How many days till i tell her...

The meetings between Vanessa and I became more frequent. However, much to my own regret, I was never the one to initialize them. It always seemed to be Vanessa asking me out to join up with her and her friends (who I met during these outings). I think this was probably because I never did anything on weekends. I don’t often gather all my friends together and have dinner or lunch with them all at once. They all seem to be into different things with different personalities and interests. Not to mention the culture clash of them all. I have pictured it not working, and me being the only focal point of such a dinner. I never liked being the center of attention ^^. Anyway, our first outing/dinner she talked to me about it on MSN and invited me to go with her and her friends. I thought it was very nice of her to invite me, and needless to say I was quite flattered that she wanted to meet up with me again so quickly. I’ve met up with a person from a game before and we stopped talking pretty much after we met up for the first time.

I was very nervous, to say the least. I never used to go out at all, or meet up with friends of friends or get called out to dinners. I was always, and still am quite, a anti social kid. So this was a new thing for me. I thought that I was going to have to impress Vanessa by dressing sharply/cool and doing my hair properly (because I had always worn my cap when I met up with her, hiding my haircut). So I dressed nice. I wore a black long sleeve top (which I had bought quite recently to look better when meeting up with people…), some normal sized jeans that didn’t look like I crapped myself 10 times and did my hair with some hair paste. Now I thought I looked pretty cool. My hair, was sort of “emo”. When I say sorta, I mean “pretty damn emo”. My friend did it for me, and I was content with it, but Vanessa and her friends (Ron especially) thought it looked pretty dumb. :<.

The dinner was pleasant. Everyone was talking to each other, I was opposite Vanessa (<3)>

She’s lucky to have met nice people in her life that don’t have dark histories or bad habits;**** even though Vanessa and I teased Ron about his frequent visits outside for some “fresh air” that always meant he had a craving for a smoke. Haha. We left Sofias, divided up the cost of eating evenly and I joked about how much change Vanessa was carrying around – as she managed to give everyone back the exact amount they needed ^^. I was sad to see Vanessa leaving. I had a lot of fun t hat night, and had met some very nice and funny people. As I was walking back to my car (that was parked AGES AWAY because I didn’t see where the restaurant was and got lost -_-) the whole time I was berating myself for not saying more or for not making more jokes or making her laugh more. Some of my fears were dissipated when she and Ling called out “RAYRAY!! BYE BYE RAYRAY!!”. I waved back.

Then I walked away smiling, and blushing.

Our next dinner out was at Nonya Hut. Vanessa was telling me that this was a place that served authentic Malaysian food. She always told me how badly Melbourne food sucked. Lol. I never thought it was so bad, but she always said “You have to try Malaysian food. It is fantastic.. the Mee goreng in Malaysia …. *drooool*”. I don’t have a specific taste in food; I just eat what’s recommended to me and keep eating it if it tastes good ^_^. So, already trusting Vanessa’s taste in food (because Sofias rocked), I accepted and decided to go to eat with her again. Let me just say that, if we were going to eat at a place that served the worst food imaginable or had a bad reputation for something, I would still have gone only because Vanessa invited me to go <3. style="">

So I was left with the question of who to invite. It wasn’t a tough decision though, everyone of my few friends was either busy or uninterested so I was left with only one, but still good choice – my friend Phillip. Now, Phillip and I go way back to Year 8 in high school. We always just used to chat normally back then about computer games and joke around about crap. It wasn’t until later on though, that we started to poke fun at each other and call each other names. The most clear example; I call him “The HULK” and he calls me “The THING”. You might recognize these names because of the marvel characters – and that’s exactly what we named each other after. You see, Phil is tank. He used to work out. A lot. And although his frame seems small at a glance, its very deceptive. Oh, I often think back to how many times I’ve lost my self staring into his arms just wishing that I cou- OK. YOU GET THE PICTURE.

Anyway at the dinner (which Vanessa was late for!!! :P) she commented on us making these stupid comments, complementing each other on how “tank they are”, and she said “You guys are gay together.”. Phil made a quick come back, and said “Nah, I wouldn’t dare steal Ray away from you – Vanessa.” Her reply? “What? Me and him? Never. I could never like him.” YOU HEARD IT FOLKS!! RIGHT HERE ON MY BLOG!! THE TRUTH OF WHAT HAPPENED THAT NIGHT!! Of course, Vanessa denied that she ever said this from then on. Even saying that I must have been lying about it just to tease her. Phil heard it, and Ling heard it. There were other witnesses too; Lawrence, Ron and Blake. Blake was too far away to hear it, so we left him out of the ruling. Lawrence and Ron both didn’t hear the comment, so Vanessa said that it was proof that she never said it (this was all after we got together, I just thought id say it now :P)

The dinner continued at the same pace that Sofia’s did, chatting and joking around and having fun. After Sofia’s I always looked forward to times like these. I never had them with my friends earlier, and it seemed so normal and fun to do and I said I should probably arrange one for me and my friends (which, hasn’t happened yet because they’re all on different sides of Melbourne and its hard to get them all together at once). The food was ONLY OK :P. Lol, Vanessa questioned why I ordered the dish that I ate (some chicken and rice thing with peanuts!!) and I said “I like peanuts.” She replied “Yeah, but it didn’t look that great, you should have ordered something that tastes more like authentic Malaysian food.” Then time came for desert, and something else happened that she denied (but Phil knows about all too well that it happened). Vanessa ordered this little crispy roll thing, that was green in colour but was sweet and filled with some coconut or something inside. Anyway, she looked at it, then looked at me. I was like “Uh..” She then STARTED TO PLAY WITH IT BY TOUCHING ITS TIP IT AND SAYING “Is yours this big???!!”. She was giggling while my face went from a pale white, to a crimson red. Phil turned to me and asked “Your eggroll?”. I solemnly nodded, in defeat. We said our goodbyes after dinner, and Vanessa was again the ‘change-lady’. Walking back to the car, I asked Phil “So what did you think of her?” His only reply was “She’s forward. Eggroll!” And then burst into laughter. We forever dubbed this night “The Eggroll incident.” I couldn’t help but join in his laughter fully. Forwardness is what I admire about her. Because it comes with honestly.

The other major dinner we had was at Mai Tai, this bar/restaurant place located on Lonsdale and Russell street in the city. Now, it was supposed to have “renowed and great food” But it really wasn’t that fantastic. It was good and tasteful, but the prices were sky high for the amount of food we got. Anyway, this wasn’t the main attraction for the night. This time, only Ron, Lawrence, Ling, Vanessa and I were present for the dinner. Vanessa drove us from her house in Docklands in her Red Honda jazz and parked in this place called “Church Parking” because its right next to a church. We were sitting down talking and joking as was the norm, and someone said something about Vanessa not noticing when guys liked her. She then said “Yeah I never notice it when guys like me. Even with ****** (her ex).” It wasn’t me who asked, I think it was Ron who did, but he said “Do you have anyone that you like at the moment? What about Blake?” “Nope I never liked Blake like that.” Ron then said “Do you like any guys that you know now?” Her reply – “I could never like any of the guys that I know now.” This broke my heart into a million pieces. A guy, sitting right next to her who had every intention to say to her that he liked her.. and she says that she could never like any of the guys that she knows? I was devastated from that moment on. All the courage I had been piling up to tell her that I liked her was gone and needed to be rebuilt. Sigh, I think back to that night and reminisce about how bad I felt then and how crushed. Luckily I didn’t give up otherwise I wouldn’t be where I am today ^ ^.

We constantly met up to go the movies; Failure to launch, Casanova, Ice Age 2 and a heap of others. We met up at Uni every time she had her break that went on for hours. Even casually meeting up in the city one time after we had talked to each other online and she told me she had been crying and depressed. That night I felt so bad and just wanted to be there to cheer her up and make her happy again with some of my lame jokes. That day we met up, I expected to find a girl crying and putting on a brave face to show that she was ok, but when i went down to meet here I was glad to see that she was her happy and childish self again. I couldn’t bare to see her crying or upset. Even from then, I wanted to be there and support her when she was in need and upset. Sometimes Ron came along or went to see a movie with her – I was so jealous of him!! ARH! I thought he was stealing her away from me! (I even told my friends that there was going to be a competition for Vanessa and that I would be heartbroken if she was going to get taken away right under me!!) With so much on the line and so much of my emotional attatchment to her already brewing… I had to say something.

I had to take the biggest leap in my life.

And tell Vanessa, that I liked her.