Short Story #24: An Unexpected Presence

CLANG! 

David snapped his eyes open and sat up on his bed.

CLANG! CLANG!

Gripping his bed sheets tightly, David gulped his throat in fright. There was supposed to be no one else at home. The only conclusion was, as crazy as it sounds, that there was an intruder at home. With him. Alone.

Luckily, David was a blackbelt in karate but he was not confident with his skills when his heart was pounding like crazy.

CLANG! CLANG! CLANG!

Unable to contain his nervousness anymore, David tossed his bed sheets aside and gingerly stepped out of his bed. He desperately searched for any object in his room that he could use as a weapon and even though he hesitated, he quickly decided that his toy Star Wars lightstick would suffice. The maximum damage it could do was stun the intruder momentarily while he could use that opportunity to escape from his house to call for help. He silently prayed the intruder was shorter than him so that he could at least overpower him.

Stealthily leaving his room, David tightened his grip on his Star Wars lightstick as he closely listened to the source of the deafening sound. Finding out that it came from the kitchen, David inched closer but quietly to it. The puzzling thing was that as he neared the kitchen, a delicious aroma filled his nostrils and he immediately licked his lips as he recognized the aroma.

"David, what are you doing walking around with your briefs and holding your lightstick like you are going to hit someone with it?" A familiar voice shouted at him, shocking him that he dropped his lightstick.

"Dad, what are you doing here?!" David stared at the man in question in shock. "And what is this mess?"

Pots and pans were all over the floor. His father smiled sheepishly and rubbed his head in embarrassment.

"I wanted to cook Japanese curry since I was craving for it," his father answered honestly. "My stomach grumbled when I woke up from my nap so I was really hungry."

"Wait. You were at home all this time?" David questioned.

"Yeah...why do you look so surprised-oh!" his father shifted his attention to the stove and turned the heat off. "It's all cooked! Let's prepare the table!"

David nodded, smiling softly to the older man. It seemed that he got hungry from worrying that it could be a dangerous intruder in the house. He walked forward and accidentally stepped on the lightstick, causing to fall onto the pots and pans on the floor. A loud crashing sound was then heard.

"Haha be careful son! With that sound, our neighbours would think there's a robber inside this house!" His father laughed at his misfortune.

David only groaned in response. His dad had no idea.

Short Story #23: Skipping School

"Where are you going, Jake?"

Jake silently cursed to himself as he turned around and threw a fake, charming smile at the bane of his existence - his history teacher. Also known as the person who has foiled his plan.

"Hey Mr Branson!" Said teacher frowned at the warm greeting. Jake could tell the nosy parker was already suspecting that he was actually doing the unthinkable.

"Are you trying to skip school, Holling?" As if trying to assert his authority, Mr Branson folded his arms and cast a skeptical glance at Jake, who was suppressing his urge to laugh at his teacher's failed attempt to look intimidating.

"I wouldn't dare, sir," Jake answered with an upturned smirk, as if insulted by that mere suggestion. "How could I ever have the audacity to skip school when my grades have been declining like our country's stock levels?"

Not fazed by the student's response, Mr Branson maintained his stance and contemplated before speaking again, "I'm glad you are aware of your current performance, Holling. I hope you'll work hard for your exams. Anyway, I think it's time you head back to your class."

Reluctantly, Jake trudged his way to his fifth period Spanish class, following behind his teacher. Unbelievable! He was close to pushing the large, metal doors and breathe the fresh air of freedom. It was all thanks to this law-abiding, bespectacled balding man that he was unable to skip school.

'Next time, I'll make sure I'll thoroughly check the hallways before leaving,' Jake made a mental note.

A Bizarre Bus Ride

Technically, this is not a short story as this is just a retelling of what happened yesterday. lol. I just wanted to share this cos I found the event quite odd.

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Usually, I take the bus directly from my university after my school day ends. However, that day, I had different plans, which was to visit the library to pay my overdue fines (of which was not a fault of mine) and while I was there, borrow some books. Due to an unfortunate server problem, I was not able to log into my Library account online so I could not renew my books as a result. Thus I incurred a library fine. Sometimes, it is hard to expect what will happen in the future. I assumed that I was able to log into my account with no problem so I withheld the renewal of my books till the end of the day that I had to return them. It is these kinds of things that make you lose your cool and just assume that the world is out against you. Nevertheless, I eventually clung to my positivism and think that this whole episode is a blessing in disguise.

That aside, when I took the bus, I had to alight at the nearest MRT station. The bus ride was considerably long as it took around nine bus stops. When I boarded the bus, I managed to find a pair of vacant seats. I wanted to move in to sit next to the window but there was a small amount of unknown liquid on that seat. Instantly, I remembered the well-known news report where a lady sat on an MRT seat that was stained with a harmful chemical thinking that it was harmless mineral water. As such, I decided not to move in and risk the unfortunate events happening to me. I definitely wouldn't want to go home with a huge hole on my pants or being admitted to the hospital or WORSE, having whatever that would happen to me be reported in local news.

Nearing my destination, I noticed that no one pressed the bell to signal for the bus to stop. Since it was the bus stop near the MRT station, a lot of ppl will surely alight at that stop. So since no one took the initiative, I reached out to press the bell and when I did, some were looking at my direction, presumably to look who was the actual saviour so that they would not have to go to the trouble of pressing the bell themselves. And the funniest and the most bizarre part was that people were rising from their seats to leave the bus first. And I was like thinking 'who was the one who actually had the guts to press the bell'. Obviously, the hero had to allow others to alight first since they clearly seemed to be in a hurry.

Short Story #22: The New Playground

After completing their homework, Chloe and Chase ran to the new playground not far away from their house. The new playground had red swings, a yellow slide and plenty of seesaws. Everything looked brand new! The siblings had their mouths open in complete amazement.

As if on cue, they both sped off, eager to play in their new playground. Seeing as there were other children playing with the other playground equipment, they made a beeline to the slide. Since he was older, Chase allowed his little sister to try the slide first. After Chloe had sat comfortably at the top of the slide, Chase pushed her gently and she screamed in joy as she slid down the slide. Grinning at her sister's enjoyment, Chase was about to slide off the slide when suddenly a bigger boy pulled him back and shoved him. Taken aback by the rude gesture, Chase frowned and shoved the other boy back. Soon, a scuffle started.

Chloe, who wanted to try out the slide again, went up and was shocked at the huge crowd above. Initially, she thought it was a long queue for the slide. On closer inspection, she gasped when she saw her older brother trapping a larger boy in a painful headlock. Pushing through the crowd, Chloe grabbed her brother's arm and pleaded him to stop. It seemed his sister's pleads had brought him back to his senses since Chase released the other boy from his tight hold. He then hugged his little sister who was crying at witnessing his violent side.

Later, the bully's mother overheard the commotion and scolded her son and apologized to Chase on his behalf.

"It's okay," Chase waved his hand off casually. He looked at the bigger boy, who was now cowering in shame. "I'm sorry if I hurt you just now. How about I push you off the slide as a form of apology?"

The boy was shocked that Chase apologized but agreed to his suggestion. That day, Chase and Chloe made a new friend.

Short Story #21: Sportsmanship

Today was Sports Day and Joshua was taking part in the cross country run. To any other competitor, this would just be a typical race but to Joshua, this was the most important race in his life as he trained very hard for this. It was incredible at how dedicated Joshua is towards this race. All those grueling hours of training be it shine or rain. I remembered Amy saying she saw Joshua running a 3-km jog at the school track when it was heavily pouring. I also remembered at how other people mocking Joshua for being putting so much effort in a trivial race. Why can't people just mind their own business? At least Joshua has something in his life that he deems as important unlike some people who never puts effort on anything other than carelessly mouthing on other people's lives.

Even from far away, I could tell Joshua was nervous. From the moment he had stepped behind the starting line, he had been fidgeting and focusing his gaze downwards - clear-cut signs that he was very much nervous.

"You can do it, Joshua!" He instantly whipped his head upwards, searching for the encouraging support. Once he had locked eyes with me, he shot me a confident smile and gave me a thumbs-up. I beamed at him and raised the cheering banner that I made myself. It was not a masterpiece but the main point was to display the words 'JOSHUA NO. 1' clearly for Joshua to see. Let the other competitors see it too. Let them be intimidated by the boy that is going to give Usain Bolt a run for his money someday.

Suddenly, the shrill sound of a blow horn was heard and all the racers started sprinting. Even only after a one minute, I could already see Joshua in the lead. A very huge lead. I always squealed at the huge gap between him and the second fastest runner. Soon, Joshua went out of sight and eventually other racers too. It would be around 30 minutes before we would see the runners running back to the ending line. The wait was agonizing that my friends and I stayed quiet throughout, too tense to even have small talk.

Before I knew it, the spectators started buzzing in excitement. Instantly, I leapt up and smiled so much that my teeth was shown. To my disappointment, the person in the lead was not Joshua and my heart broke when that person ended up finishing first in the race. A lot of questions raced through my mind. What happened to Joshua? Was he okay? Did he injure himself midway through the race? The barrage of thoughts in my head was put to a halt when the crowd started buzzing again. I looked and saw Joshua carrying another runner on his back towards the finishing line. The runner seemed really worn out and his face grimaced in pain. I then noticed that Joshua was careful in not touching the other's right ankle and that was when I connected the dots. The runner must had sprained his ankle somewhere during the race and when Joshua was heading back to the starting line, he stopped and helped him up. But why would he do that? Why didn't Joshua just ignore the injured runner and focus on the race? Won't the medic squad come to that runner's aid eventually?

Throughout the awards ceremony, the unhappy look on my face stayed. Joshua ended up being in third place. All I could of was how unfair that someone just happened to be injured and that Joshua had to help him out because that was just the person he was. When I addressed that to Joshua, he simply rolled his head back, laughing gleefully at me as if I had just told him the funniest joke he had heard in years.

Flicking me on the forehead, he looked at me and smiled. "Baby, this race is important to me. But I'm not the type to ignore a person in need. So of course I have to abandon the race and help him out. That's called 'sportsmanship', baby."

Hearing that explanation, I puffed up my cheeks before giving him a small smile.

"I guess winning isn't that important. Anyway, I'm proud of you, baby," I hugged him and he returned it affectionately.

Short Story #20: Rain, rain

Matt could sense that something was not right when he saw grey clouds in the sky early that morning. It was strange to see such the sky which had been clear and bright for three consecutive weeks to suddenly become gloomy and dull. Nonetheless, it was expected that it was going to rain very heavily that day.

Still, it was quite a shocker to him when he saw the flooded roads as he left the school. Carefully wading through the ankle-high water, he stared ahead and suppressed a shocked gasp when he saw how the nearest bus stop was so crowded that there was no more room for another person, unless they are skinny and are small.

Rain dripped off the umbrella as Matt hurried to reach the bus stop. Closing it, he huffed a sigh of relief at his immense luck that he had ended up mostly dry and that he managed to squeeze into the crowded bus stop without getting hit by the rain dripping from the roof. But he spoke too soon when the old man in front of him stretched his frail, long arms in the air, causing Matt to take a few step backwards and accidentally got significant portion of his shirt drenched from the rain.

Instantly, Matt took a few steps forward and looked at his now wet shirt with a bewildered expression on his face. That shirt was brand new! Cursing silently at his bad luck, Matt frowned and prayed that his day would not get any worse. And luckily it did not. Boarding his bus, Matt sat at one of the seats at the back of the bus. The chilly air from the air-conditioner caused Matt to shiver. He distracted himself from the cold by admiring the scenery outside through the window. Noticing that the rain was slowly stopping,  Matt could see a bright light shimmering at the corner of his eye. Glancing at that direction, he softly smiled to himself.

A beautiful rainbow formed between the fluffy white clouds and it caused a great warmth in Matt's heart.

Short Story #19: Morning Rush

It's been a long time since I have been caught in a morning rush. So, when I started being accustomed to that, I wished I had afternoon classes everyday again.

The morning rush is as terrible as I remembered! During peak hours, there are a litter of people walking towards the train station and through the ticketing machines. I joined the crowd and tried to move as seamlessly and quickly as possible so that I would be almost guaranteed to board the next train. More often than not, I managed to squeeze through the already crowded train and stand and wait patiently till I reached my stop. I did all that, while listening to music and sometimes glancing at the corner of my eyes at other people's behaviour, such as those who vehemently refused to move inside the train so that new passengers can board. Maybe it was because some of them wanted to be near the train doors so that they could alight quickly and avoid bumping onto people as they head to the door. I could empathize.

The morning rush can affect the mood badly. Since people are rushing for work or school, some people can be more uptight and grumpy in the morning. A brief glance at a small sample of passengers and you could observe that almost all of them have scrunched eyebrows, frowning. Sometimes I had a feeling that they would instantly lash out when someone were to tap their shoulders to move inside to give more space for others. And, sadly to say, other people's visibly irritated expressions tend to rub off on me too. Of course, the irritation dissipates once I finally arrived at my school. Every time I stepped out of the bus, I would involuntarily heave a sigh of relief.

Short Story #18: Buying Breakfast

I'm not sure whether it is something to be proud about but I am an early riser, waking up as early as 5.45 a.m. even on regular days. People may think that I am crazy but I relish in waking up before the sun even rises. It is actually not a difficult thing to do and comes with its own set of advantages as well. Once you stretched and stepped out of your bed, just gather all your willpower to walk all the way to your bathroom to take a refreshing warm shower. That would invigorate you greatly! And what are the advantages? Well, you get to start your day early and this leaves you more time to do your activities for the day, provided that you don't procrastinate of course.

But, for me, my favourite part of waking up early is buying breakfast. I'm not sure about others but I help buy breakfast for my entire family every morning. Tucked away in the corner, an Indian stall is doing brisk business everyday. I am usually greeted by a long queue (that fortunately does not stretch for miles and miles) by the time I got there. The waiting time is long as a result but it was definitely worth the wait. The normal thinking would be to curse at the long queue and how it is practically taking up all of your time. However, looking at the bright side, that long queue shows how well the stall is actually doing so that would mean the stall is here to stay! Also, that would also mean you have to be up earlier and be the first in line. 

Short Story #17: Sick

Shivering under the blanket, Tony tried his best to fall asleep. It was an incredibly hard thing to do when he was down with a high fever and a painful headache. To make things worse, he felt the urge to throw up every five minutes. The sick boy blamed the inedible fried rice that his mother had bought a few hours ago. It was only after he had vomited a whole chunk of food that he discovered that his mother had apparently bought the food from an unhygienic vendor who had cockroaches and rats all over his food stall.

Tony groaned in pain. Why in the world did his mother still bought the food even from the obvious clues that the food he had cooked may be contaminated? She bought the food and he had to suffer painfully because of his mother's mistakes.

Looking at the bright side, at least he did not have to attend school for the next two days and by default, he had a pretty long weekend ahead of him. Smiling to himself, Tony was glad he got to miss school. He only had a brief moment of happiness and optimism before he started to cough violently.

Jungle Fish review

Summary: This short Korean movie called 'Jungle Fish' is about the competitive and stringent school environment where students have to conform to in order to excel in their grades which would then lead to success in life. The main character (Kim Soo-Hyun) investigates the rumour where certain students cheated on an examination with his best friend (Hwang Chansung). The students who cheated did it by accident as they were given the same exam papers during their tuition classes and they felt guilty. The guilt became so strong that they acted stubbornly.

Personal thoughts: It was interesting and relatable at first but as the movie progressed, I felt that some scenes were done a bit over-dramatically and the ending was just anti-climatic. The students who cheated felt an immense guilt that they shut themselves out from others. But they were not at wrong so it did not make sense they would act so stubbornly like sending a suicide note and giving the idea that they were going to commit suicide.

Final rating: 5.5/10

Short Story #16: Surprise, surprise

On the way home, Zoe's mind was completely filled with thoughts about her birthday party. That day, she had officially turned 11 years old and she could not wait to celebrate her birthday with her family and friends.

She had managed to get some hints about the party from her older brother with some persistence of course. All she knew was that her party would have a treasure hunt game for her and her friends to play with prizes for the winners and a three-tier chocolate cake - her favourite flavour! Gosh, she could hardly contain her excitement she was practically skipping on the pavement the minute she left her school. People walking around her must had thought that she was crazy but she did not care. Let them think all they want. They were not about to have the most epic 11th birthday party unlike her!

However, her excitement was cut short when rain started to fall all of a sudden. Shrieking as the rain droplets made contact with her face, she broke into a sprint and ran all the way home, ineffectively shielding herself from the heavy rain with her hands. She ran haphazardly, stepping on some puddles and mud on the grass. As she reached the void deck of her house, she was drenched from head to toe.

Pouting, she headed home with her head hung low. Even though she had not used the word before, she knew the heavy rain was a bad omen. Once she stepped inside her house, she was yelled at by her mother for dirtying the floors with mud from her stained shoes and water from her drenched body. As if her day could not have gotten worse, her father was hurriedly heading to the door, telling her that he was abruptly called by his boss to head to work as he walked past her. Zoe was devastated upon hearing that since that would mean her father would not be able to attend her birthday party.

After Zoe had showered and changed into a fresh set of clothes, she sat on her bed and started crying. She wanted everyone in her family to be present for her party. Losing her mood, she sulked in her room all day, just staring at the ceiling as she laid on the bed. Time seemed to pass by when suddenly there was a knock on her room door. Zoe tried to ignore it but the knocking was persistent and by the rhythm of the knocks she could immediately tell it was her brother.

Sighing heavily, she jumped from her bed and opened the door. Appearing sad, her expression instantly turned to surprise when she was presented with a huge chocolate cake with 11 lighted candles.

"Happy Birthday Zoe!" Her parents, brother and grandmother shouted joyously at her. Totally in shock, Zoe just gaped in surprise and soon the tears started falling again. But they were happy tears instead of sad. It turned out that her father lied about working as he was leaving to get the birthday cake from the bakery whereas her older brother made things up as Zoe could not shut up about the plans for her birthday party.

Zoe was incredibly touched. Even though it was not the way she imagined it, Zoe definitely enjoyed the simple birthday party that was prepared for her.

Short Story #15: An Incident At The Mall

The shopping mall was packed with people. Well, it was a given since today was the super mega sale that had been plastered all over the local newspapers and advertisements. It would be a naive thinking of mine to assume that only my family had heard of this sale.

Anyway....it was so difficult to navigate around the large space filled with a sea of people. My mother and I had to hold our hands so that we would not get separated. Every step I took felt as if I was being washed away by a rough tide. As we tried to maneuver around the crowd, we both heard an ear-piercing scream. I instantly turned my head at the source of the noise and I could see that other people were also as curious and clueless as me. 

A woman, who looked as if she was around my mother's age, had a distraught look on her face with her mouth slightly gaping. At first sight, it was quite a hilarious thing to see. On closer inspection, she had a light wound on her pale neck - a thin line of red which seemed to come from a knife. I gulped nervously. Something wasn't right. 

"There he is!" I quickly tried to search for the second voice and finally rested my gaze on a young, tall man chasing after another man wearing an all black attire. The latter had a tight grip on a gold necklace and was about to reach for the door handle when the tall man caught up with him and tackled him roughly to the floor. 

"I got him!" The tall man yelled as he rested his heavy weight on the other man who was desperately squirming and wiggling to escape from his plight.

The whole incident rendered me speechless. Soon, the crowd paying attention to the scene started to shift their attention back to their shopping, my mother included.

"This is none of our business," she told me. 

On the way back home, I was playing games on my phone when I received an interesting notification from a news app that I downloaded. 

'Valiant man caught a thief in the Expo MegaSale'

After reading the whole article, realization dawned on me. The man dressed in black attire actually sneaked up on the woman - his victim- and pointed a knife at her, threatening her to give him her valuable gold necklace. When she did not comply immediately, the man sliced her neck and forcefully removed the jewelry from her neck before running away. However, a young man witnessed the scene and promptly chased after the thief to retrieve the stolen accessory back. The 'valiant man' was profusely thanked by the woman and was even offered money for his brave actions but he refused it. The thief on the other hand was only given a warning since the woman forgave him easily. 

I was shaking my head in disbelief as I read the article. To think that an incident that I witnessed a few feet from me actually got published in the local news. I was happy that there was at least one courageous person who stepped up and helped a victim unconditionally. At the same time, this news could serve a great lesson to everyone: never wear expensive jewelry when you go outside lest you become a target for a thief. 

Short Story #14: Predicament inside the Lift

After a long tiring day at work, my muscles ached badly. Even though it was an office job where it was mostly sedimentary, my hands were numb from typing on the keyboard for hours and my legs were numb from not stretching. I breathed a sigh of relief when I was finally a few feet away from my house. As I was waiting patiently for the lift to come down, I smiled at my neighbour who was also waiting. She was several months pregnant and was expecting a baby soon. Finally, the lift arrived and we went in. Being the considerate person that I was, I let her enter first. Halfway up, there was a strange buzzing sound and the lights started to flicker. Wide-eyed, we both stared each other nervously. We both had a hunch what was wrong but were not confident to voice it out. Suddenly, the lift came to a jerking halt. Our greatest worry came true. I jabbed a random button repeatedly- the frantic action reflecting the turbulent feeling in my stomach.

"We're trapped..." I heard a faint voice. I looked at my neighbour. Her face glistened with sweat and it was more apparent in the darkness. But what was worse was that she was hyperventilating! That's definitely not going to be good for the baby!

"Relax! It's going to be fine!" I hurriedly tried to calm her down. "People are going to help us get of here!"

Seeing as my words did not seem to convince her at all (and me as well), I frantically took out my phone in an attempt to call the local policemen, firefighter, my mother - anyone! Unfortunately, there was no reception in my phone, considering the airtight box I was trapped in.

"Help! Help!" I screamed as I banged the lift doors so hard that my knuckles were probably bruised. "One of us here is pregnant! Please help us!"

I then heard a strangled cry and quickly turned my head. To my horror, my neighbour had slid to the floor, clutching her stomach. She looked like she was in great pain.

"My-my water broke..." My mouth gaped in shock. Instantly, I took out a folder from my bag and furiously fanned her with it.

"It's going to be alright...calm down...everything's going to be fine..." I gently said, comforting her.

"Take deep breaths.." I advised her and she obediently heeded my advice, following my lead.

We were stranded there for a few more minutes when suddenly the lift doors were forcefully opened. It turned out that one of the neighbours heard my pleas and notified the repairmen who promptly got us out of our predicament. 

Noting of my neighbour's situation, I quickly called for an ambulance. I had to accompany her all the way to the hospital as she pleaded me to and she had an iron grip on my hand so I complied. After she delivered her baby smoothly, she thanked me and said that her new baby owed his life to me. I shook my head and said that I had nothing to do with it and that it was all the mother's strength that the baby was alive.