Buttocks Part I of The Amorous Centaur Gentleman’s Club By He Wapi Translated by Nicky Harman and Yvette Zhu

I.

FIRST UP, I should warn you this is a tragedy. On the surface, it’s a sexy skirt. You’re curious? Go ahead and lift the skirt to take a peek underneath—but take care you’re not blinded by crude, selfish desire. And please don’t feel sad about the story’s ending either. Our good-hearted heroine, Lilian Ma, was always going to be ruined one way or another. So ending her life in Mr. Black’s glass cabinet was by no means the worst thing that could have happened to her.
When she was nine, Lilian Ma began to notice something peculiar happening to her body. At the time, her name was not Lilian Ma but since most of this story takes place after she changed her name, let us, for the sake of convenience, call the child little Lilian. Little Lilian lived with her mother and two elder brothers in Ma Village, a few hundred li from M City. She was always skinny and undernourished because her family was dirt poor, but one day she noticed her buttocks swelling strangely. It was as if someone were injecting them with a litre of water every day. Before, she had always worn her brothers’ cut-down trousers but now she could barely get her legs into the trouser legs, let alone pull them up. Grumbling, her mother decided to stick to making skirts for her. That would save on fabric. It was a hot summer afternoon. The child Lilian went to play in a grove of trees, by a river that glinted silver. After checking that no one was around, she jumped into its cool water. The current lifted the skirt to her waist and her white buttocks floated on the water like cool, refreshing icebergs. Big white geese swam over, flapping their wings in noisy excitement, and landed on the icebergs where they frolicked and dozed. Suddenly, little Lilian heard hoots of laughter. She opened her eyes to see both banks crowded with children from neighbouring villages. Someone, she couldn’t see who, aimed a stone at her floating icebergs and others followed suit. The missiles rained down on little Lilian’s buttocks, startling the geese into flight. Little Lilian could not get near the shore, so she swam down the river with all her might. But the pain and humiliation followed her. “Freak! Freak! Freak!” The children hollered excitedly as they ran. Our poor little Lilian, at barely ten years old, was overwhelmed with terror and desperation. She wept and wailed, hands flailing, feet kicking, like a ship going down under enemy fire. Just at this moment, a gun sounded in the air above the trees. The children scattered like birds, whooping and hollering as they ran from the grove, and disappeared in the blink of an eye. A pair of weather-beaten, calloused hands reached out to little Lilian and pulled her from the water. Thank god, she thought: Uncle Ah-de has come to rescue me. Uncle Ah-de was the Ma Village forester. A bomb had exploded near him during the Korean War, making him stone deaf. Over time, he became increasingly taciturn and now he was more silent than a birch tree. He held the gun and gazed with astonishment at little Lilian’s rump under the wet skirt. He really didn’t know what to say.

II.

STARTING WITH HER first period, Lilian’s buttocks seemed to defy those laws of nature she had learnt in human biology class. They swelled up, almost bursting free of the bonds of little Lilian’s waist and thighs. Now that she was an adult (by which I mean she had reached the age of consent), her buttocks were famous in all the neighbouring villages. I don’t know if she had the world’s largest buttocks, but here are some numbers to give you a better understanding. At sixteen, she was 1.63 metres tall and the circumference of her buttocks was the same as her height. She weighed 70 kilos, of which about half was her buttocks. This made her twenty-four inch waist look especially slender by comparison. Sadly, her brain was not as developed as her buttocks. Out of all her classes, Chinese was the only one she scraped through and classical poetry was the only thing she liked. She often pretended to have a stomachache and slumped over the desk so that she could secretly read the Ming dynasty classic, “Jade Tablet Dreams,” a book said to be full of fanciful stories that were meant to appeal to female readers. One was the story of Mr. Black and the blind girl: “Mr. Black was a good man but somewhat unbending. A minister’s daughter was keen to marry him but, although she was beautiful, he spurned her and fell in love with her maid, a blind woman, plain and ordinary. She was really nothing to speak of, but she was very kind. After some years, Black passed the imperial examinations and everyone gathered at the temple to burn incense. There, the maid overheard some pilgrims say, ‘It will surely not be long before he marries the young lady.’ Knowing how lowborn she was, the maid felt very sorry for herself. Yet, to everyone’s astonishment, Black married the maid just a few days later.” Every time she read “Black married the maid,” Lilian Ma would cry with joy at its happy ending. She dreamed of meeting a real Mr. Black. He would utter the touching words, “Ah, dear girl, I like you just the way you are,” and she would be happy to cook and wash for him, and bear him three or four children. So whenever her boy classmates thought up new ways of tormenting her, she never felt too hurt. I’m just waiting for my Mr. Black to take me home, she said to herself. One day, the boys put two drawing pins on her chair and laid bets on whether her buttocks were padded with black cotton like the stuffed toys at the night market. She lifted her short skirt and sat down, only to jump up in agony and run around the room, tears pouring down her cheeks. Without thinking, she said, “My Mr. Black . . .” The worst thing was that her words drew ridicule on Mr. Black. The whole room burst out laughing: “Your Mr. Black’s going to need a rolling pin of a dick to fill your arse!” Lilian flushed scarlet and covered her ears. She got no further than lower middle school before deciding to pack up her books along with her big buttocks and leave. She’d heard that if she could save enough money, she could get cosmetic surgery. This would get rid of the kilos and kilos of surplus flesh from her buttocks and make her a normal woman. Just like all the other migrant worker girls, Lilian had heard tales of the fantastical things that went on in M City. She decided to try her luck too. So she bought a hard-seat train ticket and joined the tribe of drifters heading north. But one thing quickly became clear: opportunities come only to those who already have opportunities. Thus the rich get richer and the poor poorer. Apart for her huge buttocks, Lilian had nothing else to offer. At every interview, the interviewers’ jaws would drop as she stepped into the room. Immediately, those buttocks trumped her name, hometown, educational background and so on, and were all that the interviewers were interested in. One interviewer said as he rejected her, “We are an accounting firm, not a circus, miss.” Luckily for her, Lilian was not that smart. Half the time, she didn’t understand people’s sneaky mockery. They had been calling her a freak since she was ten. She was used to the special attention everyone paid her buttocks. Her self-esteem may have been low, but in general she was cheerful and optimistic. She was also thick-skinned and her tear glands were somewhat underdeveloped. The first job she got was waitressing at a Sichuan restaurant. But it was very difficult for her to weave her way between the crowded tables, encumbered as she was by those two lumps of fat. Whenever she turned, she would knock over some diner’s table. One night, as a punishment, she was made to stay behind to do the washing up on her own. As she was washing dishes and humming a little tune, big hands suddenly grabbed her haunches from behind. She screamed and tried to turn around. But the hands had her neck in a vice-like grip, and she found her face pushed into the soapy water. There was a sharp pain and something thrust between her buttocks. Water rushed in her ears. Then she heard a voice groaning in a Sichuan accent, “I’m sorry, ah! I’m really sorry. Your arse sticking up like that, like it’s inviting me to fuck you . . . Ah! Ah!” In this shameful way the chef, a man with a wife and a daughter, took her virginity. What made her feel even worse was that when, three days later, the restaurant dismissed her, he never even looked her in the eye. He just sat in a corner playing cards with a bunch of waitresses. After that, she found it very hard to get a respectable job. Occasionally an advertising agency might hire her to hang a sandwich board from her hips. “Big mama dumpling, the most delicious dumplings in China!” the board might read. Or, “New easy cure for syphilis!” Or, “Want cheap airline tickets? Try old man Sun.” All she needed to do was to walk up and down the city centre streets with the board hanging off her. She made ten yuan an hour.

III.

I DON’T WANT to tell my readers too much about Lilian’s dire predicament before she acquired the name “Lilian Ma”. You would feel dreadfully sorry for her, especially when you read the ending. She did have a few admirers, but mostly they just wanted to know whether having sex with a giant arse felt special. Some men kept very quiet about their relationship with her, as if they were trying to hide a dirty little addiction. Other men liked her to meet their friends and eagerly offered her to them to try. Her life was a mess and she often went hungry. The longest relationship she had was with an insurance salesman. He liked her to lay on top of him face-up, her big arse sliding up and down on his stomach. He gave sharp cries and whipped her buttocks with a leather belt: Faster! Faster! Faster! One day after making love, he sat up and leant against the headboard for a smoke. He reached into her moist pubic hair with the other hand, and broached his latest scheme. “You know why you can’t find a job, don’t you, darling?” Lilian shook her head. She took a deep breath and inhaled the B.O. from his armpit. “Once everyone sees your buttocks, they don’t notice your breasts or your face any more, let alone your brain.” Lilian looked at him expectantly, hoping he would tell her what to do. “You can’t change this, so why don’t you just face up to reality and use it to your advantage? We could partner up and advertise on the web: ‘Want to have sex with the world’s largest buttocks? Two thousand yuan a go, and cheap at the price.’ You’ll need protection from the odd pervert or deadbeat john but I’ll do that. We can split the money fifty-fifty or you get sixty and I get forty . . .” “I thought you loved me . . .” Lilian leapt off the bed and covered her bottom half. “There’s no love greater than this. Love shouldn’t be exclusive, should it?” Lilian bolted out the door. She hoped the insurance salesman would chase after her, telling her it was just a joke. But he didn’t. Lilian Ma had one genuine love affair after this: an earnest, good-natured security guard, Wang, who confessed that he liked watching her on her hands and knees wiping the floor. “Your buttocks inch forward like a little tank.” He giggled, fancying himself a poet. During the few months they lived together, M City was hosting the Olympics. Because of the threat of separatist terrorists, almost all of M City’s security guards were seconded to the Olympic Village. One day when Wang came home, he brought Lilian a very special present—a strand of curly golden hair. He was quite certain it was a pubic hair from Michael Phelps, the swimming champion Lilian hero-worshiped, because it was stuck to the plastic chair assigned to him. They studied this strand of Caucasian-American pubic hair for a long time. In the sunlight, it sometimes gleamed palely, at other times appeared tinged with red. Lilian Ma was overjoyed. Carefully she put it between two pieces of glass and mounted it in a frame. But one day when they strolled past a wedding photo shop, the security guard saw the girl’s gaze lingering on the shop window. He sighed. He knew in his heart it was time to part ways. “I shouldn’t waste your time any longer. I can’t marry you. I’m not a man with a lot of self-confidence. I don’t want all the men on the street giving my woman that kind of look, do you understand? It would be worse than her betraying me. It would make me feel even more inferior. Your buttocks are fated to belong to a man of exceptional quality. I have owned them for three months and that will content me for the rest of my life.” Lilian Ma moved out of the security guard’s rented room and wandered alone through the bitterly cold streets, holding the only photo she had of herself, as a nine-year-old. In the picture, she looked wafer-thin and her small, slitty eyes shone brightly. Standing in the wan light of the street lamps, she stared despondently at the picture and reminisced about the carefree life she had once led. How she wanted to hug the Lilian of her childhood! But when she reached out her arms, all she embraced was the falling snow and the chill air. “I’m a freak. I’m defective.” She lowered her head, her eyes welling with tears. Just at that moment, a pair of black leather boots came into view, standing on the snowy ground in the circle of lamplight. Lilian looked up to see a beautiful face, a face of such beauty that it was hard for Lilian to judge the woman’s age or parentage. She was statuesque, wore a gray woollen coat, and a few strands of curly hair escaped from under her woollen hat. Her large, deep-set eyes were as mysterious as the black hole of the cosmos. The woman extended her gloved hands and massaged Lilian’s shoulders. She asked with a charming smile, “What’s wrong?” “Look at me.” Lilian turned to show her buttocks. “Look, I’m a freak. There is no place I belong.” “Not true. There is a place that will welcome you. Come with me.” The woman’s voice was husky, her tone gentle. “There, you can have everything that is rightfully yours.” Somewhat bewildered, Lilian accepted the woman’s hand and followed her. And that was how she arrived with Lucy at the Amorous Centaur Gentleman’s Club and took the name you are familiar with, Lilian Ma. It was there that she would meet her Mr. Black.

IV.

LILIAN MA HAD never imagined that the busy thoroughfare she walked down every day concealed such a place. The club was in the penthouse of the city’s most expensive office tower and was reached by a stand-alone elevator from a secret garage. Compared to the Imperial Seafood Restaurant where she was once interviewed, this was many times grander. In the restaurant, all the dazzling glitter had just been spray-painted on, to feed the fantasies of the greasy-mouthed diners. But here, the telephone receivers, the ashtrays, the legs of the chairs … all were made from genuine pure gold. As Lucy said, “The clients who come here are the wealthiest and most influential of people. They are the emperors and this is their world.” As Lucy showed Lilian Ma around, she told her the history of the Amorous Centaur Gentleman’s Club. “It was set up, back in the days when you were just a baby, to cater to people who have seen everything the world has to offer and are sick of it, sick of eating delicacies, numb from dating movie stars. They feel their lives have suddenly lost a sense of direction. Some believe that they stand at the very pinnacle of the world, some even see death as the only way to shake off their feeling of futility. Only after coming to the Amorous Centaur Gentlemen’s Club do they understand the poverty of their imagination.” She chuckled. “Consequently, they have new goals to strive toward and life becomes more meaningful. So, you see, the Amorous Centaur Gentleman’s Club works very much like a psychotherapy centre.” Lucy turned on the lights. A chandelier covered the entire first floor ceiling and hung down, dazzlingly radiant. “That’s made from nine thousand, nine hundred and ninety-nine pieces of imported Czech crystal. The one in South Africa’s Sun City Hotel only has seven thousand crystals, even though they claim it’s the world’s largest . . .” she said contemptuously. “That’s because they don’t know about the Amorous Centaur Gentleman’s Club.” A peacock appeared suddenly before them, displaying its plumage with an air of bewilderment and melancholy, one foot raised in the air. “This is a wild Indian peacock. Its eyes have been replaced with Burmese jade. Chile’s largest ruby has been sewn into its chest. Its plumage is permanently on display.” She walked up the staircase and turned to smile mysteriously. “This is our secret. We have the world’s largest and best of everything, but the rest of the world will never know it. For example, your buttocks measure 2.052 meters. Although that’s smaller than the fattest woman in the Guinness Book of Records, the ratio of your waist to your buttocks is one to 6.462, so you have the world’s largest waist-to-hip ratio. That is your secret.” In a black silk dress, against which her back looked as white as the snow of the Swiss Alps, Lucy appeared to swim like a mermaid through the brilliant light shed by ten thousand carefully cut crystals. “Only secrets can offer such majestic pleasure. Only secrets can bring one nearer to eternity,” she intoned. Lilian Ma hurried after Lucy. She felt lowly and uncouth in these surroundings. Even a champagne flute from the Amorous Centaur Gentleman’s Club was nobler than she. They passed into an aquarium through a glassed-in passage. Sharks and whales swam over their heads. “You are very beautiful, do you know that?” Lucy turned to say. The blue water cast rippling shadows over her face. “No, not me,” Lilian Ma replied, trembling all over. “You are the most beautiful woman I’ve ever seen.” “Your beauty is like these fish.” Lucy pointed to a stingray swimming above their heads. “You are a creature of nature, able to arouse men’s sexual desires. I can’t do that.” She dropped her eyes and looked rather forlorn. “Things that are too perfect are lifeless, there to be praised, but not desired. But you should enjoy men’s desires, take pleasure in humiliation. This is the value you have.” At the end of the passage was a dance hall. The light was like a sea mist saturated with moisture. There was a small round stage in the centre of the room. “This is the stage for your life, Lilian Ma.”

V.

LILIAN MA’S JOB was very simple: every day she had to exhibit her buttocks. But this job was more challenging than hanging a sandwich board over her arse while walking around eating lamb kebab. First, she put on tight silver-coloured trousers, then she bent over until her head touched the floor and displayed her magnificent buttocks. Then, slowly, she removed her trousers. Lucy praised her control of pace; she did not move too fast, but at just the right speed to stir the emotions of the audience. Only Lilian Ma knew that she was not acting. It was because the trousers were too tight. It really was very difficult to take them off. In the end, she was left wearing only a thong, the narrow strip of fabric digging into her flesh so that it was almost invisible. She swayed her buttocks energetically to the rhythm of Lady Gaga, whirling as wildly as a discus-thrower about to hurl her discus into the audience. She enjoyed the moment when cool air sprayed from the ceiling, forming icy crystals on her buttocks. She would tremble all over and cry out, “How deliciously cool!” Sometimes there was a plotline: a huntress caught a wild boar (Lilian Ma) and thrust her into the fire. “Your arse looks more succulent than a virgin suckling pig. I want to eat you before you get old,” she said, holding a red-hot shovel close to Lilian’s rump. Lilian would bellow excitedly, feeling as if she really had become a wild boar. “We’ve had a few big arses, but they were nowhere near as good as yours,” the performer who played the huntress said as she took off her leather belt backstage. She had been a member of an army song-and-dance troupe and Lucy had taken her on at the Amorous Centaur Gentleman’s Club because of her beautiful voice. She said that the gentlemen here were much more civilized than the ones she was used to. After the performance, Lilian Ma walked amongst the audience, letting the gentlemen autograph her giant buttocks with a permanent marker. The Amorous Centaur Gentleman’s Club opened Lilian Ma’s eyes. Here she saw a woman with breasts so large that, when she stood up, they looked like two forearms. Here too was the girl with the world’s longest neck, collected by Lucy from the Kayan people in Xishuangbanna, Yunnan. There was a woman with a tongue almost half a metre long. And a woman with the world’s longest, thickest pubic hair—it dragged on the floor like a mop even when braided into two plaits. One woman had three firm and perky breasts. Sometimes she stood next to the door, a human hat stand with hat, scarf and walking stick hanging from her breasts. Here were what Lucy believed to be the world’s Most Beautiful Feet—size 37, every toe long and slender as fingers, the skin fine, white and smooth, cared for with the world’s most expensive face cream, the toenails painted gold. There was also a queen of hermaphrodites, more beautiful than ninety-eight per cent of the world’s women, with a long drooping penis which wobbled and struggled to jut upwards whenever she got excited. The girls at the Amorous Centaur Gentleman’s Club loved to play with it when they were bored. Sadly, all of them had signed away their rights to have sexual intercourse as part of their contract, because Lucy said abstinence was the only way to maintain a woman’s worth. “Freedom is cheap, and is the enemy of nobleness,” she always said. The women appeared carefree and unconcerned about their future. They had even more leisure than the child Lilian had once had, playing in her grove, and they had a roof over their heads, food to eat and a generous salary. Lilian Ma became good friends with her roommate, a girl with one violet eye and one green eye. People said she was the offspring of an American soldier who had raped a Thai woman. And this Thai woman herself was a quarter Chinese and a quarter Russian, the other half being North African or South American or some such. Lilian Ma never did get to the bottom of her parentage. The girl’s name was Joanne. Joanne smoked a cigarette, squinted from her violet eye and said, “Your face has the innocence that comes from growing up among peasants. It’s the perfect match for a lusty arse.” “Oh no, men don’t care about my face.” Lilian Ma lay face down on the bed. This was Lucy’s suggestion, lest she flatten her buttocks by sitting or lying too long. “How did Lucy persuade you to come here?” Joanne said, walking over to the window. Outside, all M City lay spread out beneath their feet. “Huh! She didn’t need to convince me. I had no place to go. I haven’t told Lucy, but I want to save money as fast as I can for an operation. Once I have money, I don’t need these anymore.” She looked at the great humps of her buttocks. “What more do you want? Here you’ve got the world’s grandest men, money, a stage, beautiful clothes. Look at your custom-made D & G silver trousers, do you know how much Lucy spent on them?” “There is no romance here.” “Poor thing,” Joanne blew a smoke ring at the window, lifting up her golden brown hair. “Watch out for Lucy, she loathes romance.” “How about you, Joanne? What’s your plan?” “I’ve been here three years. They’ll soon tire of the colours of my eyes and go looking for more exciting eyes. The day Lucy lets me go, I’ll take my money and go back to Thailand to look for my mother.”

VI.

LILIAN MA NOTICED a man in a white shirt sitting hidden in a dark corner, only the occasional sweeping beam of light picking him out. He surveyed the stage with a cool eye, massaging his chin as he watched the performance. He never cheered and rarely moved. A glistening stingray always undulated beneath his feet. One night, the Most Beautiful Feet left without saying goodbye. Joanne whispered to Lilian Ma that she had heard the Most Beautiful Feet arguing with Lucy on the roof. Although she couldn’t make out what they were arguing about, it was obvious Lucy was very upset. The rumour was that a client with a foot fetish had put a Cartier diamond ring on her big toe and asked her to marry him, and Lucy was trying to put a stop to it. The end result was that the Most Beautiful Feet eloped with her admirer overnight. Joanne was sceptical. “You really think that stupid girl could escape from Lucy’s clutches so easily?” One day after the performance, Lilian Ma saw the man in the white shirt waiting for her backstage. He bowed courteously, “Miss Lilian.” Flustered, Lilian tried to cover her almost naked nether regions with her coat. She felt almost stifled by the proximity of his black eyes and hair, and his understanding smile. Is this the Mr. Black I’ve been waiting for? went through her mind. So let’s call him Mr. Black, because when all is said and done, we have no idea who he was. Mr. Black threw himself into the pursuit of Lilian Ma. Every morning he gave her one rose. Every night before bed he would telephone to wish her good night. She felt so flattered, our Lilian had to pinch her buttocks every day to convince herself this was not a beautiful dream. Mr. Black planned to take Lilian Ma out on a date over the weekend. The day before, he sent her a custom-made red Dior evening gown. Lilian Ma eagerly stripped off her clothes and put it on. The slinky silk hugged her slim waist, and cascaded over her buttocks and right down to the floor. The effect was spectacular. Even though Joanne remarked sarcastically that she looked like the Queen of Hearts, Lilian Ma was so infatuated with her image that she could not tear herself away from the mirror for the entire evening. Mr. Black must have put a lot of thought into this romantic outing. He took her to an Italian restaurant, and then to watch opera. He even thoughtfully bought her two seats to accommodate her giant buttocks. When the tenor sang at the opera’s climax, Lilian Ma was so overwhelmed with emotion that she suddenly threw herself at Mr. Black’s lap, and took his penis into her mouth through his trousers. She could think of no other way to return Mr. Black’s kindness. Mr. Black hurriedly pulled her up and stopped her. Mr. Black got Lilian Ma back to the Amorous Centaur Gentleman’s Club unravaged. When they arrived at the secret garage, he took her hand gently and said good-bye. Lifting her skirts, Lilian Ma stumbled back to her room, afraid she would faint from happiness on the way. I have found my Mr. Black, she thought. He’s the only man who doesn’t want sex with me. He’s the only man who didn’t date me for sex. In the hallway, Lilian Ma ran into Lucy. Lucy’s face looked like a thundercloud. She had a silver fox stole draped around her shoulders, and the fox’s head reared up, its teeth bared malevolently. Remembering Joanne’s warning that Lucy didn’t like romance, Lilian Ma fled to her room and shut the door. Joanne was lying on the bed with a detective novel. Glancing up coolly, she noticed her friend’s obvious embarrassment, then carried on reading. Sometimes she read with her green eye, then changed to the violet one when she was tired. But when Lilian Ma talked excitedly about the scallops in cream she had had at dinner, Joanne felt obliged to interrupt, “But why does he like you?” “He said I remind him of his mother. She had plump buttocks too,” said Lilian Ma shyly. Joanne laughed lightly, “So you’d give the operation a miss just for the sake of this man’s admiration?” Lilian Ma was sure that Joanne was jealous, so she kept quiet. If she could secure Mr. Black’s love, if her great buttocks could give back to Mr. Black a kind of maternal love, of course she didn’t want to lose them. In fact, she would like them to grow a little bigger. “Let’s be honest, Lilian,” Joanne said, putting down her book. With her violet eye wide open and her green eye squinting, she was able to express two emotions simultaneously: warning and contempt. “Just stand next to Black, and you’ll see he’s completely out of your league. He and Lucy would be a match made in heaven! Do you really believe that old fox could love you, you little pullet?” Why was Joanne speaking to her in such a cruel tone of voice? Lilian Ma was outraged. She turned her back and said nothing, but secretly she began to worry. Maybe Joanne was right. How was it possible that in a world where there was Lucy, Black would choose her? She had been a joke, a freak, all her life. Even in an expensive evening gown, she was still a clown. On the second date, she sat despondently in the back seat of the car and Mr. Black, sitting next to her, sensed something was wrong. “Why me?” she asked him. “Why am I the lucky one? Only Lucy is a match for a man like you.” Mr. Black turned to look at the night cityscape reflected in the car windows, and said gently, “Every person is unique.” This reply melted Lilian Ma’s heart. If the Mr. Black in the “Jade Tablet Dreams” had chosen the blind girl, then why shouldn’t her Mr. Black stand out from the common herd, and have a different taste in girls? “He is the boulder, she the reed / The reed is pliant as silk, but the boulder remains still,” as the old lines went. From that moment on, Lilian Ma surrendered herself unconditionally.

VII.

LILIAN MA FOUND a letter in her mailbox. It was from Uncle Ah-de. She sat on the steps of the post office, opened the letter and read it carefully. Uncle Ah-de had remembered that tomorrow was her birthday. He might be the only person in the world who remembered her birthday. Inside the letter was a blue hairpin in the shape of a little cartoon pig wearing an apron. He said he thought of her often, and wondered how she was doing. Not long ago he had heard her two brothers joking and had found out why she had such big buttocks. He felt sorry for her. Lilian Ma took a deep breath. Deep down, this was something that had puzzled her too, because in the entire history of the family no one else had had abnormally large buttocks. She continued reading. “When you were little, there was a famine. There was not enough grain to eat, so your brothers secretly sneaked the rice from your bowl and mixed in pig feed instead. Such wicked boys. Pig feed is full of hormones.” Lilian Ma could almost hear him sigh as he wrote these words. She felt sad, but also ridiculous. So she really was a swine. Oink, oink . . . He said he was getting old. If she had time to come home to visit, she should stop by to see him in the grove. A flood of memories came back to Lilian Ma. She had not lost her virginity at that sink stacked high with dishes, or in that dark, dank back alley. The first time someone had touched her buttocks was in the grove. That was also the first time she saw the look of shock she would become accustomed to later, in the eyes of Ah-de, the village forester. A whole summer had passed without Uncle Ah-de seeing Lilian, and he was amazed at the change in her body. He couldn’t help himself, he knelt down and embraced her buttocks. After a moment, he let her go and stood up, motioning for her to turn around. The ten-year-old turned around obediently. She knew Uncle Ah-de was a good person. She stood in the forest, sun shining down through the trees and onto her body. She listened to the birds tweeting, enjoying the warm spring wind on her face. Behind her, the forester was making a dull moaning sound. There was a light cough and, finally, a sigh, and a shot of warm liquid spurted onto her calf. Little Lilian had quivered. So Uncle Ah-de wasn’t mute after all. Sitting on the steps, Lilian Ma recalled every detail. The feeling of semen on her skin was so real, she couldn’t help but reach down and scratch her calf. In the letter, Uncle Ah-de wrote as if he were her elder, apparently having totally forgotten the thing he did repeatedly that summer. Lilian Ma didn’t loathe him, nor did she hate her two elder brothers. Only the earnest words “thinking of you” at the end of the letter made her feel a little embarrassed. She put the plastic hairpin and the letter into her purse. She even seriously considered going home at once to visit Uncle Ah-de and her mother. The long-awaited first night with Mr. Black finally arrived for Lilian Ma. Here, our story nears its end. The evening that Mr. Black arranged to pick her up, Lilian washed herself with shower gel, feeling just like a virgin, feeling as if there had never been an Uncle Ah-de, a chef, an insurance salesman, or a security guard in her life. . . . Her body and soul felt as new as a carton of unopened milk, just like the nine-year-old Lilian she had once been. It was her birthday, and Lilian Ma had asked Lucy for a couple of days off, saying she wanted to go home. Lucy lowered her eyelids to conceal the suspicion in her eyes. She asked, “Have you really made up your mind to go?” Lilian Ma trembled with fear. She nodded, sensing Lucy had seen right through her. But fortunately, Lucy didn’t stop her or lock her in her room. Lilian packed an overnight bag and rushed downstairs. In the underground garage, only Mr. Black’s black sedan stood parked under the wan light. Mr. Black sat in the back seat and smiled at her tenderly. His face was as pale as the white gloves of the driver. Lilian Ma dreamed that she was embracing Mr. Black. She hooked his body between her legs, and he became a tree. His skin was as rough as old bark, his body stiff as wood. His face had turned into Uncle Ah-de’s. Just then Lucy appeared, carrying a hatchet. Vengefully, she struck the old tree in Lilian Ma’s embrace, again and again, almost severing him at the waist. . . . She woke up, felt herself drooling and opened her eyes lazily. The scene before her gradually swam into focus. A branching chandelier hung swaying from a white ceiling. No, it wasn’t the chandelier rocking; it was she who was floating, in the sea. No, that wasn’t it either. She was surprised to find herself lying naked in a bathtub, with the water almost reaching her chin. Her head was heavy. When she tried to shift into a more comfortable position, she discovered her arms and legs were tied to the four corners of the tub, and her mouth was covered with tape. Then the moment of panic passed and she snorted a laugh. Was this Mr. Black’s idea of a joke? But where was he? She saw him. His sleeves were rolled up and he stood with his back to her in front of an icy cold, stainless steel trolley. On it lay a selection of scissors, knives and tweezers. Mr. Black heard the sound of slapping water. He glanced at his watch and said, “You woke up ten minutes early.” She wanted to say sweet words, but could only make muffled sounds. Mr. Black raised a glass of wine with his gloved right hand, and chatted to her, “Remember your contract with the Amorous Centaur Gentleman’s Club, and the rule ‘no sexual intercourse with the opposite sex without permission’?” “Hmm, hmm.” “No, no. I’m not blaming you, because I’m not going to allow you to breach your contract.” He took a leisurely sip of the wine and said to himself, “This wine is not bad.” “Hmm, hmm.” He walked to the red velvet curtain behind the desk. “The night is just beginning. Would you like to see what we will be doing tonight?” “Hmm, hmm.” He pulled back the velvet curtain. Lilian Ma stared, fear clogging her every pore. She had never seen anything so frightful, so disgusting. She wanted to faint. No, she had no desire at all to hear the rest of the story.

IX.

“YOU ARE LOOKING at a human horse. It is almost complete. It will be my gift to Lucy on the day I propose to her. “Do you find the face of the horse familiar? That’s right, it’s Chen Deli. As a child, she starred in historical dramas. When my mother watched TV, she often said that this child star would grow up into a horsey-faced woman. And sure enough! Of course, she doesn’t really look like herself, because I changed her face slightly, opened her mouth wider. This way she appears friendlier. Otherwise, I worry Lucy might associate the face with a weeping and wailing Manchu princess. “Speaking of which, these legs were hard to find. Look at these sturdy pairs of thighs, they came from a pair of twenty-year-old twin sisters—I’m referring to their age when they became taxidermy specimens. You might have seen them in the soft drinks adverts, wearing hotpants. Even now, people still wonder why they disappeared so suddenly from magazines and the TV. Do you really think they found themselves husbands in Hong Kong? Hah! Actually, they’re here with me. “The lower legs came from two different young women. The front ones are not quite right, because they’re shorter. I’m thinking of swapping them for a better pair. And do you recognize those feet? They look like Size 37 from the Amorous Centaur Gentleman’s Club, don’t they? You must find it odd that all four feet are exactly the same.” He laughed. “That really gave me a headache. In fact, back when I first had the idea, I collected the forefeet first. And obviously the hind feet had to be up to the standards of the forefeet, didn’t they? “Finally, I came up with a good idea. I found a pubescent girl and got her to wear a mould of the forefeet while she grew up. When she was eighteen years old, I took her to the Amorous Centaur Gentleman’s Club. That’s right, the hind feet are from the girl you knew as the Most Beautiful Feet. But her beauty was only a copy of nature’s masterpiece. Consider me to have cheated. I know Lucy was a little sorry to see her go, but the day she sees my creation, she’s sure to forgive me. “Look at the beautiful, muscular lines of the horse’s back! She was a retired swimming champion. I hesitated a long time whether or not I should keep her breasts. But I couldn’t consult Lucy, because this is to be her surprise. Do you find the result I’ve achieved satisfactory? “Now, the only part missing is the horse’s rump. I waited years to find a sturdy, prominent rump like a real mare. The day I saw you, I knew you’d be perfect. Just wait till I attach your arse. Then you, or rather all of you together, will be a superb Belgian Brabançon mare, like the one dear Lucy owned when she was a young girl. “I apologize for talking too much tonight. I tell every one of you what will become of your body, because I don’t want you to die too sad. On the contrary, you should feel honoured, because you will be part of the greatest plan in the history of mankind. As to what that plan is, I’m sorry, I’ve just realized we don’t have enough time left for me to explain everything. Don’t be afraid. The entire process is painless.” Mr. Black put down the wine glass and walked over to Lilian Ma. He pulled the tape off her mouth. Before she had time to cry out, he had grabbed her hair and pushed her head under the water. Her arms and legs were bound and she could only jerk her waist and buttocks until water splashed out of the bath. Mr. Black’s face, distorted by the water, looked alternately hideous and savage. She closed her eyes, waiting for the end. Oh, she didn’t regret that her buttocks would be separated from her body. She would even have agreed if she’d been asked. Do just as you wish, master! Free my head, my body and my limbs from these wretched buttocks. “I just feel a little hurt,” she said silently to herself. “Why didn’t you give me a chance to say ‘I do’?” Mr. Black held her head firmly, afraid to relax his grip until her struggles dwindled to a final few spasms, until her buttocks no longer sloshed the water. Lilian Ma’s story ends here. Except that, unbeknownst to Mr. Black, in her last confused thoughts, Lilian Ma found herself longing for the grove of her childhood, and for Uncle Ah-de.