Many still think of him as the kindest killer they ever met. Of course, they had not known a lot of killers before him. Macario was the first and therefore, the most remembered. After his death, plenty of mediocres would follow but none had the heart Macario had.
Ser, mobalor lang ko’g uska libo. I wouldn’t ask if we had other people to borrow from. We’ve already tried everyone else. I’ll pay you on my next salary. It’s just the two kids are in the hospital. The salary you gave me just isn’t enough. Ser, maluoy ka! Ser! I’ve worked on your house for a year. I’ve never cheated, never shortchanged! Palihug! Ayaw wad-a akong respeto nimo!
It wasn’t only his skills though that earned him his reputation in this place people only refer to as tapos sa rayl. He was a man of principle, that Macario, people would always reminisce. His composure was always calm. His victims always shot cleanly, almost humanely, with the least struggle. He almost always targeted the head, sometimes the heart. When he couldn’t get a clear shot, he would always make sure to follow immediately with a second bullet to stop the pain. And that was why people loved him. Yes, he was a man of principle, that Macario.
Hide the hammer. Stash the other things. Clean your hands. Clean the blood on the floor, on yourself, on the furniture. Place a handkerchief on his mouth. Tie his hands with rope. Open the water tank. Smooth him in gently. Be quiet. Find the money.
The houses tapos sa rayl were known to be residences of the misfits. The railroad tracks did more than just divide the land. They also divided the people, segregating them to the before and afters of society. Those before the rail were a mixture of old Spanish colonial mansions with well-kept gardens and large verandas peppered with smaller 70s style homes with adobe walls and geometric shapes.
Those after the rails were made out of dilapidated boards slanting to the side. The luckier ones had nipa walls, bamboo kitchens and small patches of green in the front. That was before Macario came. He gave his neighbors jobs, letting them take care of his chickens and repairing his house. He sent some of the kids to school and gave them small treats when they passed by. He organized basketball leagues and doled out large prizes, so kids can stay away from bisyos. He even donated large amounts to the church, renovating the priest’s dormitory and providing all the carosas for Holy Week. Even the barangay council started soliciting from him for large projects. Nobody knew where the money was coming from. When they found out, he became Jesus, weeding out the hypocrites to serve the poor. He soon was only referred to as Tatay to everyone. Macario’s coming became the golden age of the houses tapos sa rayl.
Dong, where’s your Mama? Still at the hospital? Give this bag to her when she gets back. And here’s a hundred. Don’t spend it on toys. Now, listen, Papa has to go away awhile, okay? He’ll come back for you when he’s ready. Don’t worry. I’ll be fine. And when somebody asks, don’t tell them I’ve been here.
For all his popularity, nobody really knew anything about the man seated in his rocking chair. Even those he especially chose to take under his wing, teenage boys he taught carpentry to who became his drinking buddies every weekend, hadn’t had the guts to ask. Once, they had tried to get him drunk in order to extract some information. His face had suddenly turned hard and he whispered audibly, ‘Bata pa ang gabii, mga pisu. Klaro pa ang panan-aw.’. The truth was it wasn’t just that he didn’t want to answer. It’s that he could no longer remember vividly at all. They’d never tried to ask him again. Still, it did not stop the questions from neighbors. Where he came from before he got here. How he started. How he got to do what he did. Who his first ‘job’ was. Who his connections from the mountains were who, in turn, had connections to the syndicates. They wanted to know. Their houses needed repairing too.
Gie, are you there? Di kayo ko kasturya. So, listen. Don’t butt in. I dropped off some money for you. It’s with a vegetable vendor named Edna in the market. Don’t ask her where I am. She won’t know. Spend the money wisely. It’ll be a while before I can send again. People might get suspicious. I love you. Tell the kids Papa misses them. Tell Dodong not to spend it on toys.
The day Macario died, he was delivering flowers to be used for Sunday mass. One of his students was rattling on his ear, pesking him for money. Please, tay, just to help his child get out of the hospital. If they couldn’t pay, the child couldn’t get out. There was treatment to think about and the wife was pregnant too. And no one would lend him the money. Macario fished in his pockets, opened his wallet and found a few hundreds plus coins. He gave everything he had. Drop by the house, Macario told him so he can give more. Soon after exiting the church, he was stabbed at the back. The cut was clean, immediately stopping the connection from spine to brain, almost like Macario would’ve taught him. Because it wasn’t enough,Tay. Not even close.
His funeral became the most lavish his neighbors had ever attended. And in the corner, two children and a widow looked down at the father and husband they haven’t seen for eight years. He was a man of principle, that Macario, they were told. Who knew if they believed this. Dodong, now 19, left a hundred pesos for abuloy. Don’t spend it on toys, he muttered under his breath.
And that was the end of the kindest killer they ever met, and the end of the golden age for the people tapos sa rayl.
Jesus had died. All the rest were just murderers.
Thursday, August 12, 2010
Wednesday, August 11, 2010
Melons and Pears
These breasts. Ah, if only they could speak with liberty like the vagina. If only it had two lips, a wide opening, a deep canal. The things it would say. The stories they would tell. For breasts are both spectator and spectacle. Their sole purpose to see and feel, the eyes of sensuality, the giver, the receiver. All taken with a stride that is more taboo than the inverted triangle will ever be.
As is, the breasts will never lie to you. They will never give you a fake orgasm. They will never give what they don’t have in their capacity to give.
They will always show you if it hurts. They will always look you in the eye. They will rise with excitement. Engorge with love. Pock red with pain. Bruise with suffocation. And go depleted when it refuses to nourish itself.
On some days, the breasts are more woman than the woman itself.
Green Signals
I was afraid, because I was naked; and I hid myself
- Genesis 3:10
To him, she was a trespassing sign. Her face was closed. Eyes dilated, constantly searching. Lips pursed. Hair the color of dried grass and barbed wire. Arms crossed even when walking. And when he came astride beside her, she wasn’t there at all. Like the shoulder he draped with his arm was the only anchor for her not to float away. It seemed the world and its stories were never allowed to enter again.
There lies the mystery. Because as she seems closed to those around her, her body seemed to be screaming just the opposite. Her breasts were like two green signals. It caused people to blunder, lose sight of the road, jam in intersection. She had warned him they tended to have that effect. But nothing quite prepared him until he actually got to take a look. They arrived a few steps before her every time. Adam had tried to look everywhere else but there since they met. But he couldn’t. It would always start and end there. Only the conscious effort of looking at her face would divert from this. Sometimes, he’d admonish himself because when he sneaked glances, his mouth would go dry rather than water.
There were only bulky sweaters, tent dresses, dark blouses. Ones that never gave more attention to what they already garnered by themselves. She did not want attention. She wanted to disappear. There were never any Friday Nights with girlfriends or casual dates. She had always gone home. Even now when she was already 27 and there was no family to go home to.
In a way, he was grateful for that. He never would’ve met her had she been any of those things. Everyday, she would lock herself in the confines of her room with iced tea and laptop in hand, and meet him there, in cyberspace. She updated often, talked a lot. Her blogs intrigued him. Like she was living the happiest life surrounded by the simplest things. She talked about the things around her home. The dog she inherited from her younger sister. The kitchenware she never gets to use because she was always dropping by somewhere new before going home. The rock music she plays full-volume just so she’d feel she wasn’t home alone. Her life lists. Places she was going to someday. Big purchases she was saving up for. Sometimes he feels like she was just there, living in cyberspace. Trusting a stranger whose voice she’s never heard, but who listened 500 miles away.
Soon came regular chats at night. Hurrying home to get online. Plans to drop by each other’s areas. Exaltation in sharing childhood traumas, deep secrets. Personal info. Contact numbers. Love, maybe. Maybe but not really.
Then just as soon as if they were just talking about it, he was there. In her doorstep. For three weeks, he watched her cover herself up whenever they were beside each other. Noticed her move her elbow slightly so his own can never accidentally bump into her side. Watched her lock herself up every night in the same room he used to just imagine, and then wake up very early so they can never bump into each other on the way to the bathroom.
Why has real life suddenly become more surreal than their relationship in cyberspace?
Adam knew why, of course. It was those green signals. They had suddenly turned red for him. And he had become a stranger again.
A Recipe for Stuffed Breasts
1. Place the two pieces between your hands and a flat area; pound with a meat mallet or with own fists until they flatten evenly. Be careful not to tear through the meat.
2. Sprinkle breasts with salt to taste; fill with even portions of anger and sadistic guilt.
3. Roll up and pin with any sharp object. Arrange breasts in an orderly fashion. Spoon extra praise and attentiveness around the breast rolls. Mix soup with ½ cup tears and garnish. Pour over breast fillets.
4. Then, bake at 350°, basting occasionally with assurance it’s never going to happen again. Heat inside the baking dish, for 1 hour or so.
5. Remove your hands for until the next time. Add lavish gifts and new promises. Display to guests in a nice serving dish.
He thought they were the perfect target. This was what he found out soon after the rest of her body had been experimented with. The face and arms were too obvious. They garnered too many questions in the work place. The stomach was too sensitive. She couldn’t get up to make breakfast for him in the morning. That would be a waste to the highest degree because she was such a good cook. The back seemed too fragile. Last time he hit her there, she had to go to the hospital and made him foot the bill for what she told the doctor was a simple slip in the bathroom.
But the breasts, those round orbs he loved to bite until she screamed, were perfect. It excited him to suck them on and on like in a trance. He didn’t notice they bled too much afterwards. He could do anything with it and no one would ever see. They would be in bed and he would always stop there, slowly at first, like a child nipping candy. Then small nibbles. Then fast suckles. She knew this was the start. But she was too afraid to let him stop, so she would slowly divert him by kissing the crook on his neck and whispering ruggedly, ‘Hon, let’s go.’ .
Sometimes, it would work and he would continue down there where she no longer felt anything. But on some days, it triggered that Supernova. There’d be quiet before the big bang, but she knew it was coming. She had seen it in his eyes that glittered a little too much. The problem was she never knew which days were which.
He never meant it, of course. That was important to state out. She had to know that. It was just these fitting rages she always caused. It made him lose too much control. He would stand over her sometimes, like in an out-of-body experience, and cry from the inside. Who was this fuck slapping his wife?
Soon after, he would take the cigarette burns from the mounds and place toothpaste on them to make sure they wouldn’t swell. The last ones turned into a heart-shaped scar which made him smile. See, even her body thought it really wasn’t that bad.
In the morning, when she was ready with those made-from-scratch brioche he would tell her to make so they can kiss and make up, he would give her a smack squarely on her slightly swollen mouth. Hon, you really know how to spoil me. She would then clear the table and wait for him to leave before she would. As parting call, he would nonchantly add, Oh, maybe next time, a little easy on the milk? It’s too creamy.’ This would make his day because he knew he’d just exercised a little extra patience with her, a step to his absolution.
The breasts were slowing her down in the workplace. They were swollen and itchy and reminded her of nights past. Even when she was cooking, the thing she used to love the most, there was only the longing to take them off, discard them like the apron she hangs on the rack every night.
When was it that she started living like this? Did she know? Did he know? Was it that time when she forgot to bring out his slippers and the first hit came? Was it the time when he asked her to choose between him and her friends, and the TV broke? Was it that time when she was staring at the clouds outside his kitchen, and he fucked her from behind because he thought she was looking at their neighbor’s teenage son? She forgets what life was before this. How freedom was not always a lie. Before all the recipes for a man she now only saw as a horse coach. Once, cooking had been the dream, just like the man. Then a passion. Then obligation. Then lifeline.
She would go home now. Her body knew. There was a tingle she felt at the core the same way a sundial knew how to tell time. There was no longer dread. Only calm acceptance. Perhaps it would always be like this. These were the marks of her days, how she would chunk out one dish after the other until all her cards would run out. Perhaps then he would no longer need her. And she would go. She would mince, blanche, boil, fry, grill and roast herself until then. Most of all, she’d wait, for that time when she’ll finally be able to use that recipe for tronquito she always wanted to try.
Guide:
Tronquito- bull penis soup
Brioche- flaky French bread
Mama Knows Breast
Damn advertisements. Were they going to run this thing the whole day? Commercials just didn’t have the same professional integrity they used to. Seriously, who in their right minds who’ve actually given birth and breastfed their kids would think those boobs they’ve been flashing have been through rigorous wear and tear. Was there such a thing as a boob double? If there was, they’d probably used it here. Those smooth, creamy mounds of skin have not been milked through. She would know. It’s only been a month and already her breasts were these uneven stress balls that engorged on one side and tilted down on the other.
And don’t even let her get started on the nipples. How had they gotten so dark? Once, they were these cute little buttons that looked more like the color of pink pearl. Then coral. Then brown. Now those areolas looked like an antique coin with a nub. They were never indiscreet. They were like flashcards that screamed ‘Look at me! Look at me!’ and they did. It didn’t matter where she was. In a dark corner or in a busy mall. Somebody was always bound to look. She or the husband would look at some guy who seemed to be magnetized by the power of the nub and they would cough discretely to veer his attention away. Come on, maniac! Haven’t you had enough boobs from watching your daily porn fixture?
Seriously, wasn’t it enough she go through the painful process without having some weird standby watch her attempts at trying to let the little girl latch? But a hungry screaming baby knows what it wants. They’re torpedoes zeroing in on the targets. It hadn’t seemed such a long time ago when she would still daintily cover her assets with her hand when she bent down or looked for clothes that didn’t reveal too much. Now, one flip of the bra, and plop! It was there like a 24-hour open pantry. Constantly available. The first time they went out for her check-up and a small run-to to the mall, it was all there too. All over her clean, pressed white shirt. An outpour of liquid no one would ever doubt from where it was coming from. The husband must be livid. Even she’s never seen so much of her own breasts before.
God. The baby’s crying again. See, here’s the thing. Doctors constantly explain the benefits of breastfeeding. But what they never seem to cough out is how painful it is during the first week. It is. There’s no point sugarcoating. It’s like a bad toothache or a festering wound. It hurts like you wouldn’t believe especially if the baby’s a succubus. The first few days, she’d suck and suck and the breasts would still be empty. Seriously. Where’s the milk supposed to be coming from?
Then by some miracle, it’d be there. Flowing like a waterfall. The pain would be gone too.
What’s left would be this child who people say unbelievably came out from you. It was then, those moments when she’s feeding off from some deep part, some stronger extension, some life form made out of rougher stuff, when it’s going to hit. It’s all been worth it all along.
After that, a coin could be bounced off those little clumps of scabs once called breasts, and they’d feel nothing.
Someday, this little girl will look at her the way she once did her own mom, as if she were some creature from another planet with sandbags sticking out of her chest. She would point at those two shriveled raisins pointing to the floor. And with a small voice would probably ask, ‘Mom, what’s that?’
She knew what her answer would be.
‘Well, sweetie, that’s you. That’s all you. Right there.’
As is, the breasts will never lie to you. They will never give you a fake orgasm. They will never give what they don’t have in their capacity to give.
They will always show you if it hurts. They will always look you in the eye. They will rise with excitement. Engorge with love. Pock red with pain. Bruise with suffocation. And go depleted when it refuses to nourish itself.
On some days, the breasts are more woman than the woman itself.
Green Signals
I was afraid, because I was naked; and I hid myself
- Genesis 3:10
To him, she was a trespassing sign. Her face was closed. Eyes dilated, constantly searching. Lips pursed. Hair the color of dried grass and barbed wire. Arms crossed even when walking. And when he came astride beside her, she wasn’t there at all. Like the shoulder he draped with his arm was the only anchor for her not to float away. It seemed the world and its stories were never allowed to enter again.
There lies the mystery. Because as she seems closed to those around her, her body seemed to be screaming just the opposite. Her breasts were like two green signals. It caused people to blunder, lose sight of the road, jam in intersection. She had warned him they tended to have that effect. But nothing quite prepared him until he actually got to take a look. They arrived a few steps before her every time. Adam had tried to look everywhere else but there since they met. But he couldn’t. It would always start and end there. Only the conscious effort of looking at her face would divert from this. Sometimes, he’d admonish himself because when he sneaked glances, his mouth would go dry rather than water.
There were only bulky sweaters, tent dresses, dark blouses. Ones that never gave more attention to what they already garnered by themselves. She did not want attention. She wanted to disappear. There were never any Friday Nights with girlfriends or casual dates. She had always gone home. Even now when she was already 27 and there was no family to go home to.
In a way, he was grateful for that. He never would’ve met her had she been any of those things. Everyday, she would lock herself in the confines of her room with iced tea and laptop in hand, and meet him there, in cyberspace. She updated often, talked a lot. Her blogs intrigued him. Like she was living the happiest life surrounded by the simplest things. She talked about the things around her home. The dog she inherited from her younger sister. The kitchenware she never gets to use because she was always dropping by somewhere new before going home. The rock music she plays full-volume just so she’d feel she wasn’t home alone. Her life lists. Places she was going to someday. Big purchases she was saving up for. Sometimes he feels like she was just there, living in cyberspace. Trusting a stranger whose voice she’s never heard, but who listened 500 miles away.
Soon came regular chats at night. Hurrying home to get online. Plans to drop by each other’s areas. Exaltation in sharing childhood traumas, deep secrets. Personal info. Contact numbers. Love, maybe. Maybe but not really.
Then just as soon as if they were just talking about it, he was there. In her doorstep. For three weeks, he watched her cover herself up whenever they were beside each other. Noticed her move her elbow slightly so his own can never accidentally bump into her side. Watched her lock herself up every night in the same room he used to just imagine, and then wake up very early so they can never bump into each other on the way to the bathroom.
Why has real life suddenly become more surreal than their relationship in cyberspace?
Adam knew why, of course. It was those green signals. They had suddenly turned red for him. And he had become a stranger again.
A Recipe for Stuffed Breasts
1. Place the two pieces between your hands and a flat area; pound with a meat mallet or with own fists until they flatten evenly. Be careful not to tear through the meat.
2. Sprinkle breasts with salt to taste; fill with even portions of anger and sadistic guilt.
3. Roll up and pin with any sharp object. Arrange breasts in an orderly fashion. Spoon extra praise and attentiveness around the breast rolls. Mix soup with ½ cup tears and garnish. Pour over breast fillets.
4. Then, bake at 350°, basting occasionally with assurance it’s never going to happen again. Heat inside the baking dish, for 1 hour or so.
5. Remove your hands for until the next time. Add lavish gifts and new promises. Display to guests in a nice serving dish.
He thought they were the perfect target. This was what he found out soon after the rest of her body had been experimented with. The face and arms were too obvious. They garnered too many questions in the work place. The stomach was too sensitive. She couldn’t get up to make breakfast for him in the morning. That would be a waste to the highest degree because she was such a good cook. The back seemed too fragile. Last time he hit her there, she had to go to the hospital and made him foot the bill for what she told the doctor was a simple slip in the bathroom.
But the breasts, those round orbs he loved to bite until she screamed, were perfect. It excited him to suck them on and on like in a trance. He didn’t notice they bled too much afterwards. He could do anything with it and no one would ever see. They would be in bed and he would always stop there, slowly at first, like a child nipping candy. Then small nibbles. Then fast suckles. She knew this was the start. But she was too afraid to let him stop, so she would slowly divert him by kissing the crook on his neck and whispering ruggedly, ‘Hon, let’s go.’ .
Sometimes, it would work and he would continue down there where she no longer felt anything. But on some days, it triggered that Supernova. There’d be quiet before the big bang, but she knew it was coming. She had seen it in his eyes that glittered a little too much. The problem was she never knew which days were which.
He never meant it, of course. That was important to state out. She had to know that. It was just these fitting rages she always caused. It made him lose too much control. He would stand over her sometimes, like in an out-of-body experience, and cry from the inside. Who was this fuck slapping his wife?
Soon after, he would take the cigarette burns from the mounds and place toothpaste on them to make sure they wouldn’t swell. The last ones turned into a heart-shaped scar which made him smile. See, even her body thought it really wasn’t that bad.
In the morning, when she was ready with those made-from-scratch brioche he would tell her to make so they can kiss and make up, he would give her a smack squarely on her slightly swollen mouth. Hon, you really know how to spoil me. She would then clear the table and wait for him to leave before she would. As parting call, he would nonchantly add, Oh, maybe next time, a little easy on the milk? It’s too creamy.’ This would make his day because he knew he’d just exercised a little extra patience with her, a step to his absolution.
The breasts were slowing her down in the workplace. They were swollen and itchy and reminded her of nights past. Even when she was cooking, the thing she used to love the most, there was only the longing to take them off, discard them like the apron she hangs on the rack every night.
When was it that she started living like this? Did she know? Did he know? Was it that time when she forgot to bring out his slippers and the first hit came? Was it the time when he asked her to choose between him and her friends, and the TV broke? Was it that time when she was staring at the clouds outside his kitchen, and he fucked her from behind because he thought she was looking at their neighbor’s teenage son? She forgets what life was before this. How freedom was not always a lie. Before all the recipes for a man she now only saw as a horse coach. Once, cooking had been the dream, just like the man. Then a passion. Then obligation. Then lifeline.
She would go home now. Her body knew. There was a tingle she felt at the core the same way a sundial knew how to tell time. There was no longer dread. Only calm acceptance. Perhaps it would always be like this. These were the marks of her days, how she would chunk out one dish after the other until all her cards would run out. Perhaps then he would no longer need her. And she would go. She would mince, blanche, boil, fry, grill and roast herself until then. Most of all, she’d wait, for that time when she’ll finally be able to use that recipe for tronquito she always wanted to try.
Guide:
Tronquito- bull penis soup
Brioche- flaky French bread
Mama Knows Breast
Damn advertisements. Were they going to run this thing the whole day? Commercials just didn’t have the same professional integrity they used to. Seriously, who in their right minds who’ve actually given birth and breastfed their kids would think those boobs they’ve been flashing have been through rigorous wear and tear. Was there such a thing as a boob double? If there was, they’d probably used it here. Those smooth, creamy mounds of skin have not been milked through. She would know. It’s only been a month and already her breasts were these uneven stress balls that engorged on one side and tilted down on the other.
And don’t even let her get started on the nipples. How had they gotten so dark? Once, they were these cute little buttons that looked more like the color of pink pearl. Then coral. Then brown. Now those areolas looked like an antique coin with a nub. They were never indiscreet. They were like flashcards that screamed ‘Look at me! Look at me!’ and they did. It didn’t matter where she was. In a dark corner or in a busy mall. Somebody was always bound to look. She or the husband would look at some guy who seemed to be magnetized by the power of the nub and they would cough discretely to veer his attention away. Come on, maniac! Haven’t you had enough boobs from watching your daily porn fixture?
Seriously, wasn’t it enough she go through the painful process without having some weird standby watch her attempts at trying to let the little girl latch? But a hungry screaming baby knows what it wants. They’re torpedoes zeroing in on the targets. It hadn’t seemed such a long time ago when she would still daintily cover her assets with her hand when she bent down or looked for clothes that didn’t reveal too much. Now, one flip of the bra, and plop! It was there like a 24-hour open pantry. Constantly available. The first time they went out for her check-up and a small run-to to the mall, it was all there too. All over her clean, pressed white shirt. An outpour of liquid no one would ever doubt from where it was coming from. The husband must be livid. Even she’s never seen so much of her own breasts before.
God. The baby’s crying again. See, here’s the thing. Doctors constantly explain the benefits of breastfeeding. But what they never seem to cough out is how painful it is during the first week. It is. There’s no point sugarcoating. It’s like a bad toothache or a festering wound. It hurts like you wouldn’t believe especially if the baby’s a succubus. The first few days, she’d suck and suck and the breasts would still be empty. Seriously. Where’s the milk supposed to be coming from?
Then by some miracle, it’d be there. Flowing like a waterfall. The pain would be gone too.
What’s left would be this child who people say unbelievably came out from you. It was then, those moments when she’s feeding off from some deep part, some stronger extension, some life form made out of rougher stuff, when it’s going to hit. It’s all been worth it all along.
After that, a coin could be bounced off those little clumps of scabs once called breasts, and they’d feel nothing.
Someday, this little girl will look at her the way she once did her own mom, as if she were some creature from another planet with sandbags sticking out of her chest. She would point at those two shriveled raisins pointing to the floor. And with a small voice would probably ask, ‘Mom, what’s that?’
She knew what her answer would be.
‘Well, sweetie, that’s you. That’s all you. Right there.’
Monday, August 9, 2010
The Lemon Juice Page
No New Entry Today.
The struggler is busy with writing a series of pocketies (for pocket stories. Yes, I'm inventing terms now.), much shorter than the normal short story but quite longer than a short pocket story as well.
Her obvious lack for apt descriptives leaves little wonder why she needs to produce more work for practice.
The culprit to this confusion will be published tomorrow.
In the meantime, please veer your attention to the Lemon Juice Page, which features other people's short stories in reaction to my own. Or if you just want to write one of your own and want it placed on the said page.
Because a story creates another story. This is how the world works.
The struggler is busy with writing a series of pocketies (for pocket stories. Yes, I'm inventing terms now.), much shorter than the normal short story but quite longer than a short pocket story as well.
Her obvious lack for apt descriptives leaves little wonder why she needs to produce more work for practice.
The culprit to this confusion will be published tomorrow.
In the meantime, please veer your attention to the Lemon Juice Page, which features other people's short stories in reaction to my own. Or if you just want to write one of your own and want it placed on the said page.
Because a story creates another story. This is how the world works.
Sunday, August 8, 2010
Fourteen
My mother was trying to kill me. She really was. Why else was she intent on letting me take vitamins and preparing breakfast for me everyday, forcing me to eat, when all I want, all I really want is to catch a disease? Nothing serious though. Maybe dengue or pneumonia. Something that makes you lose weight really fast.
In between the scrambled eggs and the bacon, I thought for the hundredth time how much easier it would be if I were poor. They were so much more blessed. After all, nothing to eat, nothing to gain.
It was the Christmas Holidays and she and I were shopping for new clothes to wear for Simbang Gabi and the family reunion. I climb into the car with her. You know about that disorder called anorexia? Well, my mother, she has the opposite. She looks at me and sees this beautiful child with shapely legs and makings of big breasts. But I was not a beautiful child. I was fat. I knew that just as surely as I knew I was smart or crafty or responsible. But really, when you’re in 2nd year high school, who actually cares about those things? The guys in our school sure don’t. I’d just as surely wish I were dumb but a lot skinnier, skill-less but with more coordination, boring but able to fit into dresses other than my mother’s.
And there it was, the Ladies Section. Tense salesladies going to and fro the backroom. A long line going to the dressing room. And so many clothes in disarray, I didn’t know where to start. In my mind, I was thinking of a checklist I saw in a magazine once. The topic was about ‘Take off 10 pounds by Dressing Right’. I let my palm graze through the hangers and racks. Choose Black. Look for a V-neck neckline. Maybe an empire cut. No sleeveless. Flowy material. Perhaps small prints all over.
But there it was. All the things I had not been looking for. A red dress. In stretch cotton. Sleeveless. With the simplest cut. The trouble was, the simplest things aren’t always the easiest to get. I knew this because I‘d been trying to lost weight since I was 12 and look at me. Just staring at the dress, I knew it was going to be tight. But I snatched it up anyway, not even looking at the tag and hurriedly took my turn on the dressing room before my mother comes back and insists she come along to watch.
I looked at myself in the mirror and pinched the parts that stuck out the most. The chicken wing arms. The inner thighs. The calves. The butt. But most of all, the belly. That part where from ribs to waist, all was laid flat, until I reached an obvious curve like a hump in the road. I tried all the others on and saved the red dress for last. It was difficult dressing my age. What, with all the tight shirts, tight jeans and skimpy everythings going around. The black mini was a bad idea. The see-through cream top too. The floral prints made me look old. And the jeans couldn’t even reach my crotch.
Then, the red dress. It had barely reached my breasts when the material wouldn’t go down anymore, my arms still flapping up and down like that of a headless chicken. I pulled it up, pushed it down but it wouldn’t budge. I was stuck in that red dress, grunting and flapping my way through the dressing room for what would seem a minute, five minutes, ten. Who knows. I sat there on the vinyl floor thinking somebody was going to walk in here soon and find me in this thing and laugh their heads off. Maybe they were doing that now from their security cameras.
By some intervention though, my hands seemed to find a zipper on the side of the dress. I slowly pulled it down and the material went down with it like magic. It had seemed too good to be true and maybe it was, because there in the mirror was a vivid reflection, an equal image of subtle and striking at the same time. I pulled my hair up to see the full effect and I knew it was a sight to keep. For a moment, I actually passed for someone beautiful.
The salesladies smelled of sweat and no one seemed to entertain. But finally, I had managed to find one and asked if there was one in medium. ‘Large, maybe?’, she asks me quietly and hurriedly went off to wherever they seemed to disappear. She came out smiling and my breath signaled a sigh of relief because for a minute there I—-
‘Sorry, miss. Only available size left.’, she says and hurries off to entertain another customer, leaving me to clutch the red material in confusion.
I had tried to talk my mother into buying it, assuring her I would fit into it by next month. I would diet, skip the holiday pig-out, join the volleyball team, walk from school, drink less soda, find more stress. I promised her it’d be worth it. But then she looks at me as she always does and lunges on to a 20-minute sermon about how ‘You are beautiful the way you are. You’re beautiful on the inside where it counts. Just wait. They’ll see. And---‘
Yeah. I cut her off. Whatever. I don’t care. I don’t care. I don’t care.
In the end, she chose all the outfits for me. My attention just wasn’t in it, knowing that again this year, I would manage to look like my mother again. We left the Ladies Section an hour after, looking for something to eat somewhere else in the mall.
She went ahead and I looked behind. Because there, in that bed of mess with salesladies going to and fro, stressed buyers waiting to use the dressing room and hundreds of pretty dresses somebody else would get to wear, I knew I just had my first heartbreak.
I am fourteen and I am no one.
In between the scrambled eggs and the bacon, I thought for the hundredth time how much easier it would be if I were poor. They were so much more blessed. After all, nothing to eat, nothing to gain.
It was the Christmas Holidays and she and I were shopping for new clothes to wear for Simbang Gabi and the family reunion. I climb into the car with her. You know about that disorder called anorexia? Well, my mother, she has the opposite. She looks at me and sees this beautiful child with shapely legs and makings of big breasts. But I was not a beautiful child. I was fat. I knew that just as surely as I knew I was smart or crafty or responsible. But really, when you’re in 2nd year high school, who actually cares about those things? The guys in our school sure don’t. I’d just as surely wish I were dumb but a lot skinnier, skill-less but with more coordination, boring but able to fit into dresses other than my mother’s.
And there it was, the Ladies Section. Tense salesladies going to and fro the backroom. A long line going to the dressing room. And so many clothes in disarray, I didn’t know where to start. In my mind, I was thinking of a checklist I saw in a magazine once. The topic was about ‘Take off 10 pounds by Dressing Right’. I let my palm graze through the hangers and racks. Choose Black. Look for a V-neck neckline. Maybe an empire cut. No sleeveless. Flowy material. Perhaps small prints all over.
But there it was. All the things I had not been looking for. A red dress. In stretch cotton. Sleeveless. With the simplest cut. The trouble was, the simplest things aren’t always the easiest to get. I knew this because I‘d been trying to lost weight since I was 12 and look at me. Just staring at the dress, I knew it was going to be tight. But I snatched it up anyway, not even looking at the tag and hurriedly took my turn on the dressing room before my mother comes back and insists she come along to watch.
I looked at myself in the mirror and pinched the parts that stuck out the most. The chicken wing arms. The inner thighs. The calves. The butt. But most of all, the belly. That part where from ribs to waist, all was laid flat, until I reached an obvious curve like a hump in the road. I tried all the others on and saved the red dress for last. It was difficult dressing my age. What, with all the tight shirts, tight jeans and skimpy everythings going around. The black mini was a bad idea. The see-through cream top too. The floral prints made me look old. And the jeans couldn’t even reach my crotch.
Then, the red dress. It had barely reached my breasts when the material wouldn’t go down anymore, my arms still flapping up and down like that of a headless chicken. I pulled it up, pushed it down but it wouldn’t budge. I was stuck in that red dress, grunting and flapping my way through the dressing room for what would seem a minute, five minutes, ten. Who knows. I sat there on the vinyl floor thinking somebody was going to walk in here soon and find me in this thing and laugh their heads off. Maybe they were doing that now from their security cameras.
By some intervention though, my hands seemed to find a zipper on the side of the dress. I slowly pulled it down and the material went down with it like magic. It had seemed too good to be true and maybe it was, because there in the mirror was a vivid reflection, an equal image of subtle and striking at the same time. I pulled my hair up to see the full effect and I knew it was a sight to keep. For a moment, I actually passed for someone beautiful.
The salesladies smelled of sweat and no one seemed to entertain. But finally, I had managed to find one and asked if there was one in medium. ‘Large, maybe?’, she asks me quietly and hurriedly went off to wherever they seemed to disappear. She came out smiling and my breath signaled a sigh of relief because for a minute there I—-
‘Sorry, miss. Only available size left.’, she says and hurries off to entertain another customer, leaving me to clutch the red material in confusion.
I had tried to talk my mother into buying it, assuring her I would fit into it by next month. I would diet, skip the holiday pig-out, join the volleyball team, walk from school, drink less soda, find more stress. I promised her it’d be worth it. But then she looks at me as she always does and lunges on to a 20-minute sermon about how ‘You are beautiful the way you are. You’re beautiful on the inside where it counts. Just wait. They’ll see. And---‘
Yeah. I cut her off. Whatever. I don’t care. I don’t care. I don’t care.
In the end, she chose all the outfits for me. My attention just wasn’t in it, knowing that again this year, I would manage to look like my mother again. We left the Ladies Section an hour after, looking for something to eat somewhere else in the mall.
She went ahead and I looked behind. Because there, in that bed of mess with salesladies going to and fro, stressed buyers waiting to use the dressing room and hundreds of pretty dresses somebody else would get to wear, I knew I just had my first heartbreak.
I am fourteen and I am no one.
Transform
The day the remains of Padre Pio passed through the little town of Majilud was the day Nang Idang transformed into a manananggal. No one thought they would see it happen since the last report of one was 30 years ago when superstition was still strong and a civilized system weak. Now, manananggals mostly kept to themselves save for a limited few who still roamed at night, sucking on chickens and getting stuck on TV antennas.
They said a lot of things about Nang Idang that day. But prior to that, she kept mostly to herself, managing her own fishery and then selling it on the market.
Nang Eukring says, ‘Bantug ra himsog kaayo na iyang mga isda. Iya kaha nang gipakaon ug atay ug tina-i’.
But that’s getting ahead of the story. On that day, Nang Idang was in a hurry to get to town, hearing of the news that Padre Pio’s blessed remains would be in the church for public viewing the whole morning. It was a busy day. She had woken up at dawn to collect some fishes from the pond and was doubly hurrying to sell it to the market so she can line up to kiss and pray over the Saint’s remains.
She skipped breakfast and went on to sell all her fishes. By the time she was finished, it was already 10:30. The closing time was 12:00. After which, the remains would be transferred to the next town 3 hours away. This was her only chance. When she saw the line which reached the outside of the church, Nang Idang did not make the sign of the cross and directly took her place at the back of the line. Slowly, the queue ebbed and it was finally her turn. When she prayed over the metal box, her skin was already a little pale and her eyes seeing slightly blurry outlines. Many of her once-friends note she seemed a little withdrawn from the prayers.
After which, she went directly home via a tricycle which was so fully packed, it was difficult to breath. Witnesses then continue the story on her account. She had barely reached her house when the rest of the passengers caught her jumping out, the vehicle still moving. Her eyes were flickering from side to side involuntarily. Her head moving in full rotation as if in a trance. Her hair was scattered all over and from her throat, a loud gibberish language they had never heard of.
The witnesses were dumbfounded. The morning after, Nang Idang was not in her usual stall at the marketplace. By that time, everyone had already heard of the news.
‘I tell you, she had the ghastliest eyes. I saw it turn red and look at us straight as if she was the devil himself….and…’ said Norma to Nang Jinky.
‘…And she was saying some kind of ritual. It’s probably the prayer they use to help disguise themselves. But of course by that time, it was too late. We had already seen...’, adds Nang Jinky to Esther
‘…seen her start to run and hide under her house. But Nang Jinky saw a stump in her back. It was the start of wings growing. There were black spikes on her blouse…’ Esther said to Noy Tope
‘…blouse started to break open. And they saw her half run, half fly...feet barely touching the ground because she was in such a hurry. Esther saw her black wings flap themselves. And get this, they also saw her going through her things and drinking some kind of potion…’ Noy Tope said to the carrot vendor.
‘…drinking some kind of potion, no doubt to heal herself because by then, she must’ve been burned by the sunlight. And they saw her writhing on her floor like a snake...’, the carrot vendor said to the tricycle drivers.
‘…transformed herself into a snake because as you know, mananggals are excellent shape shifters. Then she went into her room and was never seen again that day…better be careful when she’s around.’ , the tricycle drivers said to every passenger they drove.
And that’s how Nang Idang transformed into a mananggal.
Kids were no longer allowed to look in her eyes for fear they might be transferred with the ‘curse’. The Sisters of Mary no longer sat beside her in church and lowered their veils when she was around. Tricycle drivers said they were going in the opposite direction every time she’d take a ride. And buyers, aside from the out-of-towners, made sure never to buy from her again. Thank Padre Pio for revealing her evil ways.
Of course, some people say Nang Idang was just diabetic and had only suffered a hypoglycemic attack that day. But you didn’t hear it here.
They said a lot of things about Nang Idang that day. But prior to that, she kept mostly to herself, managing her own fishery and then selling it on the market.
Nang Eukring says, ‘Bantug ra himsog kaayo na iyang mga isda. Iya kaha nang gipakaon ug atay ug tina-i’.
But that’s getting ahead of the story. On that day, Nang Idang was in a hurry to get to town, hearing of the news that Padre Pio’s blessed remains would be in the church for public viewing the whole morning. It was a busy day. She had woken up at dawn to collect some fishes from the pond and was doubly hurrying to sell it to the market so she can line up to kiss and pray over the Saint’s remains.
She skipped breakfast and went on to sell all her fishes. By the time she was finished, it was already 10:30. The closing time was 12:00. After which, the remains would be transferred to the next town 3 hours away. This was her only chance. When she saw the line which reached the outside of the church, Nang Idang did not make the sign of the cross and directly took her place at the back of the line. Slowly, the queue ebbed and it was finally her turn. When she prayed over the metal box, her skin was already a little pale and her eyes seeing slightly blurry outlines. Many of her once-friends note she seemed a little withdrawn from the prayers.
After which, she went directly home via a tricycle which was so fully packed, it was difficult to breath. Witnesses then continue the story on her account. She had barely reached her house when the rest of the passengers caught her jumping out, the vehicle still moving. Her eyes were flickering from side to side involuntarily. Her head moving in full rotation as if in a trance. Her hair was scattered all over and from her throat, a loud gibberish language they had never heard of.
The witnesses were dumbfounded. The morning after, Nang Idang was not in her usual stall at the marketplace. By that time, everyone had already heard of the news.
‘I tell you, she had the ghastliest eyes. I saw it turn red and look at us straight as if she was the devil himself….and…’ said Norma to Nang Jinky.
‘…And she was saying some kind of ritual. It’s probably the prayer they use to help disguise themselves. But of course by that time, it was too late. We had already seen...’, adds Nang Jinky to Esther
‘…seen her start to run and hide under her house. But Nang Jinky saw a stump in her back. It was the start of wings growing. There were black spikes on her blouse…’ Esther said to Noy Tope
‘…blouse started to break open. And they saw her half run, half fly...feet barely touching the ground because she was in such a hurry. Esther saw her black wings flap themselves. And get this, they also saw her going through her things and drinking some kind of potion…’ Noy Tope said to the carrot vendor.
‘…drinking some kind of potion, no doubt to heal herself because by then, she must’ve been burned by the sunlight. And they saw her writhing on her floor like a snake...’, the carrot vendor said to the tricycle drivers.
‘…transformed herself into a snake because as you know, mananggals are excellent shape shifters. Then she went into her room and was never seen again that day…better be careful when she’s around.’ , the tricycle drivers said to every passenger they drove.
And that’s how Nang Idang transformed into a mananggal.
Kids were no longer allowed to look in her eyes for fear they might be transferred with the ‘curse’. The Sisters of Mary no longer sat beside her in church and lowered their veils when she was around. Tricycle drivers said they were going in the opposite direction every time she’d take a ride. And buyers, aside from the out-of-towners, made sure never to buy from her again. Thank Padre Pio for revealing her evil ways.
Of course, some people say Nang Idang was just diabetic and had only suffered a hypoglycemic attack that day. But you didn’t hear it here.
Friday, August 6, 2010
Entries of the Small Spaces
Dear Monday,
You are not the start nor are you the end. I don’t know why I insist on writing you like a novel when that is not what you are. What you are is some bullshit form of therapy Hao insists on having, to make me change my mind. But you and I both know I will not. I’m knocked up, not continuously stupid. Sure, I have my moments of haphazardness, not surprising why I got into this kind of trouble in the first place. But what I want is the dream, the chance to make it before 31, the age when Sylvia Plath killed herself. I want the nervous breakdown. I want the depression. I want the burning. Not this.
They were two strugglers sharing beer on the sidewalk, looking at the debris people left behind. His tattoos were beautiful and he picked from the pile of trash at his side, making spontaneous verse for each one. A Coke can. A torn shoe. Election paraphernalia. She smiled because she knew all these were supposed to impress her. It worked.
Dear Tuesday,
Today, after consuming half a fried chicken and then some, I laid down on the same bed where you are in now and stared endlessly at the fluorescent bulb that keeps on flickering like a woman’s thoughts. Soon after, I went around the room, killing mosquitoes with a copy of Marquez’s Melancholy Whores, quite apt, and loving the sound of their bodies being squashed and smudged all over my white walls. Empowering. How easy it was.
She talked about her love for Kidlat Tahimik and how she cried every time there were Il Postino reruns on the Hallmark Channel. He talked about his contempt for existentialism, absolutism, egotism and all the other isms she thought could never be attached to a word. He confessed other’s porn were his erotica. She found this romantic. When they made love, they made sure to do it in small spaces, small rooms to make sure all other thoughts were left behind the door. Finished, she’d think about how she would write about this later. He thought about how waking up with her seemed to make him forget about the Arroyo administration. He wrote on her palm, Fuck me, then marry me. She only answered the first one.
Dear Wednesday
Sigrid asked while we were sipping our coffees outside the office, How would you know how it would feel if you haven’t really done or even thought of doing it? What she meant was raising this thing. Well, Sigrid, you don’t have to be hit by a bus to know how it feels.
The day she stopped by twice for fast food, he bought her a home pregnancy kit. There it was. Two lines staring up at them while they huddled on the floor. They laughed about how the pharmacist asked Hao if there was any particular brand he preferred. Then she locked herself in the bathroom.
Dear Thursday,
I tried to write something I’d remember from this experience. This is, after all, supposedly a turning point in my life although I still have no idea where it is I’m supposed to turn. So far, all I have are these three lines: Tongues act. Unending Seizures. Tasting Vulgarity. Hao insists that if I could just hear the heartbeat, I’d immediately change my mind. I probably would, and maybe that’s why it’s important for me not to hear. Why is pro-choice so hard to understand? Why can’t tomorrow come sooner?
Friends insist they could do a Juno. She looks the part, they pointed out. They talked about the theories of art versus domesticity. Greatness versus subtleness. All sorts of dead philosophers coming to life at the mouths of drunk companions while she sips her iced tea and Hao keeps watch. She wonders if through the night, they could resurrect all of them, Greek, Roman, forgotten TV episodes, to conjure the fate of the living.
Dear Friday,
Hao will be here soon, and after this, you and these stupid thoughts will be forgotten only to be taken out of the junk trunk when it serves me convenient. The boss gave me the whole week off to take care of matters. I told him someone in my immediate family just died. Who knows how this will affect me. Maybe I’ll regret it one of these days, and I will cry myself to a stupor. Maybe I’ll want this someday, and it’ll be too late. Maybe. But I just can’t give up my life now.
Once again, it was a small space. It struck her funny how she always seemed to end up in small spaces. She didn’t know where she was. Only that a kind old lady was stroking her hand, leading her to a makeshift bed. This was her operating room. The setting of her before and after. Smoking outside, he was thinking about what he can no longer experience: mounting hospital bills, a photograph of his arm tattoos carrying a small body, waking up next to her. She was thinking about how she would write about this later.
You are not the start nor are you the end. I don’t know why I insist on writing you like a novel when that is not what you are. What you are is some bullshit form of therapy Hao insists on having, to make me change my mind. But you and I both know I will not. I’m knocked up, not continuously stupid. Sure, I have my moments of haphazardness, not surprising why I got into this kind of trouble in the first place. But what I want is the dream, the chance to make it before 31, the age when Sylvia Plath killed herself. I want the nervous breakdown. I want the depression. I want the burning. Not this.
They were two strugglers sharing beer on the sidewalk, looking at the debris people left behind. His tattoos were beautiful and he picked from the pile of trash at his side, making spontaneous verse for each one. A Coke can. A torn shoe. Election paraphernalia. She smiled because she knew all these were supposed to impress her. It worked.
Dear Tuesday,
Today, after consuming half a fried chicken and then some, I laid down on the same bed where you are in now and stared endlessly at the fluorescent bulb that keeps on flickering like a woman’s thoughts. Soon after, I went around the room, killing mosquitoes with a copy of Marquez’s Melancholy Whores, quite apt, and loving the sound of their bodies being squashed and smudged all over my white walls. Empowering. How easy it was.
She talked about her love for Kidlat Tahimik and how she cried every time there were Il Postino reruns on the Hallmark Channel. He talked about his contempt for existentialism, absolutism, egotism and all the other isms she thought could never be attached to a word. He confessed other’s porn were his erotica. She found this romantic. When they made love, they made sure to do it in small spaces, small rooms to make sure all other thoughts were left behind the door. Finished, she’d think about how she would write about this later. He thought about how waking up with her seemed to make him forget about the Arroyo administration. He wrote on her palm, Fuck me, then marry me. She only answered the first one.
Dear Wednesday
Sigrid asked while we were sipping our coffees outside the office, How would you know how it would feel if you haven’t really done or even thought of doing it? What she meant was raising this thing. Well, Sigrid, you don’t have to be hit by a bus to know how it feels.
The day she stopped by twice for fast food, he bought her a home pregnancy kit. There it was. Two lines staring up at them while they huddled on the floor. They laughed about how the pharmacist asked Hao if there was any particular brand he preferred. Then she locked herself in the bathroom.
Dear Thursday,
I tried to write something I’d remember from this experience. This is, after all, supposedly a turning point in my life although I still have no idea where it is I’m supposed to turn. So far, all I have are these three lines: Tongues act. Unending Seizures. Tasting Vulgarity. Hao insists that if I could just hear the heartbeat, I’d immediately change my mind. I probably would, and maybe that’s why it’s important for me not to hear. Why is pro-choice so hard to understand? Why can’t tomorrow come sooner?
Friends insist they could do a Juno. She looks the part, they pointed out. They talked about the theories of art versus domesticity. Greatness versus subtleness. All sorts of dead philosophers coming to life at the mouths of drunk companions while she sips her iced tea and Hao keeps watch. She wonders if through the night, they could resurrect all of them, Greek, Roman, forgotten TV episodes, to conjure the fate of the living.
Dear Friday,
Hao will be here soon, and after this, you and these stupid thoughts will be forgotten only to be taken out of the junk trunk when it serves me convenient. The boss gave me the whole week off to take care of matters. I told him someone in my immediate family just died. Who knows how this will affect me. Maybe I’ll regret it one of these days, and I will cry myself to a stupor. Maybe I’ll want this someday, and it’ll be too late. Maybe. But I just can’t give up my life now.
Once again, it was a small space. It struck her funny how she always seemed to end up in small spaces. She didn’t know where she was. Only that a kind old lady was stroking her hand, leading her to a makeshift bed. This was her operating room. The setting of her before and after. Smoking outside, he was thinking about what he can no longer experience: mounting hospital bills, a photograph of his arm tattoos carrying a small body, waking up next to her. She was thinking about how she would write about this later.
A Tear
Once, there was a little girl named Sadness. It was probably the depressants her father took before holding her mother’s hand in the birthing room. It could also probably be the backward sense of humor only hippies of that age could understand. Whatever the case, Sadness came to be. Everything about her seemed small. The hospital staff saw her as an omen.
But Sadness was really anything but for she refused to repeat herself. When she scraped her knees at school, she would let out a loud ‘Whoops!’ flinging her whole body into the air as if wishing the accident that beseeched her scrawny legs be carried away by the winds.
Despite what other people thought, there was really nothing strange about her except for those who cared too look really closely. It had seemed, even at an early age, she wanted to be the antithesis of her name. She knew, by being who she was, people would withdraw from her as some of her classmates whose mothers were uncomfortable such a name did.
But most of those she knew, apart from the ones who judged too easily, seemed to be drawn to Sadness. Of course, adults only knowing half of what a child knew, they easily mistook cheerfulness for happiness. They’d just as easily think a brightly-colored toy could replace the sight of dancing fireflies in the school yard. How convenient. Nevertheless, people just thought of Sadness as the pleasant girl with a weird name.
‘I’m sad.’, one of her classmates would say.
‘No, you’re not, stupid. You’re Ted for Teddy.’ know-it-all Jenny Alcaraz would say. ‘She’s Sad.’
They would start to squabble in high-pitched voices that drowned the laughter in the playground. Sadness would then come in between them then because she did so hate anyone fighting. People were never allowed to be gloomy when she was around.
Soon, the whole class was infected with Sadness’ aversion and everyone always wore a smile on their face, a spring in their step, a soft lilt in their voice as if they were expecting gold stars to be stamped on their hands or spanked with rulers if they didn’t.
‘That’s life.’ Teddy would say like a grown-up, when his parents separated, and he left to choose where to live.
‘We’ll be so much more comfortable now.’, said Dresa when her father left for the States to work for three years, excitedly narrating what kind of dolls her father might get from there.
‘There’s a reason that he died. God wants him in heaven.’, said Jenny without even shedding a tear when her dog, Peanut, died.
‘I needed a new look anyway.’ reasoned Kate when the barber cut too much of her hair and her once long locks were now like a husk pasted on somebody’s head.
Sadness smiled because she knew, for some reason, it was her that brought such peace and sedateness to their days. Tomorrow she would keep guard again.
And so it followed that there was no grief. No remorse. No regret. And no acceptance in Section Faith of Miss Alvarez’s Class.
It was then that the whole room came to a standstill for days, then months on end. They neither squabbled or cried or had tantrums anymore. But neither was there authentic amazement when the cocoon Miss Alvarez placed in an aquarium finally broke free and the butterfly went around the room, flitting on each one’s shoulders like it did flowers. Nor was there a round of relief and pats on backs when Dresa finally returned after she broke her arm and was out for a week.
There was no excited banter in the air when the principal gave away free ice cream to the whole school nor was there a secret burning in their hearts when at long last, they seemed to have found something that they liked. Teddy managed a polite Thanks when people complimented him on his dragon drawing. Kate just acknowledged her singing voice as if she knew she could carry a tune all along. And Sadness, well, Sadness was quite confused. Was this what she had really wanted all along? Still, she kept the act like the rest of them.
Then one day, the dam broke. It started out as a rainy day and what would’ve been a trip to their garden to tend to the cherry tomatoes ended with doing their Maths for the whole afternoon instead. The outpour outside continued and suddenly, there came a sobbing from the back of the room. Dresa was staring at a tree, balling quite loudly. In its branches were a group of baby birds, its nest dangerously tipping to the right. They couldn’t hear. It was just too far. But all of them knew the birds were chirping, their mouths pointing upward like arrows. Everyone started joining in. Looking at the branch and rubbing their eyes back and forth. Their chins reached the window’s ledge as they began following the nest’s movement until it eventually toppled down and was swept away by the current.
‘It’s okay to cry, you know’, Miss Alvarez said coming out from behind Sadness who was stuck in her seat, looking at everyone. ‘The great thing about tears is it’s like the rain. Each drop can be a different thing to different people. You may cry because you’re sad now. But you may also cry because you’re too happy tomorrow.’
When the bell came, everyone tried to look for the nest. They scattered all around the playground, the garden, the front yard. Sadness sat down on a tree stump, staring at the nest which was already partly destroyed. And there in that little stump where furrow met soil, she hugged her knees, keeping vigil over the empty basket of grass. Sadness tried to shed a tear. She really did. But nothing came out for somehow, she had already forgotten how to be herself. She was sure, the way a child often was about these things that would’ve been key to her happy ending.
But Sadness was really anything but for she refused to repeat herself. When she scraped her knees at school, she would let out a loud ‘Whoops!’ flinging her whole body into the air as if wishing the accident that beseeched her scrawny legs be carried away by the winds.
Despite what other people thought, there was really nothing strange about her except for those who cared too look really closely. It had seemed, even at an early age, she wanted to be the antithesis of her name. She knew, by being who she was, people would withdraw from her as some of her classmates whose mothers were uncomfortable such a name did.
But most of those she knew, apart from the ones who judged too easily, seemed to be drawn to Sadness. Of course, adults only knowing half of what a child knew, they easily mistook cheerfulness for happiness. They’d just as easily think a brightly-colored toy could replace the sight of dancing fireflies in the school yard. How convenient. Nevertheless, people just thought of Sadness as the pleasant girl with a weird name.
‘I’m sad.’, one of her classmates would say.
‘No, you’re not, stupid. You’re Ted for Teddy.’ know-it-all Jenny Alcaraz would say. ‘She’s Sad.’
They would start to squabble in high-pitched voices that drowned the laughter in the playground. Sadness would then come in between them then because she did so hate anyone fighting. People were never allowed to be gloomy when she was around.
Soon, the whole class was infected with Sadness’ aversion and everyone always wore a smile on their face, a spring in their step, a soft lilt in their voice as if they were expecting gold stars to be stamped on their hands or spanked with rulers if they didn’t.
‘That’s life.’ Teddy would say like a grown-up, when his parents separated, and he left to choose where to live.
‘We’ll be so much more comfortable now.’, said Dresa when her father left for the States to work for three years, excitedly narrating what kind of dolls her father might get from there.
‘There’s a reason that he died. God wants him in heaven.’, said Jenny without even shedding a tear when her dog, Peanut, died.
‘I needed a new look anyway.’ reasoned Kate when the barber cut too much of her hair and her once long locks were now like a husk pasted on somebody’s head.
Sadness smiled because she knew, for some reason, it was her that brought such peace and sedateness to their days. Tomorrow she would keep guard again.
And so it followed that there was no grief. No remorse. No regret. And no acceptance in Section Faith of Miss Alvarez’s Class.
It was then that the whole room came to a standstill for days, then months on end. They neither squabbled or cried or had tantrums anymore. But neither was there authentic amazement when the cocoon Miss Alvarez placed in an aquarium finally broke free and the butterfly went around the room, flitting on each one’s shoulders like it did flowers. Nor was there a round of relief and pats on backs when Dresa finally returned after she broke her arm and was out for a week.
There was no excited banter in the air when the principal gave away free ice cream to the whole school nor was there a secret burning in their hearts when at long last, they seemed to have found something that they liked. Teddy managed a polite Thanks when people complimented him on his dragon drawing. Kate just acknowledged her singing voice as if she knew she could carry a tune all along. And Sadness, well, Sadness was quite confused. Was this what she had really wanted all along? Still, she kept the act like the rest of them.
Then one day, the dam broke. It started out as a rainy day and what would’ve been a trip to their garden to tend to the cherry tomatoes ended with doing their Maths for the whole afternoon instead. The outpour outside continued and suddenly, there came a sobbing from the back of the room. Dresa was staring at a tree, balling quite loudly. In its branches were a group of baby birds, its nest dangerously tipping to the right. They couldn’t hear. It was just too far. But all of them knew the birds were chirping, their mouths pointing upward like arrows. Everyone started joining in. Looking at the branch and rubbing their eyes back and forth. Their chins reached the window’s ledge as they began following the nest’s movement until it eventually toppled down and was swept away by the current.
‘It’s okay to cry, you know’, Miss Alvarez said coming out from behind Sadness who was stuck in her seat, looking at everyone. ‘The great thing about tears is it’s like the rain. Each drop can be a different thing to different people. You may cry because you’re sad now. But you may also cry because you’re too happy tomorrow.’
When the bell came, everyone tried to look for the nest. They scattered all around the playground, the garden, the front yard. Sadness sat down on a tree stump, staring at the nest which was already partly destroyed. And there in that little stump where furrow met soil, she hugged her knees, keeping vigil over the empty basket of grass. Sadness tried to shed a tear. She really did. But nothing came out for somehow, she had already forgotten how to be herself. She was sure, the way a child often was about these things that would’ve been key to her happy ending.
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