I spent a night at 67 Keppel St before I moved in. My friend was still living in his room and invited me for their house warming - a hat shindig!I didn't know anyone, so was sitting in a corner sipping bourbon and coke, observing people. The most beautiful girl at the party walks up to me and starts a conversation. Heather - we make some small talk and then Jemma comes up and says, Did you tell him about your commercial? Blank look on my face. Heather proceeds to tell me how she just finished a series of ad campaigns for TAC - the Transport Accident Commission, to discourage drink driving. I saw those advertisements. She was in them!!! Of course! She drinks on the ad and has a horrible accident and dies. Very morbid, really.
She took me outside to check out her new bike. Wow, a Honda rider! Yes, women who ride bikes are certifiably H*O*T, especially when they do that cheesy thing - take off their black helmet and toss their hair!!! Maybe I should clarify that - H*O*T women are even H*O*T*T*E*R when they ride bikes, so please don't go and buy a bike just to impress men! :p (you know who you are, impulsive woman!)
Years went by, we never met again after that night, but the image of her on the bike stuck. I wondered what had happened to her. I returned to India. Seven years after our brief meeting, I finally saw her face again - in a yearly magazine published by the University of Melbourne. An article, in memory of Heather. She had a fatal accident on her bike. I learnt a few other things about her that day - she had an angelic voice and a promising career. All cut short in a tragic collision on the road. In a twist of irony, she bought that bike with the money earned from the TAC ad campaign.
I still remember her smile, her eyes, her laughter, riding away into the dark on her Honda... fading into the twilight of my memory.