But why break poor Andreae’s heart? The dear girl was plunging her paddles valiantly into the waters, puncturing each exertion with a screeching yelp, no doubt designed to draw the team captain’s attention to herself.

“Did you not notice how he always stays back after practice to chat with us?” Andreae had more than once repeated her observation.

“He chats with everyone. It’s his role as the team captain to build the team spirit.” Jessica felt it her duty to douse the poor girl’s misdirected ardency.

“That is so not true. You must be blind not to see that he is interested in us.”

That, in a nutshell, was Andreae’s problem, Jessica mused.

The two had met in junior college and Andreae had clung onto her like a parasitic clump of mistletoe onto a full-grown, flowering eucalyptus. Over the past four years, Andreae had copied her hairstyle, her make-up and her clothes. It never struck the poor girl that she did not have Jessica’s height, skin or contours to carry it off. She always ended up looking like a smudged, off-colour carbon copy of the real deal. Some of the mean girls on campus called her “Fake Prada”, but Andreae either did not know or pretended not to.

Jessica hadn’t minded Andreae’s clinginess. But it unnerved Jessica whenever Andreae fused their separate identities as a singular “us”. It was as though Andreae actually believed that she could feed on Jessica’s attributes like a mistletoe would its host eucalyptus.

Both girls were rinsing off after dragon boat practice ended when Andreae suddenly declared, “Maybe he’s too shy to ask us out. Maybe we should ask him out instead.”

Jessica secretly sighed. She hadn’t the heart to tell Andreae that the team captain had in fact asked her out on a date once before and had been somewhat embarrassed when she told him she had a steady boyfriend.

“You can always try.” Jessica shrugged.

“Yes, I should.” Andreae decided happily, now that her best friend had endorsed the idea. She rinsed off the shampoo suds and raced off without even drying her hair. It took her all of five minutes to return triumphant.

“He said yes.”

“He did?” Jessica had to admit that caught her by surprise.

“We are going to the soup kitchen after this.”

“Is that some fancy new place I haven’t heard about?”

“It’s a soup kitchen run by some NGO to feed the migrant workers. He says he will bring us.”

“Why are we eating at some soup kitchen that gives free meals to migrant workers?” Jessica asked, mystified.

“Because he has already signed up for volunteer duties, so I told him that we will be happy to help out,” Andreae said cheerily.

Jessica rolled her eyes. Of all the relaxing or fun things she could do on a Sunday night, Andreae had to sign her up for soup kitchen duty.