Birthplace

by K. S. Villoso

  I started to feel a little frustrated and in dire need of a cigarette. I left the room, wondering if Imelda knew where the dirty laundry went. I had thrown my pants by the window sometime before sleeping and they weren’t there that morning. I might have had another stick or two left in the pockets.

  The whole house seemed empty, though. I tiptoed around, feeling remarkably small and dirty against the polished grandeur of the place.

  “Pablo, is it?” A movement from one of the chairs propped close to the window startled me. I hadn’t seen the old woman there at all, but now she was leaning over the armrest and staring at me through heavily-lidded eyes. “I was wondering when you’d wake up. Come and give Lola a hug.”

  I stumbled towards her and was enveloped in her chicken-bone arms. She smelled of herbs and ginger. “You look like your father,” she said when she finally released me. “When he was younger. Of course, I haven’t seen him since he was a child, and only so briefly. How is he?”

  “He’s doing good. He’s working as a nurse in Canada.”

  “A nurse?” She looked amused. “Does he enjoy it? Being a nurse. Having to sit around looking at sick people and dead people all the time.”

  “I... really don’t know. I think he kind of did it for the money. He’s been there for four years.”

  “Ah. I didn’t know. Well, I heard he went off to college, but I didn’t know he wanted to be a nurse.” She made a face. “His father—my sister’s other boy was a mortician, you see.”

  I grimaced. “That sounds unpleasant.”

  “Oh, but someone had to do it. He owned a business right here, in the village, although he serviced most of the area close to the valley and was away quite often.” She tapped my knee and gestured at a chair across me. I knew what it meant. Grumbling a little, I pulled the chair close and slumped into it.

  “Now where was I? Ah, yes, your grandfather. Quite a hardworking young man, he was. Fifth son of eight children, you understand, so he didn’t have much of a chance with the inheritance. Now Milyong—his name was Emilio, your grandfather—married that woman, and that’s when everything went downhill for him.

  “I warned him, you know. I told him you shouldn’t take a young girl from a family we hardly knew all the way up here and expect her to be content. We tried to make her feel welcome—accepted—oh God, how we tried! But she would have none of it. She got pregnant and irritable, and for some reason got it into her head that she didn’t like this village one bit. Complained about the smell, the people, boredom—everything. Even said there was a tik-tik targeting her, just woke up looking at that long tongue one day—as if it’s not the kind of scare every pregnant woman in this nation goes through. She had Milyong buy a plot of land down in the valley and build her a house there, all for themselves.”

  “A house... you mean, Lolo Ciskong’s hut?”

  “If that’s what it is, yes. I’ve never seen it. He had his younger brother Francisco come down, you see, to help him till the land, because he didn’t know one thing about being a farmer and he had to make more money so he could pay the whole thing off. Now, that sounds all well and good, if you think about it. That spoiled brat of a woman had her own domain and the men were working overtime for her benefit. But then her son was born.”

  “My father,” I said, knowing I had no biological uncles.

  “No.” Her nostrils flared. “The baby was stillborn. Suddenly she wanted nothing more to do with that house that her husband was breaking his back working for, or that piece of land, or this whole entire place. She stormed off to Camalig and poor Emilio had no choice but to follow her. He left Ciskong in charge of his land, here.

  “That woman got pregnant again and the child lived, this time. Julio, of course. For a time, we didn’t hear from them, but Milyong wrote to me longing to be back home. He said he wanted his own son to know of his family and roots. Julio was ten years old when he brought him here.

  “Something about that made his mother angry. She was an escandalosa, that woman. The moment Milyong brought his son back home she took him off somewhere and left Milyong behind. The last I heard she had a daughter—claims it’s Milyong’s, but a woman like that? Psh! My poor nephew died all alone after having to be content with seeing his children once every few years. They never even came for his funeral.”

  I knew that part. I’d never questioned why they hadn’t. I remember my father feigning unavoidable business meetings and my aunt proclaiming she was ill. I had been too young to understand that they were nothing but excuses.

  I looked up at the old woman. She was gazing out of the window with a thoughtful expression on her face, and it’s like she didn’t really care if I was there or not... she would have told that story anyway. I excused myself, and she smiled and patted my knee and told me Imelda would have had breakfast ready by now. That courteous part of me that usually remained absent poked its head out and asked if she would join me. She shook her head and pointed at a cup of tea cooling by the window-sill.

  The smell of fried hotdogs and eggs was in the air when I entered the dining hall. Imelda was serving a smiling Rachel Ann, and she glanced over at a set plate when she saw me. I sat down and ladled my own food. It was amazing how easy breakfast could go down when you’d had a night like mine, and also how much one could miss good, white rice after days of Ciskong’s terribly pebbled fare. Not that I judged the man about it—but there were just certain things a person couldn’t live without.

  “Pablo,” Rachel Ann murmured. I looked up. Imelda had gone and left the two of us alone in that corner of that immense table.

  “Where’s Enrique?” I quipped.

  “I thought you’d know. Imelda said he’s still sleeping.”

  “Ah, right. Of course. I forgot how much he loves his beauty rest.”

  She sighed. “We need to talk.”

  Panic set in. “Look,” I said. “I wasn’t thinking straight. I did that so you’d pay attention, because let’s be honest, you haven’t exactly been the picture of reason the past couple of days. It worked, didn’t it?”

  “I was going to talk about those creatures.” She frowned. “It’s good to know what was on your mind, though. Thanks.”

  I felt the heat rush into my cheeks. “You’re welcome,” I found myself snapping back. “No, really. I was afraid you’d think I’d gone crazy. You know, like one of your boy-toys.”

  “Yeah.” Her face got serious all of a sudden. She pushed the food away from her and gave me the shadow of a smile. “You know we can never be anything but friends, right Pablo?”

  I felt like I had just been cheated into a slow, painful death in exchange for the bloody but quick one I could’ve had last night. The moment she said that I knew there was no turning back. Her words were the key to unlocking the feelings I’d been trying to pretend weren’t there the whole night through. Please don’t, I thought desperately. It was the only thing running through my mind that made sense. The rest were just irrational thoughts. I saw myself running out and grabbing some flowers to drop by her feet so I could properly proclaim my undying love to her.

  My pride won through, though. I steeled myself—I hadn’t realized how much her words hurt me until that moment—and looked her in the face. “I always knew that, Rachel Ann. Don’t get me wrong—you’re freaking hot, but you’ve got the manners of a Catholic-schooled monkey and the question of your sanity’s always been a running topic in school. No thanks. I wish both you and Enrique a lifetime of happiness, or at least until the next semi-pretty guy comes along.”

  Her face was as red as a tomato at this point. I knew I was dangerously close to getting a fork in my eye. “Do you always have to be so sarcastic, Pablo?” she demanded. “Why can’t you just be honest, for once?”

  “I am being honest! Some truths are just harder to take, that’s all.” I picked up my cup of coffee and pretended to take an extended sip.

  I’d gone and done it. I’d crossed the line. I’d known her long enough to know when sh
e was holding back tears. That only made it easier to harden my heart around that pulpy, bleeding mesh she’d so casually made of it not even a minute ago. What the hell had she got to cry over? She shouldn’t have cared what I thought—I was just friend-Pablo, after all. Her fallback boy. The kind of guy good only for a few amusing moments of abuse.

  Enrique appeared. My comment about his beauty rest might as well been for nothing, because he looked like a wreck. His eyes were bloodshot and baggy and his hair appeared to have been nested on. He gave me a good exit point, though. I gave Rachel Ann the cockiest smile I could bear, saluted Enrique, and got out of there as fast as I could.

  I was afraid if I stayed a moment longer I would have turned into a puddle on the floor.

  One breath.

  It’s ridiculous how you play in your mind over and over again those things better left unexamined. Those memories that act like razor blades to your soul. Two memories, at least, for me—that kiss and that slight hesitation she did before she so casually dropped those words at me. I wanted to know if there was any angle from which either could mean something, anything else but what was clear. Or both. What about the words she’d used? The way she said them? People don’t always mean what they say, if they even mean anything at all.

  Ridiculous. And pathetic. Here I was, quite possibly one of the more negative people on earth, and I was grasping at these faint threads of hope and trying to turn the truth upside-down so that it would better suit me. I knew I was acting like those guys I used to make fun of, but it didn’t stop me. It wasn’t that I wanted her to agree to be my girlfriend, or marry me, or even love me back. I just wanted the pain to stop.

  I found Ciskong outside in the yard communing with the old woman’s roosters. “I’ve heard good things about that one,” he told me, by way of greeting. “Back before my cousin Fernan passed away he often went down to Albay, the big cockfighting ring over there.”

  “When are we leaving?” I demanded.

  He looked at me then, his piggish eyes bloodshot. “I’ve sent someone down to find transportation. I don’t want to risk going back to Sakul for now.”

  “What could they do out in the daylight?” I snapped. “You said so yourself. The townspeople will be on them like hungry drunkards on an unsuspecting dog.”

  “I don’t want to cause trouble. I live there, you know.”

  “Trouble?” I fought to stop myself from shrieking like a girl. “Um, Lolo, in case you’ve forgotten, those people tried to eat us! Are you trying to protect them?”

  “Don’t be angry. I’m trying to protect everyone. Raul Prageda and his family aren’t fully in control of their desires, no more than you or me. Try to understand. You’re a mature boy, Pablo.”

  I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. Here was a man trying to make it seem like he was speaking perfectly reasonable words at a perfectly reasonable time, when we both knew he was just spouting bullshit. He even had this little condescending smile going on.

  Again, I thought about decking him, but decided to be the bigger man and walked away.

  I spent the next couple of hours getting acquainted with the village. There wasn’t much to see—it was mostly a scattered outpost of little houses connected by simple gravel footpaths, the kind you often see buried under mud on TV after a bad landslide. The typhoon didn’t actually seem to have hurt this village at all—the only evidence that it even passed at all was in the form of flattened banana plants and maybe a few crooked bamboo fences. People saw me coming and kept to themselves. They didn’t talk much, but then again, it’s not like I expected them to.

  So imagine my surprise when I turned up a street and there was a drinking party going on that knew me. I showed up around the corner and a shirtless guy waved his hand and cried out, “You must be Pablo! Come, join us!”

  I glanced around. There was no one behind me, so I assumed he didn’t make a mistake and strolled up to them smoothly. The young man grinned and clapped me around the shoulder as if we were long-lost friends. “I’m Berto,” he said. “Dad told me about what happened last night. You actually saw an aswang?”

  “Well, yeah...” I started. The rest of the party, seated around a coffee table laden with chopped barbecued chicken and shot glasses full of brandy, laughed. I glanced away, a little offended, but Berto pulled a chair close and pushed me into it.

  “Don’t mind them.” He had a tooth that jutted out whenever he grinned. “They’re just all drunk and upset we couldn’t find any girls to join this disgraceful excuse for a party.”

  “I saw a dwende once.” This one was so thin the nerves popped out of his neck when he spoke. He rubbed his fingers together and pressed his hat closer to his head. “A black dwarf. It promised to curse me, but it never did.”

  “Lies, Glen. Have you looked at a mirror lately?”

  They all laughed again, in unison. A stocky fellow, with ears that stuck out, gestured at me and offered a shot glass. “I’m Rafael. We’re told you’re Riko’s cousin. How’s that like?”

  I took the glass and downed it. It was stronger than I was used to and I frantically glanced around for the chaser. “Horrible,” I answered, biting back tears. I stuck my tongue out. “The guy took a shine to my friend.”

  Berto hooted. “Has he? That’s amazing.” His eyes twinkled. He pressed a glass of what appeared to be powdered grape juice into my hand. I quickly swallowed most of it.

  “Yeah,” I admitted. “They worked pretty fast, those two.”

  “Women always liked Riko better.” Rafael took the next shot and passed it to the guy beside him. “He’s a bit stuck-up. Didn’t even show up for Fernan and his children’s funeral. You know Fernan?”

  I shook my head.

  “Well, he’s kin to you, if I recall correctly. Him and his entire family got wiped out. Car accident, you know. Heading up to Quezon. Fernan’s son Juan—another cousin of yours—hated Riko. Says Riko thinks he’s too good for us country folk. He was born in Manila, you know?”

  “I know.” The shot glass came round to me again. I took a swig, this time having the chaser glass on hand. “But man, my friend really likes him.”

  “And you really like her, ah?” Glen practically leered when he said it.

  I hadn’t had lunch, and after two shots my head was already starting to spin. So I nodded. Berto laughed, wrapping his arm around my shoulder. “Not the first time I’ve heard of that! Riko stealing a girl from under someone’s nose. Like Rafael said, that Manila charm of his. Gets our girls hot like nothing in the world.”

  “I’m from Manila,” I countered, my cheeks burning. “So’s she.”

  “Then it’s his wide-eyed innocent appeal. Tell me, is she the kind of girl who’ll teach him stuff?”

  Normally I would have laughed at his choice of words, run out to tell Rachel Ann, and watched as she proceeded to beat the crap out of him. I reached for more brandy. Those days, I realized, were gone. We’d get back to Manila and I’d probably never call her again. I’d miss her, but it’d be better that way.

  My eyes watered again. They made a joke about what those two would be doing back in my great-grand aunt’s enormous house and that made me drink even more. I wondered how I lasted seven years. I wondered why I’d even made friends with her in the first place. Everybody always said it was impossible to “just” be friends with a girl. I even remember making a joke about it to her once—how our friendship was so damn unique, and how I thought of her as a dude with breasts, which made her slightly less attractive to me than a goose.

  I wondered how I was ever so naive, and foolish. And so fucking clueless.

  “She told me, see. That we’d—that we could never be more than just friends. I know. I know. What a bitch.”

  They grilled me about “missed opportunities.” Seven years, man, and I never made a move. I mean, fuck. Fuck. If that wasn’t stupid, I don’t know what is. D’you know what I do when she starts crying about her boyfriends? Not offer my shoulder, stupid. I buy her tis
sue. Fucking tissue. Then I get her to pay me back. I know. Laugh all you want. And you know what else? All those times I try to piss her off—why in hell do I even do that? What the fuck is wrong with me?

  I drank. They cheered. I started seeing stars. What the fuck is wrong with her? Seven years—fucking seven years I’ve been there for her. Standing by her like no other guy would. Fucking Mark couldn’t even last six months with her. Seven years! And what do I get? Not even a thanks. Just the friends bit. She might as well drive the knife deeper and start calling me ‘big brother’.

  Of course, she was older than me. By a couple of months. But the point remains.

  “Maybe she doesn’t like younger guys, man.”

  I told them about Benedict, who was a year younger. They laughed. My words ran together. I don’t know how but that’s just it, she’s gone out with younger guys too so I don’t know what the fuck is wrong with me except maybe I wasn’t mean enough to her, even though I know I have been maybe I should have bought her more stuff and taken her out to more expensive restaurants that prissy little...

  By the time they dropped me back at Lola Selda’s house, it was evening and I’d puked several times. “You’re all right, Pablo,” Berto said, slapping me through the gate. I gave him a dopey smile and stumbled towards the door.

  I stood in front of it for several minutes, trying to figure out where the knob was and how to turn it. Eventually, it turned on its own. I grinned, stepped inside, and turned towards Enrique’s displeased face.

  “Hi.”

  He walked over and shut the door behind me. “You were drinking with Berto and his friends,” he said. A statement, not question.