1Waiting. I LIVE IN A cosy little vein between two arteries; my evenings are quiet as the grave, or they were until the night Uncle Bernard got hanged. Truth be told, the vein, Evans Road, is more a capillary than a vein, more a lane than a road, but don''t tell Evans, whoever Evans is or was. In 1980, it sneaks across the university from Tanglinside to Bukit Timah Road. Anybody crossing the campus at night, unless they skulk through the grass and bushes, uses Evans Road and I see them - if I''m looking. Not that many make the crossing, so the normal pulse of my Evans Road evenings, once the girls in the dormitory opposite switch off their lights at ten, is almost imperceptible - a deathlike silence. Well, silence broken by the episodic shrill of male cicadas trying to attract a mate. When on, they fill my mind; when they snap off, my mind floats, free, empty, waiting .

for Venus. As I hang on in hope, waiting for Venus to show up, Professor Bernard Fox, my best friend in the world or by this time out of it, is just up the road hanging by his neck from a rope. I do nothing to save him. Uncle Bernard is dying and I''m doing nothing. I''m not heartless; I''m really quite sensitive. And it''s not quite true I''m doing nothing; I''m waiting for Venus to call by. Well, to call by maybe. Venus only half-promised.

''I''ll try to call by, Tom, after work.'' She''s done that before. Lucky I''m good at waiting. Tonight, it''s pretty much waiting as usual: still life with whisky. Nothing suggests the world is turning turtle on me; I''m the same tiny speck I always was - in the same enormous place it always has been since the Empire built it in 1924 and since I moved in a couple of years back - in 1980 a young man full of dreams and nothing in the bank. A place defined by its ''nos'': no aircon, no TV, no telephone, no hot water, no glass in the windows. Just ''Hard Furnishings'': chairs with no cushion, beds with no mattress, cold water, and overhead fans that wobble on long stems from a high ceiling. My flat''s a bit of a desert island.

I love it. Outside my space, suicidal flying insects explode soundlessly on dimly-lit old-fashioned street lamps. Same most nights; why do they do that? I go into the kitchen to get a tub of ice cubes from the secondhand fridge I bought for a song because its door won''t close right and the seller delivered and installed it, saving me the bother. I don''t think this simple journey from window to fridge has significance but it does, although at the time it doesn''t. I notice the dirty shirt I tossed in the basket last night is still there and still dirty; Norsiah has not been in to clean today, hope she''s not sick or something. I return to sit by my glassless window, looking through open shutters to the deep outside. I semi-focus on the old wind-up clock with luminous hands beside me as my eyelids close . 9 o''clock and already the whisky''s taking over.

I''m not thinking, just being. I don''t think, therefore I am not; no, that''s not right, but never mind. My mind is somewhere, I don''t know where. Is that important? I suppose it is. Everything on that night is important. * * * ''Professor .?'' A whisper from outside. My eyes open.

Inches away, a silhouette. It doesn''t startle me. I am beyond startling. ''I wish.'' I sigh. ''Bitte?'' ''Bitter?'' The whisky talking, trying to be funny. ''Not much. This is my first teaching job.

Can''t become professor overnight. There''s still time.'' ''It is five minutes past the 10 o''clock.'' I look at the clock; he''s right. An hour has gone by and I didn''t notice it go; lost time, not waiting, not wasted, not killed, just lost. ''Yes, I know. Most of the lights have gone out in the girls'' dorm.'' ''Bitte?'' This brief encounter with a Germanic shadow I recall because I remember everything that happened that night - well not quite everything, there''s the lost hour.

Then the cicada starts again and the black shape at my window shouts to be heard above the insect''s scream. I don''t answer; I''ve just noticed what''s behind him. ''Professor Haddock?'' The voice is accented. Must be German. Behind him waits a black Citroën of the large-bonneted World War II type with double chevrons on its grill and its engine ticking over, ready for a quick getaway. It must have come onto campus from the Bukit Timah side; I''d have noticed had it turned the corner from Dalvey - but maybe not if I''d been transported back forty years during the lost hour; doubtful I suppose, time transmogrification, but after half a bottle of whisky, and with a German at the window saying bitte and a WWII Citroën in the driveway, I can''t be completely sure. The silhouette glances back at the car. The owl-eye headlamps light up its face.

Blond, bronzed, square-jawed and built to last a thousand years; can''t get more stereotype than that - although I suppose you can if you pop in a WWII backdrop. Now I know what it feels like to be invaded by Olympian sculptures from old war movies. ''Haddock, yes, professor, no,'' I say. ''I am Doctor Tom Had-dock. What do you want?'' ''I vant to see Professor Fox, but he does not answer his door. I knock very hard. May I call him from your telephone?'' VW-problem. Definitely German.

Definitely stereotype; although I tend to stereotype too readily. I''ll never be a novelist. ''No. Don''t have telephone.'' I must sound brusque; he leaves without a thank you. I could call out and tell him there''s a public phone at Guild House a hundred metres down the road just opposite Bernard''s front door but I don''t - he didn''t say thank you. Doesn''t he know there''s a courtesy campaign on? An unseen hand inside the Citroën opens the passenger door for him and off he goes Tanglin way. I wonder why on earth a German in a WWII Citroën would visit Bernard after lights-out in the girls'' dorm, but I don''t wonder hard enough to go and check on him; I could, I have the key, but I don''t.

I sit on in the room we call the living room, as if all the other rooms are dead. Funny language, English. Still, it is my language; my mother tongue as they say. Well, I suppose it is, my mother spoke English, though when I started to talk, I probably spoke more Malay; the amah was Malay and I loved her as only a very young boy can love the woman who washes behind his ears and foreskin. Most of the other kids in the kampong were Malay, except for some Chinese in the market and a few Tamils from the rubber plantation and I would speak Malay with them all; it was the language of fun and games and sandwicaiskrimdankek. I didn''t distinguish the two languages much back then; Mum and Dad spoke English but everybody else in my world spoke Malay - so Mum and Dad were the odd ones out. I grew into English and Malay grew into the national language of Singapore, one of three official languages, no, four, I tend to forget Tamil, a minority language, but aren''t they all? Then again, Malay is the language of the national anthem so it can''t be all that minor, can it? I slouch in my armchair, ask myself senseless questions and tenderly sing Majullah Singapura. I''m not in the habit of sitting alone singing the national anthem, so maybe the whisky''s really taking over.

I love the tune though and I know all the words; more than I can say for God Save the Queen. In Singapore, we sing the national anthem in the home language of the nation next door. Nobody questions that. As an academic, it''s nice to have something I don''t need to question, form into a hypothesis, test and prove. And I suppose it keeps the neighbours happy. Why do I remember singing the national anthem? No reason really; perhaps I imagined it. I am young then: gathering memories without reason. Imaginative.

I''ll live forever. Life has yet to gift me its fear of death. Although death must be in the air. I should smell it, sense it; I should do something about it. But I don''t. Instead, as Uncle Bernard dies, I make Venus a present of the most valuable thing in the world I will ever have: my time. And Venus, bless her, doesn''t even know I''m giving it to her. Shall I wait for Venus or pop her into my pending box andnip down the road for a few beers with Madhu to celebrate the coincidental start of both our birthdays at midnight? I didn''t tell Venus it''s my birthday - well, it will be in an hour - I didn''t want her to feel obliged to come or do something silly like buy a present.

I''ll wait. Hang on. Hoping Richard will let her come.