The postcard read “My dearest jewel, I miss you so much! I wished to be with you now! Love, Edward” Tossing the postcard to the dustbin, Calista continued her work. She didn’t care about Edward despite his declarations of undying love for her.

All she felt for him was a sense of irritation and annoyance. He was persistant and she wished that the earth would swallow him up at times. All the bouquets and flowers he sent almost every week were often given away to her female or male subordinates. The males wanted to pacify their girlfriends or wives. The females just wanted to feel romantic or make their husbands or boyfriends feel jealous.

Calista enjoyed her work and was happy to be an events planner manager. Being in this position wasn’t easy as she had to overcome prejudice from men who often gave her that “What-is-a-woman-here-for” look whenever she visited her clients with her male subordinates.

However, her efforts and results have paid off and her director was always satisfied with her work. Everyone in the office respected her as she often stood by them when they had problems with difficult clients.

Her phone rang just before lunch. It was Edward. He wanted to lunch with her. Rejection seemed impossible when her secretary pointed that he was just outside her door. Sighing, Calista resigned herself to an agonising lunch with him.

Just as they were leaving the office, Calista saw her regular client. “Mr Fu! What are you doing here?” Mr Fu beamed at her and introduced his friends saying that he was bringing them to see her. “What a surprise, do you want to have lunch first? We can always discuss it during lunch.”

“Will I be disrupting you and your…”

“No! No! He was just leaving.” Calista cut Mr Fu off before he could complete his sentence as it was simply drive Edward’s ego further, something she didn’t want. She left with Mr Fu and his friends happy for the intervention. Edward was left at the lift lobby. He scowled at her leaving back.

When she returned to her office, her secretary was worried for her. “Miss Teo, I doubt that Edward is happy. He looked evil just now when you left.”

“Lucy, I think he is harmless. I have tried to tell him in whatever ways I could to let him know I don’t like him but he still doesn’t get it. I think this ought to let him know that I don’t care to have lunch or anything with him at all.”

However, Lucy was worried because his face was scary at the lobby and she couldn’t convince her boss that he could be up to nothing good even with his nerdy appearance. She left the room reluctantly and hoped Calista would be safe.

Calista took note of Lucy’s words to heart. She didn’t want her colleagues to be worried about her when it was her problem. Edward was known to be persistent and today’s episode must have wounded his ego even more than the previous times.

She just couldn’t understand why he wouldn’t let go when she had informed him in various ways that she wasn’t remotely interested in him and had always rejected his advances. Sighing inwardly, she started on her planning for her new clients.

It was two weeks later when a woman stormed into her office demanding her to leave her husband alone. Calista was called a slut, bitch, snake and all other terms that the angry woman could think of. Shocked, Calista didn’t know how to react but she had no idea who the husband was.

“Who is your husband” she asked when the tirade died down due to the woman pausing for breath.

“You don’t know who he is?” the shriek was hurting the ears. “He is Owen Fu! The two of you have been meeting each other almost everyday and he hasn’t been home for the past two weeks!”

“Mrs Fu, your husband and I were only talking about work. I have a business dealing with him.”

“My foot! Work indeed!” Mrs Fu spat out the words as if they were vile. “The two of you have entered different hotels for 3 consecutive days and you telling me it’s work?”

“The hotels are for selecting the ballrooms.”

“Right! I don’t believe you, you little slut!” At that moment, the security guards arrived to pull the angry and jealous wife out of the office. “So, you need bodyguards now? I’ll have a piece of you!” Mrs Fu struggled to be freed so that she could slap Calista. However, she was no match for the guards. Soon, she was dragged away screaming and kicking her way out of the building.

Calista sat down at her desk in shock. She didn’t know that by meeting her clients after work would affect their families. She never had any problems with any of her clients until now.

“Miss Teo?” Lucy was at her door. Calista motioned for her to enter. Lucy closed the door behind her and sat in front of her. “Here’s your hot drink. I think you need it now.”

Calista took the hot milo from her and sipped it, grateful to have such an efficient secretary. “Lucy, I will need to cancel my appointments for today. I’m going to take the day off and leave today’s work to your capable hands.” Nodding, Lucy took note and left the room. Calista proceeded to pack and called Sonia for a drink.

Sonia arrived at the pub at the same time as Calista. She was the only one Calista would confide in first. They found a corner in the pub and ordered their drinks. Enjoying the atmosphere, they drank in silence until Calista recounted her scary encounter with a jealous wife.

Sonia listened with animated eyes. Finally, she said, “Well, from the looks of you, I can understand why she called you a slut. You still look beautiful while she could be frumpy looking. And going to a hotel with a man does look suspicious.”

“I know, but I was really talking to the hotel managers with my client. I just don’t understand why she didn’t go and ask them if she doesn’t believe her husband.”

“From her point of view, her husband is quite influential and could easily influence anyone to just ‘lie’ to her. She is getting older and feeling inadequate when dealing with her younger counterparts.”

“Sonia, you could be right. She was all wild-haired when she stormed into my office just now and the guards did have some difficulty trying to stop her from clawing at me. I think my face would have been the first to go.”

Sonia laughed but she was serious when she replied, “True but if it were any other woman who could escape the clutches of those guards, I think you would have been in more serious trouble.” Calista agreed.

As they left the pub, a dark figure was following them towards the taxi stand. Feeling chilly, Calista turned around but noticing nothing. Shrugging the ugly thoughts away, she boarded the taxi with Sonia.

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Calling the police twice brought no relief. Her neighbour continued the practice from 10pm to 3am everyday. When Nancy was finally up at 7am despite sleeping for just 4 hours, the neighbour was already blasting the TV set at 7am.

Working at home had become a pain and Nancy resorted to using the public library’s resources. Her work suffered a little and she wanted the source of the noise removed. Being sleepless meant that she wouldn’t perform well for her freelancing gigs and she didn’t want to lose any of her clients during this recession.

Being surrounded by 3 units next to her bedroom, she was unable to deduce the source since the noise seemed be loud enough just for her ears alone. Knocking on doors on the pretense of borrowing sugar brought her no closer to the culprit.

Each time she heard the noises from the neighbour’s TV set, she cursed. She cursed that the culprit will be deaf soon, TV set to be spoilt every time a certain volume was reached, no electronic product will last long in the hands of such inconsiderate person and may the person go blind.

Until now, her curses didn’t seem to work and the noise continued throughout every night. Sometimes, she wanted to smash the source of the noise into little pieces. At other times, her lost of sleep made her irritated and short tempered more easily.

Unable to take the torture any more, Nancy took out her trusty Nikon with 20x optical zoom and went across her building to the one opposite hers. Once there, she set up the tripod, adjusted the aperture and shutter speed.

Zooming towards her apartment, she scanned the windows near hers and found only one with the lights on. Zooming in, she found her source. The girl was in her teens and munching on her potato chips watching some idol drama.

Nancy took a few shots with incriminating evidence before packing for home. Sleepless at home was the worst thing since she had always loved being at home doing her stuff. With the evidence in hand, Nancy printed a few black and white copies.

She wanted to ask the girl to lower down the volume however, the girl sneered at her before slamming the door in her face. Fuming, Nancy pasted the photo of her with the words, “She keeps you awake at 3am daily.” in front of the lifts.

It was evil but it solved the noise problem as she saw the girl moving out a few days later.

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She would have shouted had not her tooth gave her a sharp pain. Holding the affected side tenderly, she demanded, “I made an appointment with one of you two weeks ago and I have taken leave just to come all the way down. I am NOT going to go back and ache for another two weeks. I am in pain. Understand?”

The nurse looked at her and told her to wait before going off. It felt like an eternity during which the tooth attacked the gum at irregular intervals. “Lynda Chew.” Upon hearing her name, she picked up her handbag and walked towards the dentist’s door.

The dentist was apologetic towards her during the extraction. He was sorry that his nurse had lost her appointment and resulted in causing her some inconvenience. The extraction was smooth and he gave her the tooth in a small zip-lock bag.

With the dental appointment done, Lynda headed home as the anesthesia would wear off in 30 minutes. During her ride home, her mobile phone rang. It was her boss. “Doesn’t he know that I can’t talk with this thing in my mouth?” she rolled her eyes at no one in particular.

Moments later, a text message was received. “Lynda, why don’t you pick up my call?”

“I can’t talk with a cotton bud in my mouth. I had a tooth extraction that I told you about yesterday. What do you want to talk about?”

“Oh, sorry. I forgot about that. You take a good rest. I will let Suzy handle the rest since she’s your assistant.”

At that, Lynda alighted at her stop. Her gum was starting to throb and all she wanted to do was to sleep the pain away. With the last wisdom tooth extracted, Lynda would not be afflicted with such pain again.

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Stuck, she turned to concentrate on her jewellery making since going out in the heavy rain would induce coldness to her body; something that she didn’t care for. After completing 3 pairs of earrings and 2 necklaces, the rain wasn’t letting up.

Since her inspirations were used for the jewellery, she went on to check if there was anything online that was interesting enough. Noticing that a granny was fit enough to give chase to her snatch thieves, she was amused. the granny was a former cross-country champion and was still swimming and jogging regularly.

Checking the weather site, she realised that the rain was going to stay for the rest of the day. Sighing, her bills would have to wait for another day. However, she was glad that she completed writing 2 stories and her jewellery for sale on such a wet day.

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A pretty lady with a successful career. She is often sought after by men for her grace and beauty while women hate her for her looks. Once mistaken for a mistress of a rich businessman, the wife sent her a threatening letter to stay away from her husband.

This led to a period of depression as Calista was facing pressure from work for a promotion that she wanted to get desperately. She went through it with help from her close friends. She has since become stronger and is known to be cold towards men whom she doesn’t know very well.

Despite her cool exterior towards men, she yearns for someone who can let her cry on his shoulders and just be with her when she needs someone to lean on. She hopes to find him one day.

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