Wander Girl

by Tweet Sering

  “I’m sure, Mom,” I said patiently.

  The next day you try having a good mix of smooth and a-bit-bruised mangoes just to make sure. But this yields the same results—there’s always something wrong with them.

  “Are you, OK, Hil?” my mom asked, concerned.

  “I’m fine,” I said, reassuring her with a smile.

  They are not the mangoes that you want. So far, since going to that grocery, you still haven’t sat down to enjoy ripe, juicy, delicious mangoes.

  “Hmm! Sarap!” That was my mom.

  What do you do?

  A) Go back to the same grocery, buy the mangoes hoping against hope that they be good this time, and when they aren’t, complain and bitch about it to friends as you eat them anyway (telling yourself that, at least, you have mangoes; ‘yung iba nga dyan wala, eh).

  B) Tell the grocer that you will no longer buy mangoes from his store unless he enforces strict quality control and sells only the best.

  C) Look for the best mangoes, even if it means driving past the nearby grocery and traveling all the way across town to get to them.

  I could hear my mom start her daily lamentation about my dad. But by now I was already half-deaf to her. This was a very recent self-preservation strategy I had developed to keep from snapping under the combined weight of my angst and my mom’s anxiety.

  Pinoy men are like mangoes in a grocery store with low quality control standards, and where the shoppers are happy to take just take any mango. The rotten product is not one person’s fault—it’s a conspiracy, a joint effort of both grocer and shopper.

  We Pinays are shoppers in that grocery store. We are dissatisfied with our mangoes and yet we bite into one, swallow a chunk with a grimace, and then go back for more. We complain about the sub-standard men in our lives—how they womanize, gamble, drink too much, abuse us both physically and verbally, disrespect us—and yet we’re still with them. We don’t go up to the grocer and say, “Sir, the mangoes in your store are rotten. Tomorrow, when I buy your mangoes—despite the two occasions they have disappointed me—I want them to be juicy and delicious. Otherwise, I will look elsewhere and never set foot on this store again, “and then make good our word.

  “I think the Lord is testing me,” my mom said, in conclusion to the same sentiments she had been voicing the past months. She spooned the fleshy yellow fruit.

  At that moment the Lord’s Test sauntered into the kitchen, dripping with sweat, in his shorts and boxer’s gloves, looking very Raging Bull.

  “Hey, De Niro,” I said.

  It had been almost a year since my dad’s resignation and he had yet to show signs of coming to his senses. In fact, The Bourbon Blues was opening a block from our travel agency in Malate in a couple of weeks.

  He grinned at me, then turned to my mom. “Are you talkin’ to me?” He gave her cheek gentle punches. “Are you talkin’ to me?”

  My mom looked straight ahead, stoic as ever, as she slowly sipped her hot chocolate.

  How symbolic, I thought. She’s just taking his blows. The way I’ve just been taking whatever Gabe could give me.

  My dad danced around the kitchen, punching the air. He narrowly missed our helper Gang-Gang’s head as she balanced a newly-refilled ice tray towards the freezer.

  “Why do you always shop at Danny’s?” I asked my mom, referring to the small neighborhood grocery we had been going to since I was a kid.

  She lifted an eyebrow, finished off her chocolate, put down her cup. “I don’t know, I like it there.”

  “Have you ever tried going to Rustan’s or Robinson’s or Landmark?” I prodded.

  “They’re too crowded,” my mom said, looking a bit puzzled.

  “Yes, but have you even tried?”

  “Of course I have, but I didn’t like it, too many people.” She was frowning openly now. “Why? What do you want to know?”

  “I bet they have better mangoes,” I said. And you are just too scared to venture outside your comfort zone.

  My mom got up. “Take a shower already.” She threw me a what’s-wrong-with-this-one look before leaving the kitchen. “We’ll leave in 30 minutes.”

  I picked up a slightly bruised mango from the basket on the table and eyed it.

  Why do we still patronize the same grocery store that sells consistently low grade mangoes?

  My dad tried in vain to pick a toast off my plate with his gloved hands.

  And why do we suffer fools?

  Pinoy men, I concluded as I rose from my chair, are emotional underachievers because we don’t exact high standards from them. They are brats because we spoil them. They give so little and take a lot because we give a lot and take so little.

  I kicked the door of my room open.

  They are weak mama’s boys who drink all night with their buddies and won’t speak to you when they’re having a bad day because we wait with hot coffee, ready to remove their shoes, when they come home drunk.

  I growled as I removed my clothes and threw them down on the floor.

  They are disrespectful pricks who raise their voices at us in public because we just stand there and take it.

  I turned on the shower and cooled my head. Aaaahhhh....

  Why not, as an experiment, try barring the door and changing the lock? (Or better yet, shove an application for annulment form under the door, highlighting the reasons your relationship qualifies for one?) Why not, when he ups his voice level just a notch above normal, scurry towards the nearest security guard and tell him that the man yelling from the opposite end of the street was trying to extort money from you. Finish with a nervous, “Taga-Mental yata, boss.”

  The question was, I thought as I toweled off, why even suffer all that aggravation for a Noyps? Why even try to make him better? Why not, I thought as I vigorously brushed my teeth, just walk into the grocery, dump your bag of uneaten mangoes on the counter and give the owner the finger before you walk out, without a word. In fact, I thought, slipping into my jeans, why show up there at all? Why not just march straight to the other side of town, where the mangoes have been getting rave reviews?

  I pulled on a gray cotton top, slipped my feet into my kitten heels and slammed my bedroom door as I went out.

  The more I considered this last option, the more it made perfect sense. When was the last time a mango had made me swoon, “Sarrrraaap!” When was the last time a guy had really impressed me? Made me cross-eyed with admiration? Opened my mind to new ideas? Made me feel like the smartest, the funniest, the most beautiful, most charming, most intoxicating woman to ever walk the earth? Six years ago! Hint: it wasn’t with a Noyps. It was in the company of a white boy!

  “You ready?” my mom asked as I paced by the front door.

  I nodded, got in the car, and strapped on my seatbelt.

  With Tristan, I forgot I was supposed to be the obligatory sidekick of the pretty girl, the one who trailed, along with her male counterpart, behind the bida girl and her equally good-looking bida boy in countless Pinoy movies. With Tristan, I was Sharon Cuneta, not Sandy Andolong. I was the only person in the room.

  I forgot that dark skin was not supposed to be pretty, that it was supposed to be treated with skin-whiteners, that small eyes were unattractive. I forgot that I was the group’s designated taga-tawa whose own joke was sure to fall flat. Tristan couldn’t marvel enough at the golden brown color of my skin, couldn’t touch me enough, couldn’t look at me enough. And he would sit there and laugh and laugh as I told him funny stories about my family and friends.

  Then it hit me: FUCKSHIT! I’M IN THE WRONG @#$!%^&* COUNTRY!

  The car swerved sharply, nearly hitting the truck beside us. The side of my face slammed against the window. “Aaagagghhh!”

  My mom and I were on EDSA, and I had jerked up in my seat with a Eureka-like cry.

  “What is wrong with you?” my mom screamed. “We almost hit that truck! Loohrd!”

  If I had died that day on EDSA, it would have been with this knowledge: th
at I’d been exposed to the wrong men because the right ones for me were halfway across the globe, and would only venture this way to build houses for Habitat for Humanity.

  My epiphany was almost as though I had landed right smack in the middle of a cockfight (yup, pun intended) knowing exactly where to put my bet: “Sa puti! Sa puti!”

  My breakthrough was so thorough, so complete, I couldn’t contain it. I fished for a pen and leftover Tapa King napkins in my bag and scribbled away excitedly.

  The following were the things one could be sure to be up against when they hooked up with a Pinoy:

  1. They cheat on their wives - Martin

  2. They’re lousy in bed - Gabe

  3. They don’t give a shit about your dreams - Gabe 2

  4. They mask their insecurity by surrounding themselves with fancy cars and bodyguards - Tito Carlos

  5. They never apologize - The Spawn of Satan

  6. They abdicate their financial and emotional responsibilities to you when they hit middle age - my dad

  I figured that if I avoided Pinoy men like SARS, I would be sparing myself unpleasant and aggravating run-ins with, at the very least, the above-mentioned characteristics.

  Pinoy men were just too much work. Shaping them up into the kind of lovers and partners that would make us happy would just use up all our time and energy, so that there’d be none to spare for other important things, like our families, our friends, our career and ourselves. I wanted to kick myself for not realizing this sooner.

  From then on, I vowed to learn things faster. If there’s anything formal education had instilled in me, it’s the value of learning the lesson quickly so that I could move on to the next grade. The longer it took for me to learn the lesson, the longer I stayed in misery. And there was just no escaping the lesson—it would be taught to me over and over and over until I was ready to wail, “I learned it already!”

  And I’d be damned if I was to be the girl left behind taking remedial classes.

  Fall of the Old Order

  What was it with soon-to-be-ex-boyfriends and out-of-character sweetness and sensitivity? Was the correlation between the two real or just imagined? Do guys really develop a sixth sense when you’re about to show them the door? Right when I had made up my mind to break it off with Gabe, he began exhibiting behavior that on other guys would probably have been sweet but on him was just downright weird.

  “Hey,” he’d say on his fourth phone call to the agency before the lunch break.

  “Hey,” I’d mumble distractedly, typing the record locator—a sort of personal identification number that gave one access to a client’s flight schedule—or stuffing airline tickets in envelopes for pickup. “Sup?”

  “Um...wala lang. I was just thinking about you.”

  My attention would wander off the computer screen for a moment. I’d frown.

  “Don’t you have work?” I’d ask.

  “I have. Dami nga, eh. But I was... thinking about you.”

  “Gabe, can you call me later? I’m just finishing something, can’t concentrate.”

  “OK,” he’d say cheerfully, when before it would’ve been, “Yabang nito. Never mind, I won’t call anymore.” (Click) Then the new, weird Gabe would say, “Have a nice day, baby! I love you!”

  “Ba-bye, ba-bye.” The new bitch-in-the-house would brusquely dismiss him. (Click)

  There were other unnerving manifestations. In his bedroom one Saturday night, as he lay on top of me, and I was engaged in a staring match with a bikini-clad Heidi Klum on a poster on his wall, he slid his lips from mine, moved down my neck, past the space between my breasts, past my belly button...

  “Gabe...Gabe...Gabriel!” I was too startled that my knees jerked up involuntarily as though from an electric shock, and my right knee slammed against his left ear.

  “Ow!”

  “What are you doing?” I demanded, propping myself up on my elbows and staring up at him.

  “Men, ang sakit.” he murmured. He was kneeling between my legs, caressing his ear. “There’s a ringing...”

  “What was that?” I repeated, narrowing my eyes at him.

  “I just wanted you to relax, baby,” he said, sheepish as a little boy who’d been caught. “You’ve been kinda tense and irritable lately. I thought I’d... you know...”

  Oh no way. He read Henry Miller!

  I sat up Indian-style. Heidi’s seductive smile was now mocking me.

  “There’s just been so much to do at the office,” I said, ignoring the accusing looks of Brandon Boyd and his posse as well as those of the Victoria’s Secret models from the posters that adorned his walls. “We know what you were really up to,” they all seemed to say.

  My mind played out the image of me at the travel agency the past days. In my area, two cubicles down from my mom’s desk, filled with postcards from Lulu’s and Helen’s travels, a photo of Hannah and me at a cousin’s wedding, and of Gabe and me at Enchanted Kingdom, I had bent over draft after draft of my breakup speech, ignoring the phone ringing beside my computer. I had noted six more points for revision. Tita Anne rose from her desk and picked up the phone. “True North Travel,” she chirped into the receiver. I had merely glanced at her and went back to my important work.

  “Well, thanks,” I told Gabe, feeling a strange heat that I guessed was guilt spread through my body. “We don’t have to do anything new, you know.” It’s rather too late for that, I felt like adding.

  So it was sex the usual way—the way we’d always done it the past three-plus years—that night. Except I held Gabe a little more tenderly, kissed him on the forehead (which I never did), and watched him sleep until his brother arrived and reclaimed the room.

  When at last my master speech was ready, I called up Gabe at his office.

  “Hey, can I talk to you later?” I asked with forced cheerfulness.

  It was lunch break, and the travel agents were huddled around a table in the small kitchen, sharing their baon in plastic containers. The lights had been dimmed and Manong Fernan had moved his white Monobloc chair just inside the glass door so he could nap. I had just finished our lunch of tinolang manok and excused myself from my mom’s area, whose only illumination now was the light from her computer screen as she read her e-mail.

  “Sorry, babe, we’re all working late tonight. I can talk to you now,” he said.

  Breakup over the phone? Ew, bad form.

  “I was hoping I could see you...” I said, sounding more disappointed than I realized. I twisted the phone cord around my wrist.

  “Oh, my baby misses me na,” Gabe baby-talked, misinterpreting my disappointment.

  Goddammmit, I had to get this over with before my guilt killed me. Two women in their 30s peered through the glass doors, and before they got any ideas about being entertained, I waved my hand at them vigorously. I checked to see if my boss had seen it, but thank God my mom was busy. I picked up the framed photo of Gabe and me and stared at our wide grins. The photo was taken during our first year anniversary, when we were obviously still very happy. But that was a long time ago.

  “How about tomorrow?” I suggested hopefully.

  No can do; his company was working on a pitch for all the marketing materials of what could be their biggest client, a new business school, and the soonest time we could see each other would be in another four days. The opening of my dad’s jazz bar.

  “Just hang on, baby,” Gabe said consolingly. “I miss you, too. I’ll make sure I’ll be at Tito Dindo’s opening. Basta, gawan ko ng paraan.”

  Awww! Why was he making this so hard for me? I was feeling more and more like the Wicked Witch of the West!

  “Don’t worry about me, I’ll be fine,” I assured him. “Just concentrate on your work and I’ll see you soon.” I hung up before he could inflict any more lovey-dovey words on me.

  The day of my dad’s bar opening. I had waited four days for this and by then I was tightly wound up and agitated that my well-rehearsed breakup speech was coming ou
t of my ears. I couldn’t sit still so I went around greeting my parents’ guests.

  The interior designer daughter of one of my dad’s partners had designed the place in the tradition of the New Orleans jazz clubs I’ve seen in movies. The bar was engulfed in smoky blue dimness, with the low stage the only brightly-lit area in the room. Round brown wooden tables that sat four people were arranged in the middle of the room, and booths with red vinyl upholstery lined opposite walls. Votive candles flickered atop the tables. On the walls above the booths hung framed black and white photos of jazz greats— Louis Armstrong, Miles Davis, Ella Fitzgerald.

  It seemed that everyone connected to my parents was here tonight. There were my grandparents, uncles, aunts, cousins from both sides; my dad’s old colleagues from publishing; his college friends; my mom’s sorority sisters; her high school friends; her travel agency employees. I even spotted two of our neighbors in the crowd.

  My mom, dressed in the part of the gracious hostess in her all-white linen pantsuit and pearls, was giving her standard hostess speech to well-wishers: Yes, naku, si Dindo talaga. He’s always been into jazz. Nanliligaw pa lang yan sa akin, puro ganyang music na ang pinapatugtog sa kotse. Kaya pinabayaan ko nalang. She was laughing and clinking champagne glasses with guests—obviously enjoying herself—and seemed to have forgotten that this bar, this jazz business, had been the source of her misery and stress in the past months.

  Hannah was busy inquiring politely if the guests would like to have some dessert and rushing back to the kitchen to inform the serving staff of the new orders. The mango float-making project had resulted in what she dubbed The Floatannah (as in “the float of Hannah”), the most art-directed dessert I’ve ever seen involving mangoes, cream and Graham crackers. It also tasted as good as it looked. Helen was having cocktails at a booth with some of her FA friends. Lulu couldn’t come as she had a flight to Hawaii.

  I kept glancing at the entrance for a sign of Gabe. He had said he would be late as he was trying to get a lot of work done for the pitch. I wanted him to come over already; I was having trouble concentrating on anything, and after quite a while of attempting a coherent conversation with me and failing, a male cousin wandered off without even excusing himself.