and to my surprise, she's there!
I was like sooo overjoyed because it has been a very very long time since I last met her (specifically, 7 years). She was my first ever friend, greeting me warmly on my first day at kindergarten despite me looking like a sickly anaemic girl back then (to quote her: "Fatimah tau tak hari first kite jumpe Fatimah tu kite nampak muke Fatimah pucat sangat. Takut kite.") For six years, she became my best friend, going everywhere together, keeping no secrets from each other, rarely got into fights/arguments, visiting each other's houses often (meh, precisely, it was me. I came to her house almost everyday to join a kelas mengaji nearby her house), being so close we were mistaken for sisters. That was until I had to move out of my childhood town of Jementah, to stay with my grandma due to some severe problems caused by a bunch of useless bastards *coughpaternalrelativescough*. We still kept in touch with each other back then until I moved to JB and went to STJ. From that moment, I did not have any opportunity to contact her (lost her number, couldn't possibly return to Jementah, no mutual friends in my new hometown). Almost gave up, thought that there's no way I'm going to meet her again.
That's when Facebook came to rescue. With a few strokes of my keyboard, I managed to trace her, the person I've been dying to meet again, the person who taught me the meaning of friendship for the first time.
Thank God! And yay to Facebook!
Turned out that she no longer lived in Jementah; she's now in Pontian which is very near to JB. We had our first ever telephone conversation in five years, spending more than ten minutes talking about how much we missed each other. She suggested that we have a meetup somewhere in JB, and I immediately agreed. OMG like, I'm going to meet her after seven years of not seeing each other? Unbelievable indeed!
The reunion was last Tuesday, 24th of November. I've been imagining about so many things to talk to her, trying to plan five years worth of storytelling to be cramped into a few hours of meetup. I could not wait to see how much have she changed in seven years time, and could not wait to show her mine too. So after finishing my regular tolong-mak-buat-kuih routine, I hurried off to meet her at Perling Mall...
...only to discover that she had brought two guys along. Two smoking guys, may I point out. I thought that it was supposed to be about us, about our storytelling time, about the reminiscence of our happier childhood days. But with the two guys along, I found it difficult to say what I wanna say. No privacy. Apparently, she met them during her maritime interview earlier that day (her reason for coming to JB exactly) and they have asked for a lift to Larkin Sentral. What shocked me most was that she had only known those two guys for a few hours, and right at the moment I found myself in her car driven by one of those guys. Omo, what happened to rape alert?? Well, it's not that I regard all guys as rapists, but when it comes to strangers (especially male, smoking, kampung hooligan-types) whom I've only known for less than a day, I would be waay more careful and definitely not going to let my car being driven by the said strangers. Meh, never mind that. Had my alcohol spray and cutter in my bag.
I thought that it was supposed to be a regular makan-makan meetup (I suggested earlier that we go to City Square), but instead we spent a good proportion of our 'meetup' in the car, driving aimlessly around JB. I could still tolerate it if she's the one driving the car, but with that said guy behind the steering, I suddenly found myself panicking. I know there will be something happening after this. Please God save me from any misfortune.
And like I expected, something bad happened. The said guy, not familiar with the tangled-up roads of JB (he's from Batu Pahat if I'm not mistaken) made an illegal U-turn right in front of a waiting traffic police. Of course, mmg kena tahan la ngan polis tu. I, who had been containing my annoyed/worried feeling from the beginning, sit back and watched the whole driver-police drama with a hydrochloric acid face. Nuh-uh I'm not going to say anything. It's not my fricken fault we were busted. I knew people like that will somehow get me into trouble (tried and tested. Trust me, I have a lot of experience with those kinds of people during my wild eleven-year-old days). But anyhoo, thank God coz the police was so generous, he let the driver go (despite him doing a suicidal traffic offence and not having a valid driver's license. Can you believe that???) and only ordered for my friend here to drive the car since it was her car, sparing us from the possibility of a fricken saman. Good thing though, if we were fined I'm so not going to pay for that.
After that misfortunate event, we finally headed to Larkin Sentral to send those two guys back home. And only after that did I have the opportunity to talk to my friend freely, being the talkative person I used to be seven years ago. From our short conversation during the journey from Larkin to my home (which took about ten minutes. Duh) I found out that a few of my primary school friends had been involved with indecent activities (read: sex) and several other random stories from our childhood memories. But since we had so much time left - thanks to those two guys - I didn't get the chance to do those things I've already planned. Hmm. I guess there's always next time, since she lives near JB and we can have another meetup next time.
Though a bit disappointed, I must say, it's good to see her again :)
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