VII.
Even though there are no more classes for senior students, I still go to the university because of extra-curricular activities. At the moment we’re busy with the annual literary folio scheduled to be released this week although we know that we cannot push it through. Also, I am obviously busy with something, or someone, for better or for worse. Today we’re scheduled to go out, and I have this creeping feeling that it’ll be postponed again because she’s not replying to my text messages. My frustration with my entries for the folio now mixes with those for her. I decide to check upstairs if she’s still there, and when I arrive at the lobby upstairs I see a long line of students; the final examination for non-graduating students is scheduled next week and their tuition fees are due this day. I see Joyce pacing around the lobby, holding envelopes. I call her and she excuses herself, apologizing because she has tons of deadlines to meet. I walk towards her classmates seated on the floor in front of their classroom, discussing something.
“Kuya Zaldy, ang dami naming ginagawa oh!” Chesca says.
“Ano ba yan?”
Charlene, their classmate, slides in. “Sa Sociology subject namin. Buti nga na-extend yung deadline eh. Kaya nga hindi rin kayo natuloy ni Joyce ngayon.” It seems that their whole section knows that we’re supposed to be going out, unbelievable. Charlene continues.
“Pwede mo ba kaming tulungan? Paki-explain naman nitong theories, paki-check kung tama yung ginawa namin.”
I check their papers and made comments about it, suggesting some editions and omissions, correcting some errors. An hour after leafing through their pages, we start to talk about the professors for a break. Someone suggests that we go to McDonald’s and Joyce asks me to come along. Of course I oblige, anticipating that this would be fun.
After ordering food, we settle on a table beside the glass wall. Joyce’s classmates are teasing us. We’re sitting side by side.
“Eh kuya Zaldy, may gusto ka ba talaga kay Joyce?” they asked, giggling like high school girls.
“Ha? Eh…”
“Ano nga?”
“Tanong natin kay Joyce.” I turn to her and ask, “Joyce, ano sa palagay mo, may gusto nga ba talaga ‘ko sa ‘yo?”
She blushes, smiles nervously and hides her face behind my shoulders, slapping it.
“Ano ka ba? Ano ba kayo? Tigilan nyo na nga yan!” We all laugh. We continue to talk, random topics, while we make fun of each other using exaggeration, sarcasm and false flattery.
“Wala ka bang kalaro nung bata ka?”
“Ang ganda naman ng boses mo,
“Manganganak ka ng kikiam!”
We’re all having a good time, and my attention is not only on Joyce but more on her classmates, her friends, her support system. It’s incredible.
After eating, we leave and Joyce asks me to accompany her to the catwalk where her friend, Kat, is waiting for her. Minutes later we see Kat, who looks nothing like when she is in her uniform, like now, looking pretty. She is from
They sit on a bench, and I stand behind Joyce, giving her a back rub. While kneading her slumped shoulders, I feel that it’s ridden with cold bumps. Heavy bags? They begin to talk about something, about a guy who apparently has caused them trouble for the past weeks. They hate the guy, but at some point in the past they both felt the opposite.
Who is this little prick? I’ll break him into pieces. I want to bury him up to his neck and leave him with two hungry huskies, who would be tearing his flesh from his face while being unable to do anything but scream at the top of his lungs.
They continue to talk about the jerk, not minding me, as if I am non-existent. How dare she talk about such while I am here! I want to wring Joyce’s neck, bump her head against Kat’s.
I change the topic after the back rub; we make fun of each other because I sense that they need to be diverted from the previous one. After the sun sets, Joyce says that we all should be going home because it’s already late. We take her outside the campus where she hails a jeepney, we say goodbye to each other. Kat is supposed to get a ride from an FX on the other side of the road; we take the overpass and wait. I look at Kat, so cute in a way, looking like a little girl, at least to me, even though she looks like a bulimic. Then I think of a friend, Ken, a guy who looks much younger at his age, the type whom little girls would steal glances at and would hurry to sit beside while attending mass. Would Ken and Kat like each other? Surely they would. We could go on a double date! Ken and Kat, Joyce and me, would dine in an Indian restaurant, go to exotic locales and look at its shining stars in its immaculate skies at night—
“Zaldy.”
We could build a bonfire—
“Hoy Zaldy!”
“Ha? Bakit?”
“May gusto ka ba talaga kay Joyce?”
Why this question again, twice a day? “Obvious ba? Meron syempre.”
“
“Uhm, oo. Bakit mo naman naitanong?”
“Eh kasi… Atin-atin lang ‘to ha. Sa palagay ko kasi hindi ka niya papayagang manligaw.”
Then, in the distance, was the sound of rolling thunder, a crack of lightning striking what seemed to be a goat.
“Ha? Bakit naman?” I ask, nervously.
“Kasi masyado siyang maraming ginagawa bukod pa sa school. Tapos scholar pa siya, so wala siyang panahon sa mga ganyan.”
Is this an excuse? I look at Kat, she is biting her lip, as if she doesn’t want to hear what she is saying. The traffic is terribly slow.
“Ganun ba?”
“Oo.”
I change the subject and we resume making fun with each other’s looks. She asks me a lot of questions; the feeling of someone graduating in weeks, the hassles of my major, my past relationships (which I don’t have), why on earth does there have to be rush hour. An FX finally pulls over and we say goodbye to each other.
I don’t know why Kat told me such things. Is it an excuse? Or is she concerned? I really hope it’s the latter. I begin to think of other ways, detours en route to Joyce but my mind’s all too clouded to come up with a solution to this labyrinth. Why is it that when I ask what’s the matter with her, something comes up that I can’t do anything about? Maybe I have to stop asking questions, to anyone or myself, because it seems that everytime I do, my face is being shoved against a wall, the answer being more peculiar and appalling than I expected, and it only builds up, my cumulative frustration in any of this. Now I have to prove something, that even though she is preoccupied with all those things, she could make an exception for someone like me. But it’s too much, too complicated, and I don’t know if it’s worth the effort because now my time is being expended in this endeavor although honestly, I have been giving up one important thing in dating—opportunity—for someone who isn’t even sure if she likes to go out with me, oblivious to the fact that I like her. Now, I begin to fear something, that what I am doing is just chasing the wind: all useless.
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