Chapter Two
The house keeps four people in relative comfort. Everyone has a room to theirself and the only bathroom that's shared is between Lorna and Cherry's rooms, which suits them fine because they'd rather not share a bathroom with a non female, some complaint about droplets and not wanting to use the toilet even if the seat was always down. Everything aside, there's a suitable enough arrangement for each bachelor and bachelorette that things work out fine.

"Hey Lee I haven't seen you for days. Got a new gig going on now?", John quizzes.
"Dude, it's this really cool place up on Sultan Ismail. They converted this old petrol station to this huge warehouse rave, as in, permanent rave man. People were jumping the fence trying to get in, they got in extra security to keep things tight. Yeah, and I got a spot Mondays, Tuesdays and Fridays. I can hook you and the girls up for a bottle of JD next Friday.", enthuses Lee.
"Awesome Lee. I'll set things up."
"You do that dude. I have to go do a gig for a pal of mine up in Hartamas, jumping private party. I'd bring you along but it's a private party man."
"It's alright Lee. I'll definitely come on Friday."
"Later dude."
"See ya later Lee."

John steps in one direction meaning to go somewhere. Then turns the opposite one and stops. Noone else is around. Cherry is in some indeterminable location, as she usually is just like Lee. Lorna's having her monthly facial. His pub mates are and were really only pub mates, not the sort to drink coffee and have a meaningful conversation. He decides to go it his own, since Telawi street can be an interesting place of its own accord, even without the warmth of friendly companionship.

Sitting at a table on the sidewalk in front of his favourite cafe, John sips on his iced mocha and drags idly on a Dunhill Light. He exhales and takes another sip of rich coffee extract. Ice cold. He never takes his coffee hot. Why anyone would want to get any warmer in the high tropics, he has absolutely no idea. His eyes follow a stunning set of legs and their accompanying torso walking up the slim avenue. Scanning the cafe behind him, he catches the gaze of a deliciously svelte executive girl who offers a tentative shadow of a smile.

As he's about to rise from his chair, a well dressed lady of indeterminate middle age walks up to him, holding up a placard with some pictures and a copy of a newspaper article. 'Hello sir. My name is Madam Chee. Can I have a bit of your time?'
'Uh..'
'I'm from the Society for the Deaf. I'm not here to ask for donations, only that you be so kind as to buy an eraser for the benefit deaf people.'
'But I don't use..'
'It only costs five ringgit for a set. If you'd only be so kind.'
'You see..'
'Here have a look. If you don't want them you can always buy them for the kids.'
'I don't have..'
'Notice how they fit exactly into their special made case, they'd be useful for any travelling artist to carry around.'
'But I'm not..'
'Give them as a gift to your architect friends. I'm sure they'll appreciate it.'
'Since when do I..'
'It's really quite a handy gift, you could take away the erasers and turn the box into a cigarette case.'
'I..smoke and...' John sighs in resignation and reaches for his wallet. '..really wonder what this will accomplish.'
'Oh, more than you can imagine, son. Thank you. You've done the deaf a great service.'
Right, by the look of all that gold, I've done them and you a great service indeed, John thinks. You and every other scammer who walks down this street in one night, the blind fellows who can jump out of the way if someone comes barging through, the poor little kids forced into selling pity, the dubious unidentifiable priestess of unknown temple and that cripple selling you things you don't need. Yes, all of you, he almost said out loud.
No sooner does he light up another cigarette a chinese monk complete with draped bedsheet comes up to him, holding out a bowl of offering.
'Nothing to sell? No orphans to buy food for? Not even one of those home-made bracelet thingies?'
The monk merely smiles and gives him a half bow.
'No plea to my inner compassionate soul under lock and key?' Seconds pass. Jack sighs again and liberates a 5 ringgit note from his wallet. 'I might as well.'
He turns around and executive girl's already disappeared somewhere, no doubt disappointed by his lack of apparent interest. All of which wasn't even his fault, it was all the evil Deaf Society Lady's doing, robbing him of an opportunity.
What opportunity? An opportunity to date someone based on the fact that she looks hot in a business suit. And how many times had that turned out sourly? John couldn't begin to count the times. There had to be a much better way to meet someone he was genuinely into, as a person. But he could never correlate a link between women looking good and having a rich, intelligent personality at the same time. Most every women he'd dated bore him stiff over the course of a few dates and it was only by some unexplainable influence that he'd actually lasted more than eleven months with one. Oh wait, he thinks, it's the sex. The great equaliser, glossing over the most blatant imperfections and strengthening the connection between a man and a woman, however purely physical it is.
John ponders some more, searching for that perfect solution, a trap of all traps. How to bait your soulmate. As he hunkers down in thoughtful preparation, outlining an objective, determining internal and external influences, putting a timeframe on the plan his mobile phone rings. It's Lorna.
"I'm done and feeling like having coffee. Where are you?", Lorna asks.
"I'm having coffee. Come on down. I'm in Telawi." I might as well stay, he thinks, as he tries to remember what it was he was planning to do just a few moments before.


"And there was this really fat woman beside me who could not stop talking her head off. I spent the whole two hours wishing she would just die of a heart attack or something.", complains Lorna.
"Now, now Lorn. We're not in the fifteen hundreds anymore. It's the twenty first century. People don't put hexes on other people, nowadays we sue. Or buy their stock out. Or beat the prices to pulp till they can't survive. Or..."
"Punch their lights out so they can shut up." Lorna playfully threatens.
"Well you could've asked for another room you know."
"And what, have them pick me up all wrapped up in that plastic sheet, like some corpse in a body bag and let them drop my fragile body and break my back while they're at it?"
"For a moment's peace..."
"You're no help. What if it was you and there was this horny gay man on the next bed trying to make a pass at you?"
"Oh no Lorn, we're not going there or I will try that punching lights out thing."
Lorna grinned. "And there was a protusion in the groin area, his eyes interlocked with yours..."
John suppressed the urge to puke. "Lorn, did I tell you how different you look today?"
"Oh really? Tell me, tell me."
"Do your boobs look a little bigger or is that the light playing off of them?"
"What? No!" She cries indignantly. "Oh you dirty little.."
"Wanker? But really Lorn. It suits you. The fullness, the radiating warmth, invitingly... can I touch, please, pretty please?"
John chuckles as Lorna hits him square in the upper arm area. "Ow."
"They're perfectly fine, they're not getting bigger." Lorna says, sighfully.
"You know there's nothing wrong with big boobs. Big boobs are good. If you got it, you gotta flaunt it. That's what I say."
"You just try walking up the street and have every man looking at them as if they were targets marked X."
"If I was a woman I'd be proud."
"Yeah, yeah. Flaunt it around. Perv."
"I am not a perv! I'm a normal healthy sexually active man. And besides, the size of a woman's boobs doesn't make a difference to me."
"Oh really?"
"Mangoes, papayas, nasi lemaks...anything goes. With exceptions, they can't be mutated or non-existant."
"Hmm. Let me try and recall. You know John, I don't remember your recent exes,"
"Sure you do there was...Laura...Farah...Sal.." John struggles to remember and scratches his head.
"When was the last time you had a real relationship? As in, love and forget about it being just about the sex alright?"
"Well...there was Maureen." He offers.
"And how long ago was that?"
"Oh, she was twenty..."
"And you were?"
"Twenty."
"Oh, you..." Lorna gives him one in the kidney.
"Oof." John struggles to breathe. "What did I do?"
"Nothing at all."
"Nothing? Look, I can't help it if all the women I end up meeting just don't interest me romantically. I try, I honestly do but I just don't meet anyone I fall in love with. Call it luck, chance, fate, whatever!"
"How exactly do you find these gems? You give them one look up and down, and you're all set. Right? Right?"
"If it were so easy then how come you're still single, oh mighty and wise one?"
"Because..." She pauses.
"Why?"
John's mobile phone rings. It's Cherry.
"Hello, hello, hello, honey." Says Cherry, in her usual perky tone.
"Hey Cher and what have you been doing lately?" Lorna raises an eyebrow as John mentions Cherry.
"Oh the usual espionage and subterfuge dearie. Where you at?"
"Bangsar with Lorn, we're having coffee. Wanna come join us?"
"Aha, but I'm already here. Tata."

A black sedan stops almost to a screeching halt and out comes Cherry. Tall, sexy and usually wearing outfits that would make men's tongues wag, Cherry's the quintessential girly girl who was the envy of every other girl or woman out there. It's that side of her she likes to flaunt, but beneath the apparent shallowness, there's a deep hidden reserve of something else. If there's one word that can describe Cherry, it's mystery.
John always chuckles to himself whenever she's around Lorna, rare as that is, as Lorna always seems to put up some kind of attack pose, shifting with slight discomfort in her seat.
"Lorn, Lorn." Cherry gives Lorna a peck on the cheek.
And proceeds to kiss John too. "John, John."
"You know Cher I can never recognise the cars you come in." John commented, as he would always comment.
"John, they're friends of mine."
"You must have a lot of them." Lorna said hopefully.
"Oh here and there, you know how it is." Cherry chirpily replies.
"Actually we don't." Lorna puts on an inquisitive tone which doesn't really come out the way she wants it, turning petulant instead.
"Now, now Lorn. We haven't seen Cherry for ages. And she lives with us, remember?" John waves diplomatically.
- posted by Bran @ 11:31 PM