Teenage crush

As I went to St Margaret’s School, I didn’t get any chance to mingle with guys in my teenage years. My brother didn’t introduce me to his friends either. I think there’s an unwritten rule about no dating of their sisters. One of my classmates had a crush on my brother and often followed me home to revise schoolwork together. Of course we didn’t do much studying. What do you expect from a starry eyed school girl?

I had a crush on a geeky boy at our bus stop. I doubt if he even noticed me but I was always secretly hoping to see him every morning. I also secretly admired another tall dashing school boy who looked like an actor. His mum sold ‘towgay’ (beansprouts) and tofu at the market. So my best friend and I referred to him as Towgay but he already had a girlfriend. These were just silly teenage crush. We were too shy to make friends with them anyway.

I grew up thinking I was ugly though looking back now, I think I must have been quite cute. I was never aware of anyone giving me any attention. On the way to school one day, I was standing near the exit door of the bus when an older boy got up from his seat and walked towards me. He was alighting at the next stop. Just before he got down, he stared into my eyes and touched my face gently. I was surprised and embarrassed, but did not react for he was already gone. It left me puzzled but I was too innocent to see the signs. I don’t remember now if I saw him again after that. Yah, I was dense like that.

When I was working in the design firm, I attended a briefing at an IT company one morning. The moment I walked into the big meeting room, one of the engineers exclaimed loudly “Oh my God! I can’t believe this. I had the biggest crush on you when I was in secondary school!” I was amused and embarrassed at the same time. He went on to ask if I remembered him from Swiss Cottage Secondary School. We used to take the same bus every morning. I dug into the deep recess of my memory but just couldn’t pull out his face. Looking at his joyful face, I didn’t have the heart to hurt his feelings, so I said “Of course.” which made him very happy. He then went on to tell me about how he is now married with two kids….