Wednesday, 10 December 2003 

 "the police cleaned up the fridge and left, but not before putting this enormous padlock on the door and grille. They told Chee Eng and Rosie that the neighbours should show up at the station if and when they wanted to get in. At the same time Rosie and Chee Eng were urging them to look into it a bit more because a whole family kind of evaporated, and shouldn't someone make sure all was well? But they didn't think the police looked like they were into that idea at all. Nor did they look very responsive when Rosie asked to be kept informed if they learned anything. Dead bodies aside and semi-cleaned up, she is still quite spooked, Chee Eng says.

 "And then?"

 "Well they figure that maybe the neighbours got into a spot of trouble with a loan shark. And decided to hide out with relatives until everything got settled"

 "Yeah but that's a small island. I can't see even incompetent Singaporean gangster being unable to find someone."

 "I don't know, that's just what Chee Eng and Rosie maybe thought. I prefer to speculate about the smell that lingers. Were those really the only bodies? Chee Eng says he doesn't know how thoroughly the police checked the place. Where in an HDB flat can you hide a few corpses, I ask myself."

 "Fucking hell, that's a little bit much I think! I told you it's just the fridge itself, It has to be removed from the flat!"

 "But it is!" Elle bugs out her eyes for theatrical effect.

 "I was going to say: a week or so after the police left, Chee Eng was at home on a week night, late evening, and he heard people outside the neighbours' door talking away. He kind of freaked out, and quietly peeped out his front window to check out the passageway. He did not want to have conversations with mafiosos or anything, so he kept really quiet, he didn't want them to know anyone was home. He saw one Chinese guy and two big-sized Indians, one of whom was saying 'I can break through this, if you want...'

 "Chee Eng crept back to the sofa and flipped through a magazine while he waited for them to go away. Then he listened while someone took a hacksaw to the police's lock on the neighbours' door and entered the flat.

 Shortly after this Rosie gets home from her French class and finds Chee Eng huddled under a reading lamp. Rosie is near-hysterical herself 'Who's next door?!' she scream-whispers, dropping class notes on the floor.

 'Pipe down,' Chee Eng tells her, so she restrains herself to that hopping thing she does from one foot to the other, you know the one?"

 "Yeah yeah, and then?"

...the final chapter