I Don't Like The World, I Only Like You

Chapter 2: He who was my Deskmate

001

When we were studying, Mr. F was a legend in our school. His face was like the actors in TVB dramas who were casted to act as righteous anti-terrorism elite; his results were so good it was considered twisted; and he could even play the saxophone. Thus, he was the object of fantasy for many female students, regardless of whether they were awake or sleeping.

He was rather snobbish, always putting up a cold front in front of others. During that period of time , I merely thought of him as a refrigerator who liked to act cool – my ideal boyfriend was Chan Ho Nam, as I dreamt of becoming the girlfriend of a godfather: together, we would use our axes to slash our way to survival from Causeway Bay to Tsim Sha Tsui, and live happy and carefree lives thereafter.

Our high school was the best in our city. However, our school had a rather odd rule – that the seats in the class would be distributed in accordance with results. Since our form teacher was extremely law abiding (he must have been a Cancer), we were always instructed to queue up outside the classroom after our Mid-Year Papers and Final Year Papers. The form teacher would then slowly go down the results list; only those who have been called could go into the classroom to select their seats.

This experience was a terrible one, and I always felt that this rule is one of the most inhumane rules that has ever been invented. Mr. F was always the first to enter the classroom, but he never sits in the first row, because he doesn't like it. Rather, he would sit in the fourth row, with his seat always being the one nearest to the window – it has a good view, so it was more convenient for him to day- (act) dream (cool).

At that time, there was a male student in class who never washes his hair; however, as he admired me, he enthusiastically wrote me a love poem, title "Spilling My Hot Blood All Over Your Tombstone". Since I was always just slightly worse than him in terms of results, I would necessarily be required to share a table with him. Just the mere thought of my tombstone with his blood splashed over it gives me goosebumps.

When I was due to select my seat, the only other seat available was the one besides Mr. F – he always sat alone – in this strange, perverted school of mine, great privileges were bestowed on those who could excel academically.

Thus, I did the bravest thing I ever did in my life. I grabbed my bag and escaped to Mr. F's side, plopping myself down on the chair before he could say anything.

He turned his head and glanced at me – I remember that he was listening to music through his earphones then. I smiled at him extremely awkwardly, while he simply looked at me expressionlessly, remaining silent until the CD in the music player had finished playing.

"Is it Jay Chou?" I tried to engage him in small talk. Jay Chou was extremely popular then, entire rows of shops on the streets were always playing his music. Mr. F opened his music player, and changed the CD before putting his earphones back on. He replied coldly, "The Beatles."

That's how we became deskmates.

Many years later, whenever I recall this encounter I would complain, "Couldn't you have been friendlier to your new deskmate?"

"Sorry." He apologized sincerely, "After all, nobody could have possibly known that the person who sat down would be my future wife."

002

Mr. F was an extremely quiet person, and rarely spoke unless compelled to. If he could answer the question with a monosyllabic word, he would never use a multisyllabic word. If he could make his point with a single phrase, he would never use a sentence. If he could summarize his reply within a single sentence he would never use two. In any case, chatting with him will cause one to be frustrated to death.