Babysitter Cougar [COMPLETE]

Chapter 16 - Cold Shoulder

14 years.

It's been 14 years since we've last met and the innocent, somewhat petulant yet adorable Saint I used to know is standing before me in 6ft 3 like Eros descended from above for me to drool over.

His well-groomed cropped hair with fades at the side, donning crisp, smooth ironed pinstripe shirt with sleeves neatly folded up to his forearms, neatly tied Armani naval blue necktie tucked under the collar, expensive looking black leather belt best believed Polo Ralph Lauren securing his crisp ironed navy chino pants and his dark burgundy Oxford shoes making him to lose all those immature impressions I once had on him.

He's an adult Saint now and he makes me want him back.

As Dato' Bahadin swiftly greets and passes us, I watch Saint follows behind him, leaving a trail of fresh mint and spices sillage accentuated with its pleasurable strong scent, best believed to be Dior Sauvage Fareed had claimed earlier.

Saint swiftly glances at me before turning his head back to his iPhone, scrolling furiously. I'm frustrated by his inability to recognise me. Am I becoming too unfamiliar for him? Am I gaining weight that he's too embarrassed to say hi to me?

"Saint!" although I could hear my voice pitch higher than usual among the chatters, he doesn't turn to respond. I don't stop there, I march forward towards him and reach for his shoulder to tap.

"Excuse me?" he turned to me in astonishment and his eyebrows furrow, feeling annoyed.

"Saint? Hussaini? It's you, right?" I brave an introductory query.

"What do you want?" he grunts.

"Hi, it's me Sofia, remember?" but he looks at me deadpan with no attempt of recalling who I am. I carry on, "I'm your former-"

"Get out of my sight, please!" he cuts off sharply and joins the entourage.

Him aborting the conversation has left me feeling baffled and dejected. Did he do that intentionally or is he blocking me out of his memory?

"You know him?" Melinda asks me as she draws near. "Or are you having one of your uncontrolled delusions again?"

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"Isn't T-Rex's mom's name Sabina Mohammadi?" I throw out the question to my CoSec mates, using the moniker 'T-Rex' for Saint which was coined by some of our colleagues who find Saint to be irritable.

"Yeah, she's the former Chief Finance Officer of the Group," Kak Aisah elucidates. She would have known the history of Taylor-Willis Bank longer than any of us since she is the most senior. "She took an early retirement a couple of years back."

I quickly open my long-forgotten email account to browse for Sabina's archived messages with old photos of me and Saint in it. And when I successfully retrieve the email, I yelp triumphantly. Distracted Fareed turns to look at my desktop screen and catches me viewing a few low-resolution images of me and Saint when we were kids.

"Wait, you and T-Rex were childhood friends?!" Fareed's almost too loud voice attracts Hasanah and Sarra to stop and gather behind me at my workstation.

"Owh, look how adorable you two were!" Sarra moans at the old photo of young Saint and I holding each other's hands in front of KLCC entrance like childhood sweethearts.

"You slept with my man?!" Fareed hissed when he sees photos of us taking a nap with young Saint covering my feet.

"Come on, you have to admit that this is cute," Hasanah elbows him. "Just wondering how a sweet looking kid like this turned so brute?"