Chapter 2

“Huh? What happened?” I asked as Brian repeated his plan once more.
“Simple, we boys, muscles of the pack, would do the patrolling…” “Of the toilet bowl,” Violet muttered cutting in on Brian’s speech in the same time leaving me in a fit of giggles.
“What’s so funny?” Brian enquired.
“The part about the patrolling of toilets,” I pointed out still laughing. Brian and Jian Ming stared at us bewildered.
“Patrolling of toilets, what on earth are you talking about? I didn’t say anything about toilets. Never mind, as I was saying, we boys would do the patrolling and you girls will keep a lookout. Okay?” he said, still quite puzzled about the toilet but obviously decided not to ask about it. Without further delay, we carried on with the patrol.
“Alright, let’s go,” Violet ordered.
“Go where?” I asked. The plan clearly did not state anything about us going anywhere.
“You really are a blur sotong aren’t you? We don’t have to follow the boys’ plan, we can follow our plan as well. Besides, we are better equipped than them. If all of us patrol, we might cover more space. Got it?” Violet explained, I shrug my shoulders. I had a sinking feeling that this expedition wasn’t one I wanted to have. But too late, Violet was already lugging me across the HDB flats and playgrounds.
“Where are we going?” I enquired thinking that I must as well go along with her. “To the market of course dummy. There must be people there who know about the gangsters. We could ask them about it, and once we get the info, we would have a higher chance of catching the gangsters,” she said enthusiastically. That makes complete sense, you definitely need knowledge or info to do or carry out something in a shorter period of time. It’s just like Violet to come up with something like that.
“Hey, maybe we could ask those aunties over there chatting,” I suggested when we passed by one of the coffee shops. Violet grabbed me by the hand and sauntered over.
“Alright, you ask them,” she said casually. I shot her my ‘me again’ look. She nudged my shoulder shoving me forward.
Reluctantly, I took a step forward and asked them. This would be what the conversation would be like converted into English:
Me: Sorry to bother you. We are doing a school project on bullies and rumour says that there have been cases of bully around this area. We were wondering if that was true. If yes, could you shed more information on it?
The aunties cast a glance at each other like before one of them replied (a little rudely).
One of the aunties: What talking you? Crazy is it? Ask us this kind of questions, what do you think we are? Gossip queens? Shoo, don’t bother us.
See what I mean? Typical of Singaporeans to say such things. I shook my head and trudged off to join Violet. “No information I guess, lets head over to the other tables,” I suggested as I pointed to the other tables but after half an hour of enquiring, we were still at the same spot we were half an hour ago- simply clueless.
“I guess we should find the boys, they might have better luck than us,” I sighed, depressed and weary. “I guess we should,” Violet finally conceded defeat. We headed back feeling pretty dejected. “Perhaps we should go back to the old times of having water fights. I’m starting to miss those,” I whined. “Yah, me too. In fact, I could do with a blast right now!” Violet proclaimed. “Oh, really?” I queried, a grin crept up the side of my mouth. Instantly, I grabbed my water bottle from my bag, uncapped it and squirted water at the unsuspecting Violet.
“What was that for?” Violet shrieked, annoyed as she brushed her hair backwards. “You said you wanted a splash!” I protested. “Not in that way, but still…”
Splash.
“Fun,” Violet finished with a laugh. I was drenched to the skin and my soaked fringe hung over my forehead gingerly as I pushed aside with a scowl.
“Hey, what’s that,” Violet queried. Thinking that it was just her ploy to distract me and then blast me, I ignored her. “Look, what is that guy doing?” I could sense urgency in her tone now. Wow, she is one good actor, that was completely natural. Perhaps I should introduce her to the drama club.
“Stop daydreaming, we got to catch that guy you sotong!” Violet hollered in my ears. Alright, that couldn’t possibly be a ploy. I turned around. Indeed there was a teenager with a weed whacker in his hands trying to smash a windshield of a car!