train tracks
Mar. 22nd, 2010 07:40 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
levityWritten one year ago, about. I don't like it very much, and it reeks of Murakami and Gaiman, but it wasn't as bad as I initially thought it was.
---
We were scheduled to have badminton and soccer and swimming- rather a full schedule for one evening’s worth of a class reunion, but nothing else could be expected, not if your hostess was the impossible Cinna Cosine- but by the time it was cool enough to do anything besides hide in the sala and play poker rain had started pouring, by the gallon, by the bucket, by the ton, and lightning had begun to crackle against the decidedly grey sky. The badminton court was splattered with rain, the lawn had transformed into an interminable mush reminiscent of the old school soccer swamp, and while the pool hadn’t changed much save for the presence of several stray leaves no one who had any sense was up to taking a chance on swimming while lightning flashed in the sky. Cinna was all for it, and Gelo told us that based on the length of time that had passed between a bolt of lightning and its corresponding roll of thunder we were more likely to drown than get electrocuted, and truth be told had we been the teenagers we were when we met we would have been in that pool in a flash, or even kicking an old ball around the slush that was Cinna’s front lawn. The sad thing about growing up is that you gain something that resembles but is not quite common sense, and you’re actually glad to gain it, even if it meant giving up playing soccer in the mud. You don’t complain about something that keeps you alive.
Gelo challenged whoever wanted to play to a game of billiards- he had spotted a table in a corner of the library- and enough people took him on to make Cinna order them to haul the billiards table out onto the porch. It was fun to watch engineers and doctors and entrepreneurs struggle with the heavy wooden thing, but then she had turned on me and ordered me to help them. She was as bossy as her high school self, but seeing as she was the country’s leading med school’s wonder girl, just as bossy was almost a relief.
“Make sure you don’t hit anything on your way out- Wait a bit there, I’ll open that- Okay, make sure not to hit the-” She threw her hands up in the air in exasperation as a table leg collided with a flower pot on the porch.
Gelo raised his hands in a gesture of surrender, causing him to drop his corner of the table. “Sorry!” Realising they were not yet at their destination he picked up his corner of the table again, talking as he walked backwards. “It’s not my fault! I didn’t see it! I was walking backwards, I can’t see out of the back of my head-”
“First you clog up our toilet, then you break a flower pot!” Gelo’s clogging up their toilet during one of our class outings was a pet story of Cinna’s. “It’s a wonder I allow you to set foot in my house at all!
“You would never throw me out of your house. I’m too interesting.” Gelo was as interesting as he had been ten years ago, even though he had lost the mohawk. He hadn’t seemed to lose anything else.
“You’re interesting- locked inside a cage with the rest of your family, that is.”
“You’re still in love with me, Cinna?! I thought you had gotten over me ages ago!”
“I’m an animal lover, my dear, there isn’t much you can do about it.”
As old as we had gotten we still appreciated friendly banter, and Cinna’s riposte left Gelo with a wounded expression and us with our lungs hurting from the laughter. Iggy came to Gelo’s rescue. “The Homo sapiens sapiens is a member of the animal kingdom!”
“Okay. My responsibilities to the world of science prevent me from throwing Gelo out into the streets. I doubt any researches on a creature like him exist.”
“Cinna!” James broke in. “Will you stop lecturing Benj and let us get on with our billiards game?!”
Cinna threw her hands up in exasperation.
James twirled his index finger around his ear in the universal sign of mental incapacity.
Gelo tried not to laugh since he had just been saved, but found that he couldn’t quite manage it, and ended up crouched under the table, pretending to look for something, hilarity choking his features.
Our hostess resumed the tasks of a hostess, wandering into the kitchen and giving orders to the maid of at least ten years and the other hired help in a voice that carried to the porch. “We need lights. Grace, turn on the lamps outside, you know where the switches are. If the rain clears up- no, I don’t think it’s a good idea to eat outside in any case. Open the dining-room doors to the porch and set tables in both. For goodness sakes, not now, it’s barely five. What’re we having for dinner? Is there enough?”
“You know what would be just right for this weather?” I remarked. “A ghost story. You know, the type of thing kids tell around a bonfire. It doesn’t matter how old the story is, or how corny. It’s just the right thing for the setting.”
“The last time we did that Tin there was scared out of her wits,” Jeanne said.
The offended party looked up from the cell phone she was tapping a message on. “I was not!”
“You refused to go out of the living room alone, how is that not scared?”
“Well, who has a ghost story?” Iggy asked.
Every eye turned towards Lina, resident literary genius. “Why are you all looking at me?”
“Well, we want a ghost story.”
“Just because I write doesn’t mean I have a stock of ghost stories at hand.”
“You should, it would prove very useful,” I said. “When you’re around bored people with nothing to do save stifle yawns in each others company-”
“She doesn’t need ghost stories to scare, all she needs to do is poke her head through the door. Everyone in the room would be running in the opposite direction screaming at the top of their lungs” said Cinna, emerging from the double doors that marked the entrance to the dining room.
“Is that how you show your gratitude towards your research group-mate of one whole year? I have never felt so betrayed in my entire life.”
“Yes, this is how I show my gratitude towards the reason why I spent fourth year running to the clinic for burn ointment.”
“Do you have a ghost story?” Iggy asked Cinna. Of course she did- her Pangasinan house, the house we were staying at, had seen more years than any three of us have combined, and all old houses have accompanying ghost stories.
“Of course,” she said. “It’s a long one, though. It happened to me, not to someone else in the family. Probably the first ghost story you’ve heard that wasn’t on hearsay.”
We listened, calmly and without getting into the story itself. As I had said, it was less the story than it was the fact that there was someone telling it. Oh, we listened, all right, and we were as interested as anything, but it had nothing to do with the story- she could have given us the one about the hook-handed guy for all we cared. Maybe it was the weather, because the rain had not stopped and the sky was as grey as ever and it was the perfect weather to relax in, or maybe it was the awkwardness of high school classmates trying to get to know each other again, after ten years of going our separate ways, but it was nice to hear a familiar voice prattle, especially if the said familiar voice wasn’t giving orders, for a change.
She started by saying, “This happened the summer before our third year,” and it was all uphill from there.
---
I was born in Manila and I went to high school in Manila- but you all know that, for goodness’ sakes you’re my high school classmates. I was always a provincial girl at heart- but I guess you know that as well. Anyway. This place of mine is five hours away from Quezon City, six hours if you ride a really slow provincial bus, but every chance I got I went home to bike. Stop staring at me like that, we’ve known each other ten years and you still don’t know I can bike?! Shame. Well, I remember each fair I surprised at least one person by knowing how to bike, but that was forgivable, we were all learning things back then, and some of those things were about other people. Damn, I think I’ve gone off topic.
I have liked biking ever since I can remember- around here, I could have gone anywhere I wanted, as long as I was back before dinner. Every trip out had the potential for adventure. I found it hard to kick the habit when I went to Manila for high school- do I sound like a drug addict?- but I also found it was equally hard to keep it up. You can say whatever you like about the potential for adventure in the heart of the city, but you couldn’t turn a corner without having to make sure nothing was there to run you over, which sucked, really.
So every chance I had, I went home, and every time I went home, I made sure to take the bicycle out on a spin. My mom used to get mad at me for waking up at six in the morning to bike, part because she thought I needed more rest after the trip home, and part because I never woke up that early when it was a school day. But really, who has the energy to get up early on a school day?
So I was out biking one summer day along the train tracks. It was past five, around the same time as it is now, but this was in summer and the sky couldn’t have been clearer if a watercolorist had done it. You saw the train tracks- we passed over them a while ago, on the highway. At that time they were long since closed. My grandfather used to talk about it a lot- for a time he had lived in Manila and worked here in Pangasinan, and he took the train every day. After it closed I traveled along it, but I was always ever the only one. The summer I was nine I went looking for the C------- train station. I found it, a dilapidated old wooden building, and though it was not interesting in itself- and a bit dangerous, too, for I was down with a fever the week after that and not even the doctor was able to figure out why- I continued biking along the track. The deserted railway was an adventure in itself, I guess.
The sky was clear and the weeds that grew wherever they weren’t pulled out or burned were browning, and that summer afternoon I saw another bike lying along the side of the tracks.
It was a very small bike, red with a basket and ribbons along the handlebars, the kind of bike you’d give your daughter for her birthday. I knew that something was lying on the grass from a long way away- if you’d seen how suddenly a bunch of grass that would originally be sticking up was being pressed down, you’d know it too- but I had no idea it was a bike. The rest of the grass obscured my view. I didn’t want to go near it, really, but it was a shame to turn back on a path I had never had any trouble with, not even a snake.
From the ribbons on the handlebars anyone would have realised that the rider was a girl, and I had realised that before I saw her sitting by the edge of the track.
She was a cute kid- about nine or ten, around the same age I was when I first went biking along this way, and my first thought was that she looked familiar, the way an old friend or a family member would look, even though you haven’t seen them for the longest of times. She had brown hair, really brown, that shone like a gold ring when under the sun, thrown over her back in a braid, and skin that was probably fair before it was sunburned. Bright eyes, too, but what kid doesn’t have bright eyes? It’s practically part of the job application.
“Hi,” I said. “Do you need help with anything?”
Her mouth was set in a line that wasn’t a scowl but wasn’t a smile either. “Hello.”
I guess I wanted to reassure her, because she seemed a suspicious sort, the sort who’ve been reminded not to talk to strangers too many times, but a polite one, too. “Do you usually bike this way? I come here sometimes, but I’ve never seen anyone else.”
She stood up. “Come here,” she said.
I blinked, thinking for a moment of old Filipino legends, wondering if tiyanaks grew up, but I got off my bicycle and took a step towards her, a small one, so I didn’t have to let go of the handlebars.
She met my eye, unsmiling. I had no idea what she was looking for, but evidently she had found it, since she relaxed. “Okay. You’re okay.” She returned to her bike and propped it up. “My pant leg got stuck in the chain, and I had to untangle it.”
“Where are you going?” I asked. I would be lying to say that I didn’t mind sharing my bike path, but the fun of being alone wore out after a month of summer biking, and she seemed like a nice kid.
“Down the track.” She pointed at my bike route. “My grandfather says that there used to be a lot of train stations that way, and I wanted to take a look for myself. It’s the first time for me to be here, it’s a wonder Mom let me.”
I smiled ruefully, remembering that I had felt the same way, the first time I was allowed to bike outside the house without a companion. “Well, they have to let us grow up sometime.”
“Have you been here before?”
“Yup. I bike along this way a lot, especially during summer. When it’s the rainy season I stick to the town- it’s always a hell of a hard time biking through the mud- but in summer when the towns full of kids on holiday a quieter place is nice.”
“How far have you gone?”
“Not very. Well, not very in terms of the railway. I guess I was about your age- how old are you, anyway?”
“Nine. I’m turning ten in August.”
“Okay, so I was exactly your age when I first biked here. I biked till I reached the C------- train station. It’s pretty far away- not anymore for me since I’m used to being out all day, but it may be for you. Sometimes I go past it, but I’ve never reached another train station.”
“So it’s the only one that you’ve seen?”
“Yup. It wasn’t very interesting- just a boarded-up old building.”
“Do you think I can get there on bike?”
I took a look at her. She wasn’t a professional, but at her age, who was? “Sure. Mind if I come along?” I thought of the long ride, and of the fever I had contracted afterwards, and I wondered if perhaps the long trip would be too much for her. If you tell a kid that a building is near enough, they believe you, and I didn’t want this kid to come to any harm because of what I had said.
She hopped on her bike. “Not really.”
So we set off, she in search of the train station, me in search of- well, in search of something. Right now, in this garden waiting for the rain to stop, it’s probably easier to imagine the nine-year-old girl than the fourteen-year-old one. She wanted the same thing we want now- she wanted a break from the monotony, even if it meant biking off into the unknown with a stranger. I wanted- I don’t know what I wanted. Who knows what any fourteen-year-old wants? Not a kid anymore, but not yet old enough to drink or live alone or legally fall in love. Too old for magic that could whisk you away to a different world, too young for society and stability and whatever it is we think of now. Look at me, I’m rambling again, talking about the good old days.
We talked as we bicycled, it was only common courtesy, and keeping pace wasn’t much of a trouble anyway. Her wheels were smaller, but I went at a slower pace. Somewhere along the way she had stopped being so taciturn. “Why did they close the railway down?” she asked.
“Well, they couldn’t maintain it. People kept on stealing tracks from the railway to sell the metal, and you can’t post guards along the entire line. The government had to shut it down.”
“That’s stupid.” The vehemence in her voice didn’t startle me- I’d often felt the same way, after all.
“There was nothing much else they could do about it, I guess. But still. It’s a pain to travel for five hours when thirty years ago the trip took less than one.” I took a glance at her. “Just wondering, okay, but are you sure your parents won’t mind you biking with someone you don’t know?”
She shrugged, not taking her eyes off the track. “I don’t think so. They say it’s safest to be in a group. I guess this is a group.”
“I don’t think this is what they meant, though.”
“I know what they mean. They know I’m out here in the fields. I guess they just think it’s better if someone was there in case I got bitten by a snake or something. My mom’s scared of snakes.”
“So’s mine. So’s everyone else’s. All moms are scared of snakes, especially if they think their kids’ll get bitten by one.” At that time I was guessing that it was part of their job application. “They don’t mind you going here?”
“They don’t know I’m here. I used to stick to the places close to home, but that was because I had to have someone watching over me. This is my first time alone.”
Now, usually when a kid’s on his or her first time out alone on a bike, they stick to the places they’re used to. They don’t go wandering off, and that’s probably why their parents let them go alone in the first place- because they stick to what’s familiar. I didn’t do that, and I came down with a fever afterwards. I couldn’t even bike home. Well, I take that bit on hearsay, because I couldn’t remember a single thing that had happened. Last I remembered was the train station, and next thing I knew I was confined to the house for a week. They say it was a miracle I was able to get home, seeing as I didn’t have my bike with me- Dad had to send our driver to look for it, and he found it somewhere along this track. I guess I saw a bit of myself in this kid, thirsty for adventure, the kind you read about in books.
She had gone on talking. “Mom isn’t the only one that’s paranoid. My grandfather likes the thought of me biking by myself, he says it’s better than sitting around all day watching TV. He hates TV, did you know that?”
“I guess when he was growing up he didn’t have access to it, and he doesn’t see how people can’t live without it nowadays.”
“He used to hunt, before he grew old and had to keep from straining himself. My grandmother is always worrying about him. She’s paranoid, too.”
“About you, too?”
“Yup. She thinks I should just stick to biking at home, if I enjoyed it that much, but it gets boring. She tells all sorts of stories all the time, about monsters and aswangs and things that could attack me if I wasn’t careful.”
I grinned. “Well, I suppose you’ve been careful.”
“I have,” she replied seriously. Nine years old is still young enough to believe in fairy tales, after all. “I check everyone. I checked you, that’s why I knew you were all right.”
“Really? Checked me how?”
“Your eyes are normal. They’re just dark brown. My grandmother says that if you aren’t human there’s something wrong with your eyes, but she always ends up arguing with my grandfather about what the thing that’s wrong is. He says that your eyes would be black, but she says that there’s something wrong about the reflection.”
My science student instincts kicked in before my brain did. “You can’t have black eyes.”
“Why not?” I didn’t blame her for asking.
“Well, if you’re a human at any rate, there are three colors in your eyes, blue, brown, and yellow, and what people see as your eye color depends on how much of each you have.” It was summer, and I was not eager to give the lecture, but she didn’t seem to mind.
“So people can have yellow eyes?”
“Well…” This was all my own fault, so I answered the question. “More or less, yes, but more of amber than yellow.”
“So if I see someone with yellow eyes they should be all right, too?”
“I guess so. You know what, I think that’s the train station up ahead.” I was saying this mostly so that I didn’t have to give another lecture, but it was there all right, a squat, shabby thing less than two minutes away.
“Race you!” she called, and before I could do anything about it she was off.
If I were a few years older I would have let her win, but I was fourteen and an arrogant fourteen, and it would be shameful to lose to someone five years my junior. I raced her.
I overtook her easily- my bicycle’s wheels were larger, for obvious reasons, and I had the more obvious advantage of practice. I left her in the dust, in this case even literally, and I was almost there when I heard her yelp. I hit the brakes, taking a half glance backwards, and I was just in time to see her keel over.
I got off the bike and ran down the path towards my fallen companion. “Are you all right?“
“Yup.“ She stood up, a little shakily perhaps, and maybe I should have realised then that she was not. “I’m fine. I didn’t see that.“ She pointed towards a fallen bar of wood, probably all that remained of a sign declaring the presence of a train station. I didn’t blame her- it was half buried in the dirt.
“I guess we’ll have to call our race off, then.“
“That’s okay.“ She dusted the soil off her palms and clothes, and picked up her bike. Kids have the recovery powers of a Wolverine. “Come on!“
She biked off, literally leaving me in the dust. I was in no hurry to see the train station, so I took my time walking there. By the time I reached my own bike she was standing on the building’s porch, looking at the windows. When I arrived she said, simply, “It’s all boarded up.“
She sounded disappointed, and I didn’t want to annoy her with an I told you so. I tapped a window. “They did a pretty good job of it, too. Didn’t want anyone breaking in.“
“They’re not using it anymore, what would they care if anyone broke in and used their house?“ It was a good point, and I’m glad I didn’t have to think about an argument because she had started to shimmy up one of the poles holding up the porch roof.
“What the hell are you doing?“
“There might be a way in from the roof,“ was her imperturbable reply.
Kids. I was a fourteen-year-old, and a pretty reckless fourteen-year-old, but I wouldn’t even have thought of climbing up. “That’s too dangerous. Come down!“
“You sound like my mom.“ She had reached the exposed rafters, and sat on one beam of wood, swinging her legs.
“We’re in the Philippines, this train station isn’t going to have a chimney.“
“We’re in the Philippines, we have storms. There will probably be a hole in the roof.“ A hand felt for the edge of the rusted gutter, and all of a sudden I knew, clear as the sky above us, what would happen next. She would try to swing up to the roof, slip, and fall, and while her recovery powers were enough for a fall from a bike, they would not be enough for a fall from a roof.
“Get down!“ I called. “The gutter’s rusted, you might get tetanus! And how are you going to go down once you get inside the house? There won’t be any poles on the inside!“
“i’ll find a way,“ she said, confident as ever, and she swung up to the roof, pulling herself up on the gutter. It took effort, I knew- I could see her slip and struggle to regain balance- but she made it. She propped herself into a sitting position, grinning in her triumph over adult sensibilities.
That was when the gutter broke.
The paint had flecked off and it was rusted through and brittle from exposure to the elements over a period of over forty years. It shouldn’t have surprised me, but it did, and my scream was as loud as hers was. I scrambled over towards the heap of limbs and metal that lay on the wooden porch, and I was about to call her name. That was when I realised I didn’t know it- she never told it to me.
She lay quite still, but her eyelids were fluttering. I poked her in the arm, gingerly, not wanting to hurt her. “Are you okay?“ I didn’t want to think of the possibilities- you know what could have happened to that girl, falling from a rooftop- I had no idea what to do if worst came to worst.
I prodded her again. “Hey. Wake up, get up, we need to see if you’ve been injured or anything.“
I had no idea what I was saying or doing, but she began to stir. Ever so slowly she pulled herself into a sitting position, and I let out a breath I didn’t realise I was holding. If she could do that then nothing was seriously wrong with her.
“I made it,“ she said weakly.
I could no longer resist the I told you so I had been biting back since we got to the train station. “I told you so.“
“I still made it,“ she said.
“Well,“ I said, “get up. We’ll need to get you home, wherever that is. You’ll have to get shots for tetanus, just in case.“ Her arms were pretty scratched up. “Can you walk?“
She nodded, hauling herself to her feet. “I’ll be okay. Don’t worry about me.“ She drew a sharp breath as she began to walk, and even though I was no doctor back then it ws pretty obvious that she would never make it to her house, or even where the train tracks intersected with the highway, on foot. It would be idiotic for her to bike.
“Listen,“ I said, “you won’t be able to make it on foot. It’s too far away and you’re hurt.“ She was. The fall had shaken her, and she must have been aching all over. “Give me your address and then you can ride on the back of my bike. I’ll take you there.“
“It’s okay. I’ll be fine.“
“No, you won’t,“ I said, rather forcefully. “It won’t be much trouble. Where do you live?“
“No, really, it’s okay.“
“You can’t walk there, not in that state.“
She seemed to realise the truth of this statement. “Yes, but-“
“Then ride with me. Wait there, I’ll go get my bike.“ Before she could protest I dashed off to where my bike was, dragging it over to the base of the porch. “Can you get on or do you need help?“
“I can get on.“
I kicked back the stand and got on myself, and waited for her to mount behind me. When she was seated, I asked, “Ready to go?“
“Yeah.“
We were off. I pedaled at a steady pace, trying to minimize the bumps while keeping a decent speed. I didn’t want to be stuck out here in the dark with only an injured kid for company. I didn’t know if time slowed or seemed to speed up- I was trying my best to concentrate on biking and keeping my balance.
When I could tell by the sound of cars and trucks that we were nearing the highway, I asked my passenger, “What’s your address?“
Her voice was strong but quiet. “1128 MacArthur.“
It was an address along the highway, one that I was familiar with. “No, it’s not.“
“What do you mean it’s not?“ It sounded as though talking took her a lot of effort. “You asked me for my address.“
I hit the brakes. “I did. That’s not your address. It’s mine.“
“What?!“ she demanded.
“It’s my address.“
“I don’t believe you.“ She was as defiant as she was when climbing the gutter.
“It’s my address,“ I could only repeat, as things fell into place, a place my mind refused to accept.
She jumped off my bike. I saw her wince as she landed on the ground. “1128 MacArthur?“ she asked. She wanted me to be hearing wrong, I guess. I wanted me to be hearing wrong. For a long moment we stared at each other, the way we had an hour ago when we had met. I recognised that face, now that I knew what I was looking for. A scratch across her cheek courtesy of her sister. A mole underneath her right eye. Chin jutting out, eyes flashing, I recognised my stubbornest expression.
“Cinna-“ I started. I didn’t know what was on the other end of that sentence, and I would never figure out.
“I never told you my name!“ she yelled, and she ran off, into the fields. The weeds were in full bloom and there was no way I could have biked through them. I dropped my bike and ran after her, not knowing what I wanted, but knowing that I wanted something. The grass was taller than she was but I could see them moving and I could see the direction they were moving in. She was a sick kid- obviously I would be able to catch up with her.
I did not. I lost sight of her, maybe got turned around in the fields, maybe confused her movements with that of a cat or something. I called and called, walking in circles for over ten minutes, but in the end I had to admit defeat and return to my bike.
---
“Well, I guess you know how the story ends,“ Cinna said. The rain was finally showing signs of stopping, and the first stars were out in the sky. “I biked home, and it would be a lie to say I never saw her again. I pulled out photo album after photo album, and I saw the pictures taken during that year, the year I was nine. Her face stared back at me from those photos, and I was shocked that I didn’t recognise her from the start. I had stared at her face in the mirror once upon a time, after all. But then again, you don’t expect to see your face of times past staring at you with a life of its own.“
The air was quiet, and not one of us seemed eager to break the silence. Maybe it was the story, or maybe it was not knowing what to say, or maybe it was the awkwardness of getting to know each other again. After a long time I spoke. “Isn’t that the scariest thing in the world.“
Cinna was smiling. “What?“
Seeing your past, I wanted to say. Seeing yourself way back when you were still infallible, unbroken, invincible, when the world was in the palm of your hand, now that you can no longer remember what it felt like to be brilliant and free, all the while knowing what would happen to this young self, and all the while having to hold your peace.
Before I could say anything, Gelo, ever Gelo, jumped in. “Seeing Cinna’s face, that’s what!“ He earned the laughter still granted to punch lines ten years old, even if they were about the girl who was housing and feeding you, and the inevitable bickering started up again, as if nothing had ever happened and we were high school students once more.
---
We were scheduled to have badminton and soccer and swimming- rather a full schedule for one evening’s worth of a class reunion, but nothing else could be expected, not if your hostess was the impossible Cinna Cosine- but by the time it was cool enough to do anything besides hide in the sala and play poker rain had started pouring, by the gallon, by the bucket, by the ton, and lightning had begun to crackle against the decidedly grey sky. The badminton court was splattered with rain, the lawn had transformed into an interminable mush reminiscent of the old school soccer swamp, and while the pool hadn’t changed much save for the presence of several stray leaves no one who had any sense was up to taking a chance on swimming while lightning flashed in the sky. Cinna was all for it, and Gelo told us that based on the length of time that had passed between a bolt of lightning and its corresponding roll of thunder we were more likely to drown than get electrocuted, and truth be told had we been the teenagers we were when we met we would have been in that pool in a flash, or even kicking an old ball around the slush that was Cinna’s front lawn. The sad thing about growing up is that you gain something that resembles but is not quite common sense, and you’re actually glad to gain it, even if it meant giving up playing soccer in the mud. You don’t complain about something that keeps you alive.
Gelo challenged whoever wanted to play to a game of billiards- he had spotted a table in a corner of the library- and enough people took him on to make Cinna order them to haul the billiards table out onto the porch. It was fun to watch engineers and doctors and entrepreneurs struggle with the heavy wooden thing, but then she had turned on me and ordered me to help them. She was as bossy as her high school self, but seeing as she was the country’s leading med school’s wonder girl, just as bossy was almost a relief.
“Make sure you don’t hit anything on your way out- Wait a bit there, I’ll open that- Okay, make sure not to hit the-” She threw her hands up in the air in exasperation as a table leg collided with a flower pot on the porch.
Gelo raised his hands in a gesture of surrender, causing him to drop his corner of the table. “Sorry!” Realising they were not yet at their destination he picked up his corner of the table again, talking as he walked backwards. “It’s not my fault! I didn’t see it! I was walking backwards, I can’t see out of the back of my head-”
“First you clog up our toilet, then you break a flower pot!” Gelo’s clogging up their toilet during one of our class outings was a pet story of Cinna’s. “It’s a wonder I allow you to set foot in my house at all!
“You would never throw me out of your house. I’m too interesting.” Gelo was as interesting as he had been ten years ago, even though he had lost the mohawk. He hadn’t seemed to lose anything else.
“You’re interesting- locked inside a cage with the rest of your family, that is.”
“You’re still in love with me, Cinna?! I thought you had gotten over me ages ago!”
“I’m an animal lover, my dear, there isn’t much you can do about it.”
As old as we had gotten we still appreciated friendly banter, and Cinna’s riposte left Gelo with a wounded expression and us with our lungs hurting from the laughter. Iggy came to Gelo’s rescue. “The Homo sapiens sapiens is a member of the animal kingdom!”
“Okay. My responsibilities to the world of science prevent me from throwing Gelo out into the streets. I doubt any researches on a creature like him exist.”
“Cinna!” James broke in. “Will you stop lecturing Benj and let us get on with our billiards game?!”
Cinna threw her hands up in exasperation.
James twirled his index finger around his ear in the universal sign of mental incapacity.
Gelo tried not to laugh since he had just been saved, but found that he couldn’t quite manage it, and ended up crouched under the table, pretending to look for something, hilarity choking his features.
Our hostess resumed the tasks of a hostess, wandering into the kitchen and giving orders to the maid of at least ten years and the other hired help in a voice that carried to the porch. “We need lights. Grace, turn on the lamps outside, you know where the switches are. If the rain clears up- no, I don’t think it’s a good idea to eat outside in any case. Open the dining-room doors to the porch and set tables in both. For goodness sakes, not now, it’s barely five. What’re we having for dinner? Is there enough?”
“You know what would be just right for this weather?” I remarked. “A ghost story. You know, the type of thing kids tell around a bonfire. It doesn’t matter how old the story is, or how corny. It’s just the right thing for the setting.”
“The last time we did that Tin there was scared out of her wits,” Jeanne said.
The offended party looked up from the cell phone she was tapping a message on. “I was not!”
“You refused to go out of the living room alone, how is that not scared?”
“Well, who has a ghost story?” Iggy asked.
Every eye turned towards Lina, resident literary genius. “Why are you all looking at me?”
“Well, we want a ghost story.”
“Just because I write doesn’t mean I have a stock of ghost stories at hand.”
“You should, it would prove very useful,” I said. “When you’re around bored people with nothing to do save stifle yawns in each others company-”
“She doesn’t need ghost stories to scare, all she needs to do is poke her head through the door. Everyone in the room would be running in the opposite direction screaming at the top of their lungs” said Cinna, emerging from the double doors that marked the entrance to the dining room.
“Is that how you show your gratitude towards your research group-mate of one whole year? I have never felt so betrayed in my entire life.”
“Yes, this is how I show my gratitude towards the reason why I spent fourth year running to the clinic for burn ointment.”
“Do you have a ghost story?” Iggy asked Cinna. Of course she did- her Pangasinan house, the house we were staying at, had seen more years than any three of us have combined, and all old houses have accompanying ghost stories.
“Of course,” she said. “It’s a long one, though. It happened to me, not to someone else in the family. Probably the first ghost story you’ve heard that wasn’t on hearsay.”
We listened, calmly and without getting into the story itself. As I had said, it was less the story than it was the fact that there was someone telling it. Oh, we listened, all right, and we were as interested as anything, but it had nothing to do with the story- she could have given us the one about the hook-handed guy for all we cared. Maybe it was the weather, because the rain had not stopped and the sky was as grey as ever and it was the perfect weather to relax in, or maybe it was the awkwardness of high school classmates trying to get to know each other again, after ten years of going our separate ways, but it was nice to hear a familiar voice prattle, especially if the said familiar voice wasn’t giving orders, for a change.
She started by saying, “This happened the summer before our third year,” and it was all uphill from there.
---
I was born in Manila and I went to high school in Manila- but you all know that, for goodness’ sakes you’re my high school classmates. I was always a provincial girl at heart- but I guess you know that as well. Anyway. This place of mine is five hours away from Quezon City, six hours if you ride a really slow provincial bus, but every chance I got I went home to bike. Stop staring at me like that, we’ve known each other ten years and you still don’t know I can bike?! Shame. Well, I remember each fair I surprised at least one person by knowing how to bike, but that was forgivable, we were all learning things back then, and some of those things were about other people. Damn, I think I’ve gone off topic.
I have liked biking ever since I can remember- around here, I could have gone anywhere I wanted, as long as I was back before dinner. Every trip out had the potential for adventure. I found it hard to kick the habit when I went to Manila for high school- do I sound like a drug addict?- but I also found it was equally hard to keep it up. You can say whatever you like about the potential for adventure in the heart of the city, but you couldn’t turn a corner without having to make sure nothing was there to run you over, which sucked, really.
So every chance I had, I went home, and every time I went home, I made sure to take the bicycle out on a spin. My mom used to get mad at me for waking up at six in the morning to bike, part because she thought I needed more rest after the trip home, and part because I never woke up that early when it was a school day. But really, who has the energy to get up early on a school day?
So I was out biking one summer day along the train tracks. It was past five, around the same time as it is now, but this was in summer and the sky couldn’t have been clearer if a watercolorist had done it. You saw the train tracks- we passed over them a while ago, on the highway. At that time they were long since closed. My grandfather used to talk about it a lot- for a time he had lived in Manila and worked here in Pangasinan, and he took the train every day. After it closed I traveled along it, but I was always ever the only one. The summer I was nine I went looking for the C------- train station. I found it, a dilapidated old wooden building, and though it was not interesting in itself- and a bit dangerous, too, for I was down with a fever the week after that and not even the doctor was able to figure out why- I continued biking along the track. The deserted railway was an adventure in itself, I guess.
The sky was clear and the weeds that grew wherever they weren’t pulled out or burned were browning, and that summer afternoon I saw another bike lying along the side of the tracks.
It was a very small bike, red with a basket and ribbons along the handlebars, the kind of bike you’d give your daughter for her birthday. I knew that something was lying on the grass from a long way away- if you’d seen how suddenly a bunch of grass that would originally be sticking up was being pressed down, you’d know it too- but I had no idea it was a bike. The rest of the grass obscured my view. I didn’t want to go near it, really, but it was a shame to turn back on a path I had never had any trouble with, not even a snake.
From the ribbons on the handlebars anyone would have realised that the rider was a girl, and I had realised that before I saw her sitting by the edge of the track.
She was a cute kid- about nine or ten, around the same age I was when I first went biking along this way, and my first thought was that she looked familiar, the way an old friend or a family member would look, even though you haven’t seen them for the longest of times. She had brown hair, really brown, that shone like a gold ring when under the sun, thrown over her back in a braid, and skin that was probably fair before it was sunburned. Bright eyes, too, but what kid doesn’t have bright eyes? It’s practically part of the job application.
“Hi,” I said. “Do you need help with anything?”
Her mouth was set in a line that wasn’t a scowl but wasn’t a smile either. “Hello.”
I guess I wanted to reassure her, because she seemed a suspicious sort, the sort who’ve been reminded not to talk to strangers too many times, but a polite one, too. “Do you usually bike this way? I come here sometimes, but I’ve never seen anyone else.”
She stood up. “Come here,” she said.
I blinked, thinking for a moment of old Filipino legends, wondering if tiyanaks grew up, but I got off my bicycle and took a step towards her, a small one, so I didn’t have to let go of the handlebars.
She met my eye, unsmiling. I had no idea what she was looking for, but evidently she had found it, since she relaxed. “Okay. You’re okay.” She returned to her bike and propped it up. “My pant leg got stuck in the chain, and I had to untangle it.”
“Where are you going?” I asked. I would be lying to say that I didn’t mind sharing my bike path, but the fun of being alone wore out after a month of summer biking, and she seemed like a nice kid.
“Down the track.” She pointed at my bike route. “My grandfather says that there used to be a lot of train stations that way, and I wanted to take a look for myself. It’s the first time for me to be here, it’s a wonder Mom let me.”
I smiled ruefully, remembering that I had felt the same way, the first time I was allowed to bike outside the house without a companion. “Well, they have to let us grow up sometime.”
“Have you been here before?”
“Yup. I bike along this way a lot, especially during summer. When it’s the rainy season I stick to the town- it’s always a hell of a hard time biking through the mud- but in summer when the towns full of kids on holiday a quieter place is nice.”
“How far have you gone?”
“Not very. Well, not very in terms of the railway. I guess I was about your age- how old are you, anyway?”
“Nine. I’m turning ten in August.”
“Okay, so I was exactly your age when I first biked here. I biked till I reached the C------- train station. It’s pretty far away- not anymore for me since I’m used to being out all day, but it may be for you. Sometimes I go past it, but I’ve never reached another train station.”
“So it’s the only one that you’ve seen?”
“Yup. It wasn’t very interesting- just a boarded-up old building.”
“Do you think I can get there on bike?”
I took a look at her. She wasn’t a professional, but at her age, who was? “Sure. Mind if I come along?” I thought of the long ride, and of the fever I had contracted afterwards, and I wondered if perhaps the long trip would be too much for her. If you tell a kid that a building is near enough, they believe you, and I didn’t want this kid to come to any harm because of what I had said.
She hopped on her bike. “Not really.”
So we set off, she in search of the train station, me in search of- well, in search of something. Right now, in this garden waiting for the rain to stop, it’s probably easier to imagine the nine-year-old girl than the fourteen-year-old one. She wanted the same thing we want now- she wanted a break from the monotony, even if it meant biking off into the unknown with a stranger. I wanted- I don’t know what I wanted. Who knows what any fourteen-year-old wants? Not a kid anymore, but not yet old enough to drink or live alone or legally fall in love. Too old for magic that could whisk you away to a different world, too young for society and stability and whatever it is we think of now. Look at me, I’m rambling again, talking about the good old days.
We talked as we bicycled, it was only common courtesy, and keeping pace wasn’t much of a trouble anyway. Her wheels were smaller, but I went at a slower pace. Somewhere along the way she had stopped being so taciturn. “Why did they close the railway down?” she asked.
“Well, they couldn’t maintain it. People kept on stealing tracks from the railway to sell the metal, and you can’t post guards along the entire line. The government had to shut it down.”
“That’s stupid.” The vehemence in her voice didn’t startle me- I’d often felt the same way, after all.
“There was nothing much else they could do about it, I guess. But still. It’s a pain to travel for five hours when thirty years ago the trip took less than one.” I took a glance at her. “Just wondering, okay, but are you sure your parents won’t mind you biking with someone you don’t know?”
She shrugged, not taking her eyes off the track. “I don’t think so. They say it’s safest to be in a group. I guess this is a group.”
“I don’t think this is what they meant, though.”
“I know what they mean. They know I’m out here in the fields. I guess they just think it’s better if someone was there in case I got bitten by a snake or something. My mom’s scared of snakes.”
“So’s mine. So’s everyone else’s. All moms are scared of snakes, especially if they think their kids’ll get bitten by one.” At that time I was guessing that it was part of their job application. “They don’t mind you going here?”
“They don’t know I’m here. I used to stick to the places close to home, but that was because I had to have someone watching over me. This is my first time alone.”
Now, usually when a kid’s on his or her first time out alone on a bike, they stick to the places they’re used to. They don’t go wandering off, and that’s probably why their parents let them go alone in the first place- because they stick to what’s familiar. I didn’t do that, and I came down with a fever afterwards. I couldn’t even bike home. Well, I take that bit on hearsay, because I couldn’t remember a single thing that had happened. Last I remembered was the train station, and next thing I knew I was confined to the house for a week. They say it was a miracle I was able to get home, seeing as I didn’t have my bike with me- Dad had to send our driver to look for it, and he found it somewhere along this track. I guess I saw a bit of myself in this kid, thirsty for adventure, the kind you read about in books.
She had gone on talking. “Mom isn’t the only one that’s paranoid. My grandfather likes the thought of me biking by myself, he says it’s better than sitting around all day watching TV. He hates TV, did you know that?”
“I guess when he was growing up he didn’t have access to it, and he doesn’t see how people can’t live without it nowadays.”
“He used to hunt, before he grew old and had to keep from straining himself. My grandmother is always worrying about him. She’s paranoid, too.”
“About you, too?”
“Yup. She thinks I should just stick to biking at home, if I enjoyed it that much, but it gets boring. She tells all sorts of stories all the time, about monsters and aswangs and things that could attack me if I wasn’t careful.”
I grinned. “Well, I suppose you’ve been careful.”
“I have,” she replied seriously. Nine years old is still young enough to believe in fairy tales, after all. “I check everyone. I checked you, that’s why I knew you were all right.”
“Really? Checked me how?”
“Your eyes are normal. They’re just dark brown. My grandmother says that if you aren’t human there’s something wrong with your eyes, but she always ends up arguing with my grandfather about what the thing that’s wrong is. He says that your eyes would be black, but she says that there’s something wrong about the reflection.”
My science student instincts kicked in before my brain did. “You can’t have black eyes.”
“Why not?” I didn’t blame her for asking.
“Well, if you’re a human at any rate, there are three colors in your eyes, blue, brown, and yellow, and what people see as your eye color depends on how much of each you have.” It was summer, and I was not eager to give the lecture, but she didn’t seem to mind.
“So people can have yellow eyes?”
“Well…” This was all my own fault, so I answered the question. “More or less, yes, but more of amber than yellow.”
“So if I see someone with yellow eyes they should be all right, too?”
“I guess so. You know what, I think that’s the train station up ahead.” I was saying this mostly so that I didn’t have to give another lecture, but it was there all right, a squat, shabby thing less than two minutes away.
“Race you!” she called, and before I could do anything about it she was off.
If I were a few years older I would have let her win, but I was fourteen and an arrogant fourteen, and it would be shameful to lose to someone five years my junior. I raced her.
I overtook her easily- my bicycle’s wheels were larger, for obvious reasons, and I had the more obvious advantage of practice. I left her in the dust, in this case even literally, and I was almost there when I heard her yelp. I hit the brakes, taking a half glance backwards, and I was just in time to see her keel over.
I got off the bike and ran down the path towards my fallen companion. “Are you all right?“
“Yup.“ She stood up, a little shakily perhaps, and maybe I should have realised then that she was not. “I’m fine. I didn’t see that.“ She pointed towards a fallen bar of wood, probably all that remained of a sign declaring the presence of a train station. I didn’t blame her- it was half buried in the dirt.
“I guess we’ll have to call our race off, then.“
“That’s okay.“ She dusted the soil off her palms and clothes, and picked up her bike. Kids have the recovery powers of a Wolverine. “Come on!“
She biked off, literally leaving me in the dust. I was in no hurry to see the train station, so I took my time walking there. By the time I reached my own bike she was standing on the building’s porch, looking at the windows. When I arrived she said, simply, “It’s all boarded up.“
She sounded disappointed, and I didn’t want to annoy her with an I told you so. I tapped a window. “They did a pretty good job of it, too. Didn’t want anyone breaking in.“
“They’re not using it anymore, what would they care if anyone broke in and used their house?“ It was a good point, and I’m glad I didn’t have to think about an argument because she had started to shimmy up one of the poles holding up the porch roof.
“What the hell are you doing?“
“There might be a way in from the roof,“ was her imperturbable reply.
Kids. I was a fourteen-year-old, and a pretty reckless fourteen-year-old, but I wouldn’t even have thought of climbing up. “That’s too dangerous. Come down!“
“You sound like my mom.“ She had reached the exposed rafters, and sat on one beam of wood, swinging her legs.
“We’re in the Philippines, this train station isn’t going to have a chimney.“
“We’re in the Philippines, we have storms. There will probably be a hole in the roof.“ A hand felt for the edge of the rusted gutter, and all of a sudden I knew, clear as the sky above us, what would happen next. She would try to swing up to the roof, slip, and fall, and while her recovery powers were enough for a fall from a bike, they would not be enough for a fall from a roof.
“Get down!“ I called. “The gutter’s rusted, you might get tetanus! And how are you going to go down once you get inside the house? There won’t be any poles on the inside!“
“i’ll find a way,“ she said, confident as ever, and she swung up to the roof, pulling herself up on the gutter. It took effort, I knew- I could see her slip and struggle to regain balance- but she made it. She propped herself into a sitting position, grinning in her triumph over adult sensibilities.
That was when the gutter broke.
The paint had flecked off and it was rusted through and brittle from exposure to the elements over a period of over forty years. It shouldn’t have surprised me, but it did, and my scream was as loud as hers was. I scrambled over towards the heap of limbs and metal that lay on the wooden porch, and I was about to call her name. That was when I realised I didn’t know it- she never told it to me.
She lay quite still, but her eyelids were fluttering. I poked her in the arm, gingerly, not wanting to hurt her. “Are you okay?“ I didn’t want to think of the possibilities- you know what could have happened to that girl, falling from a rooftop- I had no idea what to do if worst came to worst.
I prodded her again. “Hey. Wake up, get up, we need to see if you’ve been injured or anything.“
I had no idea what I was saying or doing, but she began to stir. Ever so slowly she pulled herself into a sitting position, and I let out a breath I didn’t realise I was holding. If she could do that then nothing was seriously wrong with her.
“I made it,“ she said weakly.
I could no longer resist the I told you so I had been biting back since we got to the train station. “I told you so.“
“I still made it,“ she said.
“Well,“ I said, “get up. We’ll need to get you home, wherever that is. You’ll have to get shots for tetanus, just in case.“ Her arms were pretty scratched up. “Can you walk?“
She nodded, hauling herself to her feet. “I’ll be okay. Don’t worry about me.“ She drew a sharp breath as she began to walk, and even though I was no doctor back then it ws pretty obvious that she would never make it to her house, or even where the train tracks intersected with the highway, on foot. It would be idiotic for her to bike.
“Listen,“ I said, “you won’t be able to make it on foot. It’s too far away and you’re hurt.“ She was. The fall had shaken her, and she must have been aching all over. “Give me your address and then you can ride on the back of my bike. I’ll take you there.“
“It’s okay. I’ll be fine.“
“No, you won’t,“ I said, rather forcefully. “It won’t be much trouble. Where do you live?“
“No, really, it’s okay.“
“You can’t walk there, not in that state.“
She seemed to realise the truth of this statement. “Yes, but-“
“Then ride with me. Wait there, I’ll go get my bike.“ Before she could protest I dashed off to where my bike was, dragging it over to the base of the porch. “Can you get on or do you need help?“
“I can get on.“
I kicked back the stand and got on myself, and waited for her to mount behind me. When she was seated, I asked, “Ready to go?“
“Yeah.“
We were off. I pedaled at a steady pace, trying to minimize the bumps while keeping a decent speed. I didn’t want to be stuck out here in the dark with only an injured kid for company. I didn’t know if time slowed or seemed to speed up- I was trying my best to concentrate on biking and keeping my balance.
When I could tell by the sound of cars and trucks that we were nearing the highway, I asked my passenger, “What’s your address?“
Her voice was strong but quiet. “1128 MacArthur.“
It was an address along the highway, one that I was familiar with. “No, it’s not.“
“What do you mean it’s not?“ It sounded as though talking took her a lot of effort. “You asked me for my address.“
I hit the brakes. “I did. That’s not your address. It’s mine.“
“What?!“ she demanded.
“It’s my address.“
“I don’t believe you.“ She was as defiant as she was when climbing the gutter.
“It’s my address,“ I could only repeat, as things fell into place, a place my mind refused to accept.
She jumped off my bike. I saw her wince as she landed on the ground. “1128 MacArthur?“ she asked. She wanted me to be hearing wrong, I guess. I wanted me to be hearing wrong. For a long moment we stared at each other, the way we had an hour ago when we had met. I recognised that face, now that I knew what I was looking for. A scratch across her cheek courtesy of her sister. A mole underneath her right eye. Chin jutting out, eyes flashing, I recognised my stubbornest expression.
“Cinna-“ I started. I didn’t know what was on the other end of that sentence, and I would never figure out.
“I never told you my name!“ she yelled, and she ran off, into the fields. The weeds were in full bloom and there was no way I could have biked through them. I dropped my bike and ran after her, not knowing what I wanted, but knowing that I wanted something. The grass was taller than she was but I could see them moving and I could see the direction they were moving in. She was a sick kid- obviously I would be able to catch up with her.
I did not. I lost sight of her, maybe got turned around in the fields, maybe confused her movements with that of a cat or something. I called and called, walking in circles for over ten minutes, but in the end I had to admit defeat and return to my bike.
---
“Well, I guess you know how the story ends,“ Cinna said. The rain was finally showing signs of stopping, and the first stars were out in the sky. “I biked home, and it would be a lie to say I never saw her again. I pulled out photo album after photo album, and I saw the pictures taken during that year, the year I was nine. Her face stared back at me from those photos, and I was shocked that I didn’t recognise her from the start. I had stared at her face in the mirror once upon a time, after all. But then again, you don’t expect to see your face of times past staring at you with a life of its own.“
The air was quiet, and not one of us seemed eager to break the silence. Maybe it was the story, or maybe it was not knowing what to say, or maybe it was the awkwardness of getting to know each other again. After a long time I spoke. “Isn’t that the scariest thing in the world.“
Cinna was smiling. “What?“
Seeing your past, I wanted to say. Seeing yourself way back when you were still infallible, unbroken, invincible, when the world was in the palm of your hand, now that you can no longer remember what it felt like to be brilliant and free, all the while knowing what would happen to this young self, and all the while having to hold your peace.
Before I could say anything, Gelo, ever Gelo, jumped in. “Seeing Cinna’s face, that’s what!“ He earned the laughter still granted to punch lines ten years old, even if they were about the girl who was housing and feeding you, and the inevitable bickering started up again, as if nothing had ever happened and we were high school students once more.
