Read Online Red Dot Irreal by Jason Erik Lundberg - Free Book Online

“Forgive me,” she said. “But it’s an amazing drink. And if you’ve only been in Singapore for a month, you haven’t tasted anything like it before.”
    “Is it similar to chai? I like chai.”
    “Sort of. You’ll see.” Her eyes glinted. Was this now a date?
    Our drinks arrived and Nicole paid, shooing away my open wallet, pointing out that it was less than three Sing dollars for the both of them, an astonishingly cheap price in such an expensive country. We took a two-top table near the side wall, next to a rickety plywood bookshelf overflowing with used paperback crime novels and stacks of board games like Risk and Settlers of Cataan. Out the window-wall, the foot traffic was a continuous thing, and I was taken back to my graduate school days, hanging out at Cup A Joe on the NC State campus, soaking up the intense academic vibe from the surrounding caffeine addicts. There was an energy one got from a university café that could not be found in any other setting.
    I expected Nicole to ask about the first class assignment, a thousand-word essay on self-identity, but instead she continued with the personal questions. She asked about my favorite books and authors, and told me I just had to visit BooksActually, Singapore’s best and quirkiest literary bookshop. She inquired on the movies I’d seen lately, my opinion of Singaporean politics (I hadn’t been here long enough to form one yet), the tourist sites I’d seen (only Chinatown and Little India so far).
    “We’ll have to remedy that,” she said. “I’m an excellent tour guide.” She took a sip of her Teh Tarik, and I couldn’t help noticing a bead of sweat trickling down the left side of her elegant neck, over her collarbone, between the swells of her small breasts, and underneath the V of her dress that formed at her solar plexus. The aircon in the café was just as cold as it had been in the classroom, but we’d both worked up a bit of exercise on the walk over. I looked up and she was smiling widely; she’d caught me staring, but didn’t seem to mind.
    After about half an hour more of pleasant conversation, Nicole stopped abruptly, looked to the window-wall at her right (my left), and said, “Do you know that woman? She’s been staring at you for the last five minutes or so.”
    I looked. Sitting about twenty feet from the window on a concrete bench, by herself, was a woman in her mid- to late-twenties, wearing a white blouse, khaki-colored capri pants, and suspenders. A glint of something at her ankle, a large ring on her forefinger. Straight hair stretching halfway down her back. Her gaze was focused, and she didn’t turn away as I returned it.
    “I don’t know,” I said. “I’ve never seen her before.” It was true.
    After another moment, she picked up a tote bag lying on the ground at her feet, stood up, and flipped me the bird; the fingernail polish on her middle finger was a dark color. Then she turned and walked around a corner and out of sight.
    “What the hell?”
    “She seemed cross,” Nicole said.
    I shook my head. What a weird night. Had I actually met the woman before and forgotten? “Whoever she thinks I am, I hope she can forgive that person. Angry stalking is not a good way to live your life.”
    “Well, ah,” Nicole said, gathering her things, “I think I should be going off now.”
    “Right.” I walked behind her out of the café, through the outside seating area, and back to the brick sidewalk. I wasn’t sure what to say. “See you in class.”
    She waved and smiled once again. “You won’t be able to miss me,” she said.
    ~
    December 2008
    “What? Are you kidding?”
    “I’m afraid not,” Sunita said. Her tiny office, the approximate size of a coat closet, was stuffed to overflowing with file folders and thick textbooks on pedagogy. “The school has decided not to continue the Academic Writing program for the next semester. Not a priority for business students and future bankers.”
    “But I have