Chapter 2 - Part 2

Side Note - The author had not been updating because she's a lazy potato couch who had been photosynthesizing in the Sun. Or so she wish. She had been working part-time, waiting tables to earn the extra cash she needs for sushi buffet or the pretentious food her ex-classmates love to eat.

So, enjoy the rest of the novel. And thanks for the comments so far.

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..when I reached the ice-cream man, I ordered my favourite peppermint ice-cream. Peppermint's green and I like the fact that the colour's pretty weird for an ice-cream. The uncle returned my change and I realised I have got enough. I ordered a chocolate chip ice-cream.

"Nah!" I shoved the ice-cream in her face. Lisa was stunned, for sure, her eyes round with a tinge of fear which she tried to hide. She smiled; how rare.

"Thanks," she took the ice-cream from my hands. Bringing the ice-cream to her mouth instantly, licking the sides that were almost dripping. We licked our ice-cream, watching silently as a father and his two children of around 10 played badminton in the small patch of field in front of us.

"Are Ah Pui and Samat your best friends?" Lisa suddenly popped this question. She wasn't looking into my face. She was staring ahead, her face pretty blank.

"Yes....eh, maybe Ah Pui not really, but I have been with Mat from Kindergarden onwards." I said. I licked the melted ice-cream off my fingers, in hope that Lisa haven't caught me doing something so disgusting. But she did. She clucked her tongue and threw me her packet of tissue paper. "Ah Pui I only know him last year when my mother made me attend Maths Tuition at the community center." I continued.

"Okay," she seemed to have lost interest. The Badminton family ahead of us was arguing because the 10-year old girl could not seem to hit the shuttlecock properly. Her brother was calling her 'stupid' and the father seemed to lost the ability to stop the predicted chaos that will come later. Through the time I was watching them, I suddenly had the courage to pop a question to Lisa. The three of us never really asked Lisa much, because she either always give one-word replies, or not answer us at all.

"Who are your best friends, Lisa?" I asked, hoping that the question had came out with the right tone and at the right time. I feared Lisa would get angry and leave.

But she didn't. She finally turned her head to face me, and seem to be thinking of something really hard before she said this:

"You." It came to me, almost like a whisper. Her smile broke into a laughter. All I could do was smile back, as questions started filling my head. I wanted to know more. I wanted to ask Lisa how come she has got no friends of her own age, how come she wants to hang around with three twelve year old boys. And how come she said I was her best friend.

But I knew I don't need the answers to the questions.

Chapter 2 - Part 1

Lisa took down her school nametag, shoving it into one of the netted sidepockets of her haversack. I watched as she undid yet another button of her school blouse. She noticed I was staring, and I could almost felt the heat from her blush. Or maybe it was just the weather.

"Sorry, hot ah." she said, her voice with the usual nochalance. She picked up a thin book, fanning herself. It was Tuesday evening. Samat had Karate lessons at the nearby Community Centre: his Mom made him join after she caught him screaming at the sight of a cockroach. Ah Pui had tuition lessons at home because his Maths results were real lousy. That was why I was alone with Lisa at our usual marble table.

It was 6pm, my Ma knew I was with Lisa, but she did not mind because she said "Lisa is a good girl". "She is in Stamford Girls, and she will help you with your studies!" Mom said. Stamford Girls is supposed to be one of the best secondary schools in Singapore.

Lisa does not help me with my studies. I didn't ask her for help either. We usually minded our own business: she reading a new book from the library, me finishing up the homework I had on that day. My homework was increasing: my school teachers were getting worried as the Primary School Leaving Examinations were coming.

I drew a doodle on one of my pages of the Maths Textbook. I could use my blue pen to draw because no one else will be using the textbook after me, unlike Samat who had to pass on his textbooks to his younger sisters when they grow older. I looked up once again from the doodle, to find Lisa engrossed within the book which she had just used to fan herself.

"Lord of the Flies," I read her book title aloud. She looked up, frowning slightly. "Philip, do your work." Woh, stern voice.

"Finish already!" I said, picking up some of my worksheets to show her. In a flick of a second, she snatched the papers from my hands, glancing through the content, nodding and occasionally giving the acknowledging 'hmmm' sound.

"Good. Your mother would probably stop asking me to coach you in your school work." she said, shoving the worksheets back into my face. My Ma has been speaking to Lisa? Now that was weird.

"But you don't help me with my work at all," I said, matter-of-factly.

She looked up from her book once again, sighing heavily. "I don't know what impression I had given to her, but your mother has been thinking that I am the free tuition teacher she didn't have to hire for you, dear Philip." she said, "Now not only I have to play 'big sister' to you, I have to be pretend to be your mentor."

"Mentor?" I asked. She had always been talking so fast and using words I did not understand.

"Never mind, lah." she said, waving me off. I returned to doodling on my textbook.

A few minutes later, the familiar ring from the brass-bell sounded, much to my delight. I left the table, without inflicting much of an interest from Lisa, who seemed lost in her own book fantasy.

Chapter 1 - Lisa and Us

Lisa was the oldest among the four of us. She was 15, in secondary school, while myself, Ah Pui and Samat were just 12, still stuck in our primary school shorts. We had a common meeting place after school: a deserted bus-stop which no one frequents since it was the last stop before it reaches the bus interchange. Since the boys and I came from different classes, we meet there right after school. We often had to wait for Lisa for around 2 hours as her secondary school is quite far away. During those 2 hours, we usually make a lot of noises, often making fun of Ah Pui of his super-tight shorts which made his buttocks look like two full blue balloons. Ah Pui never fought back, except once he got so angry that he threw his ice cream on the floor, walked to one end of the bus-stop and big angry tears started flowing down his full round cheeks. After which Lisa came, bought Ah-Pui another ice cream and refused to talked to Samat and I for the rest of the day.

When Lisa came, we would go to the nearby park near to her house. At times, Lisa's maid would come down from their house with Badminton rackets, shuttlecocks, or sometimes even a soccer ball. Lisa doesn't play soccer. She prefers to watch us play with the Malay boys: the whole gang who only miraculously appear everytime the ball is brought to the field. My guess is the Malay Boys could not play anything else other than kick a ball around. Samat does not like the Malay boys even though he is Malay himself, because he said they always make fun of his small-frame and his girly school bag. And unlike other Malay boys, his skin is also pale yellow, just like mine.

Ah Pui didn't like to play soccer, and even if he did play with us, the Malay boys would make him the goal keeper, "Because Goal-Keeper don't need to move around much!", or he would complain that he is tired after five minutes into playtime. He would join Lisa at the marble table nearby, as she flicks through her textbooks, such as Charlotte Bronte's Jane Eyre, while he buried his flat nose in stupid books like True Singapore Ghost Stories. They don't talk much, much enjoying this comfortable silence between them.

Occasionally, the ice-cream van would come to the park at around 4-30, his brass-bell shouting for attention to salivating and thirsty mouths. Lisa would dig into her brown coin-purse: the one with the weird embriodery of a fish, fishing out loose change, and insist we go get our fill. That comes with one condition: that we helped her buy her favourite ice-cream cone: chocolate-chip ice cream in between two thin waffles. After which we would sit together, seeing her as she sink her teeth into the ice cream slowly, savouring every bite as though each is a estacy moment: the very process which would take her at least 15 minutes, while the rest of us had gobbled up our fill within 5.

By 6pm, when the smartly-dressed adults were in sight with their leather bags, on their way home for dinner. It was a sign: we too picked up our schoolbags and started leaving. Ah-Pui would walked off to another direction, and Samat and myself would walk home together sicne we lived in the same block. Lisa would get her maid down to carry her belongings, while she leaves, saying nothing, though we already knew that we would be seeing her again the very next day.

A little introduction.

This blog is for the sole purpose of my participation in the online event: National Novel Writing Month (More info at http://www.nanowrimo.org). To put it short: I'm supposed to complete finish writing a online novel which achieve the 50,000 word count, regardless whether the plot makes any sense, or whether it wins me a Pulitzer.

My name's Jiayuan, or JY (Jay-Why) for the convenience of anyone who hates pronouncing Chinese names.I'm really just your typical currently-unemployed Chinese person who lives with 3 Million other Chinese people in Singapore: the country which bans chewing gums, restrict the showtimes of Sex and the City and used to discriminate anyone who emulates Axel Rose's hairstyle.

I write in English because I really suck in my own Mother-Tongue: how typical of the many Chinese kids who were born and raised here. Recently out of school after the struggles of getting a Diploma in IT, I have written some theatre plays while I am not doing programming or deleting chain or spam mail (damn spammers).

The local music and arts scene within Singapore is really non-existent in many eyes as kids here embraces acts like Hillary Duff, Simple Plan, and the huge franchise: Singapore Idol, spawned from American Idol. And I guessed this novel would basically be about my displeasure towards that.

If you're sick of reading this novel which might end up being plotless (just like the many shows on my local TV stations) You can be part of my ramblings at my blog: http://shindigger.blogspot.com. Other than that, just leave me a comment below.

P/S - Excuse the spelling mistakes and bad grammar. :P