- Oogachaga
-
Singapore’s most established LGBTQ+ charity, offering counselling, peer support, and community services since 1999.
- Pelangi Pride Centre
-
A volunteer-run LGBTQ+ library and resource centre fostering inclusivity and learning.
- Pink Dot SG
-
An annual event championing the freedom to love, support, and be seen.
Chapter 44: The Girl Who Could Bend the World (Singapore, 1998 – Just Before the Master’s)
https://freeimage.host/i/K3g7eLX
(AI-generated image of Rina)
Disclaimer: All names, characters, and events in this chapter are fictional, although inspired by the lived experiences and memories of the protagonist. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental. Settings and timelines have been adapted for narrative purposes.
It’s easy to forget names.
Harder to forget someone who could put both ankles behind her head and still ask if you preferred Bee Gees or Bon Jovi.
Rina was unforgettable.
We met at a birthday dinner, hosted by a former colleague, just a few days after I left my consultancy job. I was in limbo: freshly unemployed, waiting for my master’s course to begin, and enjoying the strange freedom of a man with no schedule and just enough savings to eat well but not foolishly.
She was a friend of the birthday girl, petite, sinewy, full of kinetic energy.
Tan, toned, in a simple halter top and track pants. She carried herself like she always knew where the edges of her body were, and that no one else did.
Rina taught fitness part-time at a women’s gym and was finishing her diploma in sports science. She’d done ballet, yoga, and rhythmic gymnastics, the kind with ribbons and hoops and impossible backbends.
At dinner, she perched sideways on her chair, one knee tucked under the other like a cat, and teased me for how stiff I looked.
“I bet you’ve got tight hips and zero flexibility,” she said.
“I can barely cross my legs,” I admitted.
“So sad…,” she grinned. “We’ll fix that.”
We exchanged pager numbers, hers with a star to indicate urgency, and met two nights later for drinks at Brewerkz.
She wore a fitted black tank and a tennis skirt. Her legs looked like they belonged on a race track.
We didn’t waste time.
My rented flat in Tiong Bahru was humid and quiet. I still had the same mattress from when I moved into the flat years ago, thin, uneven, and already bearing the creases of past lovers.
But that night, Rina made it feel like a stage.
She started by kissing my collarbone.
Not rushed; slow, deliberate, a kind of rhythm in her mouth.
She pulled her top over her head without breaking eye contact, her sports bra underneath more erotic than any lace I’d seen.
She undressed me piece by piece, sliding her fingers across my chest like she was measuring muscle memory.
And then came the first surprise.
She lay on the bed and effortlessly pulled one leg over her shoulder.
“Come here,” she said, voice low. “Don’t worry. I’ve done this stretch a thousand times.”
I’d heard of flexibility as a sexy trait.
But Rina turned it into
choreography
.
She straddled me in a deep squat, her balance impeccable, her core firm.
She could twist her hips at an angle I didn’t know was possible, and kept adjusting, not for spectacle, but for
connection
.
Every time I thought we’d found the limit, she shifted, a knee here, a foot behind my head, a half-bridge that arched her back into mine.
We tried classic positions with new flourishes:
•
Missionary
, with her ankles crossed behind her neck.
•
Cowgirl
, but in a low sumo stance, her palms resting on my shoulders.
•
Doggy
, with her elbows flat and her torso folded almost flush to the mattress.
•
Spooning
, then reversed.
• Even a gentle
standing carry
, her legs wrapped tight around my waist, her spine curving against the wall.
And yes, we attempted the fabled
69
.
With her flexibility and composure, it wasn’t awkward.
It was fluid. Natural. Even tender.
But what stood out most wasn’t the novelty.
It was her comfort. Her confidence.
She moaned softly when it felt good, adjusted when it didn’t, and kept smiling through it all like she was enjoying a good workout and a warm lover at the same time.
Afterwards, we lay tangled in bedsheets, our limbs like vines.
She traced circles on my chest.
“That was fun,” she said. “You learn fast.”
We saw each other a few more times over the next month.
Sometimes she brought protein shakes.
Once, she massaged my shoulders after I complained about back pain from bad posture.
We didn’t talk about feelings.
Just bodies. Breath. Curiosity.
Eventually, we drifted.
She got busier with training camps.
I got started the rhythm of postgrad prep and errands.
There were no tears, no unspoken regrets.
But I remembered her.
Not just for the acrobatics, but for the lesson:
That sex isn’t about position.
It’s about presence.
About two people learning each other’s geography,
without needing a map.
Rina reminded me that the body is not a machine.
It’s a
conversation
.
And when spoken with care, even a single night can echo for years.
⸻
[End of Chapter 44]
Mirror Site:
Chapter 45: The Sandra Ng Doppelgänger (Singapore, Start of Master’s)
https://freeimage.host/i/KFXAYEQ
(AI-generated image of Yao Yao)
Disclaimer: All names, characters, and events in this chapter are fictional, although inspired by the lived experiences and memories of the protagonist. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental. Settings and timelines have been adapted for narrative purposes.
Starting my master’s was supposed to mark a clean slate, a pivot back to the intellectual after years in the working world.
But I hadn’t expected it to be the start of something else entirely:
The Marathon.
Dozens of women.
Dozens of stories.
All unique.
This was the first.
Yao Yao wasn’t like the others.
She was a mainland Chinese postgraduate doing a business communication course on a scholarship.
Big, slightly crooked teeth. Wide eyes hidden behind constantly foggy glasses. Jackets always two sizes too big, and a canvas bag so overloaded it knocked into chairs, people, tables… or basically anything in its way.
She reminded me of Sandra Ng in those old Hong Kong films: awkward, expressive, always on the verge of disaster but somehow never falling apart.
We met at a required orientation talk in one of those airless seminar rooms at the Bukit Timah campus.
She showed up twenty minutes late, her bubble tea leaking from the top and her bag smacking into three chairs before she sat down.
She didn’t notice the puddle until she was in it.
“Oh no!” she squealed, then turned to me. “You think pudding smell will help me find husband faster?”
“I think it’s an upgrade from the usual library musk,” I replied.
She grinned.
From that moment, she was in my life like a misplaced footnote, too loud, always in the wrong place, and impossible to skip.
We went for chicken rice after class. Then roti prata. Then late-night chats on ICQ and the occasional call on those translucent, plasticky home phones with tangled cords.
We shared a kind of mutual loneliness, the kind that came from living in rented rooms far from family, surrounded by people younger, more certain, less worn.
One Friday evening, she showed up outside my Tiong Bahru flat, holding a floppy disk in one hand and a blue folder in the other.
“I need to print something,” she said. “And I can’t connect the modem properly in my place. I think I killed my phone line.”
“I have dial-up too,” I warned. “Prepare for lag.”
“I bring curry puffs,” she said.
I let her in.
⸻
Her first move was classic Yao Yao:
She dropped her bag, knocked over my standing fan, and tripped over the phone cable coiled from the wall to the modem.
“Ah, I already destroy your infrastructure,” she said sheepishly in mandarin.
“You can rebuild it,” I replied… and then I kissed her.
She
froze
. Just for a breath.
Then she kissed me back, her hands cold but eager, fingers fumbling against the buttons of my shirt like she was opening a vending machine for the first time.
She laughed when our hips bumped awkwardly, then gasped when I slid my hands under her shirt.
“You really like wobbly thighs?” she asked, raising one eyebrow.
“I love them.”
She peeled off her oversized sweatshirt and tossed it toward my fan.
Underneath, a pale blue cotton bra, the kind with no padding, just softness and breath.
We undressed each other like we were both surprised this was happening.
Like two kids who’d read about it in books but never thought it would work in real life.
She smelled like talcum powder and mint from her breath spray.
Her breasts were small, warm, her nipples stiffening under my tongue.
She moaned like she was telling a secret: so soft, so confessional, and so real.
I laid her down on my bed, the kind with the metal frame that squeaked too easily.
She spread her legs, not like a lover but like someone welcoming an adventure.
When I entered her, she gripped my arms and giggled.
“Sorry… I just never had Singapore boy before.”
I began to move slowly, adjusting to her rhythm. She pulled my head down to kiss her.
She whispered things in Mandarin and then switched to mainland Chinese-accented Singlish mid-sentence.
“Don’t stop ah… but also… wah, I need water after this.”
It wasn’t poetic.
It was chaotic, funny, messy, and utterly
honest
.
We rolled, shifted, repositioned… clumsy and sticky in the still night air.
Her body met mine not with practiced elegance, but with joyful surrender.
She came once, her legs tightening around my back, her fingers digging gently into my spine.
She didn’t shout. Just let out a long sigh and kissed my neck.
Afterwards, she curled up beside me, still half-laughing.
“Not bad lah. Not Korean drama level… but solid first try.”
⸻
We stayed friends.
A week later, she started seeing a Korean exchange student who wore too much cologne and looked like a K-pop backup dancer.
She waved at me across the canteen one afternoon, dropped her tray in front of everyone, and mouthed “SORRY!” before disappearing behind a pillar like a cartoon villain making a getaway.
We never slept together again.
But I never forgot her.
Yao Yao taught me that sex didn’t need music or moonlight.
It could be hilarious. Uncoordinated. Beautiful in its imperfection.
Wrapped in chaos, and still feel like clarity.
⸻
[End of Chapter 45]
Mirror Site:
Chapter 46: The Girl from the South (Master’s Program)
https://freeimage.host/i/KKqxX1e
(AI-generated image of Thi)
Disclaimer: All names, characters, and events in this chapter are fictional, although inspired by the lived experiences and memories of the protagonist. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental. Settings and timelines have been adapted for narrative purposes.
She sat two rows ahead of me in one of my modules, always early, always dressed simply, always with her long black hair tied into a low ponytail.
Her name was Thi.
We first spoke during a group project.
She was soft-spoken, sharp with her numbers, and unusually observant.
Unlike some others in the course, she didn’t try to show off.
She just… watched. Listened. Understood.
We got close during a long night in the Bukit Timah library, sharing a laugh over correlation coefficients and their uncanny resemblance to relationship dynamics.
Thi was Vietnamese, from the southern Mekong region, she said, a place with more water than roads, where life moved slow and stayed wet.
Her skin was darker than the other Vietnamese women I’d known, not olive, not tan, but a warm, golden-bronze that caught light the way riverbanks catch dusk.
She saw me looking once, and raised an eyebrow.
“I know what you’re thinking,” she said.
“Not really.”
“Most Singaporean guys like pale girls,” she said. “They think light skin means class.”
I didn’t deny it. It was still true at the turn of the millennium, in lecture halls, in advertisements, even in mothers’ advice to their sons.
Thi didn’t care.
“I grew up under the sun,” she said simply. “Farming, swimming, walking barefoot in dry mud. I don’t want to be pale. I want to look like me.”
Later I learned this was more than just pride. It was
truth
.
Vietnam may be a single country, but it contains multitudes.
Northern Vietnamese, from Hanoi or the highlands, tended to be fairer, shaped by cooler temperatures and sheltered lives.
Southerners, particularly from rural provinces, had a deeper tone. Generations of sun and soil. Skin kissed by labour, not lotion.
Thi wore her skin like an inheritance.
And when I undressed her that first night, it was like unwrapping something both fragile and timeless.
⸻
It happened in my Tiong Bahru flat, after dinner at a Vietnamese eatery she said tasted “
nearly right
.”
We talked. She sat with her legs tucked under her, a strand of hair falling over her collarbone. When I touched her shoulder, she leaned in. When I kissed her, she didn’t hesitate.
I undressed her slowly, peeling back her blouse, unhooking her bra, drawing down the waistband of her cotton skirt.
She stood before me, nude but completely unashamed.
Her skin glowed, warm and even. She was soft where it mattered, firm where it surprised me. Her nipples dark and smooth, her belly slightly curved, her hips narrow but strong.
She let me explore her…
mouth… fingers… breath
.
She moaned low in her throat when I kissed the inside of her thigh, then guided my hand to her center, already slick and pulsing.
We made love on my mattress, thin but clean, the window cracked open to let in distant traffic and the occasional clink of a neighbour washing dishes.
Thi didn’t need to be loud to be passionate.
She moved with intent, wrapping her legs around me and pulling me deeper, her hands gripping my back without urgency.
She whispered things in Vietnamese I didn’t understand but felt in the rhythm of her breath.
She didn’t arch or cry out, she folded into me, quiet and tight, until her climax rippled silently through her.
Just a shudder. Just a sigh.
Afterwards, she curled against my chest and traced small circles on my forearm.
“You’re different,” she said.
“How so?”
“You
listen
. Most people just chase.”
I didn’t answer. I was still learning the difference.
⸻
She left Singapore at the end of the semester. Didn’t finish the course. Her family needed her to work, and she couldn’t change her student visa to a work visa in Singapore. It was still the Asian Financial Crisis.
No drama. No tears.
Thi taught me that not all heat comes with fire.
That sensuality doesn’t have to be
loud
.
It can be felt in
stillness
, in careful hands, in skin that remembers the sun.
⸻
[End of Chapter 46]
Mirror Site:
Quote:
Originally Posted by
brownkettle
TS, does Thi have tan lines?
I’ll leave that to your imagination.
But Thi grew up under the southern sun, her glow was more riverbank dusk than swimsuit tan lines.
Chapter 47: The Shopkeeper Who Didn’t Know She Was Beautiful
(Master’s Program)
https://freeimage.host/i/Kf2OcVj
(AI-generated image of Lan)
Disclaimer: All names, characters, and events in this chapter are fictional, although inspired by the lived experiences and memories of the protagonist. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental. Settings and timelines have been adapted for narrative purposes.
Sometimes, it’s not the long nights or the wild dancing.
Sometimes, it’s the softest detour between classes that turns into something you never quite forget.
Lan ran a small fashion boutique just outside the campus, tucked between a tuition centre and a nail salon. The kind of place with pastel mannequins, plastic hangers, and racks of lacy blouses imported from Bangkok or Saigon. The air always smelled faintly of green tea body mist and talcum powder.
I used to walk past her shop between lectures.
One afternoon, caught in a sudden downpour, I ducked in.
She offered me a tissue.
Then a smile.
That was the beginning.
She was 25.
Soft, fair skin. A round, almost porcelain face that flushed easily when she laughed.
She would have looked exactly like Huyền My, that gentle Vietnamese beauty queen, except Lan had no idea what she looked like to the world.
“I’m not pretty,” she said one afternoon, half-embarrassed.
“I don’t have double eyelids. My cheeks are too round. My hands are not soft.”
I stared at her, stunned.
How do you explain to someone that they’ve been carrying radiance like a secret?
Lan was humble to the bone.
Since two years ago, she worked seven days a week, lived in a rented flat above the shop with two other girls from Hanoi, and sent half her salary back home.
She wore the same two pairs of shoes, always remembered my name, and always offered exact change.
I started dropping by daily, first out of politeness, then for her smile.
We’d talk between customers. Sometimes she’d pass me a cup of cold tea in a reused Yakult bottle.
Sometimes we sat together on the stool behind the counter, whispering about nothing.
Then one day, just after I’d helped her close the shop’s shutters for the night, she turned to me and said quietly:
“I’ll be leaving next month. I saved enough. My family has someone for me to marry. But I want… one last adventure before I go.”
She looked down sheepishly. Then up again.
⸻
That night, we went back to my Tiong Bahru flat.
She stood near the window, hesitant, her back straight, her hands folded in front of her. I poured her a glass of water. She didn’t drink it.
When I kissed her, she kissed me back, cautiously at first, then deeper, her breath hitching when I cupped the side of her face.
She undressed slowly, not with seduction but with sincerity.
She peeled off her blouse and stepped out of her skirt, revealing a delicate frame, small breasts with dusky nipples, a slight tummy, and thighs that touched like a promise.
Her body was smooth and pale, but carried the slightest farmer’s tan on her arms, evidence of another life under another sun.
She covered her chest with one arm.
“I’ve never shown anyone in Singapore like this,” she whispered.
“You’re so beautiful,” I said, not to flatter, but because it was true.
We made love slowly, deliberately.
She let me explore her body gently, with fingers and lips, gasping softly when I kissed along her collarbone, when I slid between her legs.
Her thighs trembled as I entered her, her breath caught in her throat.
She gripped my shoulders tightly, her hips rising to meet mine in quiet rhythm.
No theatrics. Just quiet surrender.
She held my gaze the whole time.
When she came, it was with a long exhale… like a release of years of restraint.
I followed soon after, my body folding into hers as the ceiling fan creaked above.
Afterwards, we lay side by side. She traced invisible lines on my chest with her finger and whispered:
“Thank you… for making me feel not plain.”
⸻
We saw each other once more before she left.
I helped her carry a box of stock to a supplier. Then walked her to the MRT.
She handed me a folded receipt with her Vietnamese name written in perfect cursive.
She didn’t ask me to visit.
Didn’t promise to write.
She just smiled, soft and perfect.
⸻
Lan taught me that
beauty isn’t what the mirror reflects
.
It’s how gently someone touches the world.
And that sometimes, the most fleeting connections come with the deepest gratitude.
⸻
[End of Chapter 47]
Mirror Site:
Chapter 48: The Lady in Tiger Blue (Singapore – When Wanting Isn’t Enough)
https://freeimage.host/i/KfQyF9e
(AI-generated image of Jessie)
Disclaimer: All names, characters, and events in this chapter are fictional, although inspired by the lived experiences and memories of the protagonist. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental. Settings and timelines have been adapted for narrative purposes.
You don’t always meet someone in a lecture hall or gallery.
Sometimes, she’s standing beside a crate of beer, smiling through tired eyes, calling out,
“Uncle, buy two bottles, I give you discount.”
That was Jessie.
I saw her at a coffeeshop near campus, one of those old-school ones with mosaic tiles, red plastic stools, and 90s Mandopop playing softly from a tiny TV above the drinks stall.
She was slim, mid-thirties, in a tight-fitting dark blue form fitting
Tiger Beer
shirt and a faded denim skirt.
Hair tied in a loose bun. Small gold earrings.
Tired, yes, but radiant in a way that came from carrying too much and still standing tall.
She noticed me watching.
I noticed her watching me back.
The third time I passed through, she said:
“You don’t look like you drink beer.”
“I don’t drink it much anymore,” I said. “But I for
you
, I might make an exception today.”
⸻
We started talking.
She was a single mother with a five-year-old son.
Brought up by a single mother herself.
Still renting a room in Bedok. Still sending money back to her mum every payday.
“I never really got to dream,” she said once, over shared bak chor mee.
“But I can work. And maybe one day my son will dream big enough for both of us.”
She wasn’t bitter. Just honest.
And she didn’t want sympathy. She wanted
more
, and she was clawing toward it, bottle by bottle.
⸻
But she also told me what the job
really was
.
“Some men touch. Grab my arm. My waist. Sometimes they ask for more than beer.”
She said this without flinching, like it was just part of the trade, not excusable, but expected.
“You act nice. Smile. Laugh it off. Walk away. You learn which ones are safe. And which ones might wait behind the bin after closing.”
I didn’t know what to say.
So I listened.
⸻
One rainy evening, I offered to walk her to the MRT under my umbrella.
We shared silence most of the way, her fingers occasionally brushing mine.
At the platform, she looked up and said:
“I like you. But I don’t want to be a burden.”
“You’re not,” I said. “Not even close.”
She nodded once.
“Come by tomorrow. After I close.”
⸻
That long rainy night, we met again at her place, a rented HDB room in a two-room flat she shared with an older lady and her young son. Both were out, with her roommate having brought her son out for a friend’s birthday party, one of those cute ones at McDonald’s.
Her room was sparse but clean.
A mattress on the floor, a plastic drawer chest, toys neatly stacked at the foot of the bed.
A Garfield calendar on the wall. A tiny oscillating fan.
We sat on the mattress.
She offered me a drink from a chilled packet of chrysanthemum tea.
Then she reached for my hand and held it, quietly.
We made love, gently, slowly.
Her body was slim but strong, the kind of resilience carved from years of shouldering more than her share. Her skin held the faint warmth of the day’s heat, a salt-sweet trace of rain still clinging to her. She undressed without ceremony, but with a quiet dignity, folding her shirt, placing it aside, as though making space for something more sacred.
When she leaned into me, her breath caught against my cheek, a trembling mix of anticipation and restraint. I kissed her softly, beginning at her temple, tracing the line of her jaw, before finding the tender hollow of her neck. She let out a sound… not loud, not practiced, but unguarded… like something opening after too long shut.
Her hands pulled me closer, pressing me into the curve of her ribs, the flutter of her heartbeat beneath my palm. The mattress was thin, the fan above humming its restless rhythm, but the world outside slipped away. There was no need for performance, no need for roles. Just two people meeting each other’s hunger with honesty.
We moved together as though discovering a forgotten language… hesitant at first, then certain, then lost in the rhythm of skin on skin. Her legs curled around me, not to bind but to hold. Her hands gripped the back of my neck, not to command but to keep me near.
And when the moment crested, she clung to me as if afraid I might dissolve with it. Her eyes closed, her lips parted, and for a fleeting second there was no tiredness in her face, no heaviness in her life, but only release, only presence.
Afterwards, she lay back against the pillow, hair loosened across her face, the faintest smile softening her exhaustion. She exhaled as if laying down a weight, then whispered into the dimness:
“
I haven’t felt safe in a long time.
”
⸻
We met a few more times, on quiet afternoons, having short phone calls on borrowed minutes, small comfort between long shifts.
I liked and wanted her, genuinely.
But I knew, like I knew with Thi, and with Lan, that we came from different constellations.
We could share the same sky briefly.
But our orbits would never align.
⸻
One day, she messaged:
Got a new job. Not beer anymore. Something stable but less pay. Gonna save more. Maybe even take part-time classes.
I think it’s time I leave the coffeeshop.
She left the coffeeshop scene shortly after.
We stayed friends for several years, exchanging festive greetings via text, sending the odd photo of her son at school functions.
⸻
Jessie taught me that strength doesn’t always roar.
Sometimes it stands in the heat, under neon beer signs, brushing off lewd comments and still managing to dream quietly.
And that even if love can’t stay, it can still leave behind dignity and softness.
⸻
[End of Chapter 48]
Author’s Note: Be Kind to the Tiger Ladies
Brothers,
You’ve seen them before, the slim figures in tight shirts pushing beer under the Kopitiam lights. Some of you flirt, some joke, some cross the line.
But behind that smile is a woman working hard. Jessie, the lady in this chapter, was one of many. Single mum. Supporting her son and her own mum. Working long shifts, dealing with wandering hands and crude remarks just to make ends meet.
Not all of them want pity. But none of them deserve disrespect.
So next time you see a beer promoter, pause before you act. Respect her space. See her as a person, not a product.
Because behind every “Uncle, buy two bottles,” there’s a story, and sometimes, it’s more strength and sacrifice than most of us can imagine.
– Casanova of Singapore
Mirror Site:
Chapter 49: The One Who Chose Herself
https://freeimage.host/i/KqL7qEF
(AI-generated image of Shuangyi)
Disclaimer: All names, characters, and events in this chapter are fictional, although inspired by the lived experiences and memories of the protagonist. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental. Settings and timelines have been adapted for narrative purposes.
She was a burst of colour in a world still painted in grayscale.
I met Shuangyi during a policy module in my master’s program, in 1999 Singapore, just post-crisis but still cautious.
She had a voice that lingered even after she stopped talking. Her laughter made people look up.
And her look, which was half riot girl, half floral daydream, made it impossible not to.
She wore Doc Martens with flowing skirts, chopped her hair into uneven layers she styled with coloured clips, and had a septum ring she fidgeted with when thinking too hard.
She challenged the professors. Called out our group’s lazy assumptions. Quoted Adrienne Rich and Fiona Apple in the same breath.
We were assigned to the same project, which was a policy brief on regional integration.
But instead, we spent half the time talking about ourselves.
Over very late-night (
or perhaps very early morning
) Mccoffee at the old McDonald’s in King Albert Park.
Taking long walks around the Botanic Gardens, kicking gravel and talking about family, dreams, the women she admired, the men she didn’t trust, the feeling of being “
half-invisible
.”
One night, after too many drinks and too little pretense, we sat by the canal near Alexandra, watching a stray cat play with a discarded Yakult straw.
“I’ve always felt…
off
,” she said. “Like everyone’s playing a game and I didn’t get the rulebook. I like
guys
. I like
girls
. But sometimes… I don’t know what to do with
either
.”
I didn’t have an answer.
So I took her hand instead. “Shall we find out?” I asked.
We kissed. It was tentative, exploratory. Her lips were soft, unhurried.
She pulled away, looked at me, eyes wide but steady, and said, “So do you want to come over?”
Her flat was small, rented, full of incense and second-hand books.
A futon on the floor. Strings of fairy lights that barely lit the room.
She lit a stick of sandalwood, put on
Portishead
, and turned to face me.
We stood there for a moment. Just breathing.
Then she kissed me again, deeper this time, with her hands in my hair and mine tracing the ridges of her spine.
We undressed each other slowly, not like we were in a rush to get to the end, but like we were peeling back uncertainty.
Her bra fell with a sigh. Her nipples hardened under my fingers.
She slid her fingers under the waistband of my jeans, not with boldness, but care.
There was something about the way she looked at me, not with hunger, but study, like she was trying to decide how much of herself she could safely give.
We moved to the futon, limbs tangled, breath syncopated.
She guided me in with her legs wrapped loosely around my hips.
We moved slow. Rhythmic.
She made small sounds, not performative, but real.
She looked at me the whole time, as if to say:
This is still me. I’m still here
.
She came with a quiet gasp, her fingernails pressing half-moons into my back.
After, we lay there.
She pulled a blanket over us and placed one hand on my chest.
“You’re the first man I’ve wanted to try this with,” she said.
And then, after a pause:
“I’m not sure I’ll want to again.”
I turned my head to look at her.
She didn’t flinch.
Didn’t say it like an apology.
Just truth, gently offered.
We saw each other a few more times, always late, always lingering.
But something shifted.
She started spending more time at The Substation, going to queer readings, talking about desire in words I hadn’t heard before.
She grew into herself, not away from me, but
toward
something else.
One night, she sat me down at a bench outside Holland Village.
“I think I’m more into girls,” she said, quietly. “Being with you helped me realise that.”
I nodded.
Not because I was fine, but because I was proud of her.
We kissed one last time. No heat. Just thanks.
We never slept together again.
But I think about her every now and then, not as a lover lost, but a mirror held up to someone trying to be honest, even when it hurt.
⸻
A Note for Readers in Singapore
In 1999, conversations about gender and sexuality were barely whispered, and rarely safe. Today, while challenges remain, support exists:
•
oogachaga.com
•
pelangipridecentre.org
•
pinkdot.sg
If you’re questioning, discovering, or just learning how to be more you, know that you are not alone.
⸻
[End of Chapter 49]
Mirror Site:
Chapter 50: Fifty and Counting
Disclaimer: All names, characters, and events in this chapter are fictional, although inspired by the lived experiences and memories of the protagonist. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental. Settings and timelines have been adapted for narrative purposes.
Some nights, when the fan rattled just a bit too loudly in my Tiong Bahru flat, I’d sit at the small desk by my window and flip through my exercise note book, the one I’d been keeping diligently since university.
It was never a trophy ledger.
It was memory, discipline, ritual.
Initials. Dates. Places.
Details that made each encounter more than just flesh.
A scar on her inner thigh.
The smell of chrysanthemum shampoo.
The way she bit her lip just before she came.
But I’d stopped logging for a while, unintentionally.
Maybe it was the string of long nights.
Maybe it was the essays and case write-ups.
Maybe I just didn’t want to look too closely.
Until one night, I turned the pages and saw a gap.
And realised I’d passed
fifty
without even marking the line.
⸻
https://freeimage.host/i/KB8dRst
(AI-generated image of Yueqing)
I’d met Yueqing at a networking reception, one of those hotel ballrooms where the drinks are weak, the handshakes strong, and no one remembers your name an hour later.
She was older, early forties, from a Chinese logistics firm.
Elegant in a slate-grey pantsuit, hair tied back so tightly her features sharpened with every glance.
Her Mandarin was precise. Measured.
“你讲得不错，” I said.
“You speak beautifully.”
She smiled faintly. “还好啦。不过你的声调要改一改。”
Not bad. But your tones still need work.
I laughed. “看来我得再练习。”
Looks like I need more practice.
She sipped her white wine, then leaned in and whispered:
“1903房。你慢慢来，我先去冲凉。”
Room 1903. Take your time. I’ll shower first.
⸻
She undressed like she had somewhere to be afterward.
No flirtation. No flourish.
Just efficiency, graceful, and matter-of-fact.
Her slate-grey pantsuit slid from her shoulders without ceremony, revealing skin the colour of burnished porcelain. Her bra clasped open with a quiet snap. Her breasts were small, high, her nipples dusky and already taut from the chill of the room. Her black panties followed, peeled down those runner’s thighs, firm and smooth from years of discipline.
She lay on the bed like it was her own, one arm behind her head, the other resting on her abdomen, nails short, no polish. Her hair was still damp from the shower, fanning slightly on the pillow. The scent of white tea and shampoo lingered.
She watched me undress with the same calm composure, neither rushing me nor inviting hesitation. I climbed onto the bed beside her, letting my fingers trace the length of her collarbone, down the valley between her breasts, across the flat of her stomach. Her breath remained even, but her pupils widened with each touch.
I kissed her inner thigh, and she parted her legs with elegant indifference, guiding me lower with the faintest tilt of her hips. She tasted clean and faintly sweet, and when her breath began to quicken, her thighs closed gently around my head, not forcefully, but with deliberate containment.
She came with a quiet exhale, her back arching just slightly, her fingers curling into the sheets without sound. Then she pulled me up to her, not with urgency but with purpose.
I entered her slowly, letting her heat take me in, inch by inch. She wrapped her legs around my waist, then whispered:
“节奏可以。不要浪费力气。”
Your rhythm’s good. Don’t waste your strength.
And so I didn’t. I moved with her, not against her, letting her body set the cadence. She met me with practiced control, no moans, no theatrics, just the deep, steady sounds of two people synced in breath and tension.
She scratched lightly down my back when she was close again. Then she held her breath, eyes locked with mine, as the second wave took her. Only then did she pull me deeper, letting her body soften completely around me.
Afterward, she rolled away, not coldly, but like someone satisfied, unbothered by silence.
She reached for the room service menu, scanned it lazily, then looked back at me with a half-smile.
“你很细心。可惜你还在试炼期。”
You’re attentive. But still in training.
⸻
https://freeimage.host/i/KB8FWLN
(AI-generated image of Li Na)
I met Lina (or was it Li Na?) a few weeks later at an art walk in Joo Chiat, soft-spoken, wistful, standing in front of a painting of a misty Chinese riverbank.
She wore a linen dress and jade pendant.
She told me she was thirty-six, worked in textile sourcing, lived alone in East Coast, and missed her hometown in Fujian.
“这里的空气湿得像汤。”
The air here’s so humid it feels like soup.
We talked for hours.
And when I invited her over, she came without hesitation.
⸻
She undressed slowly.
Not for show, but like a gift she had wrapped in layers of restraint, now carefully untying the ribbon.
Her linen dress slipped from her shoulders in one smooth motion, pooling around her ankles. Her bra was lace-trimmed, pale peach, slightly faded, worn not for seduction but softness. She unclasped it without turning away, letting it fall to the floor before reaching for my hand and guiding it gently to her breast.
Her body was lush, rounded where Yueqing was angular, the kind of curves that invited holding. Her skin was warm and velvety, carrying the faint scent of osmanthus and linen. A small mole near her left rib, a stretch mark under her right hip, details that made her real, not just beautiful.
She stepped into the space between us and leaned her forehead against my chest, just for a moment. As if to say: I am here. I am ready. I am still afraid, but I am trying.
We lay down on the mattress together. No urgency. Just breath and shared silence.
I kissed the hollow of her neck, down to her chest, tracing the soft under-curve of her breast with my tongue. Her nipples responded instantly, and she arched subtly beneath me, fingers threading through my hair, not pulling, just anchoring.
When I moved lower, kissing the swell of her belly, she exhaled and whispered:
“你会温柔一点吗？”
Will you be gentle?
I looked up and nodded.
She opened for me with instinctive grace, her thighs parting, her hips rising slightly in invitation. I took my time… tongue slow, deliberate, learning her rhythm by feel. She gasped once, then steadied herself by gripping the pillow above her head. Her moans came in soft, unguarded sighs, like the loosening of a knot held too tightly for too long.
When I finally entered her, her legs wrapped around me immediately, firm and enveloping. Her body welcomed me fully, drawing me in as if to shield herself from the world outside.
“不要急，” she whispered between kisses.
“让我忘记我是一个人。”
Don’t rush. Make me forget I’m alone.
I moved with her, slow and constant, letting our breaths align. Her eyes fluttered open and closed with each thrust, as if caught between surrender and memory. She held onto my back, not to command me, but to keep me close. She wanted to be felt, not just inside, but understood.
She came with a long, low cry muffled against my neck, her arms locked around me, her body trembling with the kind of release that felt like relief. She didn’t let go even after I had collapsed beside her, still catching my breath.
Later, in the hush of post-midnight quiet, she curled into me and said softly:
“你让我觉得自己有价值。”
You made me feel like I mattered.
I didn’t speak. I just kissed the top of her head and held her until she fell asleep.
⸻
Weeks passed.
Then came Chinese New Year.
I was invited to a banquet through a trade association, eight courses, red lanterns, too many toasts.
That’s when I saw them.
Yueqing.
In a burgundy cheongsam.
Lina.
In a pale silk blouse.
Standing side by side
, laughing.
I froze.
They turned.
Lina smiled gently.
Yueqing lifted her glass.
“我们以前就是老乡。”
We’ve known each other for years.
I smiled. Nodded. Stepped outside into the corridor.
My hands trembling for the first time in months.
⸻
Back home, I opened my notebook.
There were entries.
But not in order.
I’d stopped recording for a couple of weeks, maybe more.
I flipped through carefully.
And there it was: the gap. The names. The realisation.
Somewhere in that span, with Yueqing and Lina, I had crossed
fifty
.
And I hadn’t even paused to honour the moment.
⸻
Fifty women.
More, now.
Each one shaped me, through affection, friction, curiosity, or absence.
Not a single one erased the others.
They layered. They echoed.
I wasn’t proud.
But I wasn’t ashamed either.
I was… attentive.
Still learning. Still listening. Still moving.
And, perhaps most of all, still writing it down.
⸻
[End of Chapter 50]
Mirror Site:
https://archiveofourown.org/works/68...ters/182571351
