This chapter opens with a flashback to a time before the novel was written. It is the same time that Mr. Yeoh took a shower in the same place where the novel is set. This time, the smell of the shower is different from the one he used to smell when he was a child. He is now a lustful man, and the smell reminds him of the "dark desire" that he once felt for him. The flashback is interrupted by the sound of a "prick" and a "squeal" . This is the first time the reader is introduced to the action of the novel, which is set in the present day. The action begins with the young narrator's flinching and squelching as he smells the shower's "scent." He realizes that the smell is different than the "lustful person" he once thought it was. The young narrator realizes that he has been thinking about the smell for a long time, and he is afraid that he will go "crazy" if he does not release it now. The narrator asks the young reader if he has someone on his mind, and when he does so, he is asked if the person he is thinking of is him or someone else. He does not know who this person is, but he does know that it is not him. He feels that he is going to have to