Chapter 13

10th April 2010, Saturday, 11.30am

I could not remember the last time I had such a good sleep. No phone calls, no messages and no one to disturb me. I checked my phone, a little worried that there might be some messages from Don or maybe an SOS message from Celeste but there was nothing.

After washing up I paced up and down my room, thinking of what to type within that message box. I wanted to ask Celeste out, but something as simple as that took me a good 10 minutes of pacing before I summoned up enough courage to type a dumb message.

‘Lunch?’

That was the best I could come up with. That was not the worst of it, like a school boy texting his puppy love for the first time, I placed my phone on the floor, squatted down and just stared at it. I watched the digital clock on my phone tick by and I checked the reception level bar. There was definitely enough battery, but I decided to plug it in.

Pacing up and down a few more times, I mentally willed the phone to beep but there was nothing. I was about to grab my phone when it rang.

Words could not describe the joy in my heart when I saw Celeste’s name appear on the screen.

“Hello.”

“Seriously? ... Lunch...? ... just one word ah ... haha.”

I gave a sheepish reply.

“I’m not good with words.”

“Oh please ... Haha ... Ella warned me about you.”

“She’s prejudiced against me, thinks I’m a bad influence on Don, but I assure you that’s not the case.”

She laughed and my heart skipped a beat when she asked what I wanted for lunch. I suggested we meet up first before deciding.

“You don’t mind coming up north?”

I laughed and told her not at all, that I needed friends in the north.

By 1.00pm, I was loitering around Punggol MRT station as I waited for Celeste to show up. It was a quiet afternoon, even more so at the end of the line at Punggol. There was hardly anyone exiting the station, as most travellers were heading up towards the LRT station instead.

As a steady stream of people from the just arrived train headed up the long escalator, I saw a lone figure came down, choosing to walk down the steep steps instead of letting the escalator take her.

There are not many times in my life I could exclaim I’ve seen an angel but that Saturday was truly one of those days. The skylight from the roof of the station was shining brightly through into the interior, the filtered rays of light hit Celeste as she descended down the stairs, almost like an angel.

She wore a sleeveless white dress, it looked casual enough yet there was no hiding the delicious body beneath. Her breast looked full, she had on very light makeup and instead of a handbag, Celeste had a sling purse diagonally hung across her body. The black string cut directly down the cleavage of her love pillows, accentuating her nice petite figure.

If only the station played some slow jazz music, I would have asked her for a dance right there and then.

As Celeste closed the last few meters between us to the gantry, the image of a graceful angel disappeared. She tried tapping out with her entire sling purse but the sensor could not read her card. She waved it around wildly as if she was trying to flip an omelette before laughing and hitting the purse a couple of times onto the sensor. I stared with my eyes wide open as she laughed and tried to retrieve her fare card while looking at me at the same time.