The Ballad of Citra Sidek and Her Terrible Taste in Men

1

There was something to be said about the way all government buildings were designed - the same florescent lights, the utilitarian beige walls and grey-green tiles that gave way to cement flooring once you left the offices and stepped into the common areas. It was that way with the old polyclinics, the hospitals before whatever upgrades they got and, presently, every single Singaporean school in existence.

The staff room, the beating heart of any school, was a sacred place. Whatever propriety present was left at the door, which was also as far as where students would go.

"Fuck. My. Life," Citra set down the stacks of worksheets. "All I want is just one day... one day, where these fools hand up their work without one person telling me they forgot." She ran her hands over her face and sank back in her chair. "Is it too much to ask?"

Mountains of bundled papers stared back at her and she dreaded thinking about the other piles of unmarked student work she had lying in wait for her at the classroom, in the cupboard, and at home. Who am I kidding, she thought. Even if everyone had handed up their work, there was no way she could finish grading all of this on time.

The problem was her.

"Aiyah, if got one day where everyone passes up their work, I buy 4-D," her colleague in the neighbouring cubicle answered as a disembodied voice. "That Jonathan didn't pass up his work like four days already. I call his parents until I sien. Even his mother also sien."

"Jonathan needs to be caned," Citra replied, staring at the ceiling. She drew herself straight and started arranging the stacks in order of urgency. Unit worksheets could wait. This story writing thing was going to have her by the throat if she didn't get to it soon but... the annual subject book and file checks were also due this term and that meant, the math workbooks needed some extra attention. "If I pulled half the shit these kids get away with, my mom would have murdered me. In fact, she did. My secondary school art teacher called her because I didn't hand up any of my portraits... you know, because I suck at art and what's the point, really... but that still pissed my mom off and I remember that beating till today. Every time I get miss a deadline, I think of that."

The disembodied voice showed itself in the form of a taller woman with straight hair, dyed jet black in line with the ministry's regulations. Her puckered lips and eyes that were in the process of being rolled back into her head elicited a chuckle from Citra's sealed mouth. "Ya lah. But look where you are now. You have a job. You are responsible. You are obviously okay what," Anna replied, arms akimbo as she shook her head. "This one?" she picked up the list of items Jonathan had not handed up. The paper rustled as she shook it angrily. "I tell you, suck my blood."

Citra rubbed her neck. "Jonathan is bright but he coasts. Does the bare minimum," Citra shrugged, inwardly empathising with the kid. Sure, it was always good to do one's best but she was often guilty of just coasting too. Sometimes, she wondered if that was why she ended up in this job instead of traveling the world as the journalist her primary-school-self envisioned. Citra shook herself out of it. She had things to mark, school events to plan and paperwork to complete. Introspection could wait till she had time. Like in the middle of the night after dreaming of not being able to complete marking those damn workbooks in time for the book check.

"Anyway," she muttered to herself, "I'm an adult who made the choice to waste time. Jonathan is nine and doesn't know any better."

"What?" Anna pipped from the other side.

"Huh? Nothing," Citra answered, looking for her red pen. She adjusted the laptop screen so that she didn't have to see how messy her hair was or how her skin was glistening its need for a quick wash. "Just talking to myself. Sorry." She sighed and reached for the pack of wet wipes buried under a ridiculous amount of information leaflets and student work she had yet to get to. One thing at a time, she told herself.

Wipe your face. Comb and re-tie your hair. Drink some water. Get to work.

She often lost time of how long it took to grade a stack of worksheets. One had to decipher terrible handwriting, decide what led to the error and then plan where to draw the line and bracket for the correction that needs to be done. Citra found that if she didn't keep her mind from wandering, she would take about an hour to be done with a stack of thirty, four pages each.

The light chime of the laptop alert stopped her pen in mid-scratch. Yet another security update that would mess up her laptop. Unplugging it, she carried it one hand and took it to a desk on the far side of the office. "Hey, Arjun," she grinned at the technical assistant. "You got a minute?"

Arjun was the resident 'hottie', as the older female teachers liked to say. He was also the only Indian guy present who wasn't married or gay, a veritable glossy black unicorn that had somehow crossed paths with the all-female Tamil Language sub-department with a few single teachers within their ranks. Blessed with a thick head of hair kept long enough to annoy the department heads but short enough to be within guidelines, he was often seen walking around the school, fixing one IT problem after another. "Sure," he smiled back, showing the top row of his even white teeth. "Is it the update? It's very annoying, I know," he added, taking the laptop from her. Long fingers clicked and typed away as he studied the screen from behind his Malcolm X glasses. "You need to leave this with me so I can keep an eye on it," he sighed as Citra leaned against the cubicle wall, studying the details of her shoe. "Do you have a backup of your files?"

Citra pursed her lips and shrugged. "Nope but it's fine. I can't think of one thing on that laptop that I want to keep anyway. When can I get it back?"

"Probably tomorrow," Arjun rubbed his eyes, chuckling. "But I'll text you once it's done."

"'Kay," she replied, turning to go. "Thanks!"

"Eh... have you had lunch?" he asked, halfway getting up from his seat.

Citra shook her head as Arjun sat back down. "No, but I got a lot of marking to finish," she weighed her options. "Maybe I should order something in. Do you want anything?"

"Nothing at the canteen?"

"It's past dismissal time," Citra reminded him. "There's nothing at the canteen."

"What are you ordering?" he asked as she whipped out her phone.

"We have a few options. McDonald's, KFC... oooh. Ayam Penyet Ria delivers," Citra squealed happily. "I would murder for a Teh Botol Sosro right now. So damn hot. The weather is atrocious."

"I don't feel like having something heavy," Arjun frowned as she scrolled down the menu.

"They have ice cream sodas," she passed him the phone. "See? Crazy Soda comes with rose syrup, condensed milk and a scoop of ice cream." She waggled her eyebrows at him in an exaggerated attempt of a hard sell.

"It looks good."

"Or we can be boring and order in something from Soup Spoon," Citra offered. "I haven't had the clam chowder in a while."

"I thought Soup Spoon wasn't halal."

"Are you going to tell my mother?"

"Aren't you afraid of Allah?"

Citra winced. "Remind me to guilt-trip you when you order a quarter pounder from McDonald's," she narrowed her eyes at him, taking the phone away.

"Eh, don't be like that lah! Kidding only," Arjun took the phone back. "Soda Gila is fine. In fact, I'll also order Ayam Bakar. No rice." He tapped the screen a few times and passed the phone back to her. "Thanks. Let me know how much I owe you."

Citra rolled her eyes while resisting the urge to smile but failing. "I'll let you know when your food gets here," she said, her voice faded as she walked away. "So much for having something light!" She didn't stick around to hear his response if he had given any. She was already halfway back to her seat. "Anybody else wants to order lunch? Anna?"

The rest of the day passed in a blur. Somehow along the way, Citra had managed to complete a good amount of the marking she set out to do, had lunch with Arjun and some other colleagues before stepping out of the office. The day was mundane but honestly, how could every day be an adventure? That was the sort of thing privileged white people posted on Instagram about while using poor non-white folks as props in the background.

No. Life was hard with pockets of pleasure to break up the monotony. Work was tough and the commute back would be peaceful. Work was one less task before she went to bed for the day.

Now all she had to do wassurvive the evening at home.

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