It's not the tweet that pushed me down the memory lane, it's the person, the thought of him. We were in the same boarding school, he was a year older than me. He was a senior and I was a junior. We had a brief undefined relationship back in that days, and I am still unsure of the nature of our connections. The closest I can get to now is friends, and seeing how things unfold in hindsight, I think I'm just gonna stick with this definition. It can be interpreted differently, but it's all in the past, so whatever it is, we had something sweet and that's all that matter.
So a quick description of this person, we have the same name, Brandon, which I think is very sweet, a pleasant coincidence if you like. Our birthdays are also two days apart and we find this really interesting too. He had an average figure, scrawny somewhat, like any other typical teenagers. I stalked him before writing this post, and he still has the same figure telling from his pictures. He's cute, needless to say, babyface actually which I told him back then and he was flattered by it.
The other thing about him is that he's super genius. His specialty was Chemistry, he was the brightest student in the subject, like the top one in the whole school, and he liked Maths too. If we want to play the stereotype game, he's definitely the cute nerd. Challenging Maths problems literally gave him pleasure, which I never understood how one could possibly find pleasure in those 'things' (I made Maths sounds like a foreign gross object, I know).
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I never paid much attention to him to be honest, since we had little in common. Obviously being in different year group made it unnecessary to know one another, then the circle of friends we had were also different. As I blogged here before about my first love (it was the same school and a year later), I was with the divas, so my senior friends were from the same group too and he's obviously not one of them. He hanged out with people who talked about Chemistry, Maths and Physics which I didn't really enjoy so our paths rarely crossed if ever.
However, one day, I was chatting with a friend of mine who was also a senior, and Brandon came to us. As it happened, my friend was in the same class with him and Brandon needed something from him, so out of courtesy my friend introduced us to each other. This happened back in 2008 so I vaguely remember how it went, but I do know that we chatted after my friend left us alone afterwards. I was really enjoying the conversation which I can't remember on what, but we had a good talk, and I think that sparked some attractions in us.
After that, we bumped into each other more often (or perhaps we were more aware of walking passed one another) and talked a bit more. Since living in boarding school, you had to do your prayers in congregation especially for the dusk and night prayers. So we usually talked in between the prayers, as he often came and had a chat with me. There were always some religious lectures in that period too, but we often hanged at the back talking to one another. There was nothing unusual about it, not that I was aware of, I simply liked talking to him and I would like to think that he enjoyed it too. Sometimes I noticed before the prayer started, he would suddenly appeared and had the prayer besides me, so that we could talk afterwards. It goes without saying that I found this very lovely of him, but little did I know that he had so much more nice gestures up his sleeves.
One time, I had lost my Chemistry paper in the school's hall. It was after some exams, mid term I think, and I didn't do well in it. I was really bad in Chemistry back then (I got better the year after), so I didn't really care that much about it. That night, after supper, before I went up to my room, I bumped into him. He said he found my paper, and I immediately felt embarrassed. I knew how good he was in the subject and his reputation of being the only person that ever answered all of the Chemistry questions correctly in an exam made me feel like my stupidity was exposed to the most brilliant person ever. It became more embarrassing when he said he had take a look at it. I mean if you didn't do well in a paper, you obviously don't want anyone to look at it, let alone the one that can see all the mistakes just by flipping through the paper. I struggled with Chemistry and I was really insecure about admitting it back then.
So he gave me the paper, and I instantly took it. He asked me to take a look at the paper that night, I took this as a sign that I needed to study more and I was basically ready to get away from him then. That night I did take a look at my paper, and it was such a shocking moment when I found that he had corrected every single one of my mistakes, with all the calculations, methods and steps written clearly next to each questions. I was surprised, and the only kind of feeling I could describe was "that's so sweet of him." If this is a love story, this is definitely the point where the characters fall in love with one another. I vividly remember his handwriting and the blue pen he used to circle the correct answers in my paper. I was really touched by it. Too bad I still didn't do well in Chemistry later that year lol. When I saw him again and told him how nice of him to do that, he just smiled sheepishly and it was the cutest thing ever.
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And it didn't stop there. Oh no it didn't.
One time I was in the shower, and my friend had called me to say that the head boy was looking for me. I was instantly scared, usually when someone was called by the head boy to his room, they're in big trouble. Boarding school students always find a way to deal things in a way that's very perplexing to me. They sometimes asked the trouble maker to a room, and all the seniors with some authoritative power would deal with that person, sometimes by mere lecture but more often shout-shaming and ragging basically. I knew our head boy was nice, but he was still a serious person, highly disciplined, so I still feel a bit anxious about being called to his room, which was just a few rooms away from mine.
After the shower which I had cut short, I went to the head boy's room, braving myself of whatever it was I was about to face. So I knocked on his door and he invited me in. Then he said with his usual serious face, "Brandon wants to see you," and then I realised that Brandon was in his room too. I was puzzled, in my head I kept thinking "so I wasn't in trouble?". The head boy clearly saw that on my face and said, "I don't know what he wants, or what business the two of you have, but feel free to meet each other." and then walked to his table and continue studying. I was confused. Brandon and the head boy was in the same class so they're definitely good friends. What I didn't know was why he wanted to see me and used his friend. He could've come directly to my room, that should be less awkward, at least for me. Another thing about boarding school culture is, words travel easily, and senior-junior relationship that are out of ordinary can easily become the talk of the school. Perhaps he wanted to avoid this. So we stayed in the room, and turned out he just wanted to talk, and I was flattered again by his gesture seeing him went to great length just to talk to me. That sort of effort should be applauded.
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After the school year ended, I was at home and he had to stay for another month or so for the final graduating exam. During this time, he often phoned me. Back in the days (it was only 2008 but felt like ages) we relied on public phones to make our calls. So I know it's not cheap for him to call me, but he did anyway. We talk for ages. Again I can't remember the details of our many conversations but I know I felt happy receiving his call.
It was lovely to have a friend like him, who never stopped to make me touched by his sweet gestures. I mentioned earlier about the undefined relationship because it seemed like coquetry to me, but at the same time, there's nothing official about it that I think friendship is the best I can get to. Also, being with him made me feel like how having a big brother who's looking after me felt like. I don't have any brothers, and I know siblings can be mean to one another rather than all-loving and sweet, but it's still nice to feel loved in that sense.
In my final year at the school, he graduated but we still kept in touch. Fast forward, he's also studying in Europe but I never thought about him much until just now when I saw his tweets. We were friends on FB of course, and occasionally he would RT my tweets. I felt compelled to check on him again, which meant stalking his FB and Twitter. I thought of reaching out to him after all these years, but it might get awkward. It was such a long time ago. I wonder if he ever felt something, he's certainly cute and I won't mind if we ended up in a relationship truth be told. But in the end, it is what it is and I savour these memories. And don't get me wrong, we did have plenty of conversation and FB chats afterwards, but it's mostly casual and just updating about one another life.
In hindsight though, I could be a better friend. You see, I am such a callous person in any sort of relationship. I don't know how to make friends, I must admit to this. In terms of getting to know people, that comes easily to me, but actually making an effort of keeping a friend, I am never really good at that department. My father once said to me, "you don't know how to be a friend." and he's right about it. I could've kept in touch more with Brandon, and visits him since we're not that far away, but I just forget. People come and go, and I have other friends and other friends afterwards from prep schools, to uni, to being abroad etc etc. I just...I don't know, sometimes we missed out on friendship because there's too much to choose from, but when we finally realised we should keep the one we already have, it might be just a little too late.
Anyhow, it was nice to remember my moments with Brandon. I realise now that I should work on becoming a better friend, so that I won't lose anyone that I have now.
p/s: Sorry if this post is a bit cheesy, but I would like to put them here so that I won't forget about him. New memories are coming in, so I better keep safe the old ones huh :)
