‘Hey. I am Jessica.’
‘Oh hi. J here.’
‘You played really well there. It means a lot for someone having dinner alone. It’s cheesy to say this, but you have been with me throughout, in a way.’
‘That’s nice to know. And I have been eating with you too, with all that salivating aroma, in a way.’
The sounds of her giggle was soothing in the noisy background outside the restuarant, and we walked casually into the park behind the building where diners and party-goers hang out. In the company of a Swedish girl, her accent was what kept me asking her questions, and my life as a Singaporean was her talking point in exchange.
‘Whiskey?’
On a wooden bench far from the closest bungalow, I took out my old hip flask, to see her smile at me holding my favourite in an all-scratched up bottle. She took the steel flask from me and took the first sip, inhaling deeply through her nose as a chilly breeze blew past.
‘I haven’t had such a quiet night since I was here a month ago. And to meet a local who knows how to appreciate the finer things in life. Most of them who chatted me up was in a hurry for something else.’
‘And why wasn’t I surprised? With a gorgeous like you.’
From the corner of my eyes, I could see her admiring me, holding a gaze longer than a glimpse. Another sip went down my throat before our eyes met, communicating what we were thinking without words.
‘Say, have you ever kissed a Swedish girl?’
‘Not in my life.’
Our hands went across each others’ cheeks and an invisible magnet drew our faces closer, till we were breathing in the masculine, and feminine scent of us. The lips that met, almost seemed too ‘movie-like’, when it lingered long enough for the dryness to fade away to our slithering tongues.
Under the light from the street lamp behind our bench, it was two of us, making out in an unstoppable, growing passion. It felt like a pair of friends secretly in love with each other, meeting by chance after a long time.
Our mouths pulled apart after a long kiss, wetness gluing us till the last moment our faces were too far away.
‘It was beautiful.’
Those words were exactly what I had in mind, that couldn’t believe a stranger would so intimately meet him.
‘Will we see each other again?’
I had to ask as she stood up, tucking her hands in her pockets ready to walk.
‘Yes. At dinner tomorrow. I know you play on the weekdays.’
We exchanged a final hug before we went our separate ways, knowing that it would be ‘fate’ if we didn’t see each other again.
‘The erotica that didn’t happen.’