Sapay Koma: "August"

Almost two years after an experience of loss, tragedy, hopelessness, and even the toll of having enemies, I barely recognized my dreams and my goals. Everything became bleak, uncertain, almost confusing. To re-examine one’s life must be one of the most difficult stage of moving on. After my father’s death in that gloomy August, I lost the passion and drive to become what I dreamed of - I was depressed. Failure, it seems to me, has become a familiar visitor, a friend which stays, not really to taunt, but to keep me out from the brink of insanity. “This is life”, I muse from time to time.

But I’m not a kid anymore. I write about hope, and damn put my belief on it - that no matter how wrong things seem, it will always turn out alright in the end. I felt good about that idea, who wouldn’t? Acceptance, however, is most easily said than done. My father’s death has become the death of one of my dream’s purpose – to impress him, to prove that I can do things, to prove that I’m not immature. But then, all becomes irrelevant in the face of death.   That day, I also died. It is not what I want, who would want that anyway? but perhaps...it is what I need.

What did I need? What did a self-aggrandizing irresponsible prick want? Surely, I was heavily confused back then. It may have changed in the last two years. To a certain extent, I hoped that I gained a sensibility common to those who have experienced grief, or loss – humility, among others, and a deeper appreciation of life. A couple of years may not have totally changed me, nor was my experience the ultimate tragedy that may shatter one and mend the same anew to a better one (there are countless others who went through worse), I would like to believe that in those years, I did not just lose a life…that I also reclaimed one myself.

What’s the rush in August? I always ask. But, before I tell the story of August, one may wonder about that first week of December. It may not be that hyped month of hearts, but nevertheless a very interesting one; and that cold merry night after the shared boozed laughter…and two lonely people decided to spend a long special moment together. Ah, how can I make it sound romantic? The story is rarely found on the sheets and the pillows. The real story started when we received the biggest surprise of our lives.

I may have also surprised everyone. And believe me, I know the repercussions. But, for what it is worth, and after the painful gossip of politics, regretful comments, burning bridges, and what have you-- of ‘what ifs’ and ‘whys’ ,and, even if I may hurt that other one who might be waiting for me on the other side of the world, or even that other one in our neighborhood, how can I deny the existence of a very special gift? How can't I yearn to feel his first kicks in his mom's tummy? To see his sleepy eyes on his first day?  I couldn't. For me, telling the world, and having him in our home, and being a father, a good father, is the right thing to do. Even when my life is really full of wrongs, I wouldn’t dare add this on top of it. To tell the world that I have a son, is one of the better things I did in a long time. Indeed, it is, really, the right thing to do.

What’s my rush in August? Two years ago, I dreaded this rainy month for taking away one valuable life from us...But from that, it reminded me that everything has its own time and reason -- the rains may take life away, but it may also nourish and give another one. This August, the night must finally give way to the day, and just like the seasons, there is a time to be a kid, and a time to have one. Life, can't be meaningless after all...

                            - I will always be here Vash Gray !

Free beer (Fast Fiction)

A little of the moist he considered only necessary to swab the chalk dust which settled on his palms. ‘501’ must be reduced by pummeling small arrows from a good seven feet and nine inches away – the one-fourth inch tape included. The bucket of beer for him was never just a bet, not even the packs of cigarette. What is it that sets their mood? A Billy Joel song? The new nineteen-year old waitress?

“Double twenty!” his new partner yelled. And double twenty indeed. At forty, he had doubled his wealth but also doubled his wives (and debts). ‘Men and their insatiable pleasures’, they always say that. But, in his many years of drinking with journalists, politicians, lawyers, doctors, teachers, artists, musicians, and what have you, he had come up with the conclusion that men are pigs indeed. At least after a few beers.

The college students on table number four beside the bar exploded with laughter, probably talking about some little adventure they did. He used to be as trim as them, he remembered. Then work, age, and stress came; and the car he bought was used more often, even on a mere five-hundred-meter walk. It didn't help too that big grills of pork and beef became part of his daily diet. Add the visits at bars to drown the pressure of two wives, and his weight is doomed to rise.‘Screw life, we eat and drink because tomorrow we die’. They always say that. Not after a bypass or a costly operation though. A visit to the doctor in some pale room always scares them. Changes them a bit, and makes them re-evaluate their lives – even their last will and testament. He had thought about that too. After all, a few of his friends had already kicked the bucket to meet their maker.

 

“Out!” his partner had aimed for that green flake of that pie but missed. Perhaps that it is the price for secretly cursing the moon. He steadied himself mechanically to execute the drill. For that moment, he was a deity holding a thunder bolt. Just like an artist who escapes this world by painting their own reality, he raised his left hand victoriously for a high-five. His minions rose to applaud. They are now sure that the couple of beers they have grabbed are free. 

Nothing beats free beers.

"Squatter"

He counted the men with powerful tools and concluded that they are almost as many as the thirty armed uniforms that came to assist them. The resonance of the beating and piercing instruments reminded him of the same sight five years ago – when ‘they’ demolished his make-shift home upon the court's order. The scars on his head are still throbbing.

His home is similar to the first house they beat with their metal claws; tearing the tin roof apart, kicking the wooden frames, flaking all the tin sheets which served as its cheap wall. In exactly five minutes, they’re done with it. A man with a plastic crown pointed towards his direction and for a moment he frost.

“Ket kasanu? Inya ngay garud ket saan yu nga kanya daytoy lote? Apay Ada TRO yu….?” they approached his home.

He didn’t really understood what TRO is, but, the sight of the gang with big metal tools clearly scared him. He understood that he has to go. “Sir, mabalin nga iparwar tayu pay dagitoy usar ko?”, he can only plead. The engineer batted his eye, he knew that the guy with a plastic crown hated his job. This job.

After pulling out his things, he reminisce the places where he found the bed sheets, the old plastic chair, the frying pan…even that old calendar with a pretty woman. He had felt joy on each event he picked those things because he can add them to his little kingdom. He was, after all,  born poor and had lived with his mother before she died. He didn't have a family since then. He came to the city years ago and managed to survive by doing any work that requires physical labor...it is the only thing that he can offer - his arms, his shoulder, his hips, his legs. These, he knew, won't last for a very long time.

The gang members with metal tools were laughing. It has something to do with one of them who joked about “squatters”. He is familiar with the term because he had heard it often, and have learned to shun it. However, he couldn't understand why one can laugh even on the sight of a grieving person. He only needed less than ten square meters for his life – a place to stay, a place to hide against the sun,  the chill, the rain. 

He heard that the owner already has a lot of houses. He only prayed for a box which he can run to. He wandered away and wept.

He asked God why some people have everything, and some have none; like his existence, his dirt-like existence. 

The Preacher

He did good. The church will give eighty percent of its tithes and offerings to the Golden Pyramid. Given the vast followers of the fellowship, it can attach thousands of people from its 'bottom' mark. The 'multi-level marketing' business will have another 'market' The production of cash will be instantaneous. He suspected that the lawyer and policeman in the congregation will raise their suspicion, but the networking business is not exactly illegal.

He has been their head pastor for 10 years. He managed to exploit the verses about tithing, or giving 10% of church-members’ income, aside from their church-offerings and love offerings. As their accountant and pastor, he had managed to build a house for himself and even bought a car. It was not enough.  In the Philippines, there are actually four ways to get rich; first is to get into business, another is to work abroad, another is to become a politician or work in government office, and the last and most infamous, actually  almost a taboo to mention is… to build your own ‘church’. He took the fourth path.

In a minute, he will give another speech for the afternoon session. He took his bible and balanced it with the heavy gold ring he wore on his left hand. He walked nonchalantly at the door but transformed automatically into the gleeful leader he projects to his members when he appears before them. He proceeded to the pulpit; he was almost a different person. After the prayer and the usual ‘good days’, he played his gold ring in the pages of Mathew 23:23 and try to tell the church that Jesus criticized people, even the Pharisees who did not observe ‘tithing’. He saw a few people who budged uncomfortably and concluded that they were those who do not give their ten percent income to the church. He tried his best to hide his irritation.

“God told me that the Golden Pyramid will help us. He whispered it to me. And those who doubted this must come to see the check that we received in joining their business. We gained an income of Fifty- thousand pesos in a month by just putting our church-funds in their hands. This is a blessing given by the Lord! Amen?”

“Amen!!” The church had developed a mechanism of saying ‘amen’ immediately after the preacher would say, ‘amen’. Just like how babies respond to their mothers' lullabyes.

He paused, and saw it already: Three million pesos after nine months. Mr. Lee assured him, the business will close at the end of the year, employees will disperse wildly, and the account managers will take the fall while Mr. Lee and the other VIP’s will be on their way to Australia. Another pyramiding scam news. The church funds which were supposed to be used for its' building's construction but were put into the business’ network fund will vanish, actually, transferred to the pastor’s secret bank account. Brilliant.

He cut himself on the pleasure of that day-dream. He ended the sermon after an hour- long ceremony of saying  “Jesus" and “God” and “Lord” repeatedly, he almost felt guilt. But he couldn’t. He marched slowly in the front rows for people to shake his hands. He has to maintain that smile for another ten minutes. After shaking about twenty hands, he saw a familiar face in the right aisle - the policeman from the morning session. He was not smiling, at all.

He didn't care. That policeman can find another church or be labeled a backslider.