Chapter 3

My relationship with Lara was bad for the rest of the year.

Although we sat beside each other, we would try to avoid each other when we do pair work. I always called her “girl”, whereas she called me “boy”. It sounded awkward but I did not want to call her name. Lara Wu… it sounded like la la ops.

It was during a Primary Two Excursion that we got closer. The school took us to the Jurong Bird Park and we were supposed to be paired up to explore the place. Ironically, I paired up with Lara, after failing to find a partner, and we got lost.

We were astrayed for nine hours. During the nine hours, I gave Lara a birthday present and then threw it away. I remembered Miss Pat’s words of “boy protecting girl”, so I tried my best to protect her. And I succeeded to do so.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Lara was sent to the hospital after the incident as she suffered a post-traumatic shock. The next day, I went to the hospital with my father to visit her.

Her cheeks had no colour but she was smiling. I saw her mother – the lady with big earrings – and my father introduced me to her. They went out to have coffee together, leaving me alone with Lara in the ward.

“How’re you?” I asked. The ward was cold. It could be the air-conditioning or I was feeling nervous.

“Great. Thanks, boy.” she lifted her head higher. It had been quite a while since I saw her smiling so broadly. “I thought we were going to die. I was about to get Kim back. It’s so… exciting.”

I nodded. I had thought I was going to die too. Just like those heroes in the movies.

“Who’s going to heaven first?” I asked.

“You!” we said together in harmony.

I regretted what I had said.

A lot.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Lara is a big Hello Kitty fan. Whenever we had breaks in-between lessons, she would tell me about the latest Hello Kitty stories. She would often update me about the new Hello Kitty toys too.

We had our Streaming Exams when we were in Primary Four. Both of us were streamed to EM2 and we both prayed to be in the same class. And remarkably, we were posted to the same class.

As we were about the same height from Primary One to Four, we sat next to each other according to the Form Teacher’s decision. We still called each other “boy” and “girl”.

Sometimes, she would sing and I would listen. I liked her singing. Her youthful voice reflected a new Singapore talent. “I write songs too.” she had said. I wanted her to sing a song that she wrote but she said she was “not ready to showcase it yet”.

Finally, we had our Primary School Leaving Examinations. My parents grounded me at home everyday, making sure I studied hard for it. They left the choice of my Secondary School to me. “It’s going to be your school for the next four or five years,” they had said. “Choose wisely.”

“What school will you choose?” I asked Lara that day.

“My mother wants me to go to Jurong Secondary. She said it is a good school.”

I sighed. Jurong Secondary School means cut-off point was about 226 then. I had no confidence of getting that good a result.

“You?”

I shook my head. Jurong Secondary was out of my league. “First choice gotta be Regent Secondary. Second… depends.”

“Why Regent? It’s so far.”

“I wanna travel. I like taking bus and MRT.”

When we got back our PSLE results, I got an average score of 208 and Lara got an average grade of 236. What surprised me was that we both got into Regent Secondary School.

“Actually, I put my first choice as Jurong Secondary.” I confessed to Lara on the day we got back our results. She laughed out loud for quite a while. “What? Why laugh? I was just hoping that maybe I can get into the same school as you…”

After Lara’s long laughter, she said, “Well, actually, I put my first choice as Regent Secondary. Was just hoping that maybe I can get into the same school as you.”

I jumped up and down like a boy who had just bought a new toy. “Same school, same school!” When I turned to face Lara, I realized she was emulating my actions.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

And so, we went to the same Secondary School, Regent Secondary School.

There were only a few students from Rulang Primary to Regent Secondary School. We questioned one of them on why he had chosen Regent Secondary School and his answer was hilarious: “I wanna be in all the R schools.”

“You should go to Raffles Girls’ School.” Lara teased him.

I had prayed to be in the same class as Lara. So far, my prayers had always come true and I hoped it would come true this time as well. We got our class numbers on our first day of school and I told Lara instantly.

“1E1.” she said. It took me a few seconds to register the fact. 1E1. 1E1! My prayers had come true. I wanted so much to hug Lara but I stopped my compulsion and just smiled back. Lara knew what my smile meant right away.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

My next prayer was to be seated beside Lara.

However, this time, fate played a joke. I sat about three tables away from Lara. Everyday, I could only look at her from afar. We tried to stick together during our orientation games but were often pulled apart by our seniors.

We would have our meals together during recess, though. Just the two of us, always having the same dishes. Some people thought we were siblings. “Good friends.” I always had to explain. “Six years good friends.”

As we stayed near Boon Lay MRT Station and Regent Secondary School is near to Yew Tee MRT Station, we took the train to school every morning. We had to wake up by six in the morning for the morning lesson.

On our first few trips, we fell asleep in the train and nearly missed our stop. I told my mother about this and I suggested getting a Discman, a portable CD player that can play audio Compact Disc. It was, then, one of the coolest gadgets. A few days later, she bought me a Sony Discman that cost over three hundred bucks.

“Don’t sleep.” I said to Lara one morning while we were in the morning train. We would always sit at the two-seater seat near the tail of the train. “I’ve got something interesting to show you.”

“Yeah? What? Three thousand bananas hidden inside your Outdoor bag?” Lara said.

I dished out my shiny portable CD player and grinned. A few standing passengers stared at me. They must be impressed with my new CD player. “Look at this!” I pressed a button and the disc cover sprung up. “Jacky Wu Zhong Xian’s latest album, Original Sin!”

“Wow!” Lara said, as she started to stroke my Discman. “This… wow. Must be expensive. Gosh. This is better than three thousand bananas hidden in your bag, boy.”

I nodded. “Wanna listen?” She nodded almost too fast. I passed her an earphone and slotted one into my ear. Then I pressed the “Play” button and the song rang into our ears.

The first song caused Lara to shake her head a little to the music. On the second song, Lara sang aloud. It attracted the attention of all the passengers near us. I tapped her shoulder a little and she took the earphone off her ear. “Yeah?”

“You were singing. Aloud.” I said.

“Was I?” she shrugged. “I didn’t know. Sorry. This is just so cool! Okay, I’ll just listen quietly, okay?”

Just when I thought it was going to be fine, she started singing again on the third song. I turned my head away but she was singing so loud that almost all the passengers were looking at us. She sang well but the train is not a stage.

I thought of a way to stop her from singing. When the song was playing, I pressed the “Stop” button on my portable CD player without her knowing. She continued to sing one more word then stopped.
“Gosh.” she whispered as her face turned red. She hanged her head and after that, listened to the songs quietly.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

We passed our Secondary One Examinations with flying colours and were promoted to Secondary Two. We stayed in the same class but still sat afar from each other.

“Actually,” I said to Lara in class on one of the days. It had been more than a year since I heard her singing in the train. “Your singing is really very good.”

Lara nodded. I had walked all the way over from my seat to hers to steal a conversation with her in-between lessons. This had been a routine during my Secondary One and Secondary Two days. “I hope Miss Ho would agree to let me take Music as an ‘O’-Level subject then.”

“She will.” I said. Actually, I had already constructed a plan that might convince Miss Ho to allow Lara to take Music as an ‘O’-Level subject. We had just finished our Streaming Examinations and were going to be posted to different subject combinations next year.

“Hope so.” Lara said. A few months ago, she had told me that she had written a song and it sounded “so nice that you will cry listening to it.” She had tentatively titled it “You Are Here” but had refused to sing it to me. She claimed that she was still “perfecting it”.

Our next teacher stepped into the classroom. “Just practise your song well.” I said and dashed back to my seat. Before we stood up to greet the teacher, I stole another peek at Lara. She was clearing her throat.

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