For the Love of Lin Mai

A large man entered the club carrying what seemed to be his entire life, stuffed into two duffles which he dropped off in the DJ booth. He wandered the club hesitantly, unsure of where he was welcome to sit. I noted his confused expression and volunteered:

Me: You can sit over there.

I pointed at a table across from the stage.

Him: Thank you.

He went over to the table and sat awkwardly, looking around with the same uncertainty, then shortly after stood up again and wandered over to the side of the bar furthest away from everyone. I didn’t know what to make of him. He’s a tall lumpy white man with greasy hair chaotically wound about his scalp. He wore a khaki colored oversized fishing shirt over khaki pants. He looked sadly down into his beverage. I decided to talk to him.

Me: Didn’t like the other table?

Him: It was fine. It’s just so empty here. And I didn’t know they don’t sell alcohol.

Me: It’s a California thing. No alcohol at full nude clubs. You can drink at topless and bikini bars, though. It’s a stupid law.

Him: Hm.

Me: So… How’s it going?

Him: Fine. I was supposed to be on a flight to Shanghai right now, but apparently they decided I’d had too much to drink and wasn’t able to fly.

Me: Haha! Did you get too rowdy?

Him: Not at all. I was drinking normally, but for some reason the flight attendants decided I couldn’t fly. You’d think I’d be getting better treatment considering I paid $10,000 for the ticket.

I couldn’t argue on that point. It was strange to hear of someone getting kicked off of a flight for drinking without causing some kind of scene or getting into an altercation with the flight attendants. I didn’t know what to make of his story, but decided to suspend my disbelief and assume he wasn’t lying.

Me: Are you visiting Shanghai or flying back home?

Him: I live in Shanghai. I was here visiting my old neighbor. I think she’s dying because she’s shrunk a lot since I last saw her. We used to live next door, and she didn’t have any family around so I would come by and take care of whatever she needed around the house. It was hard to see her like that. I knew it would probably be the last time I saw her alive. It may not sound very strong or manly, but I cried. We both cried.

Me: There’s nothing weak about crying.

He didn’t believe me. I could see it in his face as he turned back to stare sadly at his non-alcoholic beverage.

Him: Now I have to wait twenty-four hours to get on the next flight. And apparently I can’t be in the Sky Lounge more than eight hours prior to my flight.

Me: Did they at least give you a hotel voucher?

Him: No. I tried to check into one of the hotels around here, but they were full.

Me: That’s so unusual. I’m sorry.

Him: It’s okay. Truth be told, I’m a little nervous to return home. While I was away, my daughter was born. It will be the first time I meet her.

Me: Wow congratulations!

Him: Thank you.

Me: Are you with the mother?

Him: Yes, my girlfriend’s name is Lin Mai. She’s 4’11”. She refused to get a C-Section. Most Chinese women who get pregnant with caucasian men get a C-section, because the babies are bigger, but she refused. Our daughter was 10lbs, and she decided on a natural birth.

Me: Wow, that’s a big baby!

Him: I don’t know how she did it. To be honest, I’m glad I wasn’t there to see it. I’ve only watched one birth. I was watching PBS and suddenly I saw this close-up of something red moving under a blue canopy. I shut it off as soon as I realized what I was watching.

Me: Birth is scary. As a person who never wants to give birth, I can understand not wanting to watch.

Him: You’d think I wouldn’t be affected by that. I retired from the military. I’ve seen all sorts of things--

Me: Wow, that’s like twenty years of commitment.

Him: I did a little over ten years. I got early medical retirement after several concussions.

Me: Traumatic brain injury?

Him: TBI, yes. I lost my memory of everything before I turned fourteen.

Me: Wow, you don’t even get little glimpses of those memories?

Him: No. They’re all gone. I don’t like to talk about it.

Me: That’s fine.

Him: I can’t believe I’m telling you so much, considering I’m here and you’re topless.

Me: I’m actually fully naked.

I stepped back and gestured toward my vulva. I couldn’t tell if he liked me sexually. He gave me no signals either way, but I could tell that he enjoyed talking to me.

Him: I didn’t know clubs could be like this.

Me: Me neither.

Him: Lin Mai knows that I go to places like this when I’m traveling. I know she does what she wants to do when I’m away. We have an understanding.

Me: That’s great. She seems like a cool woman.

Him: I think she is. Most Chinese don’t like her.

Me: They don’t like you? Or her?

Him: They don’t like Lin Mai because she isn’t good Chinese. She’s too outspoken and confrontational.

Me: Is she from Shanghai?

Him: No, she’s from a small rural area. My friend really didn’t want me to get involved with her. He thought Lin Mai was just a gold digger. One day he and Lin Mai got into a confrontation about it. My friend is a really big guy, fromer PLA (People’s Liberation Army). He started yelling at her in Chinese and Lin Mai didn’t back down at all. I turned away for a second and I heard glass shattering. Lin Mai had broken the end off of her beer bottle and was threatening to cut my friend. I stepped in front of her to block them. My friend thought I was choosing to protect her over him, but I pointed out that he’s nearly 6’, and she isn’t even 5’. He understood after that. The funny thing is Lin Mai didn’t even back down after I stepped in. She kept jumping up, still threatening him from behind my back.

Me: She sounds fantastic. I already love her.

Him: She’s maybe the worst person I could have picked.

Me: How so?

Him: She doesn’t really speak any English, and my Chinese isn’t that great. We mostly communicate through translators. I don’t mean people translating for us, except that sometimes we have a friend come by to translate for us if we need to talk about something important.

Me: I get it. Software translators.

Him: Somehow it works.

As much as I’m enjoying talking to this man, I feel that internal timer going off in my head, warning me not to waste much more time before going in for the dance. Thankfully, the DJ announced that it was time for the twofer schedule, the perfect cue to make my sale.

Me: I’m really enjoying talking to you, but I have to ask if I can take you for a dance.

Him: Of course, I understand. Sure.

Me: Great. I’m gonna list out the prices and you can make a decision, okay?

Him: Alright.

I listed out the prices and he sat thoughtfully.

Him: It’s too bad you can’t drink or smoke here.

Me: You can smoke. There’s a private smoking patio for patrons over there.

I pointed to the patio as he massaged the pack of cigarettes in his chest pocket indecisively.

Me: Why don’t you smoke while I go to the back for the Showcase, and then we can meet after and decide on a dance?

Him Perfect.

I hoped he wasn’t the kind of distractible man who would wander off with the first woman he saw after me, but he seemed very committed to me at this point. Of course, that didn’t stop me from hustling over to the patio entrance to wait for him while he enjoyed his cigarette. I figured he could be decent money if he was willing to spend $10,000 on a single ticket for an international flight, and was qualified to enter the Delta Sky Lounge. I waited patiently until he re-emerged.

Him: You said the half-hour is $350?

Me: Yep!

I was thrilled for the half-hour. It’s one of the top three most expensive dances, and half an hour isn’t a daunting amount of time to spend with someone. We went over to the register and paid. I guided him to the half-hour rooms and asked which one he wanted. We settled on one with one-way mirror windows.

Him: Actually, you said the hour was how much?

Me: $600.

Him: Can we do that instead?

Me: Of course. Let me go talk to my manager.

The club is always happy to accept more money. The man produced the $250 difference, and we moved upstairs to the Heaven Box.

Him: The room downstairs was cooler.

Me: We could move back downstairs?

Him: No, this is fine.

Me: Are you sure?

He stood beside me and held out his arm.

Him: You’re a little bit taller than Lin Mai. Whenever I hold out my arm, it hits right above her head. You must be 5’1”?

Me: Yep. Exactly 5’1”.

It was touching, hearing how much his partner was on his mind-- even to the point of comparing the size of a sex worker’s body to hers. I took a seat on his lap and began the dance. I took it slow, sensing that he needed to be gradually eased into physical contact. He’s a very tall man, and it’s logistically complicated fitting together with someone who is such a different size. I placed his hands on my breasts and began to grope him, and I noted that he was hard, but instead of enjoying it, he plucked my hands away; gathered me into his arms; and set me beside him.

Him: I’m sorry, it’s just too weird.

Me: That’s fine. We can do whatever you’re comfortable with.

I felt bad for making him uncomfortable to begin with, but I appreciated that I could spend the rest of the session not trying to fake sensuality when all I could think about was his greasy hair.

Me: You said you were retired military. Which branch were you?

Him: I was SOF. You know how the Marines are all about guts and glory? SOF try not to be seen. Other groups try to say that they’re Green Berets, but they aren’t. Green Berets are only in the Army. If they claim to be a Green Beret and aren’t in the Army, they’re lying.

Me: Where did you serve?

Him: Afghanistan mostly. You know the term “wrapped in the flag”?

Me: I think so. It means that one is very patriotic?

Him: When I enlisted, I was “wrapped in the flag”. I wanted to serve my country and prove myself. I came from a rich family, so I never had to join. I could have just lived off of my parents’ money. They’re both millionaires. But that wasn’t enough for me. I needed to prove I was a man.

Him: Are you political at all?

Me: I’m very political.

Him: Are you affiliated with any party-- Actually nevermind. You don’t have to tell me, and there’s so many parties nowadays.

Me: I’m more liberal.

Him: I started off very conservative. Nowadays that can mean all sorts of things like Libertarian, Tea Party-- but back then it just meant Repubican. I always believed that we started wars for the right reasons. I believed we were in Afghanistan to help. Now, my views have changed.

Me: Really?

Him: I was leading a small group of men. There were twelve of us in total. They were good men. Other units were assigned to fight, but we were assigned to peace-keeping missions-- transporting medical supplies and other humanitarian aid. But to the Afghans, we looked like any military unit.

Me: I bet.

I had a lot of opinions, but decided it wasn’t the moment to go off on an anti-imperialism rant. He also didn’t seem like the kind of man who would give my opinion much weight.

Him: We all drank a lot to get through it. I’ve never been into drugs. I tried marijuana before and it didn’t do anything for me.

Me: It’s not for everyone.

Him: I just stuck to drinking, but I had a friend who died who was doing some other kind of drug. I don’t know what it was, but we always knew when he was on it because he would start fights with people. He tried to start something with me a few times, but I walked away. He tried to fight one of the commanders once and we had to pull him away. I wish I knew what he was taking. One night we had to carry him to his room, and we saw that he had punched holes through his walls.

Me: Wow. What happened to him?

Him: I still feel so much regret for what happened, even though I know that I made the right call. We were running a mission and getting hit with heavy fire on the right side. I gave him the order to take over the SAW on the right side to protect us from fire. He was hit and killed. It was my order that killed him. That was one of the most difficult nights.

Me: I’m sorry.

Him: We all started as patriots trying to fight for our country, but now I can’t say that any of my friends died for anything. I have a higher IQ than most people, so sometimes it’s hard to relate. I thought I knew, but now… Anyway, there’s nothing I could have done. I made the only call I could.

I felt some pity for the man, but to talk about having a high IQ after talking about blindly believing the US government enough to enlist in one of the most bullshit conflicts in our nation’s history seemed like the most idiotic thing a person could choose. I may not have the highest IQ, but it doesn’t take a lot of brains to see the systematic deception utilized by the US government. I was eleven and I knew our involvement in the Middle East was primarily focused on control of oil reserves. But who am I?

Me: I’m sorry you lost your friends.

Him: It’s in the past.

Me: True. And now you get to meet your daughter.

Him: Truth be told, I’m scared to meet her.

Me: Did you want to have children?

Him: I did. I always wanted to be a father and have a family, but things happened and now I’m starting late. I kept saying I’d wait until the time was right, and it never was, and then this happened and we didn’t plan on it. I thought I was going to have a family with my first wife.

Me: How did you meet your first wife?

Him: We met in Singapore, but she was Vietnamese. I never really believed in split personalities until I met her. One minute she was so sweet and gentle and then the next she hated me and everyone. It turned out she only married me to get her citizenship. She looked at me and saw an opportunity. She turned my father against me. He took her side over mine.

Me: What happened?

Him: I don’t want to talk about it.

Me: That’s fair. Are you and your father better now?

Him: Our relationship never recovered.

Me: Well, Lin Mai seems to be amazing.

Him: She is. And she doesn’t want my money. She pays for more things than I do-- well we spend equally. Sometimes she has more money, sometimes I do, but she’s better with money than me. I only get her things that I have and think she should have too, like a Macbook or an iPhone.

Me: That makes sense.

Him: She opened up a business a while ago and it failed, so she’s been paying off that debt. I secretly paid off some of it.

Me: Aw, that’s sweet.

Him: I just didn’t want her to know about it, because I knew she would feel like she owed me. Chinese culture is about both people giving. If you give someone something, they find something in their house to offer you in return. I had to stop bringing gifts to people because they would offer me plates and decorations in return. It’s hard to describe unless you’ve experienced it.

Me: I already like Lin Mai. She seems like a very cool woman.

Him: I think so.

The DJ announced that our room was finished, which was unusual. Typically one of the bouncers knocks to signal it’s time to move on, but thankfully I was listening. It was jolting, to know that I would have to go from this intimate space to talking to other people in a similarly intimate way. I felt like we had been in a bubble, and that that bubble had suddenly popped. We stood up and I hugged him, asking for a tip. He handed me $50, which is well below 20%, but I didn’t mind because we’d just talked.

Him: That’s something that still gets me-- the tip economy here.

Me: It is strange.

I walked him back to his little corner, and excused myself. Not long after, I watched him gather his packs from the DJ booth. I hugged him on the way out. He seemed awkward, but looked like he needed it. And he left.