"You've got to put yourself out there. Don't expect love to magically seek you out while you cower in your room."
It was one of the many advice that Zack has heard time and time again from friends and in those dating self help guides. He hears it so many times that he got annoyed. But a part of him also knows that it's true. So when there was a "Singles Market" at one of the malls this weekend, he thought to himself, what's the worse than can happen? At first he downplays it as a joke. "Look at how desperate I am." Kind of thing. But then he started saying things like: "Well, I miss 100% of the shots I don't take." and "The chances are close to 0, but never 0!"
Jian, Dymo, and Yusa supported him, but had weekend plans with their own respective significant others. Well, except Jian, he had a harem.
"Why don't you recommend a girl from your harem to him?" Dymo asks over the Discord call.
"No laa, just friend only." Jian laughs at Dymo calling it a harem. "But the girls I know all playful a bit, not fit for Zack looking for long term relationship."
"Welp, good luck mate!" Dymo wishes.
"Heh, no honestly guys, I got no expectations. Actually I do have 2 expectations." Zack says.
"What are they?" Dymo asks.
"One, it's gonna be full of guys. And two, the few girls there would probably go for 30 year olds that make 5 times my salary."
"Are you going alone?" Jian asks.
"Well, I don't have anyone else to go with." Zack shrugs.
"You can't go alone, this kinda thing, you need a group to go with, so a group of guys can approach a group of girls!"
Zack contemplates what Jian said, it seems to make a lot of sense. "So what do you suggest? I don't go? Cuz I really don't have anyone to go with."
"Up to you." Jian says. "Good luck tho."
"Yeah, I'll need it."
The event runs annually during the mid autumn festival weekend, when the moon is at it's fullest. It had always been going on, but this was the first time Zack even knows about it let alone paid any attention. There was a million reasons he could give himself on why not to go. Realistically, nothing's going to happen there, so what even was the point? The point was himself, he wanted to force himself out there more. Staying at home to play video games over the weekend isn't going to do anything, especially for his self confidence after the collosal fuck up that happened at work. Deep inside, he didn't want to go, but he wants to take a step of atleast getting out of the house and experience something like this for once. That in itself would be a win for him. Anything after that is a bonus.
Like always, despite having access to his mom's car, he opted to take the train to save money on fuel and parking. When he arrived, they had everyone there wear a wristband. "Taken, single but unavailable, or single?" Somehow, he felt embarrassed as he took the "single" band and slapped it on his hand. Even more so that he seems to be the only guy alone there. Jian was right, people come to these things in groups. Awkwardly, he walked around not knowing what to do. "0 expectations Isaac, 0 expectations." He chanted to himself. "You're already out here, good job! Just enjoy the vibes." He took a deep breath, and forced himself to get out of his own head. When he managed to do so, the view was beautiful.
The event took place on top of the roof, though mall was in the city, surrounded by skyscrapers, which didn't do much for any view of the horizon, but the event organizers did well to decorate the place. There was an artificial grassy hill with a stage in front of it. On the peak of the hill was a 10 meter tall inflatable moon that glowed from within. You couldn't tell before the sun set, but after dark, the glow was obvious and beautiful. The hill was surrounded by LED lights that illuminated tall golden grass that resembled paddy fields. The perimeter of the paddy fences are the walkways that surrounded the stage and hill, food and activity stalls lined them.
There were balconies that overlooked the whole scene, and for a while, Zack just chilled against the railings and took pictures from above. He then decides to head down and see what activities he could do. There was one where if he showed that he followed @SinglesMarket988 on Instagram, he could write his name and IG tag into a piece of paper and drop it among other guys tags. He could then play darts, and if he hit the target, he could draw a girl's tag. His aim was shit unfortunately so he didn't get to. There was another booth where he could pay 2 bucks to put his phone number in, with an option to draw a girl's number for 20 bucks. But he feels like it's a bad idea to spend money on something like this. So he doesn't do anything that required him to pay. Which was most things unfortunately.
He saw a group of girls taking turns to pose in front of the giant inflated moon, now starting to glow a bit more noticeably as the sky is turning bluish grey. To his surprise, the event had a lot more girls than he expected. Some of the posing girls had the "single" wristband on. "Might as well try to do something here, it's a singles market after all." He thought to himself. He offered to take a photo of the whole group for them. But they just side eyed him before walking away as a group. "Well... That went... Terribly." He said to himself, trying to find humour in the incident.
"Maybe those girls were a shy bunch" he thought to himself. "Can't give up just like that!" He was getting kind of hungry, so he went to the food stalls and ate some noodle soup, although they were just fancy overpriced instant noodles, what did he expect from an event like this? As he was eating, a white cat with black spots wandered towards him. "Hello!" He reached his hand out to pet the cat, and it rubbed its head against his palm, like most cats do. "I can't give you this food, it's way too salty for your kidneys." He reached into his bag to take the cat food out. Nutribell. He still had the old food that the girl from NOT Coffee told him not to feed cats. But it would such a waste of food. "If what she says is true, then it would be bad in large quantities, since I only see you today, you should be able to have some." He fed the cat.
After throwing away the disposable dish, he returns to find another group of girls petting the cat. They too had the "single" wristband. "Girls that like cats? Maybe I can bond over it." He thought. He approached them, his hand in his bag prepared to pull out some Greenies cat treats. But the girls saw him and immediately went away. "Well..." Again, Zack was talking to himself, trying to distract himself from how depressed he was feeling. "At least you're still here." He said to the cat, and gave it a treat anyway.
"I gotta stop approaching girls man." He thought to himself. "Maybe because I'm alone I look like a loser or a creep." So Zack started to wander around a bit more, seeing if there were any guys that he could make friends with and potentially join their group for a day. He spotted a group that was wearing car shirts. One had a black shirt with artwork of a black A80 Supra on the front and a red turbo sticking out. His friend had a white shirt with a red R35 GTR in a Liberty Walk kit. They were with 2 other guys for a group of 4 total. "Hey!" He called out. Nice shirt!" He thought that he could hang right with them as he himself was wearing a white T shirt with a blue FD RX7 on the back.
"Yeah you too bro!" The GTR shirt guy said.
"What the fuck is that?" One of their friends in a plain red tee pointed at Zack's hand. "He's actually wearing the wristband?"
The group laughed at him. "Bro bro, pro tip." The Supra shirt guy said. "Don't put the wristband on, it makes you look desperate."
"I uhh..." Zack muttered, absolutely clueless on how to respond to that.
"And what the fuck are you wearing?" The 4th guy wearing a beige sweater with his sleeves rolled up asks. Zack looked down on his own outfit. White T-shirt with a blue RX7 on it, black slim fit pants, his jacket around his waist, and his shoulder strap bag. He didn't know what was wrong with it. "Is that a fucking jacket? Why the fuck do you have a jacket out here? It's so fucking hot. It looks like a skirt."
The group enjoyed another round of laughter, this time shorter and less intense, but equally as humiliating for Zack. "I take the train here, and it can be quite cold in the-..."
"Wait wait wait." The sweater guy interrupts him. "You took the train here?"
"Go home." The red T guy waved his hand before turning away.
"Yeah, literally, fuck off." The Supra shirt guy added. "You want to find girls here but you don't even have your own car? You're broke ass can't afford a girlfriend."
"Seriously, imagine asking a girl out on a date and arriving in an Uber to pick her up."
"I'd be so disappointed man!"
The group turned around and laughed as they left him there. They quickly blended into the crowd, but Zack could pick out their laughter from among the voices. He wanted to go straight home right then and there. He blames nobody but himself. "It's my fault." He mouthed. He was supposed to come here with no expectations, but the fact that he's feeling so bad proved that he did indeed have some expectations, and now he feels like shit and he has no one to blame but himself. He forced himself to stay for the performances though, because he remembers that the whole reason he came out here was to force himself to get out, and he's not gonna let a group of mean guys get to him.
People started to sit on the artificial hill all around the inflatable moon to watch the stage. It was dark now, and the moon looked great. He snapped a couple of photos and enjoyed the performances. There were live performances including instrumentals and singing. Couples leaned on each others shoulders, and friends sang along to the love songs. Zack was basically the only one sitting alone, but the performances were good, so he was enjoying the songs. He also enjoyed seeing some of the couples in front of him enjoying themselves. Even if he wasn't happy, he wouldn't wish this pain on anyone, so he was glad that others were happy. He just wished that he could experience some of it. Some of the couples were even in their 40s and 50s, he was glad to see that even they could keep their romance alive. The black and white cat even somehow managed to seek him out in the crowd and sat on his lap, giving him a pleasant surprise.
"Wow, what a great bunch of songs sung by our very own Luke and Za!" The emcee clapped, and everyone applauded. "Now, we're gonna play a game! Since this is the singles market after all, let's pick out a couple of single people to play some easy games!"
Zack looked around, and to nobody's surprise, everyone was too shy to volunteer themselves, so the emcee had to walk around trying to get people to participate. The vibe was playful, and the emcee was doing a great job keeping the energy up. Groups of guys were pushing each other, and girls were even raising their hands to volunteer their friends. The emcee finally got a reluctant girl to be her contestant, and was prowling around for a guy now. After all that had happened today, Zack was feeling pretty low, but he remembered what Jian told him, that the key was confidence, and a guy that volunteered himself would definitely come off as confident right? So he mustered his remaining courage and raised his hand.
"Oh I see a hand over there!" The emcee exclaimed and pulled the girl over to where Zack was. Zack stood up to greet them, but the volunteered girl pulled the emcee towards another direction and left Zack awkwardly standing among the sea of sat down audiences. He sat back down, hoping that everyone's attention is towards the girl, the emcee, and whoever they decided to pick instead. But then hears the familiar group laughter of the guys from earlier. He wished he hadn't looked back to see their fingers pointed at him.
That was when he decided he's had enough. Truth be told, he wanted to cry. But he can't cry. He's already feeling so low and pathetic, if he cried and gone lower, he'd be in hell. So he willed himself to keep a straight face and left.