Chapter 3

Eric laughed as we turned into the private estate.

My first impression of the client was not good at all. A young stuck up chap walking out half naked to greet us.

Tony: Good day Mate. Yall ready?

Eric: Yeap. We’ll get the things set up.

Tony: Good good. Don’t fuck it up. I wanna show my friends how sick this thing is. Man I fucking saw it once and it gave me the creeps.

Eric: Sure, don’t worry. We’ll nail it.

The client gave us the thumbs up before walking into his private pool for a swim.

The moment felt strangely familiar when we started to unload the stores from the vehicles. It reminded me of the times back in the army when we had to bring everything off the trucks for our training.

Everyone worked with a smile as we set up the room.

It was not a big space, about the size of a 2 bedroom flat’s living room. I could tell it was some sort of an entertainment room, a giant screen took up one end of the wall and there was an expensive looking projector hanging from the ceiling.

Anyway, we just went about our work.

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The setup was something like the diagram. Just look at the rectangles for now.

The single one is the table where Soh will be lying on, pretending to be a corpse.

The other 5 arranged side by side will be used for the offerings and stuff.

Eric would take the main role of the Taoist priest while the rest of us would be following his lead. Simple as that.

The client and his guests will be standing behind us.

Here’s the story that he would be telling his friends. Since it’s unthinkable for anyone to be carting a corpse around Sentosa, Tony will be informing his friends that he has invited us to do a Taoist exorcism. Even though we didn’t know what the fuck that meant, Tony just wanted us to set it up to look like the typical ritual at a funeral. Make it creepy, scare the girl, don’t laugh, take the money.

We spent some time arranging the fruit and offerings. The sliding doors on the left of the room were opened up fully. This is because we would be lighting candles, joss sticks, maybe burning some incense paper. You know those yellow pieces of talisman you stick on a vampire so he doesn’t move. Yeah, Eric printed a few hundred of those and we started decorating the table Soh would be lying on.

Eric: Boss here. I got a fucking big A3 size paper. Cover your face if you laugh and he won’t know.

Soh: Fuck you man.

We laughed and tested out the system and smoke machine.

By 4 pm, all was set and Soh called for a short meeting.

Soh: Alright this is stupid but fuck, the client is paying so who are we to question how people spend their money right?

We nodded as Soh went on.

Soh: We’re bound to laugh at some point but remember what I told you back in the old days eh?

Eric laughed and added.

Eric: Do anything you want. Just don’t get caught.

We all burst out laughing and Soh wanted us to go grab an early dinner.