I pass her the sunflower and she gives me a wide grin in return.
My words become lost to the noise of the crowd as she hurries off with a friend of hers.
–
My ticket, fresh from her hands, glares at me with lifeless, uniformly arranged letters; black on white.
CENTRE-1, SEAT K17
I glance up at the sparsely populated concert hall. The seats are grand, the ceiling is pretty damn high and the stage looks magnificent. A smile forms from the thin line I made with my mouth, while my eyes scanned the seats for their numbers.
Then I realized.
These are front row seats.
I bought great, bloody front row seats.
Great, bloody, centred front row seats.
I’m 10 seats away from the closest aisle to my right. No student ever buys front row seats? Well, hi there.
–
I’ve never really been the kind of person to say no with ease. Saying “what only S$25 seats are left? No way” is an incredibly pretentious thing to do in my book. So I pay, in the graciously generous form of $10 more, from my books. I also paid in the form of coming alone. If you’re going to nitpick, then I suppose being surrounded by old men and aunties can’t really be counted as being “alone”.
My nagging conscience told me to buy flowers for this performance. It’s only right to do so, it said. It’s gonna be cheap anyway, it said. The flowers on display seemed nice. They were chrysanthemums. Nah. I asked for a recommendation. The store owner said there was one sunflower left, at $5.50. Eventually, she persuaded me to purchase the wrapping for $2 and the ribbon for $0.50.
I’d say there was a pattern emerging, but patterns don’t usually look this ugly… Or pricey, for that matter.
–
The concert begins.
I happen to be sitting next to the only person in the entire concert hall that has phlegm in her throat. Fortunately (for her health, really), she manages to keep it under control.
Bows weave side to side, melding with harmony and emitting a distinctly ghostly and haunting tune. The conductor’s arm sweeps emphasize every note the musicians play. Heads bob and backs hunch in unison. Eyes dart from the sheets to the conductor. Drums pump adrenaline through my veins with every beat they make.
The concert ends.
–
A queue is set up for an autograph session. I find myself shoved near the front, so I stand behind a kid who doesn’t know what awesomeness he’d been through and before an elderly gentleman. The various conductors and players smile and ask the kid his age, but let their faces fall as they see me, and happily greet the apparently-esteemed music teacher behind me.
Sigh.
Such is the way of life, I think to myself, and started brainstorming of ways to sell off this autographed booklet.
–
I trudge through the streets of Shenton Way, through a foreboding concrete complex, further and further away from Tanjong Pagar.
The road seems desolate enough, with cars littered along its side. Bright, empty, classy skyscrapers stare down at me, casting long shadows along the streets. Oddly, this brings about a sense of calm.
I walk past the bay. Hundreds of people are taking photos of the water’s surface, empty except for the lights reflected off the cityscape.
I start feeling uncomfortable, from all the people holding hands, DSLRs and beer mugs. I quicken my pace.
–
I’ve friends who’ve headed conferences, who play instruments and get invited overseas or play for national orchestras, who play in bands…
When’ll it be my turn to mean something?
I’ve been so tired lately.
–
I opened up Facebook today, and saw post-concert photos of her with the sunflower.
And suddenly everything feels right again.
No I am not hitting on her or anything it’s just that I was relieved she didn’t throw it away
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