Part 3

I want to apologize about a few things first.
I am sooo sorry about the extremely huge delay. I was waiting for DiGi to upload something on their site; I needed it for Part 3. But after TWO MONTHS I’m really tired and I’ve pretty much given up waiting; I’m shoving all that stuff to Part 4 (hopefully, DiGi would’ve uploaded that clip by then).


Another huge apology to those who’ll find this part of my recap extremely boring… I admit, there are some things here that are pretty pointless and redundant, but… *sigh*… I’m just writing what I remember…


Last, but certainly not least, to David – I AM SORRY FOR BEING THE CREEPIEST FAN ENCOUNTER YOU’VE EVER HAD. IF YOU’VE ALREADY FORGOTTEN ALL ABOUT ME (I’m sure you have), THEN I’M GLAD, I CAN BREATHE MUCH EASIER.


Thank you SO MUCH for letting me share with you guys.
Happy reading!



OF SHOPPING, COMMERCIALS AND AAM
… and I noticed we were moving kind of quickly through the restaurant.
I’m kind of a klutz, so – especially in crowded places with narrow spaces, like classrooms or restaurants – I have to move slowly and really carefully or I’d crash into something or somebody, and it’d be really embarrassing.
And David was walking so fast.
I wanted to keep up with him but when I bumped into this little girl’s chair, and the family at that table stared at me, I had no choice but to slow down.
I fell about ten feet back, and I actually panicked because I was afraid that David and Ray would walk off without me.
But then I made it to the front of the restaurant, and saw David standing there at the entrance, waiting patiently for me, gentle smile and all.
Um, OK, can I die now?!

No sooner that I had caught up with him and Ray that we were moving again, and this time twice as fast, through the mall.
The mall was quite empty today – it was a weekday, after all, and also past office lunch hour – so it was easy for us to walk around.
I was wondering why we were walking so fast – I was almost jogging to keep up with David’s pace – and then I noticed that David was kind of keeping his head down, too, while we walked.
I immediately remembered David saying, in his interviews, that he had to move really quickly, and even wear disguises sometimes, whenever he was in the mall, to avoid being spotted.
Oh, OK.

It was kind of unfortunate, though, because at the rate we were going, David could only have two seconds maximum to glance at a store, and – since there were stores on the left and right – David was constantly whipping his head back and forth to look at them, too.
Doesn’t he get exhausted doing that? I wondered. Poor guy…
And then I thought, heck, it should be ME that I’m worrying about!
What if I got too exhausted trying to keep up with him? What if I got too tired, and got left behind? That would be embarrassing, of course.
Oh, but then again, it’d be ten times more mortifying if David were to realize I wasn’t fit enough (a.k.a fat and totally non-athletic here) to keep up with him and – being his sweet, caring self – he’d actually slow down for me.
So, yeah, getting left behind was OK…
“… how about that one?” I managed to catch Ray saying to David. He was pointing at a clothes store just up ahead.
David nodded quickly, and he detoured so suddenly towards the store Ray had pointed out, I nearly tripped over myself trying to follow him. I was SO disoriented.

Gaaaah…

I didn’t even get to catch the name of the store.
David strode real quickly inside – making the salesgirl behind the counter go into shock at the sight of him (she completely froze in the middle of doing her nails, and I totally couldn’t blame her) – and he attacked the closest aisle at once.
He flipped through the clothes really, really fast, too.
I was pretty surprised; I never knew David could actually move so quickly (he always seemed so relaxed yet careful with the things he did), and yet here he was hurrying – as in, really hurrying – through the line of shirts that I wondered how he was even able to look properly at the designs.
By the time the salesgirl had recovered, David was already turning around and heading back out the store. And we’d only been in there for… two minutes, or less.
“Nothing?” Ray asked, as David approached him at the doorway.
David shook his head, smiling apologetically.
“OK, then…”

And then we were walking real fast again.
I managed to look back at that store for half a second – the salesgirl stood at the front of the store, gaping after David. Gosh…
We passed a lot more stores, though nothing caught David’s eye for a while.
Some of the other shoppers in the mall who walked past us in the opposite direction – especially the women, ha ha – did double takes when they caught sight of David.
It was kind of puzzling at first; those women stared at him, but they didn’t look, like, surprised or anything to see a celebrity, and they just continued walking the other way after a while.
And then I finally figured out that the female shoppers that passed us were not staring at David because they recognized him, but because he was naturally good-looking and they were all ogling him on reflex.

And David still doesn’t think he’s good-looking?????!!! Ai yai yai…

Ray pointed out another store to him after a while, but when David went into that store, he barely even glanced around before turning right around on the spot and heading back out again.
OK, is it just me or does David have some sort of hidden superpower that he can see a whole bunch of things at once and process the images in his brain ten times faster than a normal human can…?
Plus, I had to make a new rule for myself that afternoon, which was ‘KEEP A DISTANCE OF AT LEAST TEN FEET BETWEEN YOU AND DAVID WHILE SHOPPING’, because when he spun right around and strode back out with the speed of an F1 racecar, I was still walking forward… and I ALMOST CRASHED RIGHT INTO HIM.

New Fact #10: David has extremely sharp reflexes

As in, before I could even think “gah!”, David real quickly and really smoothly sidestepped around me, and when I whipped my head around, he was already walking off again.
For a second, I was like, ‘… huh? What just happened?’
And then I felt like a total idiot again as I quickly spun around and broke into a jog to catch up with him.
We continued walking for another two minutes or so.
And then, David’s head suddenly lifted, and his eyes became really adorably bright, and he pointed to a store in the distance that had caught his attention, “Can we go there?”
“Yeah, alright,” Ray said, nodding in approval.
As we approached the shop, David started randomly singing, “I wanna go there…!”
Of course, I automatically started smiling.
It was just a phrase, and AT THE TIME, I thought it was just a tune he’d spontaneously made up, because I hadn’t heard of it before (AT THE TIME), and I also thought it was quite an awesome tune and could actually become an amazing song…

At the speed we were moving, I think I only managed to catch a part of the name of the shop – ‘TOUCH’ – before Ray ushered the both of us inside.
And, like at the first store, David immediately jumped at the clothes, attacking the very first rack in the left corner of the store. There were only jackets hanging from that rack, and they were of dark, warm colors – muddy brown, olive grey, dark orange, etc.
But in less than twenty seconds, David said, “Oh, I like this one!” and he was smiling and extracting this dark orange, plaid jacket from the rack. His eyes went even wider, in delight, as he looked the jacket over more thoroughly, and he added, “It’s got a hood! Cool! I like that…!”
New fact #11: David likes hoodies in particular
There were two shop assistants this time – a man and a young woman. And the salesgirl had dashed out from behind the counter the moment we’d come in, and was now standing right next to David, and her eyes were, like, really really big.
The male shop assistant, meanwhile, had just started grabbing a whole pile of hooded jackets and was holding them all out to David.
Wow, talk about, um, good customer service.
There was a mirror on the wall right next to the rack.
So, David went in front of the mirror – the salesgirl automatically moved with him, like an invisible chain was suddenly attached to the both of them, it was kind of funny – and eagerly tried on the orange hoodie.
He was smiling softly to himself as he adjusted the sleeves of the jacket, but when he looked fully at his reflection, his expression became a little pinched for a few seconds… almost like he was wishing he didn’t have to look at himself in the mirror to see if the jacket fit him or not… and I instantly remembered David saying in his interviews that he didn’t like looking at himself… that he thought he looked weird…
Seriously, WHAT?
By the way, when he put on the jacket, the first thing I thought was “Oh my gosh, AWWWW!” because the jacket was kind of big on him, and the material was one of those soft, lightweight, squishy types (sorry for the lame description, but I am so not a fashion pro, and I can’t think of anything else, ahehe), and David just looked really, really, really HUGGABLE wearing it.
You know, like how Paula Abdul kept saying, “I wanna SQUISH you…!”
And then he ducked his head, reached behind him and briefly pulled the hood up.
David in a dark orange, checkered hood.
OH MY GOSH.
The inside of the jacket was black, by the way, so altogether the hood gave David this mysterious, haunting look. But, oh yeah, it was SO hot.
But just HOW the heck did he… do that?! How did he go from oh-so-huggable one moment to dark and mysterious (and maybe even a little alluring; ok, very alluring) the next?!
Probably the same way he turns into this other person that can jump wildly around on stage and do killer head-whips while performing Zero Gravity.
And I don’t know how he does that either.
Then David snagged the hood back down, and – poof! – he was all smiles and adorableness again as he straightened back out his slightly flattened hair.
I found myself actually letting out a puff of disappointment when David took off the jacket. I just really liked seeing him wearing it! Oh well…
“How is it? Is it too big? Wanna get a smaller size?” Ray was asking David.
“No, I like it,” David replied, checking the price tag. I didn’t manage to see how much the hoodie cost, but David seemed OK with the price. He nodded at Ray – and let me just say that it is SO CUTE when he nods; he does it, like, real quickly, and his face is all quiet and smiley.
“Alright, we’ll take it,” Ray said to the male shop assistant.
Immediately, the salesgirl’s hands shot out, and the look on her face was pure ecstasy as she took the jacket from David. And when David looked away, she… well, the way she held the jacket for him was just a little too… weird, I guess, for me; she was sort of hugging it to her chest.
OK, never mind, maybe that was normal, and my mind was just blowing things sadly out of proportion…
Moving on…
The male shop assistant kind of urged David to try all the other jackets he was holding, and even when David politely told him, “No, thanks,”, the man was still grabbing more jackets from the aisle and trying to pass them all to David.
It was only when David told him that he wanted to check out the shirts now that the shop assistant instantly stood back and let him pass.
And the salesgirl trailed after David, like there really was something tying the two of them together…
And David was either really unaware of that or just politely ignoring the way she was acting around him. I wouldn’t be surprised if it was the latter; I was sure he’d been politely trying to ignore my obsessive-fan-creepiness since morning.
I really didn’t want to be like the salesgirl right then, so when David moved to the back of the store, I chose not to follow after him. I just lingered at the front of the store, watching him as discretely as I could.
David started flipping real quickly through the shirts – all of them dark colors, though there was an occasional brighter hue – and while he was at it, he suddenly started singing again, “I thought soooo…!”
AT THE TIME, I thought, Hey, that’s another really nice tune! Did he make that up, too? Or is it from a song?
But I couldn’t think of any song that had that particular melody that David had just sung, and it kind of frustrated me.
I had absolutely no idea then that I’d probably just become the first fan to get a sneak preview of David Archuleta’s duet with Miley Cyrus.
[And I was wondering ‘WHY does the song sound so familiar in some parts?!’ when I first heard ‘I Wanna Know You’… it was only, like, two weeks later that I remembered and I was, like, OH MY GOSH! LOL!]
AT THE TIME, still frustrated that I couldn’t figure out where that tune David had sung came from, I tried to distract myself.
Ray was standing there.
Without thinking twice, I asked him – or I think I asked him, because the subconscious part of my mind suddenly decided to take over right then and what happened is still a little fuzzy to me, and because we were in a clothes store, and the focus of basically everyone’s attention at the moment was clothes – “Who picks out David’s wardrobe for him? Like, when he’s onstage and stuff… does someone, like, help him choose an outfit?”
I thought he had a personal stylist or something.
Ray looked at me, all calm and friendly, and he replied, “Well, David has a friend, back in the states, and she’s a designer – she helps him out, gives him tips on what to wear… he’ll call her up and all that…”
I blinked, “Oh… wow,”
New fact #12: David’s friend, who’s a designer, picks out his outfits for him
And I think the friend’s name is Dawn. I think.
David was still going through the really long line of shirts.
And it was getting pretty… um, disturbing (sorry, can’t think of any other way to describe it) the way the salesgirl moved around him. She was almost like a magnet. Every movement David made – like, he’d maybe shift a little to the right, or he’d lean to the side so to get a better look at a particular shirt’s design – and the salesgirl would move with him, automatically repositioning herself around him each time.
Oh, GOSH, I hoped I didn’t do that with him.
If I did… GAH!!!
I’d have nowhere to hide my face.
I tried to distract myself again.
And, so, yeah, I turned to Ray again. And I kind of ended up talking to him about the weather.
I got Ray to explain to me about the different climate zones over in the states, and I actually discovered a new thing or two about him in the process.
New fact #13: Ray is from Florida, and just recently he bought a house in California
Hey, he and David are from the same place originally! Maybe that’s why they get along so well… or something.
OK, never mind…
I looked back in time to see David hoisting around half a dozen shirts from the rack.
The male shop assistant readily pointed out to David where the changing rooms were, and offered to hold the extra shirts while David went to change.
Again, I could’ve just been seeing things, but the salesgirl seemed to be scowling at her work partner.
A few seconds after David had closed the dressing room door, I felt my phone vibrate.
I pulled out my phone and saw that I’d just gotten a message.
From Gowri!
How’s it going? she asked.
And she also told me that she was watching Merlin on YouTube back in our hotel room to pass the time.
I was busy texting her back when I heard the door to the dressing room creak open. I looked up as David emerged, hair slightly tousled, in a pale orange shirt that had the words TOUCH on the front in rock-stylish, jagged letters.
Ray headed over to David for a closer look.
I stayed where I was. Stupid, but… yeah.
David strode over to the nearest mirror to check out the shirt.
“Hmm… I like this one,” he said, and then he made another one of those tiny, adorable laughs of his before adding on, “It’s orange!”
One of his favorite colors, yeah…
“So, we’ll take that one, too?” Ray asked.
David thought for a while, then he nodded, “Yeah!”
The next shirt he tried on was dark brown (I think it’s the same one he wore when he was having those meet-and-greet sessions the next day, the morning of the showcase), and he liked that one too. Then he tried on this really dark purple one with shiny, black designs on it, and, OH GOSH, this shirt was tight.
Not tight as in it was too small; the hem of the shirt actually reached all the way to his thigh, but the upper part of the shirt was stretched tight over David’s chest, and OOOH GOSH, did he look BUFF.
… I can’t believe I just wrote that, but it was what I was thinking at the time (NO JOKE), and I try not to change anything, so…
And David liked that shirt, too.
He also tried on another purple shirt – but with white graffiti on the front, this time – which he was also OK with.
At one point he tried on this figure-hugging, dark olive, buttoned-up shirt.
“I don’t really like the sleeves,” David said, tugging nervously at the short, tight sleeves that were showing off a lot of arm muscle.
Well, I thought the shirt was nice.
“I think it looks OK,” Ray told David simply, folding his arms and shrugging.
“Ummm… I don’t know…” David mumbled, still nervous about how short the sleeves were.
“You look good,” I offered, truthfully.
David glanced at me for a second, then he turned back to the mirror and just stared at it silently, trying to decide.
OK, had the way I’d complimented him sounded really weird or something? Ugh…
In the end, David decided to buy that shirt, along with the pale orange one, the dark brown one and the two purples ones.
After he’d changed back into his own shirt, he moved to the girls’ section of the store. I knew he was looking for things for his sisters.
I was watching David flip hurriedly through the rack of girls’ clothing when I heard Ray mutter, “These look really good. I always look for a new one. How much do they cost…?”
I glanced over my shoulder momentarily. Ray and the male shop assistant were standing over a display of big-sized watches and leather wallets.
New fact #14: Ray likes shopping for either watches or wallets… or both.
Meanwhile… nothing was catching David’s interest.
The selection of girls’ clothing was pretty limited, anyway – as if David was going to get his sisters those seriously short, denim miniskirts that took up more than a quarter of the line.
The way he totally ignored – as in, wouldn’t even look – at those skirts had me shaking my head and smiling like a HUGE DORK again.
“There are new arrivals here,” the male shop assistant said as he walked past me towards the right-hand corner of the store.
Unfortunately, David didn’t hear him.
“Um… David?” I called, and I felt really nervous all over again because I just wasn’t used to calling him by name, yet.
David paused and looked around at me, eyes bright and curious.
Why does he have to be so cute?
“There are some new arrivals here,” I repeated, pointing.
David’s face lit up, and then he was heading in my direction… really fast.
But I’d already gotten used to the speed at which David moved now, so I just quickly took one huge step to the side.
And David went zooming past me, smiling excitedly and singing randomly again, “That’s not my name! That’s not my name…!”
I automatically started giggling.
The Ting Tings?
I didn’t know he listened to them, ha ha. Wonder how that song got into his head…???
Oh, and yay, we didn’t crash into each other!
SUCCESS!!!
David was still going through the sets of new arrivals when Yuen-See and that woman in red from the restaurant stepped into the scene; they immediately went over to Ray and whispered something to him. I thought I heard “… behind schedule…” somewhere in there.
Ray nodded, whispered something back, then called out, “David,”
David looked up.
Ray tapped his watch then jerked his head in the direction of the store’s entrance, signaling to David that shopping time was up and they had to leave now.
“Oh, OK,” David said, smiling softly as he strode back towards the front of the store. “I wanna come back here, though! This place has, like, everything I need.”
“Yeah, OK, we’ll come back. Later,” Ray assured him. He then turned to the shop assistants. “We’ll be paying for the clothes now…”
While Ray and David went up to the counter, I hovered at the doorway. Glancing out, I saw the pretty woman in yellow sitting nearby; a few shops down, Seong was pacing with a phone in his hand.
It struck me as peculiar. What were they doing? If they were waiting for David or something, why were they waiting so far away from the shop?
Ray finished paying for the clothes.
The salesgirl took great care in folding and slipping David’s new clothes into the shopping bags.
And then, for some reason, when David reached out to take the bags from her, she quickly held them away. She whispered something to the male shop assistant.
The man stared at her for a second, then turned to a very puzzled David and said, “Uh, it’s… our custom to escort you on your way out.”
“Oh! Oh, OK…” David replied, smiling again.
[Anyone want to go to that TOUCH store and check if that custom applies to all customers? XP]
Ray shrugged, then turned and made his way towards the front of the store again. David automatically followed after him. And the salesgirl rushed out from behind the counter with all the shopping bags, falling into step with David and joyfully walking side-by-side with him until they’d reached the doorway.
“Thanks!” David said, grinning at the salesgirl as he reached out for the shopping bags.
The salesgirl giggled.
Ray offered to carry the shopping bags; David let him, except for the bag that had the hoodie in it. He really wanted to hold on to that jacket.
We thanked the shop assistants one more time, then started walking real fast through the mall again.
Yuen-See and the woman in red walked with us this time.
Looking around, I saw that Seong was following us – at a distance of at least fifty feet, and he was also pointedly avoiding eye contact with us. The woman in yellow trailed even further behind.
It was strange… at first.
And so we were walking… and walking… and walking…
David continued to look hurriedly at all the stores we passed…
Ray was talking with Yuen-See…
Then, quite suddenly –


“OH MY GAAAAAAAAAWSHHH!!!! EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEKK…!!!!”


Squealing.
Really loud, really excited squealing.
David’s head whipped around, his eyes widening.
The woman in red made a low sound of annoyance.
It took me a second to pinpoint the source of the squealing.
Three teenage girls – all tall, all slender, all pretty and dressed up – had completely halted in their tracks and were gawking in amazement as DAVID ARCHULETA and his entourage headed their way.
To my utter dismay, the second David and Ray took notice of those squealing teens, they started walking even faster. And my fast walk literally became a light run as I fought to keep up with them.


Oh my GOSH, we were running away from fans. It was just crazy!


Because:

#1 – I was not an athletic person here.
#2 – Never in my life had I ever expected to be running in a mall for that reason! And…
#3 – I was running away from MY OWN PEOPLE (the fans; I felt like a traitor or something…)
I wasn’t able to look back to see whether those squealing teens followed after us or not.
We were moving too fast for me to.
And we moved at that alarming speed constantly for another five minutes – I was absolutely sure my leg muscles were going to hurt like heck the next day – until, finally, the entrance to the hotel loomed into view (did I mention the hotel and the mall are right next door to each other, that all you need is to go through a doorway to get from one building to the other? OK, well now, you guys know… moving on…).
David slowed down considerably, and I almost exhaled loudly in relief. My heart was pounding loudly in my ears from the run and the back of my neck had started to sweat again. Sheesh, I was that wiped out.
Next time, David’s people should really put it in the Terms & Conditions that the fan who wishes to spend the day shopping with David must be an athletic person, more specifically a fast runner.
Otherwise they’d end up like me. Dang it.


It was so unexpected, I was seriously surprised, when David suddenly looked around at me and asked in a very conversational manner, “So, where do you like to shop?”
Definitely had not seen that one coming.
Totally unprepared – and my mouth was working faster than my brain, again – I replied him honestly, “Um, actually, I don’t really like to shop.”
“Oh,” David said.
And then it just got really, REALLY AWKWARD between us.
There was this look on David’s face like he was thinking seriously about something, and I was trying real hard not to freak out; I was extremely worried that he was actually thinking about how much of a weirdo I was, this girl who didn’t like shopping…
Ugh, dang it!
Well, I did like to shop, but for books, not clothes… and since I was kind of sure David meant clothes when it came to shopping…
I tried to think of something else to say. And quickly. My brain was practically screaming, DAMAGE CONTROL! DAMAGE CONTROL!
I added after a few seconds, “But… it’s mostly either Body Glove or Billabong,”
Which was true. I mostly bought from those stores.
David nodded, a hint of a smile returning to his face. He still didn’t say anything, though.
The awkward silence was reaching an unbearable level.
I was seriously desperate for something to say; I so did not want to leave the conversation hanging awkwardly like that. “Um… I, uh, heard that you like to shop at Buckle?”
Oh gosh.
I FAIL.
SERIOUSLY.
David’s face lit up at the mention of his favorite store. “Yeah, yeah!” he replied, enthusiastically.


New Fact #15: When David goes “Yeeaaah!”, it means he’s happy you get what he’s thinking; when David goes, “Yeah, yeah!”, it means he’s interested in what you’ve just said.


So… I guess do not fail?
Yet.


And then I noticed that there were other people joining us.
Seong and the woman in yellow had caught up to us. And so had some big-sized men clad entirely in black.
They were closing in on us, almost like they were forming a human barricade…
And then my jaw dropped when I saw that woman in yellow retrieve a walkie-talkie from under her blouse. Now I knew why she was with us – she was a security guard in disguise!
She and Seong, and maybe those other men surrounding us now, I guessed, had been walking at separate distances all around us during the shopping trip in order to keep a better lookout for David, as well as not draw too much attention because one would think something was up if a really huge group comprising of bulky men carrying walkie-talkies were to walk by…
Wow.
That was just… cool.
I’d never had an actual security team looking out for me before.
OK, they were looking out for DAVID, not me, they wouldn’t care if I got shot in the head right there or something, but – yeah, you get the point.
“Is it pouring?” Ray asked, looking out the front glass doors of the lobby.
We all looked.
Yup, it was raining pretty heavily.
It must’ve started raining while we were shopping, I guessed.
So we were heading towards the elevators… when more security guards suddenly rushed out of nowhere and blocked our path.
Huh? What… YIKES!
They’d stopped us so suddenly, and David was standing just slightly in front of me, that I almost CRASHED into him again.
“Tak boleh! Tak boleh!” the guards said quickly to Yuen-See. “Orang tu dah sampai…”
[English translation: “Negative! Negative!” … “Those people are already here…”]
“Oh,” Yuen-See turned to Ray, “the AAM people are here…”
Did I just hear… AAM?????


ARCHULETA AVENUE MALAYSIA?


“S’karang kita buat apa?” Yuen-See asked the security guard. [“So what do we do now?”]
“Boleh ambik lif bomba?” the guard replied. [“Take the emergency elevator?”]
“’K lah,” Yuen-See replied. She turned to Ray again, “We’re taking another elevator.”
So we took a detour, towards the closest emergency EXIT doors, security guards on alert all around us, voices crackling out of dozens of walkie-talkies.
Only after we were behind those doors and waiting for the emergency elevator to arrive, that David asked Ray curiously, “What’s going on?”
“You know those people from the airport? Archuleta Avenue Malaysia?” Ray said.
“Oh!” David said excitedly, his whole face lighting up, at the time I gasped, “Oh my gosh, I LOVE AAM!”
David looked right at me, his face just glowing with anticipation, “Yeaaah!”


New fact #16: David loves AAM (this is for you guys!!! 8DDD)


“I’m a member of that site,” I continued enthusiastically.
David’s grin went impossibly even wider, “Oh, really?”
My heart was singing.
And not only because David was flashing that huge, bright smile of his at me and making my insides melt – although, yeah, that could be the main reason why – but because AAM was here!
AAM, the Malaysian Arch Angels!
Ultimate fans of David Archuleta!
FINALLY, I wasn’t alone!!!
Seriously, the whole morning – and afternoon – I felt like such a freak because I was the only Arch Angel in the entourage. But now other fans – my people!!! – were here!!!
YAAAY!!!


Gosh, I couldn’t wait to meet them and go into crazy fan mode (full-force) with them!!!!!
Oh, but wait, were we taking the emergency elevator because of them? What? Whyyyy? It’s not as if they’re all gonna jump David when they see him, are they? C’mon!
Ugh, never mind, we’d meet them soon enough…
The elevators door slid open with a soft ‘ding!’
Everyone looked around at David – except me; I’d lowered my eyes to the floor (it’s a weird habit, can’t explain it, sorry) – waiting for him to go in first.
… he didn’t.
He just stood there, like he was waiting for something else to happen first.
Confused, I glanced up at him.
… and I saw that he was looking back at me, expectantly.
Again, I was thinking bewilderedly, huh? What…?
What’s going on? What did I do…?
Then it hit me.
Oh.
David was being the perfect gentleman again and waiting for me to go in first.
Duh!
My face was growing hot from embarrassment as I hurried into the elevator. David followed in after that, along with Ray, Yuen-See, and the rest of the entourage.
One security guard accompanied us; the rest all remained outside.
All was silent as the doors slid close and the elevator headed up to the twelfth floor.
And then, as were passing the seventh floor, David suddenly burst out singing again, “Take one step at a time…!”
Everyone else erupted into laughter.
“Wow, we have elevator music!” the woman in yellow teased.
David just smiled sheepishly.


We eventually reached our designated floor.
Just before the doors opened, the security guard whispered to Yuen-See, “Kena lekas sikit…”
We had to move fast again, he meant.
Yuen-See whispered to Ray, who nodded.
The doors slid open.
I was prepared this time as we spilled out of the elevator, and moved real quickly through the foyer towards the same lounge we’d spent the morning in.
I caught sight of a group of people in extremely familiar black shirts standing nearby.
AAM!!! They were here!!!
I was so relieved.
And then the AAM group saw DAVID ARCHULETA, and they started squealing.
Hey, no fair, not yet! I wanna squeal with you guys, too! I didn’t get any chance at all today! C’mon!
Dang it, we had to keep moving, though.
So the least I was able to do was to raise my hand and wave hello at them.
I doubt they even saw me; DAVID ARCHULETA was there, you know?
We went into the lounge, and David and Ray automatically went to put the shopping bags down on a table in the corner. I lingered near the doorway, the urge to meet up with the AAM members growing stronger and stronger with each passing second.


“OK, so you just wait for a while – I need to talk to Yuen-See about a few things first, and then we’ll let AAM in…” Ray was informing David, who nodded enthusiastically in reply.
So Ray headed over to Yuen-See, and the two began to discuss in whispers again.
David glanced cheerily around the room for a moment, then turned to me.
I’m not sure if he’d been about to strike up a conversation with me or something, because – and I know you guys will think I am incredibly stupid for doing that – I was already turning and walking out of the room, impatient to meet the people from AAM.
There they all were, in the black AAM shirts. Four girls and one guy. I immediately guessed they were the five moderators – Lily, Anne, Justine, Kylie and John.
I’d never met them in real before, just read all their posts and comments on AAM. It was seriously cool to be able to meet them for real…
“Hi!” I said eagerly, walking up to them.
“Hi,” the two who were standing closest replied. I later found out they were Anne and Justine.
[Gosh, Anne is just sooo pretty, by the way. 8D ]
Gowri : Agrees!!
And then they asked me who I worked with.
Wow, I didn’t know I looked that old. I was still in high school!
“Actually, I’m Yvette,” I told them, trying to fight the huge grin on my face. “From Penang.”
I wondered if they’d actually remember me from the e-mails I’d sent them before. I mean, there were a lot of us Arch Angels on that site.
Surprisingly, they did remember me.
“Oh! Hey!” Anne said, brightly. “Nice to meet you!”
“Yeah, it’s real nice to meet you guys, too!” I replied. More relieving, to be honest.
“So, how did you come to be here?”
OK, so the thing was, DiGi had – for some reason – told me not to tell anyone else that I’d won the SMS Trivia contest, so I hadn’t been able to tell the other fans on the site about it.
“Well, you know that entourage contest thing?” I explained, sheepishly. “Um, yeah, I won it.”
And as soon as I said that, I felt sooo elated; I had finally told other fans, and now I was finally free to gush like a crazy fangirl about how INCREDIBLY FLIPPIN’ AMAZING DAVID ARCHULETA IS…!!!
“So… so you’ve been spending the whole day with him???!!!”
“Yup,”
Anne grabbed my arm and started shaking me, “Oooh, this must be the best day of your life!”
“Yeah,” I replied, laughing kind of giddily.
“Why didn’t you tell us it was YOU?!”
“Sorry, but DiGi said I couldn’t tell anyone,” I apologized.
“Oooohhh… yeah, well, we were all wondering! Who won the contest, you know?”
“Yeah, I wanted to tell you guys, but, you know…”
“Hey, have you heard him, like, sing randomly or anything…?”
I gasped, “Oh my GOSH, he sings ALL THE TIME. He never stops…”
And then I was gushing about everything that David had done today that had been so friggin’ AMAZING, and we were all fangirl-ing right there – except for Kylie and John, because they’re the older, much more mature adults, lol – before Ray came over.
Kylie – gosh, she is such a nice and warm and sweet and amazing woman! – stepped aside to discuss something with him, and the others followed.
I decided to turn around and head back towards the lounge; this was probably a confidential discussion they were having or something, and I didn’t want to intrude.


When I got back into the lounge, I found David standing alone at the window, gazing quietly out at the rain. I looked out, too. The rain had begun to lighten up.
Too bad David had to visit KL this time of the year – when the weather is seriously whacked out; one moment it’s bright and sunny, the next there’s a heavy thunderstorm, it’s crazy.
“Sudah nak henti tak?” I muttered under my breath. I was basically asking the rain if it was actually stopping or not; sometimes it’d look like it was going to… and then it’d get even heavier, instead, and then all the roads and underground tunnels in the city would start getting flooded…
“Hmm?”
I quickly looked around. Oops, apparently David had heard me.
“Oh, nothing,” I told him quickly. When David continued to look curious, I started stuttering, “Uh, um… it usually r-rains… a lot… around this time of the year… in KL.”
And then David was giving me that stare – the same one he had back in the restaurant when I was telling him about the wide variety of anime in the bookstores here in KL – like he was having trouble understanding what I was saying or something.
Oh my heck, I was talking about the weather.
Could I be anymore LAME???
“Um… never mind. Forget it,” I mumbled, looking away. And I was, like, thinking helplessly to myself, What the heck is wrong with me that he can’t get anything I’m saying???
“No, no, I get it,” David said immediately.
… oh-kaaay, that’d been strange. How had he known what I was thinking???
OK, again, either David was a mind-reader or he was just really good at reading people’s facial expressions.
In either case, gaaaah! David, can you please not do that???!!!
Just as I was deciding whether or not to really run away (because the longer I was around him, the more incredibly STUPID I made myself look, ugh!), David suddenly started singing to himself, “Tell me whyyyy…!”
Whoa. Can you say, ULTIMATE DISTRACTION?!


I totally forgot what I’d been freaking out over just a second ago, just watching David as he sang contentedly, absent-mindedly to himself. Oh my gosh…
And, finally, I heard David singing one of his own songs!
All day long he’d been singing other artists’ songs… so it was real nice to hear him sing A Little Too Not Over You right then.
Oh, and I so could not wait to watch him perform on Saturday…
It was already sooo flippin’ amazing watching the YouTube videos of David Archuleta in concert – especially the shows from his first solo tour in the States, OH MY GOSH – and I went completely and utterly CRAZY each time I watched his performances of Zero Gravity, so to actually see him LIVE…!
Oh my GOSH, Zero Gravity… I immediately remembered the question I’d been meaning to ask David, if I’d ever had the chance…
“Hey, are you going to be performing Zero Gravity tomorrow?” I asked.
David paused, blinked a couple of times, then looked at me with this oh-so-adorable, sheepish expression and said slowly, “I don’t know… we haven’t exactly figured out what I’m going to sing yet during the showcase…”
“Oh,”


[Sadly, David didn’t perform Zero Gravity during the showcase. ):]


“My back hurts,” David said, out of the blue, and then he was reaching an arm around to rub his back.
Huh?
Dang, I was so caught off by his sudden change of topic, I had no idea how to respond.
Luckily, I didn’t have to.
Kylie, Anne, Justine, Lily and John had just entered the room.
David’s face broke into a huge, warm and friendly grin. “Hey!” he greeted them, cheerfully.
I thought, OK, time for me to step back…
I’d already had David to myself the whole morning and early afternoon – ugh, that’d just sounded wrong – so I was more than glad to let those amazing AAM-ers have David to themselves now.
I just stood in the back and watched…


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rZMg_yQIK6Y&feature=channel_page
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dmMneNvEtJg&feature=related
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jbyppk9yUhI&feature=related


They also got David to take pictures with them, sign stuff and all…
After they left, a group of people from Hitz.fm immediately came in – with a whole bunch of recording equipment – and started issuing orders for all cell phones and any other sound-emitting device to be switched off and everyone to keep silent or take their conversations outside once ‘the recording’ had started, whatever that meant.
One of them also passed David a stack of papers, and David started reading whatever was on the first page intently.
They placed an identical stack of papers on the coffee table nearest to where I was standing. Curious, I quietly went over to read what’d been printed on those pages.
I realized it was some sort of script.
… oh.


So that was what all the recording equipment was for.
David had radio commercials to do now, for Hitz.fm.
Wow, this should be really cool to watch!
But nothing much happened for the next few minutes, except David going through his lines – and bursting randomly into song again every few seconds – and the Hitz.fm crew setting up the recording equipment.
I glanced out the doorway at one point… and saw that the AAM-ers were still here!
Instantly, I got up from where I’d been sitting at the coffee table, and shot out of the room. “Hey, you guys are still here…!”
Kylie asked me to do a recap of my day so far with David – on VIDEO, oh my gosh – so we went and sat down somewhere, and once the camera was recording, I talked and talked and talked… and talked some more… but I had to rush towards the ending because Yuen-See was calling me back into the lounge, telling me to prepare for my short interview with David.


OH MY GOSH, I’D TOTALLY FORGOTTEN!
THE INTERVIEW!!!
WHERE WERE MY QUESTIONS???
HAD I WRITTEN DOWN ANY QUESTIONS IN THE FIRST PLACE???!!!
OH NO! OH NO!!!
AAAAAAAAHHH!!!
I was so DEAD.


Yuen-See was impatiently dragging me back into the lounge, unaware that I was having a major panic attack. My heart was pounding and my knees had actually started to shake…!
And then I saw David, seated in front of a microphone, speaking real loudly and clearly as he read off a paragraph in his script, “… something really important… which is to stay in school!”
He ended that particular sentence in a bright, bubbly kind of tone, then he immediately frowned down at the script and mumbled, “Wait, that didn’t come out right… sorry!” he quickly apologized to the guys operating the recording equipment. “Sorry, let me try that again…?”
“Just sit and wait,” Yuen-See whispered to me. “He should be done in the next fifteen minutes.”
Fifteen minutes.
Oh, thank goodness!


I still had fifteen minutes to think up some questions!
Gosh, I must’ve misunderstood what Yuen-See had been telling me, again. I thought she was hurrying me because the interview was going to take place now; instead, she must’ve known I hadn’t prepared my questions yet and was just reminding me to get to it.
So I sat down, pulled out the paper and pen from this morning, and resumed my impossible task of trying to think up questions for David that wouldn’t totally suck. I only had fifteen minutes, dang it, and although that was better than nothing, it still wasn’t enough time for me to generate not one, not two, but FIVE decent questions. And, I mean, GOSH, what was there left to ask him, really…???


Do you like anything else besides Thai Food?
Lame.


Do you still do chores when you’re at home?
So lame.


What’s your favorite fruit?
The friggin’ epitome of lame.


What color is your bedroom wall?
Now you really are a stalker.


What shampoo do you usually use?
ARE YOU…........... NUTS???!!!!!!!!!


And it was pretty hard to focus with David sitting a few feet away, saying things like, “Hey, this is David – ! Oh, ugh, I think I said that too fast… heeeey! This. Is. David. Ar-chu-let-aaaa… ugh, no, I didn’t like that one either… sorry…”
OH MY GOSH.
“Need help?”
I looked around.
The woman in red had come to sit beside me, looking from the paper in front of me – and the seriously dumb questions I’d written on it then viciously crossed out – to my undoubtedly anxious expression with a sympathetic smile.
Hey, I was out of options here, any help was good. “Sure, thanks…”
The woman was actually quite insightful when it came to what questions I could ask. Her advice was quite general, but helpful all the same, and I actually managed to think up about seven questions that didn’t sound horrible. The questions seemed kind of boring, though…
Plus, if it weren’t for the woman, I would’ve totally been distracted by David as he read even crazier and ridiculously funnier lines.
“… mmmm! R – wait, how do you say this? Sorry…! Sorry, how do you say this…? Rrr…” and his tongue would really roll whenever he pronounced the ‘r’, “… rrr-uhn-dung… is that it? Rrrendang… OK… oh, and the other one here… ke-tu… ketu-PAT? Yeah? OK… Mmmm! Rrrreeendaaang… ketupaaat… ha! Betcha didn’t… aargh… wait…” a long pause, “HA! Betcha… ugh, no…” an even longer pause, “Ha! Betcha didn’t think I knew about all that, huh…?”
“Does he know about all that?” the woman whispered to me, eyebrow raised.
I shrugged and tried not to smirk.
[Rendang and ketupat are types of Malay food, btw, hence the ‘mmmm!’… oh my GOSH, the way David says “Mmmm!” is SO FLIPPIN’ CUTE…!!!]
“… Selamat… h-ha-rrri? Harrri Rrrraya…? Oh, yay, I got it right! OK… Selamat Harrri Rrrraya…!”
And, later…
“… heeey! Just wishing all my fellow… what? Ma… machas? Oh, OK… heeey! Just wishing all my fellow machaaaas a Happy Dee… Deepavali? Right, got it, sorry…”
[Macha is an affectionate, Indian term for ‘brother’]
He also did commercials for Father’s Day, Christmas, New Year’s Eve… and Mother’s Day.
“… there’s one woman who holds a special place in my heart… and that’s my Mom!”
OH MY GOSH, AWWW…!!!


New Fact #17: David slaps his thigh and says, “Ai yai yai!” whenever he gets really frustrated.


“Ai yai yai!” he huffed, slapping his left thigh loudly in annoyance, and everyone – everyone, including the guys working with the equipment – completely burst out laughing at that.
David looked up, confused at first, then he realized what we were all laughing at, and he flashed that tiny, embarrassed smile of his, and I so wanted to melt into a puddle where I sat.
But the one that almost made me lose it – like, go completely INSANE – was the lines for Halloween.
Imagine this – David Archuleta (whose name represents all that is sweet and bright and young and cheerful), deepening his voice – and, I mean, seriously deepening it – to match that of a spooky horror movie villain, and doing THIS:
“MUUUAAAAH HA HA HA HAAAA…!!!”
And, yeah, he did that same laugh over and over and over again till he finally got the whole ‘Happy Halloween’ greeting out right.
And then… it was over.
David was handing his script back to them.
He sighed, relieved, and then he laughed.
I LOVE HIS LAUGH.
I LOVE IT SOOO MUCH.
The men were placing a second chair next to David’s. And they were also fixing up spotlights and a video camera (you know, the huge, black, professional-looking one?).
Then Yuen-See came over to me again.
“Alright, Yvette,” she said. “I hope you’re ready.”
… uh oh.
The interview.
It was NOW.












Part 4 comin’… I hope.
(I’m waiting for DiGi to upload the interview! But before they can do that, they need Sony’s approval. And Sony, for some reason, still hasn’t given it. I have no idea why. *sigh*)