, and I love him, more so after all my secret suffering experience. My real feelings are all reserved for him. Oftentimes I had to close my eyes only thinking of him to pass the hard times.”
“Oh…”
“Since my father’s business turned bad, I have been making money to support myself. My parents are already in deep debt, and I don’t want to add more burden to them.”
“It is really hard for you.”
“Yes, but what can I do? I have done a lot of jobs, most paying very little, let alone the number of hours is limited by my study. I still need graduation otherwise it will be a total sinking of my life.”
“Can’t your boyfriend help?”
“He comes from an average family, having to work hard to make money too.”
Melody, who had never had to worry about money, for the moment had a surge of sympathy for the poor couple, and also seemed to understand more about her hard-working Peter, and her enduring resentment towards her parents, for not having cared for her enough in her earlier years, seemed aso lessening, and she suddenly felt she was missing them and