langkau fiction

The last two days have been hectic. Got my stupid monthly salary this week only to see it evaporate within a couple of hours. Paid the two-month installments for my car because I defaulted last month’s. And as I was about to budget the remaining one third of my salary, I got a phone call from a friend.

“Your salary came in today?” he asked me. Yes, I told him. I have not heard from him for many months now. His punch line came quickly “Y’know, my sister-in-law needs money and I can’t send it to her in Kuching because there’s no bank here,” he explained without me asking. “I was wondering if you can lend her some and I’ll pay you back when you get here on Sunday,” he said.

Casually, I just asked him “Okay, no problem. How much?” It’s not the first time this happened.

“She needs RM2,000,” he informed me.

“Whaaaatttt??!!” I screamed in surprise. “What makes you think I have such amount of cash?!” I asked him.

“I will pay you back when you get here on Sunday, like before,” he tried to assure me. Yes, he did pay me back my money when I lent it to him three years ago. It took him one year to pay me back.

I said “I don’t have that much amount of money. I only have RM1,349.66 left in the bank.”

“Okay, then. Lend her RM1,000 and I’ll pay you on Sunday,” he repeated his vow. “And how am I going to live on RM349.66? Do I look like a dugong to you? I don’t live on plankton, y’know.” I tried telling him. Again, he assured me that he’s going to pay me the full amount once I see him in Bintulu on Sunday.

So, I had to depart with my RM1k with the faith that he’ll pay me on Sunday. Tiu lah…

Yesterday, a colleague called me during lunch time wondering if I could do her a favor. When people “wonder” if I could help them, it’s usually something out of the ordinary.

“I don’t have enough cash, so I can’t lend you. Sorry,” I told her before she blurted what she wanted from me.

“Huh? No, I didn’t call to ask for money. Besides, you only got paid a couple of days ago. And you finish you money?” she quizzed me. “Anyways, I was wondering if you could help me to lift my fridge from my old house. I’ve moved to a new apartment,” she said.

So, I went over to her house. The fridge was as tall as me. “Who’s going to carry it with me?” I asked her. “Oh, you can’t carry it alone?” she sounded sincerely puzzled. “Neraka berdarah lah, what do I look like to you? Do you see me wearing a blue costume with a red underwear worn on the outside?” I asked her.

“Oh, okay. Chill, man. I’ll help you carry it,” she said. And as I was about to lift the fridge from the floor, it slipped and a sharp object just sliced a small part of the skin on my finger. The cut was deep but not big. And it was bleeding profusely for a good 10 minutes while I was carrying the fridge into my pick up.

This picture was taken last night

The whole operation of moving her fridge, gas cylinder and stove from her house to her apartment, on the second floor, took more than two hours. After it was all over, I took a small rag outside her apartment, poured it with Listerine (kept in my car) and wrapped my finger with it until I reached the office. Her fridge was tainted with my blood.

And as if segala kecelakaan doesn’t stop there, on my way back to the office, my back tyre got a punctured. I really dislike changing tyres for a four-wheel drive. It’s heavy and big. Not to mention expensive if it needs to be changed. Fortunately, the tyre shop was quite near so I turned into the shop and asked them to do what should be done. Apparently, a tiny microscopic nail managed to sneak into the tyre and do its damage. “I don’t have to change it, do I?” I asked the tyre expert. He looked at me and shook his head “No need unless you want to?” I told him “No, just do that…y’know…er…tampal thing, ok?” He agreed. He got a sharp equipment, punctured the hole where that small nail had entered, put some kind of rubber plaster through the whole, and it was all done in less than 10 minutes. Great, I told him! “How much?” I asked him for that simple piece of work with a small but efficient equipment.

“RM10 lah..” he told me. My brain almost exploded “What the fuck! RM10 just to tampal it?” Of course, I didn’t say that to him. But my mind was seriously boggled. So, I handed him the RM10.

That small piece of shit nail costs me RM10!!

After that last kecelakaan, I prayed there won’t be any more strange things happening to me. I reached the office at around 3pm, exhausted just thinking about what had happened.

Oh ya, yesterday I was told that the Moonwalker died. That was kind of strange because I thought he died years ago. Then, another strange thing was that all the english radio channels were playing his songs for the whole day! And it continued till today. “The King of Pop”, they said.

It’s like the whole world is mourning. All of a sudden, everyone around the world declare their love for the Moonwalker. Famous artists claim that the Moonwalker had inspired them. People call the radio station to say how great this Moonwalker was. And it was only several years ago, everyone seem to condemn him for kidnapping, child molesting and god knows what else…yeah, maybe his plastic surgery too. I remember every time I said, “Hey, the Moonwalker’s song is playing! This is cool song, man!” I would get that disgusted look from my friends who’d say “eewwww….you like him?” Now, it is them who are mourning. *sigh*

Then, I remembered how we used to imitate everything that the Moonwalker said or did when we were young. I think I was around 8 or 9 years old when I first heard of this guy.

We would tell our parents to buy white gloves for us. Any white gloves would do. Only on one side, mind you. Then, we wanted to wear that red leather jacket under 30 degree celcius weather but of course, parents couldn’t afford it. Then, we wanted our hair to be like the Moonwalkers, curly as the Maggie mee. Parents thought we were ridiculous. Then, we did the dance moves he did till I sprained my ankle and vowed never to dance again. I can remember people just wanted to imitate the Moonwalker and maybe even be like him. Even during Halloween costume parties, kids wanted to be like the Moonwalker! Especially after he had that weird plastic surgery. He became strange in his latter life. His face turned into…y’know…like the face of that character he played in “Thriller”.

Anyway, I’ll just post a video clip of his famous number “Thriller” and show you why everyone wanted to be like the Moonwalker.

Ooops, sorry I meant this one:

Well, at least one third of Charlie’s Angels is accompanying him to wherever he’s going. So, I guess that’s okay…