OK. Just an essay ; Don't say I'm gay :P BTW the protagonist is a BOY. Enjoy :) :P

A DECISION THAT I REGRETTED

My Form three life started. Everything seemed so new. My friends were the new ones, as the school has implemented the class-streaming recently - I was sent to the best class. They are studious, and brought positive influence to me. My results had a slight increase, and my mother was happy to see that. It was good to have friends who know when to study and when to play.

 
                Time flew. In a blink of eyes it was already a week from my trials. I was studying hard enough to score A’s in the trials. I temporarily deactivated my Facebook account. My results were quite good. My trial examinations were all 7A’s and 1B. Those results were satisfying, but I aimed for straight A’s in the PMR examination. The month of September was hard, but it was never wasted.
After the trials it was already the start of October, and PMR is on the 10th until the 12th of the month. I studied day and night; my hands seldom left the books. All the facts and formulae were already in my head. I just had to do a lot of past-year questions to know the format of PMR. I had been doing the past-year papers for the next seven days continuously. On the day before PMR, I relaxed my brain, letting it to rest rather than overworking it.

                My effort was fruitful. Surprisingly, I excelled in the PMR examination and scored straight A’s, at par with my friends. All of us were very happy. After the examination, we enjoyed our ‘after-exam session’ together. We activated our Facebook accounts, we went to shopping complexes, we sang at the Karaoke centers, we had Mac Donald’s, we bought clothes; we had done everything we longed for. Although, I had never expected, never anticipated, and was never prepared for a relationship. This relationship, though happy and sweet, brought me the most miserable life.
               

                It was November, and the holidays were about to start. I had a crush; more specifically, a crush on a boy. Yes, a boy. I didn’t know why, why must it be a boy. I don’t get a clue; it was just a special feeling. Neither my friends nor my family knew this. It was a buried secret, until him - the boy, whom I had the crush on – Lennon, told me his feelings towards me.
               

                One day, I was on Facebook. Lennon approached me through the ‘chat box’ and had a chat with me. 

‘Hi Gary, How are you? Happy with your results?’ He asked.
‘Yes, of course. What about you?’ I replied.
‘It was okay, I got 7A1B. Are you choosing Pure Science or Sub Science for next year?’ He questioned.
‘Congrats; I guess I’ll be taking Pure Science. I like Biology.’ I answered.

He was ‘silent’ for a while. I was about to go offline, while the chat box popped out suddenly. I was astonished to see what he asked:

‘Gary, can you be my boyfriend?’
                I was stunned for quite a while and finally replied, ‘Are you joking?’
                ‘No, I’m not. I’m SERIOUS.’ The chat box popped out again after I closed it. I thought deeply, ‘Is it April Fool’s Day today? No; Is it a dream?’ I pinched my cheek hardly. ‘Ouch!’ - it wasn’t a dream.
I answered, ‘You…?’
                ‘Yes, I love you.’ He said.
                I typed, ‘Can you give me a couple of days to think about it? I...’
                ‘Yes,’ He said, and the conversation was brought to an end. I felt happy but confused, delighted but worried, thrilled but bewildered, jubilant but perplexed. I had never imagined that that would happen. A feeling of complication filled my heart. ‘What should I do?’ I thought. An idea came to my mind. I took a piece of small paper and tore it into halves. On the papers I wrote respectively:

                ‘Yes, accept him.’
            ‘No, reject him.’

                I cupped my hands and juggled both the papers then threw them into the air. Both dropped on the floor and I chose one of them depending on my sixth sense. I opened the paper I chose and there it was written:

                ‘Yes, accept him.’

                The next day I went to school, I met Lennon. It was a noisy recess and we discussed privately at a corner. He asked about my decision. I stopped for a few seconds and said, ‘Yes.’ We did not dare to hug in front of the crowd, but we knew both of us were only too happy. We decided to keep it as a secret, but the relationship, somehow, spread quickly enough. Lennon and I were both worried that people will look down on us. Soon, my friends started to despise me. They all left me and lived their own world excluding me. Nobody befriended me, except for my best friend, Joanna. Joanna was open-minded enough to accept this. At that time, I thought this relationship was worth anything.

 
                Soon, there came the time for me to choose between Pure Science and Sub Science. Lennon took Sub Science while I wanted Pure Science. I am always interested in Biology, but Lennon is interested in Accounts. I wanted to be in the same class with him, I wanted to see him every day, but I wanted Biology, I wanted Pure Science. There came the dilemma. It was hard to choose between these two. I was really bewildered, but I had to make a decision. Sadly, I made up my mind and took Sub Science.

 
               

Form four was tough. I fared excellently in Chemistry, Physics and also Additional Mathematics. My weakest was Accounts. I couldn’t arrange the statistics, I couldn’t understand about the arrangement of the figures, and I couldn’t find the relevance between every figure. I soon found myself in difficulty doing Accounts. Despite the difficulties I faced, I tried and tried to do better in Accounts. No matter how I struggled, it did not work. I always thought, ‘Lennon is with me, I can do it.’

                Life is always full of obstacles, but I had never met such a big one.

                I was walking back home from school with Joanna. She lived near my house. Suddenly I heard someone yelling for me, ‘Gary! Your book!’ I looked back and Lennon was holding my Chemistry book, chasing after me. I ran towards him. I had almost reached him. But it was only almost. A car rushed by and hit Lennon. If the car had sped along the road a second later, Lennon wouldn’t have been hit. If I hadn’t left my Chemistry book in the lab, Lennon wouldn’t have been hit. If I had left the school later, Lennon wouldn’t have been hit. If only I had noticed the car was speeding towards him, Lennon would not have been hit.

                Blood flowed along the road. I was stunned and devastated. A feeling of loss, guilt and helplessness overwhelmed me. Tears rolled down from my cheek to the neck. I was emotionally defenceless. The driver descended from his car and looked at what he did. Everybody’s eyes were on us. The driver took out his mobile phone from his pocket and called the police for help. I was shouting for help wildly when the tears of the sky poured. Rain fell and the scene was in a mess.

                The police and ambulance finally came to save Lennon. I was in the ambulance with Lennon, sobbing and crying. The policeman asked me some questions about the accident and I told him everything including the relationship between Lennon and me. After a few minutes, the ambulance arrived at the hospital. Lennon was brought into the surgery room and I waited, waited and waited, sitting on the bench outside the room, looking at the downpour. Everything happened so suddenly. I couldn’t handle this anymore. I could only pray for Lennon. There I sat, praying for him for an hour. Then, the surgeon opened the door and came to me.

                ‘Sorry, we failed to save him. The impact to his head was too strong. The crack in the skull caused the death. We are very sorry that we couldn’t do anything,’ the surgeon said. I asked, ‘Can I have a look at him?’ ‘Yes, but not too long,’ the surgeon replied. I walked into the surgery room and looked at Lennon’s dead body. I held his hand. It was cold as ice. Before leaving, I said to ‘him’, ‘Bye, Lennon.’

               

‘I walked out the hospital and strolled in the rain aimlessly. My future was blurred. I lost everything except for a friend- Joanna. Nobody else wanted to care about me. Even my sisters looked down on me. My life was a failure. Joanna came to me with an umbrella and told me, ‘Gary, don’t hope for forever, just remember what you had in the past.’ At that moment I noticed what the definition of a friend is. I had no more initiatives towards my studies and had always cried before sleep. Sometimes I couldn’t even manage to sleep.

                Time passed by like a jet, and I had slowly put down Lennon a few months after the incident. I scored quite well in the SPM, getting 9As, and a B for Accounts. In hindsight, I how I had ‘sacrificed’ my studies for love, how I destroyed my future, and how a miserable person I had made myself. Now, I see how I regretted for all these things and decisions I had made. The most unforgivable decision was that I chose Sub to be with him. However, without all these, I would never notice how valuable everything is. Without all these, I will never understand how precious a life is.

Without all these, I would never know how to love myself.