I was getting a ride down the escalator. That lady standing one step below me looked familiar. I could only see her profile partly so I couldn't tell for sure. She was in a vermilion tee, a pair of jeans, her long hair in a pony tail, and French pedicure on her toenails.

The escalator reached the lower floor and I sped off to the next one going down another floor. This time I was one step below her so I turned back and she said hi. It's Sherry! Or "Sherry the Merry" as a good friend of mine Ar used to call her. And she looked the same as 14 years ago. She used to be a part-time model for magazine and TV ads back then.

Sherry, Ar and I used to work together at the bank. She was in the Personnel Department. She joined the bank earlier than I, right after getting her diploma. Ar joined a few months after I did. We used to be in a very small and close circle. Money was scarce then for Ar and I as we were only interns. Sherry was under probation, but for a permanent position. So she was better off. Ar and I shared one dinky room in PJ. We used to take the packed bus together to work, and wait for the bus home at Kota Raya. I remember getting a measly 6 bucks for my annual increment.

After Ar and I left the bank, I talked to her no more than five times and met her only once. Ar and I often talked and wondered about her whenever we met. The last time I met Ar at his house in October, he asked me if I had heard anything about "Sherry the Merry" being single again.

Today I got the answer to Ar's question. I did not ask her but the first thing she told me after saying hi was that her husband married the minah salleh, as if I had known the ensuing story. I did not ask further.

I also quickly learned from her that she left the bank recently and now she is running her own business out of Bangsar. She was so such in a hurry with her business accomplice that we didn't get to talk much. We did the routine exchange of phone numbers, patted each other, promised to have lunch or something one of these days. Then we parted ways.