The Good Boy – The One With The Tennis Game, & The Cheating

It was a calm morning. No wind at all. The Boy looked up to the sky and saw there were hardly any clouds around. “It’s going to be scorching hot in a few hours,” he said to himself. “Well at least it won’t rain. I hate to stop for the rain.” He continued stretching, he reached for his toes and made circling motions around it with his hands.

The Boy hardly slept last night. Too nervous and too excited. He promised himself that he was going to do it right this time. Last year, he completely blew it. It was his first game ever and he froze. All the training and the preparation was thrown out of the window. He was just too scared to play and he suffered a humiliating loss. But that was a year ago. Now, The Boy is the champion of his school. He surprised everyone when he beat C, the then number 1 player, in his school tournament earlier that year.

The Boy was never the most skillful. His basics and techniques left much room for improvement while his physical attributes were embarrassing. He was slow, lacked power in his shots and seriously lacked stamina. However he was smart. He loved tennis. He knew the game like no other and he could read his opponent’s play effortlessly. He thoroughly understood the cliché, ‘visualise the play, then execute it’. That was how The Boy became the number 1 player in his school.

But school differed from the district tournament. The Boy will be up against the players from the Chinese school who seemed to win the tournament every year. Also he will play against players from That Monkey School (TMS), the school that made weekend outings a nightmare for his fellow schoolmates. As students of a boarding school, they were seen as outsiders. They were harassed, mugged and beaten up, and most of the time TMS students were responsible for it. He was lucky enough not to ever been a victim but nonetheless he hated them. So this wasn’t just a tennis game, it was personal.

And behold, The Boy’s first match was going to be against a player from TMS! As a bonus, his opponent seemed to be the guy that the rest of them looked up to. He was loud, obnoxious and arrogant. He was no bigger than The Boy but acted like he owned the world.

“Well maybe he is the bitch to some ‘taiko’ at TMS, that’s why he is acting like an ass,” The Boy said to his friend.

A friend of The Boy was playing against one of them. In this tournament, they don’t have any umpire. The players will make the call. The score, the ins or outs, service faults or the opposites, all of that will be called by the players themselves. So when the TMS player made a doubtful called, The Boy and his friends naturally protested against it. A war of words started, and the player The Boy will play against said, “Oi bastards, if you guys don’t trust us, come here and be the line judge yourself!”

That was the last straw for The Boy. Because of what was said, The Boy decided to teach that arrogant guy a lesson. He wasn’t going to go to the guy and smacked him on the face. He told himself that he was classier than that (although deep down he knew it wasn’t about being classy, as much as he wanted to, The Boy just doesn’t have the nerve to smack that guy).

“Well he asked for it. I’m going to humiliate him later on the court. Just wait and see!”

The time came for The Boy to play. He took his place at one side of the court, waiting for his opponent to get ready for the warm up. During the warm up, both players were supposed to hit ‘friendly’ stroke to each other to get into the rhythm of the game. But The Boy had other plan, he will used the warm up to annoy the guy.

Instead of hitting easy strokes for the guy to hit back, The Boy deliberately hit the ball all over the place. He hit it hard, way to the back, to the side and even to the net. The guy ended up sweating by chasing the balls everywhere. And just to annoy him more, The Boy did all that with smiles on his face, saying ‘oh sorry too hard’ & ‘oops sorry didn’t mean that” and even laughing out loud at his own ‘miss hits’ stroke.

It worked very well. The guy’s face was red with anger and he looked like he was going to jump over the net and straggled The Boy at any moment.

The Boy’s coach knew what was happening and gave him the ‘what are you doing don’t try to be a smart ass’ warning look. The Boy just shrugged and ignored it.

“He is an ass so he doesn’t deserve my sportsmanship,” The Boy said to himself, trying to justify his action.

The warm up was over and the game started, and The Boy was flying! Everything went well for him. His strokes were killers and his serves were aces. The Boy raced to a 4-0 lead. He only needed to win another 4 games and the match will be over. (Instead of normal scoring system, they will only play 1 set with 8 games, so matches can be decided quicker).

“Sigh, this is too easy,” The Boy said in a low voice but loud enough for his opponent to hear.

The Boy got carried away with his plan. He showed no respect at all to his opponent and because of that he angered the whole TMS team, not only the players but also their coach. Every time he hits a winner he will say out loud things like ‘Whoah, that was sweeeet!’ or a simple ‘Hah!’. He deliberately yawned a few times during the game and whenever the guy managed to win a point The Boy will either laughed or shrugged his shoulders like it was nothing.

The score was 6-2 in favour of The Boy when he decided to do a really stupid thing. He felt that the guy wasn’t humiliated enough, he felt he needed to do more. So he let the guy win a few games and he made sure everyone there knew that he was letting the guy win. He hit the ball so hard that it flew way over the court, way outside the fence. With his serve, instead of tossing the ball high, he chose to do ‘under-serve’, like a normal stroke. And even then he deliberately hit his serves to the net.

When the score was 6-5, The Boy decided to quit fooling around and tried to finish the match quickly. However, it didn’t go to plan this time. His opponent gained confidence and gaining points. Now it was The Boy’s turned to sweat. His strokes suddenly just won’t go in and he hit double faults too many times. He has lost his composure.

His opponent started to hit baseline stroke a lot of times and The Boy struggled to deal with it. A few times The Boy called the guy’s baseline stroke as out when it was actually well in. The TMS coach walked over to The Boy’s side of the court in suspicion, and sure enough when The Boy called another baseline stroke as out, the TMS coach quickly overruled him.

“That bastard, he has been cheating all this while,” said the TMS team.

The Boy was panicking. He didn’t mean to cheat. Honestly he thought the strokes were out and that was because he has lost the sense of his positioning, his panicked movements made him feels like it was out. The tables were truly turned now, it was his turn to be embarrassed.

And before he knew it, that obnoxious ass of his opponent was on match point!

“This can’t be happening, I’m losing!”

And then it happened. The Boy’s opponent hit a winner on the match point, winning the match. His forehand stroke landed right on the line and The Boy can’t move quick enough to return the stroke. The Boy has lost!

He has lost in the first round!

“Out!” Suddenly a voice, forceful and so authoritative yelled. “The last stroke was out!”

Everyone turned to see who had said it. It was The Boy’s coach, standing confidently at the side of the court, looking straight at the TMS coach and daring him to challenge the call. It was obvious to everyone that the final ball had landed right on the line. It was so blatantly obvious that the ball was in.

However, no one said anything. No one dared to challenge the call. The Boy’s coach was the head of the tennis association of the district (or something like that) so no one had the nerve to overrule him.

Seeing no one said anything, The Boy’s coach nonchalantly said, “The match is not over. Continue!”

So they continued playing and in the end The Boy managed to win the match.

The Boy didn’t even so much raise his hands to celebrate the win. He just walked out of the court, head looking down, and he headed straight to the comfort of his teammates. All he wanted to do was to hide.

Then his coach walked over to him and told him to shake hands with his opponent. The Boy would rather eat dirt than to do that but his coach left him no choice. Feeling like there were bricks stuck to his feet, he walked over to the TMS camp and held his hand up, offering to shake hands. The guy just looked at him with venoms in his eyes.

“Shake his hand and get it over with,” the TMS coach told the guy. So he shook The Boy’s hand, reluctantly. The Boy knew everyone branded him a cheat. They didn’t say it out loud but they don’t have to. It was clear in their eyes. And they were right. The Boy had cheated his way to winning.

After that, The Boy’s coach took him to a corner and said these exact words to him, “You are an idiot. You don’t deserve to play the game but I’m going to let you continue playing in this tournament because you are a good player. If you ever again do what you did just now, I will cut you to pieces and fed you to the dog.”

The tongue-lashing lasted for about 5 minutes but it seemed like an eternity to The Boy. That day The Boy learned a lesson, an expensive and valuable lesson.

The Boy went on to win the tournament, beating the first seed from the Chinese school on the way. However the victory was tainted with the cheating in his first match.

And for weeks after that The Boy didn’t go out on weekends, afraid that he might bump into that obnoxious opponent of his. Thankfully he never did!

The Good Boy – The One With The First Date

The day arrived. They have been in contact for a while now, conversing and flirting through phone and emails. Then an opportunity presented itself. Payment time. Instead of him using the dispatch to send the cheque, she would come over to his office to collect it. The date was set, 27/1, a Friday. The start of many Fridays to come.

Since morning he has been thinking about the evening. His watch moved painfully slower than ever. Although his mind was focused on the evening only, he forced himself to finish up all the work required for the day as quickly as he can. He doesn’t want work to come in the way later.

Nearing 4pm, she called him.
“Hi, I’m leaving office now. I’ll make a few stops on the way to see my other clients. So I’ll be at your office around 5.30. See you soon!”

“It’s really happening! I’m going to have my first ever date today!” He said quietly to himself, excited and nervous.

So the wait went on. He went to the toilet for the tenth time, just for the mirror. Just to make sure that the shirt he wore was ok. The shirt he chose to wear specifically for that day because through a picture he gave her, she had told him she liked the shirt.

He went back to his desk, trying to do more work but he just can’t concentrate anymore. So he tried to do other things, filing, cleaning his desk, surfing the net, reading newspaper and then his phone rang again. He looked at his watch, 5.15.

“Hey I’m already at the car park.” Her pretty voice sounded excited from the other end.

“Oh ok, wait for me there. Give me five minutes.” He rushed down. “Damn this stupid lift, why can’t it go faster!”

Few minutes later he was at the car park, looking for her car.

Then he saw the car. The first thing he noticed was the Manchester United sticker. “Ergh, what have I gotten myself into!”

He walked towards the passenger’s side. She didn’t notice he was there. He knocked on the window, she turned to see. Immediately, seeing him standing there, she slumped deeper to her seat, as if she wanted to hide under it. She bit her lip, smiling sheepishly. The smile that he will forever remembers.

She rolled down the window, then her hands gripped the steering tighter. She glanced sideways to him, still biting her lips, still with the sheepish smile, “Come in and have a sit first,” she said.

He opened the door and sat at the passenger’s seat.

“Hi, glad to finally meet you." They shook hands. “Any trouble finding this car park?”

“No, no trouble at all.” Silence. “So what should we do now?” She asked, just to fill the silence.

“Let’s take care of business first. And while we are at it, let’s have coffee. Come follow me.”

They got out of the car and walked to the Starbuck at his office. There, he gave her the cheque. After she signed the necessary documents, business was over and the date ‘officially’ started.

It was easy for them. They hit it right off, the conversations were effortless and the jokes were always followed by laughter. He looked right at her as she was telling her stories and she always had a smile on her face. That special smile of her that made her face glow. Beautiful!

After a while, he had to go back up to his office.

“I won’t be long. Wait for me here, ok?” He told her.

She nodded.

He was afraid that she might leave, that she might run away. But when he returned, she was still there. Waiting for him. Smiling.

He let out a sigh of relief.

From there they went to have dinner. They continued telling their stories to each other. They sat there for hours, just conversing. She was showing him the scar on her hand, the one she got from the accident, when she got an sms.

It was from her friend, asking her about her date. “What should I tell her? Great? Wonderful? Excellent?” she asked as she looked at him playfully. He blushed.

He told her that her name was the same as his sister.

“Really? Then what will your family call me?”
Realising what she just said, it was her turn to blush. Beautiful, like a rose in full bloom.

After dinner they walked together to the car park. Now holding hands, they walked side by side, slowly. It was almost 12am when they got to their cars. It was supposed to be goodbye time but the goodbye didn’t happen. Instead they continued talking inside the car, for hours, about nothing at all.

The time was 3am when they reluctantly said goodbye. Neither wanted the night to end.

The Good Boy – The One With The Missing Car Key

It was already Sunday. 4pm.

The boy was walking around aimlessly, back and forth from his room to mum’s room. In his room angah was getting ready, already in his black pants and now putting on the batik shirt. In mum’s room, mum was putting on her tudung while dad was combing his hair. The boy is not happy. He felt like the time moved too fast. Seemed like Friday and Saturday was cut short by 23 hours each!

The boy continued his aimless walk. He was still in his shorts. Unlike everyone else, he wasn’t getting ready. Despite mum asking him to get ready for the tenth times, he kept on walking back and forth. As he passed the living room, he saw the car key. Right there on the coffee table, he saw it. Then he smiled.


“Angah is coming back this Friday. He will take the bus so he will probably reach home by Maghrib,” mum had told the boy as he was having lunch last Tuesday.

The boy’s eyes widen in excitement.

“Ok,” he said, trying to conceal his thrill. “I need him to take a look at the bike. Something is wrong with it.”

“What’s wrong with it? You can get ayah to take a look,” mum suggested.

“That’s ok, I’ll just wait for angah,” said the boy.

Mum just smiled, knowingly.


“Anyone knows where the car key is?” Suddenly dad shouted to no one.

No one answered. Everyone was outside, ready to go. Dad asked again, standing at the door.

This time mum answered. “I don’t know. Where did you put it? It’s not on the coffee table? Maybe it’s in the dinning room.”

“It’s not there as well.” Dad continued searching.

After a while mum went back in the house to help looking for the car key. Soon everyone was looking for it. Along, angah & alang joined in the search. The boy stayed outside. After a few minutes of waiting alone outside, guilt started to creep in. He went inside.

Inside the house he saw everyone was looking frantically. High and low. Left and right. Still no sign of the key. The boy saw angah getting restless. The boy knew angah needed to go back to school before six. The time was almost five. The boy moved his attention to his dad. His dad was scratching his head with a puzzled expression on his face.

“Where is the key? It was on the coffee table before, where did it go?” asked dad, again to no one.

The guilt was getting stronger. The boy felt he should admit it now. But he was scared and embarrassed too. Yup, the embarrassment stopped him from admitting that he hid the key because he didn’t want angah to go back to his school. He wanted more time with angah. Two days were not enough.

However, he knew just what to do.

“Has anyone tried the book shelves? Maybe it’s there.” He said, in hope that someone would start looking there.

No answer. Everyone was busy looking for the key.

The boy walked to the shelves. Pretending to look for the key, he said, “I need help here, I can’t reach the top part. Maybe it’s there.”

But everyone kept ignoring him. Why would the key be there? How can the key end up being there?

The boy didn’t give up. He kept on urging everyone to look at the shelves. ‘Oi everyone! Are you all deaf? Start looking at the shelves. I’m giving you guys a clue here. Read my lips, THE BOOK SHELVES!’

After a few times asking everyone to look for the key at the bookshelves, along suddenly looked straight at the boy, funny expression on her face. She walked to the shelves, and sure enough she found the key, hidden behind some books!

“Everyone, I found the key! It was at the book shelves!”

How did it get there, who put it there? Everyone was asking the same question. And soon enough they all exchanged the look, the knowing look. Then they exchanged smiles. Then small held back giggles. The boy heard alang whispered to along, “No wonder he was so eager asking us to look there!”

Then dad, noticing the look of guilt in the boy's face, said quickly, “Ok thank god we found the key. Lets not just stand here. Lets go now, we are already late.”

Taking the cue from dad, everyone went outside to the car. Smiles on their faces, especially along's. She had so many teasing words in her head. But she realised it wasn't the time yet.

In the car on the way to angah’s school, the boy kept quiet and kept looking down, embarrassed. He knew everyone realised what he did. But no one blamed him and no one was angry with him. No one even gave him the usually mockery, which was nice. He would have cried in embarrassment.

Angah was late, but thank god he didn’t get into trouble! And later that night, after they got back from angah’s school, the teasing started. Fast, thick & heavy.

The boy was just relieved that everyone saw the funny side of it!

The Good Boy – The One With The Bloody Hockey Game

The boy stood there watching in admiration as his brother hit the hockey ball hard with all his might so it will go through the row of small but thick plants. Every time his brother, angah, swung the hockey stick, without fail the ball flew through the plants, hitting the wall and making loud thumping sound. The boy was impressed and without realising it, he moved closer and closer to angah. With each swing he took a step forward and inevitably, as angah swung, the follow through caught him right at the chin.

Blood spilled over before the crying and scream of pain filled the air of panic. Angah’s face turned white looking at the boy frantically covering his mouth with both hands while pressing hard at the chin, as if he was afraid his chin would fell off. Blood started to drip through the little boy’s hands, making both of them even more panic. The boy's crying got louder.

Hurriedly angah ushered the boy inside to the bathroom. He then shouted a few panicky unstructured words and the boy, scared and in pain, somehow managed to make out what angah was saying.

“Please, stop crying. Mak is sleeping, she will wake up angry if you don’t stop crying. Stop covering your mouth, spit the blood out and gargle with this water. Please stop crying.”

The boy, still scared and in pain, can’t believe what he was seeing. Angah was on the brink of tears. Never had he seen angah as scared as that. He saw the horror in angah’s eyes, horror at the sight of his bleeding mouth and at the thought of mum waking up angry. Both of them knew what will happen if she found out.

The boy decided that he needs to stop crying. He doesn’t want to make angah cried & scared and he doesn’t want to wake mum up. So he tried to stop. He can’t. He was just too scared and the pain was too much. He tried again, still can’t. He looked up and he can still see the fear in angah’s eyes. He has to stop!

Miraculously, he managed to. Even more amazingly, he managed a smile!

“I was just playing around! It doesn’t hurt that much at all. I was just playing you. Gotcha!”

Angah look confused. He looked straight at the boy’s eyes, looking for confirmation of what he heard just now.

The boy said, “See, it’s nothing. Look!”

The boy opened up his mouth as wide as he can. Angah looked inside as if he was a doctor examining his patient. Everything seemed to be intact, no tooth fell off. A sigh of relief escaped angah’s mouth. A look of relief, and then a smile. Rubbing the top of the boy’s head he said, “What a strong brave boy you are.”

They looked at each other and smile.

But it was too late.

Mum woke up, furious, came storming to the bathroom and yelled, “What in the world is happening? What happened to you?”

The boy shocked and scared, feet trembling, answered, “I fell.”

The mum went berserk. Dragging the boy to her room, reaching for the rattan at the door, she yelled at the boy.

“Didn’t I tell you not to go play outside? Didn’t I tell you not to run and jump around? Why are you so stubborn? Now look what happened. That’s what you get for not listening to me! All I need is a little bit of rest but you just have to ruin it for me. I’m tired working all day, don’t you realise that? All I need is just a few minutes of rest! Why can’t you be a good boy for once and listen to me?!”

With that she started whipping the rattan at the boy’s feet again and again and again. The boy cried, pleading to mum to stop. Angah tried to explain what really had happened but mum just won’t listen. She was too angry to listen.

It went on for what seemed an eternity to both the boy and angah before luckily dad came home. Angah explained what had happened quickly and the dad went straight to the room, dragged the boy away from mum while telling mum to stop. After a few exchanged of angry words between mum and dad, the dad took the boy, now crying even harder, to the hospital where the boy got god knows how many stitches!

What a good boy indeed….