Secrets of the Heart - 心の秘密

Chapter 2

When you were young, someone will always hold your hand when you cross the road. No matter who that person is, you’ll know that he/she is someone you can depend on, someone whom you can trust.

As you grow older, you would realize that nobody holds your hand anymore. You are dependant of yourself, to see the world in a different concept altogether. You are responsible to the things you do, the words you believe, the people you trust.

Trusting someone is never easy; getting someone to trust you is even more difficult in this reality world where dangers pound upon a blink of the eye.

I believe in some point of your life, you’re bound to get cheated at least once. You’ll feel sad, because you are in a lost. The world seems crashing down as you feel isolated once again. The person who’s holding your hand lets go, never spare a thought on what will become of you. You’ll feel angry, because you feel like an idiot. Your judgment has failed you and you won’t know whom to trust again.

You decided to walk alone, alone in the mist of darkest, alone in the valley of mistrusted region, wherever you go, loneliness is felt. Friends are no longer people you think you can depend on let alone entering your forbidden world of closed heart.

As times goes by, you’ve learned that trusting someone is a serious bet which you must bare the loss if one day the odds are against you. You tried to walk the road once again. This time, you tried to hold others hands. Making people believe in you and trust you may not seems as easy as you think. The responsibility of not letting go is much tougher than just holding onto one’s hand.

Finally, someone trusts you. You are no longer alone but in the warm of true friendship as you may say. From this moment on, your life begins to change. Dark alley becomes busy street of joy & laughter. You have relived life once more, you said.

And let this moment prolongs, as you hold the hands of trust and leading them to light and somewhere safe. . . .

When you looked at person, sometimes you wish you would know what she is thinking about. Are you inside her thoughts? What makes her smile as those bright eyes grew every time? Are the one who made her happy today?

Edwin used his hand to support his chin as he continued to look at Janet.

The history of Malaya that was written on the board brought in so such boredom that some of the students were already napping with their heads on the desk.

Not Edwin, as he was concentrating on his view from his side.

Janet was seated right beside the window and he was situated furthest away from her horizontally. He was contented with the seat as he could steal a glance at her and won’t be caught.

“What is she thinking and why is she always smiling?”

Edwin thought to himself.

Suddenly he felt someone kicking his chair.

“Ah Win… Mrs. Chong is calling you.”

Edwin stood up knowing he was caught with his guard down.

“Edwin Ng, top student last year. What has happened to you? Can’t even answer a simple question?”

An angry Mrs Chong walked towards him.

Edwin turned left and right fearing for his life as she advances.

“Stand there young man! Very well, since you are not interested in my lesson, you might as well go stand outside till the class ends.”

Edwin then dragged himself out of the class and stood there till the next period.

“Good morning class?”

Miss Joanne greeted the class with her usual smile.

She was their Math teacher and also their form teacher.

Miss Lee was Edwin’s favorite teacher; given the fact was that she was teaching his favorite subject, Mathematics.

Edwin was always fascinated by numbers since young. Ironically his first encounter with numbers was with a pack of poker cards that his father left on the table. It taught him the fundamental addition & subtraction without the help of tutors or assessment books.

“Right class, before I go on. Just want to inform you that there will be a Math test tomorrow.”

The whole class groaned in common rhythm.

“Now, now, I don’t wish it to be a big surprise but I guess some of you will start to panic already. All the questions are pretty straight forward and if you have followed my lesson then there’s no need to be even scared of anything”

The groaned continued.

Edwin stole a glance at Janet. She wasn’t groaning but her worried expression was written all over her face. The smile was gone and her face was frowning. Then she covered her face in agony for a short moment.

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Edwin saw Janet sitting alone in the canteen during their break. He slowly approached her.

“Hey… erm Janet… You ok?”

Edwin’s voice was shivering as he asked the question.

“EDWIN! I’m so damned for tomorrow’s Math test!”

Janet blasted everything to him.

“Hey, there’s still time mah! If you need help I can always help you revise.”

Edwin sat beside her.

“There’s no time! I’m hanging out with the gals tonight. My dad’s going to kill me and chopped me into pieces.”

“How could that be? It’s only a test right?”

“You know my grades last year huh? I barely passed. My dad grounded me throughout the holidays we had. I was only let go on the last week on one condition.”

“Which is?”

“I have to score at least a ‘B’ for all my Math test and exams.”

“Well, you can always go out on another day right?”

Edwin suggested the obvious.

“I can’t. I already promised the gals to KTV last week. They probably would not talk to me if I don’t keep my promise. Oh God, I’m so dead!”

Suddenly Janet grabbed Edwin’s hand.

“Win, you will help me right?”

“Yeahhh…?”

Edwin replied shyly.

“Then teach me whatever you know within this half and hour!”

Edwin looked at Janet in total shock.

“It’s impossible, how can I do that?”

“Then how???? Wah lau, you don’t expect me to copy right? Besides I won’t know how to copy in Math anyway. It’s either I know or I don’t.”

Janet covered her face again.

Edwin thought for a moment as he looked at her.

“Well, there’s something I can do actually.”

Janet looked at him with her eyes reddish.

“We can exchange our answer sheets you know…”

“Are you crazy? You are sitting so far away from me. How do we even have the chance to do that?”

Janet replied in disbelieving.

“Eh… I’m not asking you to physically change our papers. I just want you to write my name down in your answer sheet. I will write your name in mine.”

Edwin explained patiently.

“Won’t Miss Joanne check our papers?”

“Don’t worry; she will usually call us to pass our answer sheets to the front. Then with all the answer sheets mixed together, it won’t be so obvious.”

“Oh…”

Janet was convinced that the plot will work.

“Just remember.”

Edwin continued.

“Yes?”

Janet eagerly anticipated.

“Don’t write your answers too neatly. You are supposed to be me so try to scribble as much as possible. I on the other hand will write as neat as possible.”

Edwin smiled as he reorganized his plot in his mind.

“Will it work? I mean what if Miss Joanne caught us? Won’t I get you into trouble too?”

Janet was still being pessimistic.

“Don’t worry, it will work. You just enjoy your outing ok?”

Edwin gave her the assurance once again.

“Ok… ok I promise I will study the moment I reach home ok?”

Janet rubbed her eyes.

“Sure…”

Edwin stood up and walked off.

The smiles were back on Janet’s face when the lesson began for the second half of the day. Edwin was satisfied with himself that he could do the least bit for her.

The plan worked perfectly.

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“Win, I’m sorry.”
Edwin thought he had heard some sniffing sound on the background.

“It’s ok…Janet.”
He consoled her.

“I’m sorry I had to ask you to exchange your answer sheets with mine.”

“It’s just a test mah. Ha ha.”

“I really tried to study when I reached home… but tiredness crept over me and I feel asleep on my desk.”

“Hahaha I’m imagining that scene in my head now”

Edwin laughed over the phone.

“Shit you! I’m crying over this ok?”

“Thanks.”

Edwin replied.

“For?”

“Crying over this…”

“It’s ok, I cry very often de. See you in school on Monday, enjoy your weekend.”

Janet said before she hung up.

The breeze blew into Edwin as he continued his journey to the library. He looked up at the swaying branches and wore a smile on his face.

“Is she smiling now as she looked out her window?”

Edwin wondered.

The library was rather packed with a lot of students yearning for an asylum to rest their souls. Edwin walked around and saw many of them surfing on their laptops and some sleeping on their thick textbooks.

Edwin had always wondered why they need to come all the way to the library to sleep and surf. Can’t they do it at home?

“Psst… psst… Win, over here…”

Edwin looked around for the source of the sound. It was the owner of the sound that he was looking for since his arrival.

“Huiyee, Sorry I’m late.”

Edwin sat down.

“Hiyo Edo”

A voice greeted him from behind.

“Oh yeah, Daryl too”

Daryl smiled at him before he got back to his laptop.

“Hey Daryl, stop playing games and be serious.”

Huiyee reprimanded him like a small boy.

Daryl switched off his game immediately and smiled at her.

“Wow… sometimes the two of you really looked an item.”

Edwin commented.

“With him?”

“With her?”

That comment brought the two of them to fake vomit spontaneously and broke some attention to their table.

“Joking, joking… lower your volume”

Edwin looked around apologetically.

“Ok… let’s discuss on our history project.”

“No wait.”

Daryl stopped Edwin.

“You got to tell us first. How did our Math genius got a ‘D’ for his test?”

Huiyee nodded eagerly as she looked at Edwin.

“It’s like you can sleep through the whole of yesterday and I still won’t believe you would score a ‘D’”

Huiyee nodded again.

“Careless mistakes. I did the problems too slow to counter check.”

Edwin replied.

“Who are you kidding?”

Daryl rebuked his reply.

“I don’t think Miss Lee would believe it either.”

Huiyee added.

“Up to you to believe what you wanna believe. We are here to do our project, not to gossip about me”

Edwin was pretty annoyed by his friends.

“Ok, since you don’t want to talk about yourself. Let’s talk about Janet.”

Daryl continued the bombardment.

“What’s with her?”

Edwin asked.

“How did a person who barely passed her Math exams last year got Full marks for this test? The difficulty for this test is not really low you know. Conspiracy brewing you know?”

Daryl keeps penerating deeper and deeper.

“How the hell I know? Maybe she studied very hard? Come on give people a break.”

“Edwin, you like her is it?”

Huiyee suddenly asked.

[To be Cont]