7 March 2015 - day 0
I was supposed to attend a colleague's wedding that day. I didn't because I didn't feel like it.
Instead I rode alone on my foldable bicycle to Marina Barrage on my own during hot noon time. I just bought that the week before and had great trouble when pedalling from Changi Village back to Marine Parade. I got the brakes fixed earlier that morning apparently because they were rubbing against the wheels, front and back. It was much better after the repair; I could cycle to Marina Barrage just fine. I had lunch at Satay by the Bay, 10 sticks of satay and 2 piece of lontong. I got pretty nice tan which will probably fade away after a week.
I didn't feel like attending the colleague's wedding also partly because I hoped that Nikki ("Nik") would impulsively make some plans again, which she did. She suggested that Bon visit her friend's bike shop at Kallang in order for her to get some ideas for her new bicycle.
I cycled at got back home at 2pm and was quite tired. But I looked forward to seeing both of them. I actually looked forward the most to seeing Bon. I waited until about 4pm while doing almost nothing for Nik to fetch us.
3.55pm, I walked to Bon's place (her place is just a stone throw away) carrying the big badminton bag for the game with the Indo-NUS gang, which would be at 6pm. We met below the shade near her block. She said it's the place where normally Nik will pick her up. I hoped that Nik would come late, as late as possible so we can get more together time. We don't get much of that because I had never asked her out at all.
When I met her, I took a seat which was not so near to her. A comfortable distance. We had little talks, nothing important... It's really hard to find topic, because she is generally a reserved girl and I didn't want to appear too approaching. I wasn't nervous but I just wasn't sure what to talk about. In any case, I've known her for quite long and she normally doesn't answer a lot of questions and has always been hard to approach even as a normal friend. That probably played some part as to why I didn't have a lot of things to talk about with her. She normally does not have a lot of questions to ask me anything either and it was same pattern for her too on that day.
It didn't matter. For me, it felt like my tiredness from the lone-cycling earlier just went away just by seeing her smile from the small talks we were having. I was sufficiently content with this.
I however wished that I had more eye-contact with her that time. You know what they say, the eyes are the windows to the soul. I had hoped that somehow she could tell from my eyes that I have feelings for her and that she would let me try to guess whether she was the same too. But she was mostly looking away, or at her phone. It's always been this awkward if there was only both of us in one particular setting.
Nikki came about 10 minutes after. The timing was actually just nice because we were obviously not getting very chatty at all and were running out of topics. Elvic was in the car too. While she drove us to Kallang, my conversation was mostly focused with Elvic on life updates because I haven't seen him since Christmas at Nikki's place. I can drive conversations, and ask lots of questions casually as per my usual self.
I wanted to show Bon that. That I give my attention equally to everyone because I didn't want Bon feel that I was desperate to get her sole attention.
I also wanted to show the rest the same thing so that everyone maintains their impression of me that I do not give any special attention to Bon. Also, I have never consciously done so indeed. I may have, without realising but this concious effort to talk to the others, in this case, Elvic will be to make up to it.
After we reached the place and went to the shop, Nik's friend showed us a few models of the bicycle. From the few entry level that was shown to us, the $280-white-color URATA-brand mountain bike equipped with front suspension, push-button gears (Bon dislikes twist-switch gears) and disk brake in front of the wheels caught our attention the most. Beautiful thing. But Bon couldn't decide immediately there and then, so we excused ourselves to take a break at the coffee shop nearby and have some drinks while putting some more thoughts before letting Bon decide.
We started to look at our phones to see if there are better choices for second hand bikes online. We first chatted about bikes, but after a while the conversation shifted from Elvic's girlfriend and I got carried away to share about my ex-girlfriend. But relationships has always been a topic of great interest to everyone (hopefully everyone thinks the same way) and it was also in my intention to plant some ideas of how I would treat my girlfriend, if I had one, to Bon. I noticed I got carried away. I also noticed that I needed to go off soon because my badminton game was going to start at 6pm at Tiong Bahru. The conversation went back on track to Bicycles, and we then walked back to the bike shop.
She still couldn't decide by the time I needed to go. Nik and Bon dissuaded me from going but I told them I would feel bad because I was the one who organized the game and that I had shuttlecocks that the gang needed. If this wasn't an impulsive session with Nik and Bon, i.e. if I had known I will be spending my time with them that this Saturday, I wouldn't even have booked the badminton game. I would have preferred to stay and spend the time with Nik and Bon, or with whoever else, so long as Bon was there.
Also, back to the point above about me being a friend who is fair and equal to all my friends, this is also an applicable example. Elvic had to go too for a dinner with his girlfriend so we left them and I took a cab to Tiong Bahru to reach on time.
I was playing halfway when Bon suddenly messaged me on whatsapp:
"stop badminton and join us"
Bon never messaged me and I also rarely message her. This was her messaging me first and she asked me to join them! Then it seemed impossible so at first I thought it was Nik playing with Bon's phone and using it to message me. Thinking it was Nik, I replied her quoting Nik's name, to say that I could go after the game, take cab and reach Nik's place at 8.30pm. In the end I thought we have settled and agreed that our next meeting would be the following day.
I felt it was obligatory to have dinner with the Indo-NUS badminton gang after the game for 3 simple reasons: 1. It's dinner time after the game; 2. they are also my friends; 3. It's the most logical thing to do because I haven't met them for quite a while and the dinner is a just-nice catch up sessions.
A while after that I messaged Bon to ask her where had she gone with Nik. She replied and apparently they were going to cycle to test-drive the $280 white URATA bike and they were heading to Marina Barrage (which I had visited in the morning). Then she asked me to join them again while I was chatting with my badminton group and was about to finish my food. I thought she was just joking, but since she had asked for twice, I felt twice as compelled to join them, and some more since the invitation came from Bon herself. So I told them that I needed to leave soon.
This came as peculiar to the rest of the Indo-NUS badminton group because we were only dining for less than an hour so they kind of figured out: only a girl whom I was interested in would have enough persuasive power to distract me from the dinner.
Adit, who was part of the badminton group, also asked me why I was in rush. In front of the rest, I made excuse that it was only two normal colleagues who kept insisting that I join them. I have repeatedly told him that there's nothing going on and it's not like I'm leaving dinner for the sake of one girl (although actually it was). And then I handed him my whatsapp for him to see as a show to the rest.
He could see that Bon was asking me to join them and he understood. He knew of my crush on her too because I had previously told him before. I actuallly did not have difficulty showing my whatsapp conversation with Bon to Adit or and would have had difficulty to show even to anyone else because indeed there was nothing noteworthy from that conversation. I had never made any attempt to approach her, not even by texts.
She kept persuading even after I told her it will take me quite a while to get there so eventually I made my mind to go there. I have to admit that I was damn happy about that though. Did she really want to see me that badly? or was it because she ran out of topic with Nik because there were only both of them since me and Elvic left? Either way I was elated that I get to see her again for that day. I parted from my friends at 9.20pm which made the group to disassemble too because all of us had finished our dinner although we were still chatting heartily. I took cab and surprisingly reached there in 10 minutes.
Three of us chatted for about one hour. The smaller group meant the more chance me and Bon could get to engage in conversations. We were mostly chatting about our clique and a friend of Nik's husband who tried to join our the clique, whom I think was a nice guy. When we exchanged presents during the Christmas party at Nik, Bon got the present he bought which was a Tony Tony Chopper figure (not the one of those official figures that I knew). Bon seemed happy to receive that Chopper figure and because of that I would wear Chopper T-shirt when there's a cycling session hoping that it would bring the same smile to her face when she sees it. And he got my present, which was only a towel and a pair of slipper.
After that we left: both of them cycled back, and I took MRT and bus. They reached first before I reached home and they tried to get one of the spare bikes which was left at Lala's place because I had been complaining that I was really struggling to cycle that the previous week (and they really could see that I was struggling) when we cycled to Changi Village my foldable bike. It was already 12AM plus and they failed to get the spare bikes because Lala was already asleep by then. I told them that it was very thoughtful of them but I should be alright after the adjustments to the brakes on my foldable bike.
I had previously talked to Nik that I was keen on catching the sunrise in the east when she suggested it to us and at that point in time we already planned to have it on the Sunday, i.e. the following day, 8 March 2015. At first it was only two of us: Me and Nik, because no one else seemed interested. Then, Bon's mind seemed to change during her time with Nik that day. And it was already 12 AM meaning, it was technically already Sunday and we had to set off at 4.30AM in the morning in order to catch the sunrise as it takes about 1-2 hours by bike to reach to Changi Village. Don't forget that both Nik and Bon had just finished cycling to and from Marina Barrage and only had about 4 hours left to rest before cycling again to Changi Village.
So I asked Bon what made her changed her mind to join us to catch the sunrise. She said that she felt like she owed Nik because Nik had helped her with the bike purchase. This was one of the qualities that I liked of her, that she valued her friendship so much that sometimes she doesn't take care of herself. I told her that we should just change it to afternoon cycling unless it she really wanted to catch the sunrise as well.
I did not really persuade her to just change it to afternoon cycling and selfishly refrained from doing so because I wanted her to join both of us instead. If it was changed to afternoon, there may be more joining and as I have mentioned, I'd prefer the group to be a smaller one.
She opted to catch the sunrise saying that in any case she just sleep for the rest of the day after the early morning cycle. I was happy that she said so and couldn't wait for that. So 3 of us arranged to give a call to one another at 4.15 in the morning and after that I went to slumber.
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