Chapter 8: Can we be friend

Rachel continue her pace behind Jeremy,

As we were walking out of the office, I saw Raju at the entrance.

I quickly said, “Best that you go out first. I will follow five minutes later.”

Jeremy gave me a puzzled look and asked, “Why?” I glared at him and replied in a soft voice, “Please! Wait for me at the roadside.”

Puzzled, Jeremy nodded.

I did as what Rachel requested. Five minutes later, I saw her walking towards me. At times, she would looked back as if she was being watched or followed.

I was puzzled and worried as well that there might really be someone who was stalking her.

As soon as she arrived, I asked her “Where do you like to have dinner?” Then, I led her to the parking lot where I parked my car.

She answered, “I love Japanese food.” Surprised, I gazed at her and muttered, “My favourite as well.”

I opened the door of my car and let her in. She was startled with my action. She stepped in and said, “Thank you”.

I closed the door behind her before I went to the driver side. I started the engine and ensure that the road was cleared before I drove out of the parking lot.

Rachel was looking outside of the window as I drove. She seemed to be immersed in her own thoughts.

Yet, I need to know which restaurant was her preference? She was quiet. I have to break the ice.

Thus, I spoke “Rachel, any Japanese Restaurant of your preference?”

She came back from her thoughts and replied, “There are a few that closes at 12:00 midnight. I think the nearest should be Sushi Rakuzen. It is two blocks from here.” I smiled upon hearing her response.

Rachel,

After answering Jeremy, I was again back to my thoughts as whether should I tell him to refrain from meals together? Would I offend him? How should I start the conversation?

In fact, even though I am hungry now, I thought I should not being seen having dinner with him. I have been pestered the whole day with the rumours about Jeremy and me. It has to stop!

Jeremy gazed at Rachel who was in deep thoughts,

Rachel has been quiet after answering me. I took a quick glance at her, she was in deep thoughts. What was it? What was bothering her? Is she having problems with stalker?

“Rachel, are you okay? Is anything bothering you?” I asked out of curiosity. She seemed to be startled and came to her senses.

She replied, “Nothing”. Silence again, she didn’t say anything and I didn’t want to be pushy.

Soon we arrived at Sushi Rakuzen and a waiter came to greet us. “A table for two?” The waiter asked. I quickly answered, “Yes, we prefer a quiet corner table.”

The waiter replied promptly, “Yes, no problem. Please come with me,” And we were ushered to an empty table at a quiet corner.

Once seated, the waiter passed us two sets of menu. I looked at Rachel and said, “Rachel, please order. I will eat whatever you order.” She smiled, nodded and ordered while I looked on.

“Do you agree?” She asked while showing me the cuisine that she wanted to order and I nodded in agreement.

After ordering the food, Rachel was back to her thoughts.

As we waited for our food, I was thinking how shall I opened my mouth to talk to him about we are the centre of the newest gossip in the office?

No matter what happened, I have to voice out to him before things get out of hands. Alright, I have to talk about it. I couldn’t care about offending him anymore.

“Jeremy, I think this dinner should be our last dinner together because our dinner last night has had become the trendiest news in the office. The gossip need to stop before it get out of control.” I spoke.

Stunned, Jeremy gazed at Rachel.

What? Our dinner last night became the most trend news gossip of the office. Boom! I was shocked and furious.

“Who started the news?” I asked Rachel.

She replied abruptly, “It should be Raju. He told John and the rest that he saw us walking out at night and he heard that we were talking about having dinner later.

That was the start of the rumour by the office paparazzi.”

I could imagine her feelings and frustrations. I quickly comforted her,

“Don’t worry about it, I will handle it. In fact, there is nothing wrong for me to invite you for dinner since I was going to have my dinner anyway.”

Rachel glared at me and said,

“But it is affecting me. I couldn’t focus on my work with all these whispers and questions.”

I could sense that she was upset as it was affecting her work performance.

“I am sorry that one dinner has brought you trouble with the paparazzi. But shouldn’t we ignore them. We have our rights to dine with anyone, they have no right to stop us.” I continued to convince her.

Two waiters abruptly arrived at our table with our food and I halted my conversation. Once the food were set on our table, I spoke

“Come, let’s eat. We are both starving, aren’t we?”

As we enjoyed our dinner, I continued with what I wanted to tell her,

“Rachel, I have something to tell you.”

Rachel in her self-thought,

I looked up and gazed at him, thinking Gosh, What now? What is it that he going to tell me?’

He just smiled and said, “Rachel, I hope that I can spend time with you. Please do not misunderstand my intention. I find that you are an interesting person, a hardworking, intelligent individual which I would like to be your friend. Can we be a friend instead of just an employer and employee?”

Jeremy spoke tactfully and in excitement,

First of all, I need to earn her trust as a friend. Otherwise, she would continue avoiding me.

Rachel was stunned,

I found that I am stuck, not knowing how to answer Jeremy at all, Yet on the other hand, there’s nothing wrong to be friend.

“Yes, of course, we can be friends but we need to avoid gossips” I replied after some moments.

Jeremy’s face lit up with joy,

“Rachel, I am glad to hear that.” I smiled at her.

However, she quickly added, “Try to keep to work in the office, and we can chat as friends during off-working hours or weekends.” Then, she kept mum.

Rachel was cursing herself after that, regretted what she has just said.

Oh my goodness! What did I just say? I am too quick-witted, speaking without thinking twice.

Unconsciously I was telling him that I am available to meet him during my own free time. What have I done?

Upon hearing that Jeremy smiled,

“Thank you Rachel”. I replied hastily.

I was happy to hear her last sentence, and said to myself. ‘I believe we will get along well, Rachel.’

Then, we continue to chat about Japanese food. Rachel was excited to talk not only about Japanese food but its culture, history, literature and so forth.

She took out her phone and shared about the beautiful Mount Fuji, and many places that she wished to visit one day. She seemed to be well-informed of Japan. I was extremely impressed with her.

Later, I learned that she was taking online learning of the language as well. She has recently passed N3 now. She was going to continue until N1 in the next intake. Wow! She is amazing.

She talked about the history of Japan, the era of the shogun, ninja, emperor and so forth. She knew a lot and she was excited to talk about it.

I realised that her shyness was replaced with excitement and chattiness.

When we were done with dinner, I pushed my chair backwards in order to stand up as I wanted to proceed to the counter for check-out. While doing that, I spoke

“Rachel, I will send you home. Don’t hail a taxi. Okay?”

Then, I walked to the counter before waiting for her to answer me as I didn’t wish to have another argument with her about hailing a taxi.

Rachel was taken aback with what she just heard,

Speechless! He was commanding me again. Annoyed, and I wanted to decline but he left without waiting for my answer.

Soon, Jeremy started the engine and we were on the way to Ville Residence. I kept silence as I was exhausted from a hectic day.

I wanted to get a shut eye but I know that it would be rude for me to doze off in his car. I was thinking of a topic to start a conversation but I couldn’t think of one.

Jeremy’s voice broke the ice. “Rachel, I will get you home soon. You have been working late all the time, so take a good rest.”

Stunned, I turned to look at him and replied softly, “Thank you”.

When we reached Ville Residence, Jeremy insisted again to send me up to my unit. I didn’t refuse or argue as I know that it would be useless to argue with this stubborn creepy man.

Soon, we reached my unit and I turned to Jeremy to thank him for the dinner and for sending me home.

Jeremy smiled and responded,

“Rachel, since I would have to pass by Ville Residence whenever I drive to work, why not I fetch you from no on?”

I was shocked with his suggestion.

“But then I would become a bother and there would be more tales for the office paparazzi,” I reasoned with Jeremy.

Jeremy answered with assurance,

“No, it won’t be a bother. For those gossipers, ignore them. I promised that I would not create problems for you.”

Jeremy knew that Rachel was going to refuse him,

Then I reached out to grab her hand and said,

“Aren’t we friends? Can’t I help a friend?”

Rachel looked stunned and quickly pulled her hand away. I smiled as I looked at her reaction.

“Rachel, I meant no harm by grabbing your hand. It was just a reaction of my feelings for a friend.”

Rachel soon calmed myself down.

I spoke,

“Jeremy, I always leave my unit around 7:30am. Do you think that you can fetch me at the same time?”

Jeremy smiled and replied, “No problem. I will be here exactly 7:30am and waiting for you at the entrance of Ville Residence.”

Speechless! Can he really wake up early every morning to fetch me?

Hey! Wait a minute! I just realised that he was able to clock-in before 8:30am since his first day in the company.

Well, it was only two days since his first day, I don’t think that he can keep up with it on a daily basis.

Rachel, back in her apartment,

I took my shower and took out my laptop. I was trying to browse for degree programmes but I couldn’t focus.

My mind went back to the dreams that I had been having for quite some time.

Strange, why was I have such dream? At times, I could have the same dream two nights in a roll, about a man but couldn’t see his face clearly.

Could it be Geoffrey? No, it didn’t look like his body build.

Wait a minute! Why did I even mention his stupid name?

Move on Rachel, you survived without him for the last two years. You are better off without him.

I took the new novel that I bought two months ago but didn’t find time to start my reading.

It’s time to read. Reading helps me to relax, and I hope that by reading this book will push my thoughts of the weird dreams away.

I started off by sitting on my chair in front of my desk to read the novel, and later, I moved to my bed to read while laying down.

It was the same man but I could hardly see his face clearly, he was approaching me and touched my face. The same warmth feeling was back.

When he bent down to kiss my forehead, I felt the overwhelming feeling of love again, and my tears just came rolling down my cheeks.

There were music, singing and dancing.

A celebration!

I saw myself walking past many people who were dressed in traditional Chinese Hanfu, and everyone was cheering me on.

I continued to walk until I saw the same man. He reached out to hold both of my hands, and next to him stood an elderly man who looked like a leader or a chief. The elderly man uttered something, but I couldn’t make out what was he saying.

The man smiled after listening to the elderly man, and he took out a box. He opened the box, and took out a beautiful traditional Chinese hairpin. “This is my gift to you for our wedding. This will remind you of my eternal love for you.”

Then, I took out a pendent from a little beautifully embroiled bag. It was a jade pendent with two Chinese characters “永爱”(yong ai) inscribed on it. I was happy and enjoying the celebrations.

“Come here dear, look at these wild flowers.” the same man appeared again, he bent down to pluck some of the flowers.

He gave the flowers to me, and I said “Indeed, they are beautiful. I want our child to grow up in such a beautiful environment.”

“Surely, our child will.” he replied.

He was laughing with joy while touching my belly. Oh, it seemed that I was pregnant. I felt the joy of having his child inside me, and excited of the child’s birth.

“Liu! Liu!” shouted a man who was running towards us. “Liu, a horseman came with this letter for you. He said that it is from your father, General Liu”.

The man’s name was Liu, I believe that’s his surname as it was the same as his father, General Liu. I saw Liu opening up the letter. After reading it, he turned to me and said “I have to return home as my father is ill. I will inform him of our marriage, and I will come back to bring you home to see him and my mother after his recovery.”

I squeezed his hand and said, “Remember that this is our home, we wanted to raise our child here with all these wild flowers,” I reminded him.

“Yes, we will return here once we visited my parents. But now, you must promised me to wait for my return so that I can bring you to my parents. My love for you is eternal”, I nodded while holding back my tears.

He was going to leave now. How was I going to live my days without him. I was thinking to myself. He looked at me, and squeezed my hands.

“Remember this jade pendent that you gave me, and the hairpin that I gave, these are reminders of our eternal love. We will love each other forever, if there is anything such as reincarnation, we are destined for eternal love.”

We hugged and cried.

The alarm rang,

I sat up on my bed and cried. No idea why was I crying over a dream, but it was so real and sad.

The dream last night was longer, sadder and painful. Why was I having such a dream?

Was it due to stress and lack of sleep? If it was stress from work, shouldn’t I be dreaming of my work load?