Читать книгу Five Star Billionaire - Tash Aw - Страница 14

Gary won a talent competition when he was two months short of his seventeenth birthday. It was a small provincial affair in the north of Malaysia, not very professional, but it enabled him to move down to the capital to take part in a bigger contest which was televised on all the main channels. The finale was watched by nearly four million people, and over two million voted by SMS. At the time, Gary was amazed by these figures. He came from a town of two hundred, and could not believe that so many people would ever listen to him sing. He performed three songs, one in Malay, one in Mandarin, and the final one in English – an arrangement of a Diana Ross song, the words of which he did not fully understand. He was the youngest contestant and was shining with the innocence of a boy recently arrived from the countryside. His hair was spiky and dyed with flame-coloured streaks, which he had done himself. Recently he saw a video of this performance on YouTube and could not believe how bad he looked.

After the first song the judges said he had the voice of an angel. But even before that, from the moment he opened his mouth to sing the very first note, he knew he was going to win. He heard the strange, pure sound of his voice amplified by the microphone in the vast auditorium, its echoes separated by a split second from the time he felt it in his throat. He recognised that the voice was his, but he felt distanced from it too. It sounded as if it no longer belonged to him. In the audience, young girls were waving multicoloured fluorescent batons that glowed in the dark. When he sang the love ballad in Mandarin everyone screamed as he hit the high notes in the chorus. He felt the noise they made reverberating in his chest and ribcage, and he knew in that instant that his life was going to become confused and messy, full of privileges and sorrows he hadn’t asked for.

He won by a landslide.

He did not have time to celebrate his victory because he was signed up by an artist-management company that arranged for him to go to Taiwan two weeks later. He stayed in a hotel with a bathtub in which he had his very first bubble bath. The furniture was modern and new, with clean lines and leather upholstery. The room smelled of paint, but he thought it was extremely luxurious. Now he realises, of course, that it was only a modest and functional hotel used by sales companies wanting somewhere cheap to hold their training conferences. These days, Gary only stays in the most exclusive hotels in every city he visits.

In just under eight years in Taipei he released four albums, each of which sold more than three million copies across Asia. In the months following the release of his debut album, Rainy Day in My Heart, he narrowly missed out on winning the Best Newcomer category at the Golden Melody Awards, and starred in a film as an apprentice cop who ends up accidentally shooting the gangster girl he has fallen in love with. The film was a total failure at the box office, but everyone who saw it remarked that Gary’s face was perfectly proportioned, beautiful to look at from every angle. Maybe you saw it too and came to the same conclusion. Teenage girls began to send him presents – designer clothes, jewellery, watches, home-made CDs, cards with photos stuck to them, and even highly personal items, such as the girls’ own underwear or antiques that had belonged to their families. Every week his record company would receive enough of these gifts to fill a room. He would stare at this unwanted pile and feel guilty that so many fans wanted to give him such valuable things. He could not bear the thought that all these people, whom he did not know, were thinking of him. They were thinking of him so much that they would spend time and money sending him objects that represented parts of their lives – of themselves. And he felt bad because he was not strong or big or deep enough to accept their love. The record company arranged for it all to be donated to charity or simply destroyed, but still he could feel their desire for him lingering over him like a raincloud on a muggy day, refusing to budge.

Early last year, on the eve of a major concert at the Taipei Arena, Gary collapsed and was admitted to hospital. The diagnosis was not serious – he was anaemic, which explained not only his famously pale complexion but his frequent dizzy spells. He was also found to have low blood pressure and an elevated cholesterol level for someone so young. It was all the takeaway curries, the pizzas and other junk food he ate during late-night sessions in the recording studio. His punishing work schedule exacerbated these underlying conditions, and it was no surprise that he eventually succumbed to the pressure, the doctors said. They prescribed a fortnight’s complete rest, some supplements, and a balanced diet. Before he left, one doctor asked him if he was stressed. When Gary appeared somewhat confused by the question, the doctor posed it again, this time asking whether he found it difficult to deal with the pressures he had placed upon himself and whether, for example, he worried about things beyond his control. Gary thought for a few seconds before truthfully answering no. Because when he stopped for that moment to consider his life, he realised that there was nothing in it that was within his control. Every minute of his day was organised by his management company, even the number of hours he should sleep. It had been like this for so long that he wondered if he had ever known a different way of living.

The press was full of hysterical reports. Some said he had fallen ill from toxins ingested while eating moray eel down on the coast, some said he had suffered an overdose, others said he had AIDS. He had not been seen in public or been photographed by the paparazzi for only five days when one tabloid newspaper began to surmise that he was dead. From his apartment he peered cautiously out between the metallic slats of the blinds and saw a group of teenage fans holding a vigil for him. At night they lit candles and huddled together to console each other. In daylight, he could see that some of them had been crying. He wished they would go away, and after two days he began to resent them. Their presence weighed down on him, and he couldn’t sleep. He longed to be free of his apartment, which he hated even at the best of times. He had become used to having the blinds down all the time – from the moment he moved in, he had never seen the apartment in daylight, not even for one minute. It was always night in his home.

What most bothered him was the lack of activity. He wasn’t used to having time on his hands. Now that he was rested and feeling better he could not stand the hours spent watching DVDs or Korean TV dramas. He tried strumming tunes on his guitar or tinkling on the piano, but the apartment was too dark and oppressive, and he could feel no enthusiasm for music. He began spending too much time on the internet, on websites he shouldn’t have been looking at. In fact, it was during this period of imprisonment that he first discovered sexually explicit sites. At first he hated himself for trawling endlessly through them, but he was surprised at how his initial feelings of wariness and guilt soon gave way to an unthinking numbness, and he would spend hours sitting in the semi-dark staring at images that were initially shocking but quickly became dull. He would fall asleep at odd hours because he could not stop sifting through the pages for new images of graphic sexual acts, even though he felt nothing when he looked at them. He went to bed feeling empty and full of anger at his fans outside, for they were the ones who had forced him into this position.

Finally his management company called a press conference at which Gary appeared, happy and smiling, saying that he had taken some time off to return to Malaysia to spend time with friends and family following a ‘sad occurrence’ which he would rather not discuss in public. Relieved that he was alive and in good health, his fans did not press any further, assuming that his temporary disappearance was somehow linked to the fact that he was an orphan, raised by distant relatives with whom he had enjoyed no closeness. His troubled youth following the death of his mother was well documented – it was something that made him appear human and vulnerable to his fans. As his manager once told him, his childhood tragedies were a great selling point. But though he was grateful for his fans’ loyalty and adoration, when he looked at the mass of jubilant teenage faces at his next concert, he found their joy so empty and unquestioning that it unnerved him, and he could not get rid of the feeling that had entered his soul during the ten days of confinement in his night-dark apartment. It was unmistakable. He had started to hate them.

That three-week period of internment and difficult public relations upset his tightly packed schedule and cost him in many ways. Not only was the cancelled concert an expensive write-off, but the negative publicity surrounding his sudden and mysterious disappearance caused several projects to be suspended, and one or two sponsors even doubted whether they should continue to support him. His calendar became compressed to the point where he could not fulfil his obligations, and his scheduled participation in the Beijing Olympics music video was cancelled, depriving him of a chance to be seen widely by the biggest audience of them all.

Now he had to work twice as hard to penetrate the Mainland market, his management team said. Everything they did over the coming year would be geared towards establishing him in China – every song he recorded, every TV show he appeared on, every commercial he shot, every hour he slept, every meal he ate. He had everything it took to be a superstar in China, but it would be hard. He had to be ready to sacrifice everything. Gary thought about all the things he had already sacrificed – friends, a social life, family commitments, love, relationships. And he was not at all frightened by what he was about to embark on, because he had none of the things that people normally hold dear. He had nothing to sacrifice.

The giant billboards that stood along the elevated highway bore the poster announcing Gary’s ground-breaking concert in Shanghai. Music Angel has arrived! The Angel of Music is here to save us … His image was spread across each billboard, his newly gym-toned torso showing through a shirt that had been strategically slashed to display his abdominal muscles, the result of eight months’ work with a personal trainer. His head was bowed to show off his thick black hair, that looked slick with sweat, and computer trickery had provided him with a giant pair of angel wings, giving the impression that he was landing gently on earth after a celestial journey. It was impossible to miss these posters. As his car drove him along the busy highway, he reckoned that they appeared every couple of miles, each time positioned in the middle of a cluster of three billboards. On one side of him there was a young woman dressed only in underwear, her index finger to her lips, which were pursed in a hushing shape; on the other side were washing machines and refrigerators.

He had just performed a sell-out concert in Wuhan which had been widely covered in the local press and gained enormous publicity for his principal sponsors, a soft-drink company. They had shot a TV commercial to coincide with his tour, a big-budget production involving sophisticated computer graphics, in which the Angel Gary flies over a devastated landscape defeating gruesome monsters by shining a light that emanates from his heart. As Gary flutters softly to earth, the desert around him turns lush and green. The power to turn darkness to light, he whispers, looking at the camera with his trademark sideways glance before taking a sip of soda.

It was remarked within the industry and by the public alike that Gary was looking great. After many months of limited public appearances, during which he was rarely photographed, he had unveiled his new image – muscular and with a streak of danger. He was still boyish and innocent-looking, but his presence now carried a faint physical threat, as if he had a dark side to him. His stylists and costume designers were showered with praise, as were the people at the record company who had devised the new marketing strategy.

‘Thank goodness we invested so much in your gym work,’ his agent said as they drove past the fifth billboard. ‘Your physical condition is crucial. We can’t afford to have a repeat of Taipei last year.’

Gary did not answer. As usual, the previous night’s concert had left him both exhausted and unable to sleep. It was always like this. The adrenalin of the performance would rush through his veins, and he would feel the deep pounding of the bass notes reverberate in his chest and ribcage hours after the concert had ended, when he was lying in bed trying to sleep. Every tiny light in the room – the green numbers showing the time on the DVD player, the red dot on the TV set – seemed noon-bright and blinding even when his eyes were closed. Often he would just sit in front of the TV with the remote control in his hand, staring at the black screen. He could not even summon enough enthusiasm to turn it on. Sometimes he would eventually fall asleep at around three or four o’clock, but often he would just count the hours until dawn, which would come as a relief, because daylight brought with it activity, and he would not have to sit alone with only his thoughts for company.

In Wuhan the night before, he had tried to surf the internet for the porn sites he had become addicted to, but had failed. That was the problem with China – he could not access any of his usual sites. It had become a late-night ritual for him: turning on his laptop and idly searching for new, more dangerous sites each time. He did this after work or a concert, when he was alone in his apartment or hotel room and the night ahead seemed very long. He was not even excited by these sites any more; they had simply become something like a calming reassurance after a long day. Even the nastiest failed to provoke any response from him. The moment he arrived on the Mainland, however, he was deprived of this source of comfort. He had spent several frustrating hours after the concert searching for the kind of hard-core images he was used to, but the best he could find were women who, though immodestly dressed, wore more than the models he was now seeing on billboards in Shanghai. So he had opened the mini-bar and drunk all the vodka in it, and when he finished he rang to order some more.

Drinking was a recent thing. It helped him sleep, that was all.

He had now been on the road for sixteen days, and in that time he had played fourteen concerts.

‘But, Little Brother,’ his agent continued, ‘you need to sleep. I don’t know what you are doing at night – probably chasing girls, I suppose – but we need to do a lot of public appearances, and you can’t wear your sunglasses all the time. The photoshoots, they’re OK because we can always adjust the photos later, but in public – that’s different. You know what these Shanghainese are like. They will scrutinise your appearance to the very last detail! Please remember what a huge investment we have made for this album – who else gets concerts like the one you’ve just had? Don’t waste this opportunity.’

Gary adjusted his sunglasses. They were becoming his trademark – oversized black plastic shades that gave him a mysterious, futuristic appearance.

‘We can’t say no to the press conferences and guest appearances at malls. You have to look good, Little Brother. To be honest, at the moment even our make-up artists are saying it’s hard to disguise the shadows under your eyes. If we send you out wearing too much make-up these Shanghainese will laugh out loud. They’re haughty and not easily impressed like provincial Chinese, you know. Hey, Little Brother, are you paying attention? Shanghai is at your feet. You can be one of the biggest stars in China, you’re almost there! We have two days to charm them before your concert.’

As his agent spoke Gary knew that sleep would be impossible that night. He tried to remember when he had last slept through the entire night and woken up feeling refreshed and free of worries. It did not seem as if there had ever been such a time. He could fall asleep easily on planes and in cars, and have uncomfortable fifteen-minute naps, but night-sleep was unattainable.

That evening, when he had finished the last round of press obligations, Gary went back to his hotel. He promised his agent that he would have a bath and a massage and go straight to bed, but of course he turned on his laptop instead and began to search idly for sites that did not load properly. He did not feel like drinking on his own while continuing a frustrating search for internet porn, so he took a cab to the Bund, where he knew the high-end Western bars were located. Going out in public, unaccompanied, just before a concert, was contrary to all the advice he had ever received, but he thought that if he went to a place frequented only by Westerners he might not be recognised. His guess proved to be correct. He found a place with a view of the wide sweep of the river and the skyscrapers of Pudong. Although the music was loud and the bar was evidently popular, it was large enough to have plenty of darkened nooks and comfortable chairs from which Gary could sit and watch the crowd of foreigners, some of whom were dancing in the spaces between the tables. They were heavy-footed and big-thighed, their buttocks clattering into chairs and occasionally upsetting the drinks of passers-by. He ordered several unfamiliar cocktails that turned out to be too sweet, and then changed to vodka. He kept his baseball hat on, having decided that the sunglasses would be too ostentatious. It was a relief for him to be away from his hotel room, to hear music that he did not have to perform to. For at least two hours he sat near a window, quietly sipping his drinks. He felt his cheeks flush with the alcohol and his temples begin to throb, but it did not matter – at least he was not alone in the oppressive silence of his hotel room.

His discomfort began when he noticed a few of the Chinese waiters huddling together and whispering. They were trying to hide their curiosity, but could not resist glancing at him. He did not want to leave the bar. It was not yet one o’clock and there were too many hours of darkness left ahead of him. And then the pleasant Australian couple sitting near him – who had just been holding hands and kissing – left, and their place was taken by a sweaty Western man who tried to engage Gary in conversation. The man was drunk, but Gary did not feel like moving from his spot. Soon the man would grow tired and leave him alone.

‘What’s the matter, cat got your tongue? Don’t feel like speaking, eh? Jeez, you Chinese are so goddamn unfriendly. Hey, look at me when I talk to you.’

Gary looked around. The bar was full and there was nowhere to move to.

‘Hey, I’m talking to you.’

Gary turned and said, ‘Fuck off.’

The reports that began to appear the following morning were full of inaccuracies as usual, and there were conflicting accounts from bystanders as to who had started the ensuing altercation, what it had been about, who had taken the first swing. What was in no doubt was that Gary had swiftly lost control and knocked the other man off his feet, even though he was heftily built. The internet was full of photos taken with camera phones – grainy and badly lit, but clearly showing Gary standing over the man with his fist raised. The now-infamous video – again captured on a mobile phone and freely available on YouTube the next day – shows Gary swaying and unsteady on his feet, then bouncing up and down like a boxer ready for a fight before stumbling towards the man on the ground and aiming a casual kick to his midriff as if toe-poking a football. When the man shouts out an inarticulate insult, Gary attempts to pick up a bar stool, presumably to attack him with it. But the stool is fixed and doesn’t budge, so Gary turns his attention to a signboard that says WOW! and rips it off the wall. When some of the waiters attempt to restrain him he fights them off and shouts, Don’t touch me. Do you know who I am? Do you know who I am? The camera wobbles and cuts out, and when it begins to play again Gary is seen surrounded by a group of consoling strangers. The rest of the bar is emptying and the music has stopped. His head is in his hands and his shoulders are heaving up and down as he sobs. In the grey-pink half-light of the video, he is briefly seen in profile, silhouetted against what seems to be a curtain made from shimmering glass beads that look almost electric in the way they sparkle. Although it is dark and his face is not properly lit, his features are unmistakable – the perfect straight nose that ends in a delicate point, the soft angle of the jaw, the hair that falls over his brow. His head is bowed, his shoulders hunched and defeated. It is this image that graces the cover of all the tabloid newspapers the following evening.