The Leaving.

The door creaks open.

"I'm leaving." Robin says, sitting on the bed, with one large backpack atop his lap and a luggage bag on the floor.
"Oh, going where - Woah!" Frank gets to be surprised by what he's seeing, "You're leaving?"
"I believe I had already said that." Robin replies.
"No. No way, bro. No way." Frank walks in front of Robin and grabs his shoulders with both arms, "You are not going anywhere, not living anywhere, if it is not in this flat - why?"
"Cut the crap there, brother." Robin removes Frank's hands, and stands up, wears the backpack behind him and grabs the luggage, "I just, I - I have come to realize that I'll have to be by myself."

Then it occurs.
The most awkward pause happens in the life of Frank and Robin.
Robin takes a final stare at Frank, the entirety that he may not see for the rest of his life: those thick eyebrows, the stubborn black curls that actually make up for the hair, the big almond eyes, the reddish cheeks that gets redder in the morning when he sees it as he wakes up, the stumps of hair in his chin, the black jacket that was actually his own's and gave away on Frank's birthday, the white shirt beneath it (and wonders how many really were those white shirts of Frank are), the usual denim pants, the grey Supra shoes that he always envied. He looked at Frank.
Frank, on the other hand, takes a final gaze at Robin, the roommate he had come to trust and take for as his own brother that he never actually had, the best friend he had away from his hometown, the one he confides to, the man he just discovered one rainy evening lying, seeming to be dead, on his doorstep, the stranger that he accomodated, the stranger that he became comfortable to.
To Frank. Robin suddenly comes back to being that stranger: does he have to re-discover him and attend to him again, after seven months of incredible friendship and bortherhood that had been established between them? Does he have to see him again, perhaps tomorrow night, lying like a corpse on his doorstep, just after having a dinner date outside at his favorite restaurant that serves a lot of lobsters and crabs and red iced tea? In his head he asks the question: does Robin really have to go?

"Stop staring, you fucking twat." Robin says and pushes Frank with one hand, smiling.
"Stop staring at me too, you fucking perv." Frank says as he was pushed to sit on the bed. He smiles. "Just go."

"Now you're telling me to go. You really must be something." Robin says as he holds the doorknob.

"Go!" Frank shouts, smiling, "Go go go! Go now! Leave!"

"Okay then. Later." Robin's back disappeared from the space that is intended for the door to conceal the real world from the world filled with cereals and candies and beer and comfort and love, that is Frank's flat.

"Go," Frank mumbles, "because I don't want you to see me cry; because I will miss you, stupid brother."

Drink.

He slammed the glass back on the table.

"Next shot goes to who?" he asked me, his bloodshot eyes directed at me in a very determined manner.

"Drink it," I replied, my eyes under my glasses directed back at him with the glasses failing to conceal the very emotion reflected by my eyes, my helpless eyes. It was just the two of us, in his unit, in the eve of his birthday. He poured in another round of beer, and drank. I, on the other hand, was just staring at him, observing how far will it take for him to get drunk already so that I can finally leave and enjoy the comfort of my own bed.

He slammed the glass back on the table again.

"Come on, drink." he said, "Even just once, so that I would look less pitiful."

He took the bottle and pours beer into the glass, handed it over to me. I took the glass and drank, then I looked at him. He was in tears.

My only impulse was to hug him tight, comfort him in that way with all the best that I can, to hug him just that. But we were sitting, a position that makes the awkward hugging of two men make it look more awkward, and more unlikely to happen. But he stood up and tried to wipe his tears with his lower arms.

"I'm sorry, bro." he told me, "It's just that -" But before he could even finish I was already hugging him tight and more tears seemed to flow from his eyes as he was hugging me back and softly hitting my back with his fist.

"Fuck it off," I said, "It's your birthday today."

"But I can't help it," he replied, in his tears, "Fuck! I can't! I can't! I just can't!!"

I did a few soft slaps in his back, just so his sobs will tune down, which were more audible than the series of 'fucks' he was uttering.

Then he raised his head from my shoulder and looked at me, his bloodshot eyes directed at me in a very determined manner.

I slammed the glass back on the table.

A different morning rush.

The time was not just enough.

She took her purse, quickly and aimlessly sprayed some cheap cologne and went out of the door, panting, combing her hair with one hand and attempting to put on an earring using the other. The television noise gets to her nerves; her children, two boys aged ten and eight, were casually watching the usual morning cartoon show of a dumb cat trying to catch the smart mouse and ends up into more trouble. After succeeding in doing her multitasking trick, she pulls the plug of the television off. Her hand trembled. "We're leaving this house. Right now," she told her children, who then looked very shocked and confused. "There's no time left," she said as she grabbed both kids by the hand in the collars of their shirts, and dragged them near the main door. She slams the door open. Gunshots greeted the bland morning.

She dropped her sons on the floor, and she dropped dead.

The Breaking.

Because tonight, we're dying.

Because tonight, we're going home.

Because tonight, we will be in deep sleep wrapped in each other's arms.

In each other's arms, we will lie.

In each other's arms, the happiness shall linger.

In each other's arms, we'll carry on.

We'll carry on, with the flight of birds.

We'll carry on, like what they did in the end.

We'll carry on.

Because tonight, we will be in deep sleep wrapped

In each other's arms.

PDA (Why We Just Won't Care)

Public Display of Affection. Who’s affected, really?

Holding hands. Cuddlings. Strokes. Kisses. And then there goes your get-out-of-my-sight-because-I’m-plain-irritated stare. There goes the forehead wrinkles pointing to the nose, darkening the eyes and for a little while you whine and stomp a bit and you noisily flip the page of the book you’ve been trying to read and understand for hours already. From time to time you raise your head a little bit just too quickly to steal a glimpse of the couple, or perhaps the group of couples, or whatever was that in their loving that gives you that disgusted feeling.

Perhaps they’re just a bunch of unconcerned souls seeing nobody but their you-are-my-only-world partners, snuggling anywhere and anytime. Perhaps they’re bohemians, who believe in, above all things, love. Perhaps they’re non-conformists, battling the societal norms of conservative and oppressive behavior. Perhaps, it’s just your very own problem, not theirs.

So what was your problem, anyway? Does the very act of love - well, okay, perhaps it’s just lust or infatuation, but hell - hinder you from minding your own business? Does it stop you from doing what you were supposed to do, rather than taking time to look at them then just whine afterwards? Was that just bitter, envious perhaps? Was it your little version of voyeurism, then?

These PDAs doesn’t seem to be much of a negative externality than that of the noises people around make, disturbing you from doing what you should be doing, rather than the mere cuddling of a couple from the bench a bit far away. Besides, not everybody knows how to translate body language. Especially boys, see? Not everyone has the privilege to psych your actions out, to understand critically what you meant by flipping loudly the pages of your book. More likely then that they won’t care about you either. So it’s better to rely on the most direct way of communication: tell them to just stop, if it really bothers you that much. But first, try answering why you were bothered. Yes, it’s a matter of respect but people, we don’t know how much respect you expect from us. If you think PDA might be disrespectful, do you’re job by respectfully telling the culprit to move somewhere else, probably. Signs won’t work, seriously. People don’t interact with signs. People interact with people.

It’s either you confront them, or just don’t care.

Better Half.

I remember the frustration-stricken days of my high school, where everything felt so dark and gloomy, where everything seems to be conspiring, where everything makes me feel alone. It was an era of sadness, of the most obscure emotions, of maximum volume radio played with burned CDs of alternative rock, times in the room pretending to study hard but all I did was shout and cry, constantly praying to God that this ill feeling of extreme loneliness would go off.

It's not that I don't have any friends. I have a lot. Ever since gradeschool I have a lot of friends, people who walk in and walk out. It's just that I had no companion, no one to talk to about my own problems, my own things I'm concerned of and bothered about. All I was, was just to simply be a confidant, a good listener, a drain of everything friends of mine have poured into. I was just a vent.

But none of these friends, not a single one of them, listened to my own troubles, comforted me of my own worries, joined me in my own unfortunate quests. Neither of them knew what I was going through, because nobody asked, nobody noticed, and perhaps nobody cared. Perhaps I was just a piece of blank paper everyone had written on, making me who they want me to be, who they need me to be for the moment.

The reasons for the tears were those. All my life, as it had probably seemed to be at least for me, I have been wanting to have a companion, a best friend, a brother, or perhaps a twin. I was looking for that friend who will walk in and for the first time in my life will be concerned for me, will notice my troubles, will listen to my problems, will help me get through it, perhaps everything I could also drain myself into. Perhaps I've been looking for everything my friends were making me into, perhaps I was looking for another me, for me.

Now I think I haven't got through with this problem, but rather I got along with it. It's something I might just have to live by, not as a miserable fate but as a identity-creating trait. Probably it's just gonna come, as what a lot of people would helplessly and mindlessly say, or probably it's just gonna stay as it is and remain a wish forever.

Whatever it may be, I think for now I just want to get along with my friends and discover more who could just listen to me and all that. Sometimes they can be annoying but there are extraordinary times that come more often than what's supposed to be ordinary, then some friends simply become my confidants, probably one of my super friends, seem to be a brother, perhaps a twin, a better half of me. And I guess I'll just have to live with that, for the moment. But still a part of me wishes for the same damn thing that has remained to be a wish, a silent murmur within me, since the old days of loud alternative music and sobbing in the room, covered up by my pillows in solitude mourning for my own fate.

The silence.

It's 2 in the morning.

I wake up from a small dream, realizing that my left arm has been numb from your head sleeping on it. I decide to watch you as you sleep, as you breathe in and breathe out the air with pure tranquility. I watch as your chest moves up and down slowly, as your silent humming induced by your slumber invades the room. Then I raise my right arm to cuddle you, hold you tightly as you continue to sleep. I place my fingers to your lips, retracing the very exact lips I have kissed a while ago. I move them to your breasts, slowly travelling the curves down to your stomach.

Then as I might have already thought of, you wake up and find me circling your bellybutton with my right-hand fingers while my left arm feels the blood rush from being numb as used as your pillow. Before you open your mouth to speak of perhaps something sweet, I immediately kiss you, my hands looking for your hands, slowly assisting you to lay back down, my body above your body. But your hands reach for my neck, and your legs hanging on my back.

I can still feel the that same tiring feeling after we did that hours ago, but I also can still feel the same passionate exciting feeling.

I got the signal. I put away the blanket that covers us both, and you reach for me, my entirety within, and you kiss me back, hotter, harder. It's as if I can feel every bit of you, which I really do.

There's nothing else to remove. Everything's ready.

Here goes the second round.

The way I will hold your hand.

You're my living addiction.

My sweetest chocolate; my daily dose of sugar.

You're the painter of my smile, which I keep on putting on.

My life maze; my grandest puzzle.

You're my chosen one.

My summer sunshine; my shining star.

I love you.

Bowtie.

+

=

Bowtie Outfit

(as drawn by me)

I think I need to pursue this look for the next photoshoot (org aniversary). The problem is, I don't have the money yet to buy the things I need (spotted bowtie, vibrant and pastel-colored polo shirt, uhmm... skinny jeans or shorts, and uhmmm.... colossal ribbon for my head, perhaps?).

I suppose this is too perfect for me to achieve that "children's party" look, though it's a little bizarre. Believe me, it's simple. Really.

[PHOTO CREDITS | First photo: http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3470/3872402259_458a886d60_o.jpg; Second photo: (River Viiperi) http://fuckyeahriverviiperi.tumblr.com; Third photo: Mine, it's my careless drawing.]

But it's just a little...

CRUSH.

It's just a little crush that I had on you that's why I try to gaze at you as you walk down the sidewalk, flipping your hair in that nothing-to-care-at-all fashion, with my breathing synchronized with the pace of your footsteps. It's just that stupid little crush on you that I can't help myself but stare at you as you open your lips and do your talk, with your friends, as you sit atop the table, minding no one else as you wear that happy expression. It's just that good-for-nothing little crush that I always adore you, that only God knows how happy I am to praise you after your job-well-done moment, without the very you knowing it.

Perhaps it's just that. But why do I seem to be consistently obsessed with you? Why do I try to unravel your mysteries as I continue to enter your name in search engines and find you in popular social networking sites, looking at your pictures, reading your posts, feeling your emotions? Why do I attempt to follow you as you go out the door and go anywhere you're planning to go, even though I don't know it myself? Why do I seem to be staring right at you even though I know that you have already suspected me doing it? Why do I seem to want you, to possess you, to have you right by my side at this very moment, to touch your skin, to hold your hand, to have a heartfelt conversation with you, to hug you, to caress you more, to play your hair, to lick your ears, to kiss you, to -

Could it still be just that damn little crush?

Love Apple.

You said you love the smell of tomatoes.

I was just bored. All my friends were away and I was by myself. At that moment I didn't liked being alone, as I was, sitting in the lame white wooden chair sipping my order of white hot chocolate, reading the headline story of yesterday's newspaper. Then there was you, carelessly flipping your hair as you sit at the far opposite, waiting for your cup of coffee and probably thinking what next to do after this first thing in the morning. We were the only customers at the shop, so I collected enough confidence and grabbed my mug and threw the brown-stained newspaper on my table and I walked towards you. It was surprising, though, that your eyes stayed on what you were looking at for moments ago and never even bothered to see the one coming before I asked "Could I have a seat with you?".

You weren't surprised. You just turned your head to look at me, straight into my eye as I felt it. You displayed a very wonderful smile and said "Sure.". I returned your smile and sat down at the chair next to you. I bombarded you with interesting conversations. We talked and talked, learned about each other's lives, and fell to each other's traps of capture. And I, as I honestly say, was deeply captivated by you.

It was noon when we just stared at each other, and after realizing what we were doing we just smiled and laughed at ourselves. I said "Oh, it's nearly noon! Do you want to have lunch at my place?" and you said "Why, sure! I certainly miss home-cooked food since I moved here!" and I said "Alright then." and I, smiling, stood and took your hand and opened the passenger-seat door of my car and let you in and I got in to the driver's seat and before I could plug in the key into its hole and start the engine, you forcefully grabbed my face with both of your hands and kissed me. It was hot, your lips was. Your hands, hunting all over my body, were extremely hot too. I was unable to move probably due to shock of being kissed by a sudden acquaintance. Then you moved back. Looked down as if you were embarassed by yourself and you said "I love the smell of tomatoes.".

You said you love the smell of tomatoes.

Breach of contract.

[Hil's blog gets me inspired to write more posts. Haha.]

I already stopped loving you.

Or so I said.

Haven't we agreed on this long before? I can clearly remember it all:

No more conversations, especially at night.

No more staring in each other's eyes.

No more exclusive walks together.

No more holding hands.

No more hangouts.

No more sleepovers.

No more hugs.

No more kisses - especially French.

No more caressing.

No more foreplay.

And of course, yes, no more sex, and everything else related to that.

No more 'us'.

But then how can you explain what happened just that night?

How can you explain why you grabbed me by the hand from my sitting at the waiting shed?

How can you explain why you hugged me so tight that I felt like I don't want to ever let you go while I know inside me that I'm supposed to be on a date, meeting the girl that could be my everlasting, my wife, the one I'll be happy to be with for the rest of my life?

How can you explain why your hands travelled up my face, pulled it near yours, gazed at me for a while, and kissed me?

But then, how can I explain why I did not untangle my fingers from your clasp?

How can I explain why I hugged you back, oh so tight, that, yes, I don't want to ever let you go even though I know so consciously that I may be losing the best girl I could ever have in my life?

How can I explain why my hands travelled up and down your body and remained at your breasts, and how can I explain why I so wanted not to move my lips back but instead kiss you for what is like forever?

How can I explain why I seemed to fall in love with you again?

Uninspired.

Just as much as I thought that I could be oh so active in blogging whole summer, it was the entire opposite. Actually, looking at my archive count on the right of this page, this half-year has been a horrible blogging slowdown. What could have caused this, anyway? Perhaps I went too far on getting myself busy, really busy to think of something to post. Or maybe I lost my mind through all the work I was immersed into and expected of.

But I believe that I'm just a little uninspired. It's a scary condition, especially to those who regularly writes, for passion, for requirement, for hobby, for practice, for profession.

Just as how much I wanted to believe in other factors, I think I'm just a whole lot uninspired. I have no mind, no will to press the letters of the keyboard and make up another story, another poem, another rant, at the least. It's just that I may have exhausted my mind in all the problems and the responsibilities that has been bugging me for all these months. A whole lot of complex things has kept me from revolving into the things that I wanted. A lot of things kept me inside a box of restriction. They may have opened up some opportunities but they were rather unattainable, due to a lot of constraints, or rather too pragmatic and thus irritating.

The times, they may have been bad. But still I have to find a vent to escape from all this heat and entrapment. Oh well. I wish I could promise that I would be an active blogger after my freaking exam in Chemistry 1 tomorrow. To those who view this as soon as possible, oh please grant me all the luck and wisdom and knowledge that I need for tomorrow! :D

Hello, tan lines. (Hello, summer. When shall I say goodbye?)

Summer has bever been like this: occasional overnights to anywhere, wild moments with friends and not-so-friends, initial drinkings of alcoholic beverages, lonely dorm nights, internet insomnia, frequent emotional imbalances, plunging flow of money, pseudo-part-time jobs, meeting/hating/befriending new acquaintances, camping, swimming, getting ultimately distinguishable tan lines. Both are enjoyable and not enjoyable. Seriously. In so far, this could have been the best summer I had lived into, even though it has not yet ended.

Occasional overnights to anywhere

Of course, these are some of the things no one in my family knows about. By chance or by occasion (e.g. debut party, planning activity, etc.) I tend to go out very frequently, and go back home in the morning. It's a fresh start (or not, actually) to being able to stand alone and think for myself, without any external factors hindering me from doing what I choose to do.

Wild moments with friends and not so friends, initial drinking of alcoholic beverages

The summer heat makes the season wilder. Wild moments happen a lot of times, by any chance and by any means. Haha. I would probably miss those things when I get busier next semester. However, I started to accept drinking, but not as a habit but as an acceptable, tolerable, and controllable activity. I don't drink because of peer pressure or something. It's just that I choose to try and feel how it tastes like and probably get an excuse for doing something crazy. XD

Lonely dorm nights, internet insomnia

Having no roommate is a privilege. Seriously. It gets you concentrated and gives you total control on the order inside the room. However, it creates a crisis. I don't do all my tasks well, and not on time, really. I always sleep late due to LAN internet access and a lot of things interesting to see in there. Perhaps I should move being responsible later.

Frequent emotional imbalances, plunging flow of money, pseudo-part-time jobs

For some reason, I easily spark off my temper, and get things out of control. But a lot of times I simply get low energy and just won't talk, or won't move my eyes, and I would just probably stay silent and after a while prop myself to sleep. Making matters worse is the rapid outflow of my money allowances, making me hang on to almost entirely nothing for survival, plus, the STFAP (Student Tuition Fee Allocation Program) transferred me from Bracket C (P600 per unit) to a deadly Bracket B (P1000 per unit, then I might probably get 18 or 21 units, so how's that?) and I might not even make it to enrolling next semester, since we really can't afford everything. So with that I panicked and applied to ideal part-time jobs, and I got into two, where in the first one I have to make online reviews while on the second one I have to make academic papers. I wasn't working yet again so maybe that's a blow.

Meeting/hating/befriending new acquaintances

The summer classes and events make me meet a whole lot of people, awesome or not. And I always try my best to use the law of attraction to those who I want to be friends with. Haha. Familiarization. But I got something hanging there. Maybe I obtained a huge ego, and that's foul enough to turn down a friendship.

Camping, swimming, getting ultimately distinguishable tan lines

The PE 2 - Camping class is awesome, in the sense that I get to camp out and do things I might not even normally do even when out on the beach (yes, because we were always on the beach, and on the mountains). It's all so crazy. Swimming was the best part of it, however it really turned a risk to my arms. I have another set of tan lines, after that elementary set that still has not gotten off. Oh well. Better live with this. Besides, that's what summer is for. :)

Katipunan II

Happy endings are so passé. It was rather unattainable. As I thought, there would be not any happy ending for us, because we will last forever. But then, I realized that the last clause of the sentence should be simply cut off. It's not real. It's not forever. It's not a happy ending either. We're not gonna end up together.

5.42 PM

There's just too much people on a Friday afternoon at the Faculty Center waiting shed. I decided to take a seat on one of those green slabs since I won't get in any jeepney just yet anyway. There's just too much people.

It's been almost two months from now after we broke up. Yes, that odd girl from Spanish 11 of first year, we broke up. I thought we'd be happy together, viewing the entirety of Katipunan avenue on that blue Ateneo footbridge, holding our hands forever, sitting beside each other, simply listening to what's around us. But it was just a realized pipe dream. Those happy memories of time long gone just haunt me, like how it scares me to death to see a dead cat on the roadside or how it almost broke me to lose my wallet on my first Lantern Parade when I had just got my seven-thousand peso Christmas money from Dad. It's all gone and lifeless.

Should I even think that it broke my heart? From that morning she called me on the phone to tell me that she wanted to break up with me, I have never been so unstable as before. It's when everytime someone leaves you, you just get lost all of a sudden. Equilibrium lost me, too. I didn't know what I was thinking then, really. I was doing silly things like throwing my phone on the garbage container even if she had not hung up the call yet, crossing the road without even looking out for speeding cars, and accidentally breaking my eyeglasses when I was hurriedly running to class and I hit it badly on the corridor wall. Wearing contact lenses now just adds up to my carelessness problems, since I often doze off without any clue. I suppose it wasn't being bitter. Perhaps it's from being shocked instead, that even for the last person that I would want to love would still leave me hanging in this world by myself.

6.04 PM

Daylight flees to give way to the other celestial illuminants, and I'm still here sitting in the ugly green slab waiting for the people to go off. I know that I should've walked to the terminal near Benitez Hall instead, but I'm just too tired and at least I could rest my feet for a little while. Besides, it reminds me of our strolls and those other memories that I had junked into the garbage can along with my cell phone, that I just wanna have in my hand again, scroll to the never-erased messages and cherish the events I had marked in its calendar, and stare into the gallery's photographs and remember those days. Sometimes, I regret it. But maybe it's just what it should be.

Okay. So I might just have exaggerated it. Ever since that incident I had never been to Katipunan Avenue ever again, nor rode that red-roofed jeepney. So under the banner of moving on for a cause, I decided to go to Katipunan to spend the whole weekend at my best friend's place. I'm not so sure if I had actually moved on. Yes, I'm getting my life back from being disoriented. It's roughly eight weeks, and a lot of things had already happened. There's nothing to look back. There must be nothing to worry about. It's not like I cried over spilled milk. Tears have dried even before they came out. It's over. We were over.

6.07 PM

The jeepney is surprisingly spacious on a Friday dusk. I feel very tired that I just want to sleep, but ever since I was independent in going places, I've been always bad at sleeping while on a trip. If I attempt to sleep at this very moment, I might just repeat what I did when I was in third year high school that the driver even have to wake me up at the terminal, which was, by the way, too far from our house. Good thing I'm listening to music from my iPod. By paying attention to the music I can kill the drowsiness and let it die away.

Two months isn't that long anyway. It still feels like the usual Katipunan ride that I always take every Sunday to eat out or to go the Cubao or Marikina. It's still the usual thing where it's too seldom to see anyone I know. It's nothing new. It's - Wait. Is that her? She sure became prettier. We practically tried to avoid each other somehow and now she seems to be running to this jeepney. Oh no. Man, no. Okay. She successfully got in, and I can't hide. There's no way I can hide even just my face. Oh great. She sat beside me. How fated was that.

So what's it that I'm gonna do now? All of a sudden I feel like a dork. I let her break6 up with me without even listening to what else she was about to say in that call, particularly the reason why she broke up with me. I feel so stupid for eliminating contact with her even if it might appear to be alright anyway. I can see globules of sweat over my arms and I can feel the butterflies in my stomach. This is all so crazy. Damn, it feels like what Miley Cyrus "felt" in Party in the U.S.A.

6.12 PM

"Oh, it's you," she says, finally noticing me after a few moments of my sweating from anxiety. "Oh, yeah," I reply, finally looking at her face too, but just in a short glance. "It's been a long time since, isn't it?" She tells me. Yeah, I know. I'm sorry. "I'm sorry," she says some more. How come she tells me what I'm about to tell her? "Sorry for what?" I ask, acting like I had totally moved on and forgot that even for some four months we were together. Yeah, that was actually short to remember much of but I definitely know what a lie it would be. "For that call," she then replies, holding my hand that restlessly lies above my left knee. I turned my head back at her. W-why? I wanted to ask her why but I no sounds come out of my mouth, and instead I just gaze at her face, seemingly looking for the answers that obviously were not there.

"Forget it," I crack out, even though I really want to know her own reasons. "Yeah, I guess so," she agrees, and finally I see her smile again, that smile that for a lot of nights I've been missing so much when I'm lying in my bed reminiscing about the past, about our happy yet short memories, or that for some times in class I look out the open AS door and gaze at the sky that's peeking through the trees that reaches out to it amidst their constant fall of leaves. "So where're you heading?" I ask, trying to change the mood that we immersed ourselves into. "I'm going to Manila," she replies, "to a friend's party." I simply nod at what she had just said. I did not listen at all. Or I am unable to, since beside the jeepney is a speeding truck that distracts me from paying attention to her voice, the voice that even in the shower I thought calls me, the voice that even talks to me in my sleep when I'm in the Main Library - General Reference Section just after I send the crammed term paper of 6 sleepless hours to my professor's Gmail account.

6.25 PM

It's a Friday evening and we all know how Katipunan becomes a depressed sink hole of cars every now and then. And now I'm beside her again, and I deeply pray that this jeepney would run slower than everyone else, just so I could savor this moment, the only moment that's happening, which may not happen to us ever again.

I catch her staring at me. "What?" I ask, thinking if she was waiting an answer from me to an unheard question. "You seem to be so bothered," she says, without any other extra feat, just her lips artistically opening and closing at certain lengths. "Sorry," I apologized, "I guess I wasn't paying that much attention to anything."

6.38 PM

The slow flow of traffic is really getting to my nerves. I feel very uneasy right now, especially that I'm beside the woman I loved, and lost. For a long while there was no questions, no remarks, no voices. It becomes awkward around here as the minutes go by.

"It gets awkward, huh?" she says - how come she knows what I was exactly thinking? "Uh," I reply, "yeah. It does seems like." Then she smiled as I looked at her for a bit. Then her smile made me smile. Then my smile made her do a little laugh. Then it made me laugh a little too. Funny, as it is, that it becomes a game without us noticing it.

6.40 PM

"Hey," I call to her, "I wanna know why." "What why?" she replies, and I laugh. "Why you broke up," I say. "I thought you just want to forget about it," she says, and that reply just seemed to be silly to me. Or it made me feel like I'm silly. Of course I told her that we'll forget that. Of course I'm moving on, forgetting that myself, and that's why I'm hanging out with my best friend instead, finally after a lot of busy weeks that we had. Of course, what am I even thinking?

In a little while I'll be going down this jeepney and I might never see her face as close as this again. This might be the last time that I would fall for her, for the smile and the eyes and that sweet little face that I had missed for so long. Maybe it must all boil down to something. Maybe the feeling really should fade away. And maybe we don't have to stick together too just like what we usually do. Maybe this is just the way it is.

6.42 PM

"I'm leaving you now," I tell her, as I already see the blue Ateneo footbridge and the other establishments around, "someone's waiting for me." She smiled, as I expected. I pulled the string on the ceiling of the jeepney to signal the driver to hit the brake. "Goodbye," I say. Before I could even raise my body to move out of the vehicle, I'm very sure that I heard her say "I miss you so much." I know. I must know that. I missed her too. And I probably will miss her still.

Katipunan.

It was past eight in the dark and the sidewalk crowd rushed against me. I was trying to be careful not to drop the chocolate sundae I bought from Mini Stop and the people were making an effort to be careful too, this time to make sure they make it on the LRT immediately. Sometimes it feels like the world is conniving, that it's time to go home. So I did. And I hate to cross the street. Really. Vehicles just wouldn't bother; they don't see anything anyway.

The jeepney terminal was death in silence. I dug out seven peso coins from my back pocket, where I usually just drop coins and other small stuff. Then as I enter I realized that there weren't that much people at all. There were just five of us in the inert vehicle. I sat on the corner by the exit, which was my favorite spot since I don't have to bother myself attempting to reach the handles above and I can rest my back either on the sides or where it normally should be. The others were normally sitting, quite impatiently waiting for the jeep to go off, except for one who was lying down on the far end. It seems like he's no passenger at all. As usual I was minding my own business again. I finished helping myself with that damn chocolate sundae, which was rapidly dripping, faster than I could eat it. And while eating it I had to move up my glasses back in place again for a lot of times. As I keep the tissue in my pocket, someone called me and sat beside me. "Oh hey," I said back, "Where're you heading?"

It was that girl who always sat in front of me in Spanish 11 when I was in first year, second semester. She was the girl I had a crush on and I humiliated myself on that year's Valentine's Day confessing my love to her. As I think of it now, it was rather the stupidest mistake I ever made.

"I don't know," she replied, "I just feel like riding anywhere." She smiled at me. I didn't know what she was really up to, but it was indeed strange. "Cool," I said. Then I bowed my head and looked down. I noticed that she wasn't moving away her head from looking at me. It has been three years, and now, as I was thinking in my head, is she trying to seduce me? I felt her touching my chin, then I slightly shivered. I looked back at her. "What is it?" I asked. She just smiled. What was that? I wasn't raised to interpret her body language. It sure was strange. "How about I sleep over at your place tonight?" she asked. "That can't be," I said, "I'm a dormer." "Then stay over at my place then," she said with another smile. I could not understand. What was she up to, really? Seeing that I was drowned in my deepest thoughts again, she uttered some more. "Come on, stay over," she said, "Because I feel too lonely."

With her words I felt the same loneliness that she was talking about. After she released those meaningful sounds that my mind interpreted as 'because I feel too lonely,' I answered her, "For how long do you want me to stay over?" and she replied, "As long as you wanted to." The engine started since the seats were already filled, and she and I just looked at each other in the dim lights of the interior as the jeepney cruised the avenue. "Then for how long will you keep staring at me in the face?" I asked, somehow being naughty, but I never expected her reply: "Forever." I felt my eyes grew large a bit as she said that word. It felt like a joke, but then it felt like a trick, a trap, something weird, something bad.

I moved my stare away from her. She moved her hand over mine. I didn't know what to do. So I just smiled. I made sure she saw that. She placed her other hand over my glasses to remove it. "Carefully, please," I said. "You look better that way," she commented. "What are you up to?" I asked her. But she did not listen. Instead, she moved her head back and looked outside the window. The breeze sweeps her straight soft hair towards me. "We're here," she said as she slightly raised her hip to pull down the string that will stop the vehicle.

"What are you exactly doing?" I asked, somehow pissed off by this lovely strangeness of her pulling me up the blue Ateneo footbridge and doing all the other things tonight on me. But still I made sure to create an impression that I was already angry. I noticed that she clenched my eyeglasses a little bit harder. I noticed that she was also a bit taller than me too, which made it a lot weirder when she held my face with her both hands. Then she kissed me. Then she moved back. "You're blushing too much," she said. I should have known, I'm almost white-skinned and I get drunk red so easily. But I got so carried away that I haven't felt the blood rushing rapidly within me. I took hold of her jaw and kissed her again. It felt like time stopped and for a while I thought I lost my hearing. I had not realized that she accidentally dropped my eyeglasses, because, at that time, that kiss was what only mattered.

She pushed my head back, and apologized. "You can go home now," she told me, as she picked my eyeglasses from the cement floor, and fortunately it was not broken. "But why this all of a sudden?" I asked, as I wore the glasses again.. She said that she'll walk me home. "What about you?" I said. She just looked at me for a while. "What are you thinking?" I asked again. I didn't mind asking another question after an unanswered one. "You don't want to know that," she said. "Why do you want me to stay with you?" I asked, once more. By the way she looked it seemed to be inexplicable. "Remember the time you told me you love me?" she asked me. "Yeah, of course," I replied, "You practically humiliated me in the face of the whole CAL lobby." She looked at me again, straight into my eyes. I somehow felt a strange kind of attachment to her whenever we look at each other. It was different, peculiar. It was - "wanted you since then," - wait a minute. "What? What did you just say?" I said, because I haven't heard what she fully said. She said she wanted me. For real? "I said, I wanted you since then," she repeated, "but we haven't seen each other in a long while so I somehow forgot about it myself." I felt my blood rushing again all over my body. She is one too peculiar.

As she spoke to me those words I felt her loneliness again. I realized that I was also lonely all this time, and by being together maybe we could fight it off. I held her hand and we sat in the middle of the footbridge, and gazed at the sky, at the road, at each other. Everything seemed to be silent. And this silence had been the best of all.

*Because it wasn't included in Salidsid, the Sinag-CSSP literary folio, I can now post this entry freely. :)

Ignorance and Displacement.

It's odd and annoying at the same time.

It feels like the world is in a conspiracy.

I again for some thought do not know who my real friends are, who they could be, and why they just don't seem so.

I don't know why friends should be called friends when they just disappear at times you need them, dump you after they used you, leave you hanging without a clue. I don't know how friends can take that but hell, I'm too tired of listening to others without anyone listening to me. I'm tired of attitudes, egos, pride. I wanna vomit all the lies they have to make just not to make it look bad but still I know what a lie it was and how awful they really are. I'm sick of self-appraisal, false cares, irrational thinking, superrational thinking, indestructible worldviews, closed-mindedness.

[My. Shut the mouths of those nerds! Irritating.]

I wouldn't want to care anymore.

Getting it all back.

Finally, it's March. The past few months were abusively spent on almost sleepless weeks of horrible tasks and studying. I lost time for myself. Rather, it was a struggle for survival, not necessarily for me, but for accomplishing responsibilities and maintaining a desirable academic grade. I kinda lost time for my own self, my own interests, and the things that really pleases me. I was busy facing the laptop screen creating publicity materials and identification cards, kept myself in my room (which is better as I found out) rewriting notes and highlighting my Economics book, drowning myself in a rush of thoughts and battle of concepts, attending org activities, occasionally cutting classes, little visits to the library, walking here and there, shouting at friends, getting irritated by everyone's attitudes, panicking from time to time, rushing every work to be done, stealing few hours for sleep (and in class too), and eating and spending too much. Even eating and sleeping aren't leisure stuff anymore. They became tasks to be done for survival. Everything I did then was all for survival. Leisure seemed to be too expensive: I cannot afford it, along with the lineup of tasks that await me.

There floated in front of me a high opportunity cost of substituting work for leisure. Risks await me for every action that I do. It's like taking a journey on an upward-sloping (supply curve?) pavement filled with vines that would easily trap me and make me immobile. Assessing myself, I seem to be vulnerable to all pressures, yet I seem to be strong enough to outlive them.

Damn. A lot of challenges have already passed and a lot more are coming in. But I want to get a grip of my life first. I should steer, not row!

If it's not gonna work,

Let me know.

Let me know how failing we are.

Let me know all the trouble that I had caused you.

Let me know that you don't want me anymore.

Let me know how stupid I am.

Let me know that I am a jerk.

Let me know how much you used to love me.

Let me know how much you hate me.

Let me know that it's gonna linger forever.

Let me know that you never wanted to see me again.

Let me know that you loathe me.

Let me know.

It's totally okay.

My life is full of pain anyway, so why not add up to it?

All I See are Lines and Curves.

I woke up to the ringing of the phone. Mom. Alarm.

Yeah, I’ll get up to bed, I said. I did not.

I was staring at the ceiling, gazing at the lines.

Lines and curves that haunt me.

I got out of bed and dragged myself into the shower.

Someone played such an awful song.

I hurried to go out of the cubicle.

My general instruction was not to let these examinations ruin my day. Never.

I tried to open the book.

In a very little time, law of diminishing returns might tell me that it’s not good to study now.

More inputs, less outputs.

I went to school, walking against the stream of joggers in the human-car avenue.

I managed to avoid externalities. I managed to be just calm.

I read a bit again. Review. Or so I called it.

Walk in, walk in, they said. Walk in.

The room was rather too bright. Too peaceful.

In the middle of staring at the empty questions my eyes closed.

It wasn’t that hard, isn’t it, a colleague remarked.

Yeah, right, I said. Really.

Next one’s gonna come, I remembered.

I’m not ready.

I haven’t read anything good.

I haven’t tried to understand.

It was rather a big pain.

A big pain it was.

Migraine invaded me.

The calm look of before started to be terrorized by worry-lines.

I haven’t prepared for the curves.

Lunch.

We walked for lunch. Real lunch.

By the time we came back, there was no more time.

Scans, scans, scans.

I thought I need more time.

I realized I needed divine intervention.

It was time.

Walk in, walk in.

Once inside, abandon all hope.

The resonant trembling in my head paralyzed me in the chair.

It was rather not for thinking, but for dying.

Answer sheets. Questionnaires.

The cold air seemed to wage war with my awkward heat.

Fuck, what was that? How come I forgot to read this part before?

Firms. Competition.

Marginal. Fixed. Average.

Cost. Revenue.

My inside self went on searching.

Answers. Ideas. Correct ones.

There were hardly any.

I just wanted to explode into small pieces.

Oh how lovely.

Two hours passed and I was more awkward.

As awkward as ever.

The proctor playfully went to and fro the room.

He seemed to be entertained by our answer sheets.

I was trying to give him my don’t-try-to-look-at-me-or-even-go-near aura.

It failed.

Of course, I can’t cast it to him with my eyes.

I’m too busy trying to understand how things work.

Two and half hours.

I was dying to go out of the room.

It was rather hell.

Ten minutes before third hour.

I stood up. Gave my papers.

I wanted to show him my awesome get-off-me stare.

But I attempted to be as calm as ever.

I went out.

How I dreamed of banging the door.

How I wish I could just blame the proctor.

But I can never do that.

The marginal utility might not justify the marginal utility.