just minishorts.

After she told the joke, my aunt got all solemn and serious again. 'You have not answer me leh.'

Obviously I had not managed to escape the rhetorical question, except, my aunt, like the most of my older friends, really wanted an answer from me.

'When are you planning to get married lah?'
'Not yet lah. Stop asking.'
'Don't wait too long lah, afterwards he get used to the current situation, and he's never going to officiate the thing.'
'It's officiated what. Everyone knows who I'm with. His mother also knows me. Okay what? I'm still young lah.'
'Young what young? In my time, girls got married at the age of 20.'
'Now not your time lah, auntie. Now's MY TIME.'
'Cheh. Talk nonsense again. You plan to stay unmarried forever, like me meh? Regret then you know.'
'BUT I AM STILL YOUNG!'
'Say only young. Next thing you know you will be 36 and then you'd wished you'd put in some action.'

Action? What action? I didn't understand. So I asked my aunt, 'What you mean some action.'

'Oh you know. Sometimes, you need to put in a little bit of kungfu to see things happen.'
'Kungfu?'
'Yeah like Lixiaolong a bit. But not so obvious ones lah.'
'Erm. I don't know any Bruce Lee moves to make this happen…'
'HA… long time ago some girls used their belly to make things happen.'
'WHAT THE…'
'But you cannot do that lah, afterwards you mother and I and your uncle all sure lose face one. Don't do, don't do, okay?'

Like, not anytime soon, hello?! I wanted to tell my aunt that I was rushing off and couldn't talk anymore.

'Don't talk nonsense, girl. It's 10.30 pm, Sunday night. Where are you going to go lah. I'm the one who called you so don't worry about bills.'

Right.

'So you haven't answered me yet.'
'I did! I said it's not so soon?'
'Okay. Then when?'

Now this is the thing I don't get about parents and relatives. Remember when you were slightly younger? When you were 16 or so? For me, that's just about 10 years back, right after SPM. I came back from school after my last paper, and told my mother that I wanted to go out with some friends to celebrate our graduation. Mum decided to give me a stern warning then.

'My girl, I can allow you to go out with your friends. But whatever you do, don't go and get a boyfriend or anything okay? You still have to go to university first before you do that dating thing.'

I'll be honest here, now. When I was 16 and I had classmates who were dating other classmates, I envied them. I thought, 'Gee, it must be nice to have someone to call a "boyfriend",'and I'd pick and choose several candidates from the few boy-pals I had. Sometimes, I'd daydream my afternoons away thinking what it would like to be in a relationship with any one of them.

Sometimes, I wondered what it was like to kiss a friend of the opposite gender. And you know? I would 'practise' kissing using my pink fluffy rabbit toy. On its lips, but of course, the toy never responded, and it always left a fluff stain on my lips.

So when Mum set the curfew-age for me to start dating I was quite annoyed. 'What you mean I cannot even try going out with a boy?'

'You want to have a boyfriend so badly meh?'
'No lah. But my friends all have them mah.'
'I won't let you. You're too young. Wait a bit more.'
'Until when?'
'Until you've graduated.'
'But, but. I'd be 24 by then!'
'If you study harder you'd graduate at the age of 21, then you can have a boyfriend.'
'Mum!'

I was 19, almost 20 when I got my very first official kiss. And it felt like cold and slimy sotong sweeping across my lips. Not very romantic at all.

Funny how things change, hoh? There I was, forced into a telephone conversation at 10.30 pm on a Sunday night, and my aunt was forcing me to give her a definite deadline regarding my very own big day.

'You know Auntie? Last time when I was 16 I saw my friends dating, and I wondered when I'd be able to join the ranks.'
'Ah… and then?'
'And then, I just let things pass, had a crush or two, and then I FIRST started dating a boy, when I turned 19.'
'Okay. So now?'
'So now, I am 26 and yes, some friends are getting married, and sometimes, I also wonder when I'd be joining their ranks.'
'I can see where this is going… '
'I think I'll just let things pass, and then maybe I'll get married when I turn 29. Can or not?'

My aunt's answer was cute. 'We shall see. Tak jadi-jadi, you get married next year, then you know. Hahaha.'

So we shall see.

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