Angel

by Zoe Daniel

  ‘I’m trying to find my mother and brothers. They were sheltering at my grandparents’ farm near Basey.’

  A slim man with a camera slung over his shoulder and a head as bald and shiny as an egg steps forward and regards them with curiosity.

  ‘Hi, I’m Michael,’ he says in a broad American accent, shaking first Justin and then Angel by the hand. ‘Where do you need to go? Basey, was it?’

  ‘Anywhere near there would be fine …’

  The reporter regards them for a moment.

  ‘Look, we’re pretty full with people and camera kit and we’re all on deadlines …’ Seeing Angel’s face fall he stops and sighs. ‘Of course. Basey’s our next stop. We can fit you in, can’t we, guys?’

  ‘Thank you,’ beams Angel. ‘Thank you so much!’

  Everyone climbs into the truck and it slowly moves off. At first, Angel feels quite dizzy; they are so high off the ground and the big tray rocks wildly as they grind over the top of all the rubbish in their path.

  ‘You guys okay?’ says a female reporter, hanging on grimly.

  ‘It’s like a boat on rough seas!’ laughs Justin.

  No one says much during the journey. Everyone is transfixed by the view. Not a single roof remains and most of the collapsed buildings are beyond saving. The whole place looks like a giant rubbish tip.

  Angel remembers Mrs Fernandez teaching her class about pollution and showing them pictures of the notorious Smokey Mountain rubbish tip in Manila, which stopped operating in the 1990s. Tens of thousands of men, women and children made their homes on and around the tower of landfill, scavenging their livelihoods from other people’s waste. Deadly fires were constantly breaking out and many hundreds of the inhabitants perished over the years. Angel was deeply disturbed by the images and she can’t help thinking of it now as she watches survivors sifting through the wreckage of Samar.

  At one point the truck passes an area where a group of men are digging graves and placing crudely wrapped bodies directly in the ground. Rough pieces of timber have been hammered into crosses to mark where someone is buried. Angel hopes there can be a proper burial later, but for now there is no choice. The stench of death and the risk of disease is too great.

  Much of the island of Samar is agricultural land, so while there is less man-made debris as they move through the countryside, field after field of devastated crops stretches out as far as the eye can see. Angel thinks of her grandparents’ small acreage. Gloria and Pedro make their main income from growing bananas and taro that they sell at the local market. As far as she can see, not a single banana tree has come through.

  Eventually they arrive on the outskirts of the historic town of Basey. In the distance, Angel is glad to see the stone tower of the St Michael church. It appears that the distinctive red, blue and cream structure is intact, though the metal cross on top is bent sideways. She has attended Mass there with her grandparents many times; wedged between them she felt so safe and always loved it when Gloria leaned down and whispered in her ear, ‘If these walls could talk, eh?’

  A few times the truck is forced to stop and they all jump out to help clear a way through. A woman and two teenage girls are outside a ruined house making a pile of things they want to salvage. The reporters go over and start talking to them. A middle-aged man walking with the aid of a stick limps over to join them.

  ‘Can you tell me what happened here?’ the female journalist asks.

  The man shakes his head and sighs wearily.

  ‘It was the ocean surge,’ he says. ‘The wind and rain were very strong. My wife and daughters evacuated to the church up the hill, but I stayed to look after the house. It was frightening but I thought the house would stand up. First, the roof blew off and everything inside was soaked. Then the water came. It was a huge wave, first one, then another and another.’

  ‘How high was it?’ asks the reporter, scribbling notes with one hand and holding a long microphone in the other while a cameraman films the exchange.

  ‘Much higher than the house, higher than a tall building. It came in so hard and powerful. It swallowed everything.’

  He motions to his injured leg, the calf wrapped in a bloody bandage. ‘I was in the downstairs room, sheltering from the rain, then the water came and washed me out, through the roof and over the top of all of those buildings over there.’ He motions up the hill. ‘Then the wave started to suck me back out again but I grabbed hold of a metal drainpipe. I climbed up onto the roof of a building while the water crashed around me, and clung on through wave after wave. Somehow, during all of that I cut my leg open.’

  ‘You’re very lucky you survived,’ the reporter says softly.

  ‘We have lost everything, but my wife and daughters and I are alive so yes, we are lucky. Many Basaynons were not.’

  Angel feels a chill of dread.

  Not much further and the truck is forced to stop for good.

  ‘Looks like this is the end of the line,’ announces Michael. ‘Is this okay for you guys?’

  Justin looks at Angel questioningly and she says, ‘This is fine. I know where the farm is from here. It’s only a couple of kilometres away. Thanks for the lift!’

  As they climb down from the truck Justin spots what looks like an aid staging point up ahead. ‘I’ll just go and grab some bottles of water and see if they’ve got anything to eat. You rest here and I’ll be back in a few minutes.’

  Angel nods gratefully. Her wounded foot is starting to ache again so she walks the short distance to the waterfront and sits down on the edge. It reminds her of the seawall out the front of her home in Tacloban. She looks over at the shoreline of Leyte stretching before her. It’s odd to see the flat, clear San Juanico Strait without dozens of fishing boats and pleasure crafts. Usually it’s such a busy stretch of water. She smiles, remembering how her mother jokingly refers to it as ‘your father’s office’. It strikes her that she feels differently about it now. The ocean was always a place of beauty and calm to her, but she’s questioning if it’s safe anymore, to live so close to the sea. Perhaps Juan will feel the same after all that they’ve suffered.

  Her fingers close around the phone in her pocket, but she doesn’t pull it out. The system is probably still down, but now that she’s so close to the farm, she’d prefer to find out the fate of her family in person and not at the end of a phone line.

  Justin returns soon after with four bottles of water and a small bag of rice.

  ‘We can cook it when we get to the farm,’ he says encouragingly.

  Using the church tower to get her bearings, Angel leads them in the direction of her grandparents’ place. As they move inland away from the town the rubbish is less dense and it doesn’t take long for her to come upon the tarred roadway. After a few minutes they hear the clip-clop of a horse and cart behind them.

  ‘Can I give you youngsters a ride?’ asks the old man holding the reins. For a split second she thinks it might be Pedro, but this man is much older and even skinnier than her grandfather.

  ‘I live on the other side of Basey, but my son Antonio lives along this road and I haven’t heard a word from him since the storm. I’ve given up waiting for him to answer the phone so I thought I’d come over here myself!’ The man speaks lightly, but the teenagers can see the strain in his face.

  Something occurs to Angel. ‘I think I have met your son. Does he live down the road from my grandparents, Pedro and Gloria?’

  ‘Ah yes, I know those two!’ says the man, eagerly. ‘Tell me, what have you heard about their fate?’

  ‘Same as you: nothing. The phones are still out,’ replies Angel.

  ‘But they say the further inland they were, the better their chances,’ adds Justin.

  ‘That’s true,’ the old man nods. ‘My place was damaged but we all came through in one piece and that’s the main thing.’

  Justin and Angel climb into the back of the old wooden cart and sit on the floor. The old man wants to talk but he’s kept busy navigating his
pony around obstacles and flooded areas on the road. When they begin to head up the hill the man’s sharp eyes bring good news.

  ‘Can you see how the damage changes? It’s the same at my place. The wind smashed everything up, but it doesn’t look like the seawater reached this far.’

  ‘That’s what caused the most destruction,’ says Justin.

  ‘You know, I don’t think that most of us really understood what a “surge” was. If they had called it a wall of water like a tidal wave or a tsunami, a lot more people would have got out,’ the man says.

  ‘You’re right,’ says Justin. ‘The warnings weren’t clear enough.’

  Angel’s heart has been pounding the closer they get to the farm and as they approach the gate to her grandparents’ property she feels like it’s going to jump right out of her mouth.

  ‘We can walk from here, it’s not far,’ she tells the old man as he slows the pony to a stop.

  ‘Salamat, mano. Thank you, sir,’ says Justin as they jump down from the cart.

  ‘Good luck to you, children,’ he says.

  ‘Say hello to Antonio for us,’ says Justin encouragingly, and the old man salutes them with a wave as he heads off down the road.

  ‘Basta ang Waray, hindi uurong sa away!’ he calls after them.

  Angel smiles weakly at the old saying about Waray people never backing down from a fight, but in truth she feels scared stiff at the prospect of what she might find now that they’ve reached their destination.

  Fifteen

  Angel fights to steady her breathing as she stands with one hand on her grandparents’ gate. It is suddenly hard to move.

  ‘It’s going to be alright, you’ll see,’ Justin says calmly. ‘Let’s go.’ He links his arm through hers and they begin to walk up the driveway.

  Around a slight bend the house is revealed – it’s still standing. Angel lets out a whimper and begins to move faster. The front door bursts open and two small figures run out into the front yard, shrieking with laughter as they chase after a ball.

  ‘It’s the boys,’ says Angel and she breaks into a limping run.

  ‘CRISTIAN! CARLO!’ she shouts.

  The figures stop and turn towards her.

  ‘ANGEL!’ they both yell at the same time. ‘Mama! It’s Angel. SHE’S HERE!’

  Cristian reaches her first and he nearly knocks her over with the force of his hug. ‘Mama said you would be okay, but I thought you … when you didn’t come, I …’ and he bursts into loud sobs.

  Carlo bowls into her next. ‘I knew it, I knew it, I knew it!’ he bellows gleefully.

  Angel looks up and there’s her mother standing on the front porch with her hands clapped over her mouth, shaking her head in disbelief. And then around the side of the house her grandfather and grandmother appear, whooping with joy and hurrying towards her as fast as their old legs will carry them.

  Angel will never forget this moment.

  The only thing marring the reunion is Juan’s absence. While the others are rejoicing, Carlo scampers up to Justin.

  ‘Where’s Papa? Did you bring Papa?’ He grabs Justin’s arm and begins dragging him back up the driveway. ‘Did you leave him back here?’

  Angel quickly explains that Juan is alive and recovering in the hospital, and that he is going to be alright too. That’s when Veronica, overcome with emotion, dissolves into tears and falls to her knees. Angel understands her mother’s reaction. Her whole family has survived. It’s nothing short of a miracle.

  Gloria can’t stop fussing, dusting, wiping and tidying the little house as best she can. She has a permanent grin and she keeps dabbing at her eyes with the old towel tucked into her waistband. Every time she goes past Justin, she grasps him by the hands and says something like, ‘Salamat, idoy, young man. Thank you so much for bringing her back to us.’ At first he responded with, ‘Angel was determined to get here!’ and then, ‘It was a team effort!’ but now he just nods and grins, pleased to have played his part in this happy reunion.

  Since she arrived, Angel has been telling them everything that’s happened since her mother and brothers left Tacloban six days before. When she gets to the part about Mrs Reyes rescuing her and then the two of them clinging to the power pole, her audience is thunderstruck.

  ‘Little old Mrs Reyes? I don’t believe you!’ says Cristian.

  ‘I do,’ says Pedro. ‘She is a very tough woman.’

  ‘Was,’ whispers Angel.

  ‘What do you mean?’ asks Veronica.

  Angel falters. ‘She made it through the storm, but afterwards … it was all too much for her.’

  She tells them about her journey with Mrs Reyes, and how they ended up at Issy’s house, where Mrs Reyes spent her final days.

  ‘It was her heart. She’d been through so much …’

  Wiping her eyes, Veronica says, ‘I’m so glad that she was with Danilo and Maria. They would have looked after her the best they could.’

  ‘Mrs Reyes saved Angel,’ says Cristian.

  ‘She’s a hero,’ adds Carlo.

  ‘God bless her,’ says Gloria with a sad smile.

  Angel continues her story and the mood lightens when she describes how she found Juan in the airport hospital.

  ‘Papa’s head was wrapped in bandages, but I recognised his hair.’

  ‘Aha! The famous white streak!’ says Pedro, and they all laugh.

  She recounts what Juan had told her of his ordeal and how he’d ended up there.

  ‘What did Papa look like?’ asks Cristian.

  Angel remembers the frail figure in the hospital bed. ‘Very tired and sore,’ she responds. ‘But they say he will heal as good as new.’

  Gloria claps her hands sharply. ‘Pangaon kita! You must be starving!’ Pedro goes outside to salvage some of the bananas from the ruined crop while Gloria makes a fire to cook some of the rice Justin brought.

  The electricity and phones are still off, but the farmhouse gets its water from tanks and although one was knocked off its stand and leaked its load, the other is intact. Gloria has stockpiled a few days’ worth of food. She puts some tea from a jar in a teapot and pumps some water from the tank into a bucket, using it to fill a blackened old kettle. When the fire is going she lets it burn down a little and then puts the kettle on to boil. A few minutes later she is pouring strong black tea into seven chipped mugs.

  When the rice is ready they all sit around on upturned buckets and crates and eat a simple meal. Justin and Angel do a brief rundown of how they fixed the bangka and motored across the strait this morning.

  ‘You came on your own?’ frowns Veronica.

  ‘Justin is a great boatman,’ says Angel quickly. ‘We were perfectly safe.’

  ‘I’ve been out many times with my father,’ explains Justin. ‘We went very slowly and Angel did the navigating.’

  Gloria takes the plates and gives them to the twins, who reluctantly carry them out to be washed at the big plastic tub near the pump. When they have gone she asks softly: ‘Have many died?’

  ‘Thousands,’ answers Justin bluntly.

  Angel continues quietly. ‘For the first few days there were bodies lying around everywhere. I tried not to look at them, but it was unavoidable. There was nothing to wrap them in, nowhere to put them.’

  ‘No dignity at all,’ says Veronica, horrified.

  ‘Now most of them have been collected and taken away by hygiene crews,’ says Justin. ‘But here in Samar today we saw people burying bodies directly in the earth.’

  The adults shake their heads sadly. Angel can see that while they are not surprised to hear of the great loss of life, it’s still hard for them to comprehend the scale of the disaster. They’ve been relatively lucky here at the farm. There are trees down and roofs off the outbuildings but the house has only minor damage. The worst of it for Pedro and Gloria is that they lost their two cows and the banana crop has been flattened. The old couple will have to live off their taro crop alone for some time to come.

>   The boys come back inside. ‘Tell us what happened here,’ says Angel, eager to change the subject. ‘How did you get through it with so little damage?’

  ‘You know your grandpa,’ smiles Veronica. ‘Every year he thinks up new strategies to protect the house from storms.’

  Pedro explains how he took a set of strong coloured ropes and slung them through the eaves and anchored the ends to steel bolts in the cement floor, tying down the roof. The ropes strained and twanged as the wind swirled under the eaves, but they held fast. He was worried about the animals in the outbuildings though, and in the middle of it all he left the house to check on them.

  ‘Grandpa didn’t come back for ages,’ Carlo says, trembling at the memory.

  ‘It was only about ten minutes,’ says Pedro.

  ‘He was so brave,’ says Cristian.

  ‘I’ve seen a lot of typhoons,’ the old man laughs, ‘and I’m damned if I’ll let them get the better of me. Even the mighty Yolanda!’

  ‘Mama was brave too,’ says Carlo.

  ‘I nearly drowned before I got here!’ Veronica says.

  Gloria clucks and waves a finger at her daughter.

  Angel is surprised. ‘I thought you all made it to the farm before the storm hit?’ she says to her mother.

  ‘Yes, but that’s not the whole story,’ admits Veronica. ‘I did a really stupid thing on the way. I should have known better.’

  ‘Tell them, Mama,’ begs Carlo.

  Veronica begins. ‘It started on Samar when we couldn’t get a lift. Every vehicle was full of people rushing to escape the storm so we had to walk. The boys were wet and tired and I was so worried that we would get caught out in the open. Every time we passed a sign pointing to a coastal village I was tempted to seek shelter …’

  ‘Thank goodness you didn’t!’ says Angel. ‘The beach was the worst place to be.’

  ‘I know that now. It was only the thought of Grandma and Grandpa worrying about us that kept me going. And then we had a stroke of luck. Their neighbour, Antonio, went past us on his motorbike. He had offered to look for us on the road because he knew there would be no transport.’