Remember that social experiment with the crying kid?

I was at Lot 1 late at night, going to the bus stop to wait for my father to fetch me. There is this walkway on the side of the mall that I always see various Malays hanging out at. As the taxi stand came into view there was this little Malay boy, couldn't have been more than lower primary school age, couldn't have been more than 8 or 9, sobbing and yelling for his mama.

I got no further than 10 metres away from him before I stopped and looked back. 2 minutes I stood there at the taxi stand, maybe a cab driver or two peering curiously at me, while I thought about what we had talked about during our last meet at Rail Mall. Most people would walk on without a second thought.

Kept going to the bus stop, putting a driveway and a line of decorative shrubs between me and the boy. My father would be picking me up here. I still had plenty of time, though. I could go see what's wrong. Or maybe the child's parents were around, they were just punishing him or something. Peeked through a low point in the shrubbery and saw that none of the Malays were paying the boy any attention. Not the couple by the motorbike. Not the bunch of guys. Not the Chinese woman. A bunch of teenagers my age walked by me, dressed in teenager's clothes. The girl's height and pants were alarmingly short but her hair was long around her bare shoulders. Petite; long hair; pretty. I don't know why I cared.

What looked like a young Malay woman - long, loose hair - was now with the boy. There was also a little Malay girl even younger than he. Oh goody, I thought. The woman reached out to the boy. I saw his mouth contort and he slapped something from her hand. The woman picked up the little girl and left.

Time passed. I could ask my father what to do. Or maybe I would get in the car, close the door, and he would accelerate away even as I mumbled out the words. Maybe the little boy was the brother of one of the big Malay guys. Maybe they would challenge me if I walked up to them. Maybe this would make a good short film. I was just trying to bat away the question of what I should do, and I knew it. My backpack made my shoulders ache.

I could hear the boy screaming again. Screaming for his mother. Mall was closed. Should I bring him to the MRT station? Do they have staff there this late at night? Who the fuck leaves their kid alone in a Malay-infested walkway at 11pm anyway? And how would this make a good short film? Without warning, the lights along the walkway shut off. I could still see the crying boy, on the steps of Lot 1.

My father's Nissan pulled up. I got in but left the door open. What if a bus came up behind us? It took a minute, but my father finally understood my babbling and told me to find out if the boy knew where his house was. I put down my bag in the front seat, jogged around the shrubs -

The young Malay woman with the little girl was back again. I halted in the middle of the taxi driveway and watched her carry him up and walk away in the other direction. She glanced back briefly.

After a few moments thinking, I returned to my father's car and drove home.