LONTAR issue #1 (4 page)

She'd always bemoaned the fact that Feisal showed no interest in the state-organised affability events where most people found their intimate partners: "You're missing out. At least love is available to everybody, high station or low. It's the one thing you can get without having to sit exam."

Feisal hadn't wanted intimacy as an abstract concept, but since he'd met Xinya he was starting to see its appeal.

"There was nothing to tell," he said now. "We've talked a few times only. But she's the kind who's affable to everybody. I thought maybe if we meet in a bit more personal setting, we could, you know, bonding more. Then can find out if—if maybe—" He blushed.

"If intimacy is suitable," finished Muna. "That's right. Why don't you message her on the network?"

This struck Feisal as a good idea. If he could talk to Xinya via text instead of in person perhaps he'd have a better chance of impressing her with his intelligence and charm. In their conversations so far they had played strict roles: she was amazing, and he was an idiot.

"Just find her in the event forum, lah," said Muna. "They always set up a forum with all the attendees. If you search by date and time you'll find it." She sat down at the computer. "When did you go?"

"We didn't meet through the affability events," said Feisal innocently. "I met her at work."

Muna took her hands off the keyboard slowly, as if she thought any sudden movements might trigger an explosion.

"You want to approach your colleague on terms of intimacy?" she said. "
Adik!
Did you even check if she's our station or not?"

It hadn't occurred to Feisal to wonder. "I don't know," he said. "She's our biologist."

"Then must be she's a graduate," said Muna. "That means
bangsawan
. How come that also you don't know? How can you live for twenty-three years and still be so ignorant?"

Feisal set his teeth and called up Xinya's network profile on the computer. Muna was right—she had a degree from Universiti Kebangsaan Tanah Mas. In the picture she was still wearing the gold pin with the national symbol of twin tigers that each graduate received the day they were welcomed into the elect.

"You still want to message her?" Muna's voice rose, wobbling; she always shouted when she was about to cry. "You'll look so stupid, you know or not?"

"Never mind," muttered Feisal. He felt unutterably pointless. "Forget about it. I just didn't think."

Muna softened. She patted Feisal on the shoulder, wiping her eyes with her palm. "We all sheltered you too much. We should have forced you to pay more attention to the outside world, not just spend so much time drawing pictures." On the screen Xinya's face smiled up from her profile, a distractingly sweet dimple indenting her left cheek. "She's pretty," Muna conceded. "If not for the station thing . . ."

"She was offered medicine but she chose biology instead."

Muna snorted. "A doctor! Imagine you approaching a doctor." She shook her head. "Don't think I'm scolding you. It's good you're thinking about entering into this kind of relationship now. At your age it's very natural. Why don't you go for an affability event for our station
punya
people? You'll see what I mean. It's more comfortable. You might meet some nice girls there. If not, at least make friends, lah."

"Maybe," said Feisal. Disappointment lay sour on his tongue.

*

The affability event was on a boat on the Klang River. It had become a terrifically desirable area following the post-Crisis cleaning programmes; most of the river was now blocked off for exclusive use by the elect.

"So lucky!" squealed Muna. "You know how many people apply to get on the
perahu
events? Must be they gave it to you because you're a first-timer."

First-timers got special perks—with an aging population and a falling birth-rate on its hands, the state was anxious to encourage young people to get together and do what came natural. Feisal's dinner was free, and he was almost certain to get into the next affability event he applied for.

On the
perahu
, Muna-handled into the stiff cloth of his best suit, Feisal felt like an alien anthropologist. He'd always been a bit of an outcast at school. He wasn't like all the other kids, who had friends and signed up for more extracurriculars than they had to—he found affability hard work. It was easier to live in affability when you didn't actually hang out with other people.

But he'd promised his sister he'd take it seriously. He worked up the nerve to talk to, in succession, a former secretary who had set up her own garden utensil business which she ran from home, an inventor who was trying to get an administration contract to sell his patented bottle caps ("They won't even look at you if you're not married, though," he said, shaking his head), and a woman in construction who gave violin lessons on the side.

"How come you're not higher station then?" said Feisal.

"I only got up to Grade Two," said the woman, a gentle note of apology in her voice. "I can play when it's just playing, but when it's exams, forget about it. I only teach small children. I'm not, to say, very good."

"Then why do you keep on doing it?" said Feisal without thinking.

"Because I enjoy it," said the woman.

Maybe Muna was right, Feisal thought. He had never met so many people who cared about something other than excelling. The former secretary cared about spades and flowers. The inventor did not care about bottle caps, but he clearly enjoyed the idea of himself as an inventor, and it didn't seem to bother him much that he was not a particularly successful one. It was relaxing to speak to such people.

But he'd noticed Xinya because she cared about something other than excelling. He remembered that intensely amused wobble in her voice, and no longer felt like drinking his mocktail and making small talk. He went out onto the deck and watched the stars until it was time to return to land.

*

Something unprecedented happened to Feisal, in a time of unprecedented things. He began to think.

It seemed to him that while the affability events were an eminently sensible thing, and it was right and appropriate that people of a similar station should be joined together, the system did not take sufficient account of the waywardness of the human heart.

"But that's what the system's for," Muna said when he put the thought to her. "People are very stupid when they fall in love. They don't make the right choice for the future. They don't consider the correct things—the education, the mentality must be the same. They only think of all the wrong things."

"But if their preference is not related to—" Feisal went pink. He wasn't used to discussing such things with his family. "If it's not partiality, shouldn't that be allowed?"

"Don't kid yourself. Humans are always partial," said Muna. "That's why we had the Crisis, what. Enthusiasm, communalism, all this. At least now we all know we're doing good for the society. Society benefits if the best join together and have children who can lead, and everybody else focuses on their own role. 'Acknowledge difference to avoid conflict.' They taught us at school also, what."

"I didn't listen," said Feisal. "I was too busy drawing pictures. Anyway, we don't acknowledge difference. When was the last time you heard someone admit to being Izzahite or something like that?"

"So what, you think it's better if we go back to the old days?" said Muna. "Everything also based on you know what. Even somebody
kena
accident also must ask: eh,
orang Melayu ke Cina ke?
"

She was very angry: she would never have used the taboo language of communalism otherwise. "At least now we know what is the important differences." Feisal said no more to Muna, but it seemed to him there was something missing in the stories he'd been told about the world.

"I know we need the elect," he said to Xinya at work. "We need leaders to run the country and teach schools and develop technology all that. But would it be so bad if some people want to be less than all they can be? Do we always have to maximise?"

Even as he said it, he knew it sounded stupid. "Never mind—" he said, but:

"I know what you mean," said Xinya. "But
bangsawan
don't think that way."

"But you're a
bangsawan
."

"A second class Bachelor's in plant biology from UKTM hardly makes me one of the elect," Xinya said, smiling.

Feisal had come to realise that Xinya's smile was as much a deflection tactic as it was an expression of friendliness or an indication of her mood. Xinya never smiled with only one meaning.

She said, "But it's not very affable of us to be talking while our colleagues are so busy. You want to continue the conversation after work? Or are you busy this evening?"

"No," said Feisal. "No, no, I'm free."

"I'll come by your desk when I'm about to leave," said Xinya. "I've got a meeting at six, though. Don't worry about waiting if you want to go home."

"I'm going to be working late today anyway," lied Feisal.

Xinya reached out and brushed his knuckles with the tips of her fingers. "I've been thinking I'd like to get to know you better."

Me too,
Feisal wanted to say, but she was walking away—having been, Feisal was almost certain, delightfully, inappropriately anything but affable.

*

Xinya only glanced at him as she was leaving, but Feisal was ready. He'd been unable to work for the past half-hour, loose-limbed and distracted with the conviction that something life-changing was about to happen.

The area immediately outside their office building was pedestrianised, like the rest of central KL. In the evenings it filled up with crowded humanity: office workers surging homewards, teenagers and yuppies strolling between the malls, people handing out flyers for the newest tuition centre promising to teach foolproof exam techniques. Above their heads the electronic display flashed with a brief reminder that it was Maghrib—at home Feisal's grandfather would be praying, a practice he persisted in despite the family's embarrassment.

Xinya waited till had turned off the main road before speaking.

"Sorry I didn't stop at your desk," she said. "Didn't want everybody to gossip. You know how people are. If you want to meet outside the usual venues, they think you're going to go find a bush so you can roll around behind it."

"Ridiculous," Feisal agreed.

"I know, right? I'd want to have dinner first," said Xinya. She watched him blush, then she bought them both dinner at a hawker centre.

It turned out Xinya liked cells better than people because she was skeptical of affability. This took Feisal aback. He couldn't help imagining Muna's expression:
Of course this is the kind of girl you'll find if you go with people who don't mind stepping out of their station
.

"You don't think people should be affable?" he said.

"Being affable is one thing. Affability imposed from above is different," said Xinya. "I can't be affable with people I don't like, or people I don't even know. Why should I? This fake neighbourliness all the time. It's like drowning in
gula melaka
."

Feisal felt uneasy. "But we need affability. If not—"

"I know, I know. If not, what's to stop the Crisis from happening again?" Xinya picked at her noodles, looking morose. "It's just all this—smiling lah, talking to people like they're my best friend. You cannot even show if you have bad mood in the mornings. Just because I don't want to make small talk before I have coffee doesn't mean I'm going to start race-rioting."

Feisal was trying his best to be cool, but he couldn't help flinching. He'd grown up in a decent household; nobody had ever said the word
race
. Xinya looked at him and put down her chopsticks.

"Now you're uncomfortable," she said penitently. "Don't bother about me. I'm like this, one. If I was living pre-Crisis, I'd be scolding people for not being affable enough."

"No," said Feisal.
I like how you are
, he wanted to say, but that was too far past the bounds of affability. He said: "It's good to be honest."

Dinner came to an all-too-early conclusion. Feisal felt as he used to as a child when the closing jingle of a favourite TV show began to play. He blurted, "You want to go and walk by the lake?"

It was late, ten-thirty. Hardly anyone was about. Reflected in dark waters, the glowing buildings of the city were imbued with a new mystery. The twin monuments of the former government were a darker patch of shadow on the skyline.

Feisal could remember the days when the monument was still lit up at night, and you could see the towers, rearing up above the other buildings, wherever you were in the city. But that was now proscribed: a state-sponsored study had concluded that it encouraged positive associations with the old government and so increased the likelihood of a recurrence of the Crisis.

"I used to think I can escape," murmured Xinya. "When I was small, I thought: I won't live like other people. I'll go overseas and meet different kinds of people and never worry about excelling.

"But I did well in my first screening. Gone case. Stupid lah, I should have fail it—but I didn't know. I was only five. Later only I learnt they don't let you go overseas if you're on the uni track."