When I reached home minutes later, I called Landy. Strangely, all I did was to press the last dialled contact and Landy’s voice came.
“Landy, can you do me a favour? Come out now. I need your help.”
A few minutes later, Landy and I were out on the streets. It was nine at night, but the kopitiam was still teeming with people. I approached the middle-aged woman who always sold fish soup to me.
“Hi, Auntie,” I said. She was an old frail lady; but when I greeted her, her eyes sparkled. She must have been surprised, for I had never greeted her before. I usually just made my order.
“Oh, hi, Ah Girl,” she replied after some hesitation.
I pointed at Landy. “This is my best friend, Landy,” I said in Mandarin.
She looked at Landy. I knew I was right! However, after a few seconds, she took a step back and bit her lips. “What? Huh?”
I started to shiver. This can’t be… “This young and pretty lady here”—I rested my hand on Landy’s shoulder—“is my best friend.”
The woman was lost for words. “I…” Then, she took out a yellow paper from her wallet and clapped her hands. I stared in disbelief. She started to pray. “God bless…” Then she said something that I could not understand. Before I could say anything, she turned to me and said aloud, “Ah Girl, don’t joke.”
Landy was still smiling.
I did this experiment a few more times with some other people. They either told me to stop joking or thought I was possessed.
None of them could see Landy.
Except me.
And just when I was about to ask Landy about this, she was gone. Just like that. Poof, gone without any warning. And, as expected, her number disappeared from my contacts again.
Oh. Bastard Jacky. He should have just shut the fuck up and left the truth unrevealed.
* * *
I felt lonely.
I went to school as usual the next day. This time, however, it felt like it was the first day of school again. I was trying hard to avoid Jacky, but he was still as sticky as glue. He tried to start a conversation, but I would cut him off with these two words: “Shut up.”
Finally, lunch break came. This was the first time that I was not looking forward to it. Jacky bought my drink, but I went off and bought my own. “Joanna—”
“Shut up,” I said for the tenth time.
“Let me help—”
“Why are you doing all this?” I was boiling with anger. Could it be the laksa in front of me that drove me to this? When I looked at Jacky, I realized it was not the laksa. It was his face: his compassionate face that fuelled the anger within me. “Why are you doing all this, Jacky?” I was half yelling.
“I want to do something meaningful—”
“Fuck you!” I screamed. The whole canteen went quiet. Only the whir of the fans could be heard. “Don’t give me that fucking excuse anymore! There’re so many people in this school: Why me? Why?”
He was quiet and seemed to be on the verge of tears.
“Is it because you pity me?” If he had been facing me, I could have given him a tight slap. “Is it because you think I need sympathy, that’s why you’re doing all this?”
“Yes. Maybe because I pity you, that’s why I’m doing all this,” he said softly. People were inching forward, trying to make out what he had just said.
“And when you knew that my best friend is an imaginary friend, you pitied me more? That’s why you held my hand? Be nice to me, because the solution for imaginary friends is to make me happy and socially involved? That’s why you said all those fucking idiotic things to me at the void deck?”
I could tell that he was thinking. “Maybe,” he answered softly again. “That could be the reason.”
“You bastard,” I whispered. I splashed my soya bean milk onto his face. Then I smacked his cheek—hard. People gasped. “You bastard,” I said again and then walked off.
I was expecting him to give chase. But he did not.
He must have stopped pitying me. I went straight to the toilet. No one bothered to come forward to console me. After washing my tears off, I went back to class. I dreaded having to see Jacky again.
We did not say anything to each other for the rest of the day. I confined myself to my notes and he slept in class.
Gosh, oh gosh. What the heck has just happened? What the heck have I just done? An imaginary friend? A one-sided romance?
Then it occurred to me. It was then I knew why Jacky could not be my boyfriend. That night, when he said that we could not be together, I had cursed him. I had cursed him not to fall in love with me when I was angry.
My gosh. It was my fault. My fault!
* * *
I went back to an empty flat. Grandma came home after a few hours.
“Grandma,” I asked in Hokkien, “do you remember Landy?”
“Of course,” she replied.
I looked around the living room, pointed to the empty sofa and said, “She’s here.”
She made an effort to look at the sofa, then turned back to me. Her answer sent chills down my spine. “Yes, she still looks so beautiful. I’m going back to my room. You have a nice chat with her. Good night.”
“Grandma, can you…chat with me?” I requested. Since Mum’s death, I had not had a decent chat with Grandma. We had a “hi-bye” relationship. She had earned her living through collecting cans and donations from the residents. My allowance came from her and my aunt.
Grandma rolled her eyes. She ambled to the sofa and sat down, patting the seat beside her. She must have forgotten that Landy was “there”.
Jacky had called me a few times, but I rejected all his calls. I felt that he was just putting on a mask—behind that mask was a playboy.
“I’m feeling very lonely,” I told Grandma. It was just so weird: Grandma had always been so close to me, yet I had always consigned her to one side, as if she did not exist.
“How old are you already, Gwan?” she asked. Gwan was the name that my parents used to call me. It had been such a long time since someone called me that, that I nearly could not remember that, that was my name.
I told her almost everything about me: my age, my school and my life in general. I did not tell her about Landy and my curse. Instead, I found myself talking to her about Jacky. It just came out from nowhere.
“He’s a very nice and handsome guy,” I said. “Tall, tanned and always smiling. I always tell myself that I have not fallen in love with him.”
“Why?”
“Because…I don’t know. I know I couldn’t love him. Grandma, what does love feel like?”
Grandma took a long breath. However, I could tell that she was not thinking. She was merely preparing for a very long chat—as if the answer was long, yet simple. “Easy. Tell me, two hours ago, who were you thinking of?”
I answered almost immediately: “Jacky.”
“Who are you thinking of now?”
“Jacky.”
“And if you’re still thinking of him two hours later, you’re in love. Gwan, love is a simple thing. It’s either you love, or you don’t. You can try everything, almost everything to prevent yourself from loving, but it all boils down to this: Either you love, or you don’t.”
I pondered on her words.
“It doesn’t matter how long the love lasts. You’ll be contented once you know that you were in love before. Have I told you about the magnet theory?”
I shook my head.
“You’re like the north pole of a bar magnet, and Jacky is also the north pole of a bar magnet. There’s no way for the both of you to be close together. There’s a force that’ll always push you both apart. This force is called the obstacle, like interest differences, communication problems or whatnot.
“However, if we put a metal cube between you two, both of you will stick to it. And you’ll be close to each other. That metal cube ‘dissolves’ the force that pushes both of you away from each other. And that metal cube is what we
call love.”
Bullshit.
However, when I realized I was thinking of Jacky two hours later, I began to ponder on her words again. Our metal cube…where can we find it? I wanted so much to ask Grandma, but she was asleep.
And so, I went to bed as well.
13
Sometimes, it was so difficult to say just three words.
I could smell the rich aroma of Jacky’s coffee. He was sitting beside me, taking another sip of his coffee. I stirred my soya bean milk with my straw and yawned.
He still sat beside me in class, and I did not—or had no reason to—object. We had our lunch in silence. Jacky did not buy my drink; instead I bought his for him. Yet, he just passed me the money without saying a word.
Through the corner of my eyes, I could see that he had finished his coffee and was coughing. My cup of soya bean milk was still full. There were still about ten more minutes before we had to head back to class.
Come on, say it, Joanna!
I turned to Jacky. He returned my look. His hair was dishevelled and his eyes were, for some reason, bloodshot. Despite downing the whole cup of coffee, his lips still looked dry. “You look pale,” I suddenly said and instantly regretted it.
“Is it?” He grabbed the back of his neck. “Lack of sleep. Been thinking…”
I wanted so much to crack a joke so that he would regain the colour on his cheeks. But I did not.
Come on, just three words!
“Hey,” I said, softer this time. I did not want others to hear me.
“Hey,” he replied. That idiot. Can’t he see that I’m struggling to say something to him?
“Hey,” I said again.
“Hey.”
“Hey, hey.”
“Can I…” He stopped.
“Wait.” I felt as if this conversation was going nowhere. “I—”
“Hold your—”
“Love—”
“Hand?”
“You.”
When we both finished our sentence, his head dropped on the table slowly, creating a bang. His body began to drop towards me. I leaned forward to hold his shoulders, trying to break his fall, but he was too heavy. He went tumbling onto the ground and all I could do was to lessen the impact of his fall.
His cheeks were drained of colour. I shook his shoulders violently. Bewildered students crowded around us, whispering and screaming yet doing nothing.
“Jacky!” I continued to shake him. “Jacky!”
A tutor came, dispersed the students and sent Jacky to the hospital.
And I tagged along, my heart beating so fast that I could have had a heart attack anytime.
* * *
Jacky’s mother was a beautiful woman except for the wrinkles that came with age—it was clear where Jacky’s striking features had come from. She sat in the waiting room, muttering things that I could not understand.
I was with a few of my classmates, all waiting anxiously as Jacky was wheeled into some room. Michael was trying to console all of us, and he was the one who introduced us as Jacky’s classmates to his mother.
The wait was over in about fifteen minutes. The doctor came out and talked to Jacky’s mother for a while. He was not smiling, nor was he frowning. When he was done, the nurse spoke to Jacky’s mother as the doctor went off to attend to other patients.
We went forward. I was trying to understand more from Jacky’s mother’s expression. She seemed relieved—yet upset.
“Jacky is fine. Thanks a lot for all your concern. He just fainted due to stress over his studies. And he’s not fit to see anyone now. Come back another day, okay?” Jacky’s mother told us after the nurse had left.
Everyone left, but I stayed. I could sense that something was wrong. Jacky’s mother did not seem worried when talking to us. What left me puzzled was why Jacky should be hospitalized when he was merely under too much stress. There had to be some other reasons.
When I entered the ward, Jacky’s mother’s eyes were red. She had been crying. The moment she saw me, she covered her eyes for a while before opening them.
“Didn’t I tell you all to go back home first?” she said, a bit impatiently.
“Can I talk to you?”
* * *
Instead of talking at the hospital cafeteria, we went to the park.
Unlike Jacky, his mother was a reserved woman. Throughout the whole walk, she said nothing. When we reached the park, we sat beside an old man. The old man was wearing a patient’s pyjamas, and he kept smiling at me as if he knew me.
“It’s not just stress, right?”
“It is.”
“Being hospitalized for overstress? Not waking up till now simply because he’s under too much stress? I’ve—”
“Please don’t pretend as if you know Jacky very well. You’re just his classmate, a friend, or whatever. Please, I don’t want to start a quarrel or whatever. When I said it’s stress, it’s stress. What more can I say?”
“But—”
“He’s just under too much stress. If you don’t believe me, fine with whatever you think. I’m going back to my office. I don’t want to be overstressed myself.” With that, she went off, leaving me alone with the old man.
“Young lady,” the old man suddenly said, “are you just his classmate, his friend?”
He must have been eavesdropping on our conversation. However, I saw no harm in telling a stranger the truth, so I said, “I believe I’m more than that. No, I hope that I’m more than that.”
“Okay then, love him while you can. In love, there’s only love or don’t love. Since you love him, do it now,” the old man said.
Why do all old people say the same thing? For a second, I wondered whether he was my dead Grandpa or not.
* * *
Fifteen minutes later, everything fell into place. It all made so much sense that I changed into a T-shirt to buy a pack of cigarettes, lit one before going back to the ward.
“I wanna help you. To see you smile.”
“I want to do something meaningful while I can.”
Jacky had said that before. To do something meaningful while he can. I shivered at that thought. I really hoped that it would not be what I expected.
I walked up the stairs with my head spinning. The cigarette had made me giddy. Jacky had awakened when I reached the ward. He was smiling.
“Hey,” I said.
He just nodded weakly and pointed to the vacuum flask beside him. I poured him water. “I like coffee better.” He smiled. “Kopi-O Siew Dai.”
“Why didn’t you tell me?” I said. I was biting my lip, taking deep breaths. I could hear every single beat of my heart, and it was so fast that I was unable to count.
“You know?” Jacky mouthed.
“Your mother told me all about it.”
“Can’t be. She promised not to tell anyone. She never breaks promises.”
“How can a matter like this be kept a secret?” I said. I realized I was smiling. Gosh. “So, how many more months do you have?” I suddenly asked. Then whispered very, very softly, “Fuck.”
Jacky was avoiding my gaze.
Please, say I’m wrong, say you don’t understand what I meant…please. Please. Or just let me wake up.
It was one of the longest waits in my life. My hands were clutched and I felt the shape of my lips: I was smiling.
Fuck, I’m fucking insane. I’m smiling. I’m smiling. I’m smiling!
Then he did the most astonishing feat I had ever seen in my life. He grabbed a lump of his hair, shook a bit, and pulled it out. His hair was in his hand; his scalp had nothing but few strands of hair.
“Two more years, if I don’t have the operation within these few months.”
Fuck.
14
“Can’t be.” I was shaking and smiling at the same time. “Can’t be…not now…not now! Can’t be!”
How can everything come at this time? Just when I realized I love him, he has to say that he is d
ying soon? How can this be happening?
No!
Jacky grabbed my hand. “Calm down—”
“What disease do you have?” I whispered. I was taking three deep breaths a second. “What…?”
“I thought you know—”
“I lied,” I said that so softly that I wondered if I had said anything. I stood up and looked out of the window. On the slight reflection of myself via the windowpane, my eyes were half-closed, red with tears streaming down fast. I was shaking profusely, as if there was an earthquake.
“To put it simply, brain cancer. It’s a hereditary disease, I think. My father had stomach cancer. And now, I’ve got brain cancer.”
“Isn’t there a cure for it?”
“Basically, no. The doctors can only stop the cancer cells from spreading. That’s radiation, as chemo can’t reach the brain. There’s a tumour in my head, so it’s hard to do treatment. The only way is…”
“Surgery?”
“Right, but it’s an operation on the brain. So the risk involved is very high. And the chance of a full remission—that is, recovery—is only…” He paused. I waited, as I did not want to interrupt him. “Fifteen percent.”
“Fifteen? One-five: fifteen?”
“Yes.”
I ran my fingers through my hair. Why…why is this happening? Why?
“No…” I was whispering. I stared at the reflection again. I was smiling and shaking my head. “No, no, no, you’re lying. Oh, fuck, you’re lying.” I took out my lighter and ignited it. Then I put it out and ignited it again. I took out the pack of cigarettes from my pocket and played with the box.
“Joanna, don’t—”
“Stop messing with my heart, Jacky, stop messing with me.” I let out a sigh and dropped the lighter. “Stop messing with my feelings. Love, leave, love, leave, love, leave. Stop it all.”
“You’ve got to calm down, Joanna. We can—”
“Fuck you.” Suddenly I felt guilty. I was scolding a guy who was going to die. What the heck am I doing? “Fuck—” I stopped. I rushed to the door and ran out.
Oh, gosh, oh gosh. Gosh. What a fucking complicated life.
* * *
I had lit my fifth cigarette when I decided to think rationally. I was sitting on one of the many benches at the park, glaring at every passer-by. I had a dizzy spell by my third stick, but somehow I just wanted to smoke more.
Cancer? Death? I had never expected such issues to rub shoulders with me since my parents’ death. It had always been the least of my worries. For the past few years, I had only worried about the words that I said. The curse I had been carrying.