podeamrains and hopes
Along the sidewalk, darkened clouds loom over-head. Pregnant with rain, they tease, flickering with light, promising yet not delivering reprieve from the heat.
Hurrying down the path, wanting the rain to start, yet not wanting to be caught in it; a flash of lightning finally reaches out from the clouds.
Sheets of rain, actual sheets, race towards the ground from the distance; you could anticipate and innately calculate when the torrent would envelop you.
Racing into the shelter of my destination, rain no longer a tease but a thundering roar, overwhelming with sound, smell, and its leeching away of colour, I walk in to the shopping centre.
Sudden silence. A very Singaporean silence; just the ignored hum of air-conditioning, and ignored buzz of people.
A long queue snakes from the Singapore Pools outlet. Chinese middle aged women, clutching grocery bags and little scraps of paper, lips moving as they murmur numbers under their breath. Men, hardened by the sun and work, nonchalantly slouching, yet tense hands betraying them. Other men with wrists, ablaze with gilty watches, resting upon large bellies, impatiently grunting and complaining. Foreign men, in groups of two or three, smiles illuminating in dusky faces, as they laugh, half-hope in their eyes. Foreign women, furtively glancing around, willing for the queue to move, hands gripping hands of employers’ young children.
As I complete my errand, and walk out into the now-drizzle, the queue has yet to diminish; the line has expanded. More different people, yet all similar.
And I return home, in the now-deluge, opening up various messenger windows, starting conversations that I know would remain monologues, hoping the tests would simply forget to happen.