Peace
In my dreams
I hear my scream
Pierce the darkness
Pierce my soul
Like the edge of my sanity
Nothing about this journey
Will kill me
I have moved mountains
I brought down false kingdoms
But who I am I would like to know
I forget who I was
I cannot care less who I will be
I make my future with the present
And the present is so tense
It will overwhelm me
Until I drown
Because I cannot swim
And the ocean is too deep
In my mind the movie plays
Over and over
Like a movie that I could not stop
The gun in my face
The epithets in my ear
The bottle that defiled me
The war where home should have been
Who am I
Why do I occupy this space
I need to stop breathing
So I can start life over
And have the courage
To ask someone to stay
Hold my hand
And take me to that place
Where I no longer need to
Scream
To be heard.
Sunday, April 18, 2010
Romance
Necktie
I live in a hotel. I’ve been living in hotels since I got a shit load of money from the auction of my paintings and pictures almost ten years ago. I now occupy the penthouse suite of the Savoy in London; it’s mine for the next three years.
I have nothing against houses, it’s just that well, houses need to be chosen, decorated, kept and maintained and I have no patience for that kind of thing. And I got turned off from house hunting when I heard you can’t use the loo when you’re viewing. I mean come on, what kind of stupid rule is that? What if you really have to go?
Which is not to say I am not domesticated. I make a mean mushroom risotto and chocolate strawberry pancake. I can wash and iron my own clothes. But I don’t have to anymore.
A billionaire businessman discovered my art a few years ago and their prices took off faster a rocket to the moon.
I was down on my luck then. I couldn’t find any work because no one would hire me for being a psychiatric patient. I was stable then and all and I have learned to accept my condition so I followed a religious regimen of taking medicine and going to my shrink regularly. But no one would give me a shot despite my credentials.
I was drawing in a coffee shop, one of those franchise jobs, to pass a windy afternoon outdoors. He passed by and saw my drawings. I thought my work was crap because I was self taught and it was something that I did for myself. I draw to cope with my considerable emotional baggage. I come from a broken home, and my Dad, Charlie, who raised, me died. I still cry when I think of him, after all this time.
I didn’t know who he was then, my patron. He asked me, “Are those drawings yours?”
“I’m drawing them; whose do you think it is?” I retorted.
He laughed and took out a business card from his wallet. He handed it to me.
“Call the trunk line and ask for me. They’ll give you an appointment,” he was smiling.
I read the card and my jaw dropped. I wished then the ground would swallow me.
I gulped and said “Sorry,” in a small voice.
I did call him and got that appointment. He bought one picture for each of his seven children and a photograph of a pulley for his wife. Then he hooked me up with the art dealers and the rest as they say, is history. I am not very prolific but the clients like my self deprecation and my off color jokes, which raised the value of my work a bazillion fold. I exaggerate, of course. But my agent says I have achieved cult status in the art community that my pink polka dot panties would fetch a good price on auction. They’re shitting me, I know.
I have a pet Labrador. He’s a blonde and he’s been my companion since I got to where I am. He accompanies me to the Philippines, where I stay at the Shangri-la’s bridal suite during winters in England. Don’t judge me; it was the only available suite when my agent booked it.
So I’m here. It’s January in Manila and the air is nippy. I was just bringing in Daisy (I’m trying to make it into a unisex name) from our walk around the villages that hedge the central business district. I’m preparing for an interview with a women’s magazine with my publicist in the coffee shop when I noticed him.
He’s tall-ish, tall actually if you are five foot flat like me. He has salt and pepper hair, gold rimmed glasses and an aquiline nose that could cut butter. The first thing I noticed was that he wasn’t wearing a tie. He had an Italian suit on, and what looked like a Brooks Brothers shirt, but he wasn’t wearing a tie. This confounded me. I usually could place a suit by his tie. Silk says old money, blends say new money, and polyester says working class. I was intrigued. I watched him work the utensils on the table, and that’s when I knew he was old money. He moved like clockwork, everything was perfect. I focused back on my meeting.
I knew better than to tangle with old money. I’ve read enough Victorian pulp to know that the nouveau riche was not regarded with respect by old money. It’s not inverted snobbery, it’s just that well, like the chauffeur dad in the movie Sabrina said, there’s a reason why there’s a window in between the front seat and the back seat. And we best respect the rule. But something about him drew my eyes to him. I’d be in the middle of a sentence and my publicist would remind me to finish it. Then once, he met my gaze with a faintly sardonic, appraising look. Then he frowned. I went back to my meeting.
I saw him everyday for quite a while after that. Sometimes when Daisy and I would go out for our walk in the mornings and late afternoons, I’d find him in various spots of the lobby. During mealtimes he’d be in a table within my vicinity in one of the hotel’s three restaurants. This totally amused me.
One day, I got up just enough nerve to come up to him and smile a really wide, goofy grin. He looked shocked for a millisecond, as if flabbergasted by my audacity. Then he smiled. My heart melted. I turned and ran to the elevators as fast as I could. I didn’t look back.
The following morning, I saw him standing at the receptionist’s area. He had with him a pot of white orchids. Without saying a word, he handed them to me, smiled, walked away and never turned back.
“What the…Hey, what’s your name? Are these for me?” I asked.
All he did was to give me a short wave.
It went on for a month. Every morning I would get a small, significant gift from him. Most memorable for me were the antique boar bristle brush, vintage cameo pin and a Beatles poster.
I would take the gifts, puzzled at first but eventually liking the attention.
At the end of the month, I packed my bags for the beaches in the South. He opened his mouth then.
“Going anywhere?” he asked.
“Somewhere,” I replied.
“Take me along?” he smiled.
I frowned, but I found myself nodding. Then smiling. This was crazy, I thought. He’s a stranger; he could be a serial killer. A million thoughts were running through my mind. I held out my hand. “Name?”
“Ahh… the tricky part,” he rummaged through his suit pocket for a calling card. Then he handed it to me. “Don’t laugh!”
I laughed anyway. I laughed so hard my sides ached. “Oh gosh…oh gosh…I will definitely take you along, Bluebell.”
You know the rest.
I live in a hotel. I’ve been living in hotels since I got a shit load of money from the auction of my paintings and pictures almost ten years ago. I now occupy the penthouse suite of the Savoy in London; it’s mine for the next three years.
I have nothing against houses, it’s just that well, houses need to be chosen, decorated, kept and maintained and I have no patience for that kind of thing. And I got turned off from house hunting when I heard you can’t use the loo when you’re viewing. I mean come on, what kind of stupid rule is that? What if you really have to go?
Which is not to say I am not domesticated. I make a mean mushroom risotto and chocolate strawberry pancake. I can wash and iron my own clothes. But I don’t have to anymore.
A billionaire businessman discovered my art a few years ago and their prices took off faster a rocket to the moon.
I was down on my luck then. I couldn’t find any work because no one would hire me for being a psychiatric patient. I was stable then and all and I have learned to accept my condition so I followed a religious regimen of taking medicine and going to my shrink regularly. But no one would give me a shot despite my credentials.
I was drawing in a coffee shop, one of those franchise jobs, to pass a windy afternoon outdoors. He passed by and saw my drawings. I thought my work was crap because I was self taught and it was something that I did for myself. I draw to cope with my considerable emotional baggage. I come from a broken home, and my Dad, Charlie, who raised, me died. I still cry when I think of him, after all this time.
I didn’t know who he was then, my patron. He asked me, “Are those drawings yours?”
“I’m drawing them; whose do you think it is?” I retorted.
He laughed and took out a business card from his wallet. He handed it to me.
“Call the trunk line and ask for me. They’ll give you an appointment,” he was smiling.
I read the card and my jaw dropped. I wished then the ground would swallow me.
I gulped and said “Sorry,” in a small voice.
I did call him and got that appointment. He bought one picture for each of his seven children and a photograph of a pulley for his wife. Then he hooked me up with the art dealers and the rest as they say, is history. I am not very prolific but the clients like my self deprecation and my off color jokes, which raised the value of my work a bazillion fold. I exaggerate, of course. But my agent says I have achieved cult status in the art community that my pink polka dot panties would fetch a good price on auction. They’re shitting me, I know.
I have a pet Labrador. He’s a blonde and he’s been my companion since I got to where I am. He accompanies me to the Philippines, where I stay at the Shangri-la’s bridal suite during winters in England. Don’t judge me; it was the only available suite when my agent booked it.
So I’m here. It’s January in Manila and the air is nippy. I was just bringing in Daisy (I’m trying to make it into a unisex name) from our walk around the villages that hedge the central business district. I’m preparing for an interview with a women’s magazine with my publicist in the coffee shop when I noticed him.
He’s tall-ish, tall actually if you are five foot flat like me. He has salt and pepper hair, gold rimmed glasses and an aquiline nose that could cut butter. The first thing I noticed was that he wasn’t wearing a tie. He had an Italian suit on, and what looked like a Brooks Brothers shirt, but he wasn’t wearing a tie. This confounded me. I usually could place a suit by his tie. Silk says old money, blends say new money, and polyester says working class. I was intrigued. I watched him work the utensils on the table, and that’s when I knew he was old money. He moved like clockwork, everything was perfect. I focused back on my meeting.
I knew better than to tangle with old money. I’ve read enough Victorian pulp to know that the nouveau riche was not regarded with respect by old money. It’s not inverted snobbery, it’s just that well, like the chauffeur dad in the movie Sabrina said, there’s a reason why there’s a window in between the front seat and the back seat. And we best respect the rule. But something about him drew my eyes to him. I’d be in the middle of a sentence and my publicist would remind me to finish it. Then once, he met my gaze with a faintly sardonic, appraising look. Then he frowned. I went back to my meeting.
I saw him everyday for quite a while after that. Sometimes when Daisy and I would go out for our walk in the mornings and late afternoons, I’d find him in various spots of the lobby. During mealtimes he’d be in a table within my vicinity in one of the hotel’s three restaurants. This totally amused me.
One day, I got up just enough nerve to come up to him and smile a really wide, goofy grin. He looked shocked for a millisecond, as if flabbergasted by my audacity. Then he smiled. My heart melted. I turned and ran to the elevators as fast as I could. I didn’t look back.
The following morning, I saw him standing at the receptionist’s area. He had with him a pot of white orchids. Without saying a word, he handed them to me, smiled, walked away and never turned back.
“What the…Hey, what’s your name? Are these for me?” I asked.
All he did was to give me a short wave.
It went on for a month. Every morning I would get a small, significant gift from him. Most memorable for me were the antique boar bristle brush, vintage cameo pin and a Beatles poster.
I would take the gifts, puzzled at first but eventually liking the attention.
At the end of the month, I packed my bags for the beaches in the South. He opened his mouth then.
“Going anywhere?” he asked.
“Somewhere,” I replied.
“Take me along?” he smiled.
I frowned, but I found myself nodding. Then smiling. This was crazy, I thought. He’s a stranger; he could be a serial killer. A million thoughts were running through my mind. I held out my hand. “Name?”
“Ahh… the tricky part,” he rummaged through his suit pocket for a calling card. Then he handed it to me. “Don’t laugh!”
I laughed anyway. I laughed so hard my sides ached. “Oh gosh…oh gosh…I will definitely take you along, Bluebell.”
You know the rest.
Wednesday, April 7, 2010
Were you?
I was there
I was there when it happened, again and again over the years. I was there when he ripped the sheets and threw the beer bottles on the wall. When he punched her in the stomach and did a million abominable things to her. Because I am her daughter.
She met him at the local diner where she bused tables. The owners would not let her waitress because they thought she was too dumb to take orders and be pleasant to the customers. It did not pay much to keep both of us so she took on odd jobs with the neighbors cleaning their homes and doing their laundry on her off hours. We were not poor, but we were nearly there. And we were happy.
Mom had me when she was 16. I am another statistic of unwanted pregnancies in this country. I do not mind. I’m happy enough just knowing that Mom chose to have me instead of having me aborted, as her friends and family advised. I’m proud that Mom overcame her fears and her inadequacies to have me. If I could have one thing left in the world to keep me going, it would be this pride in my Mom.
Which puzzles me about her choice of men. I mean, if you did a smart thing like avoid abortion when you were a teenager, it would surely follow that you would have at least a decent taste in men. But her boyfriends look like they belong to a parade of losers. And I mean all of them.
But no one could be worse than Sebastian. She met him at the diner where she worked and they fell in love. No one knew much about his background like where he lived before he came to our town and where he got his money. He seemed to do nothing but drink in the local bar and eat sloppy joes for lunch at the diner.
My mom is not strictly pretty. She has neat features and a face that looks like it belongs to a nickelodeon show. And she has this way of making people smile. Grandma says it’s because mom was born happy, she could get run over by a truck and still be happy. Which I think explains me.
But I digress. We met Sebastian on my 13th summer and he was nice at first, even if back then, he already constantly reeked of alcohol. You could tell that if he wasn’t so screwed up, he could be a decent boyfriend and potential father. But he was screwed up. We learned eventually that he is living off his considerable trust fund, but he was not allowed back home in Spain because he was always getting into trouble.
I don’t know what mom saw in him, he wasn’t even nice to look at. He had a pockmarked face, his left eye was smaller than his right and he was squat, like a cross between a bull dog and a terrier. Was it his trust fund? I didn’t understand because we were getting by really well since Grandma decided to split her pension cheques with us and Grandpa took on a consultancy job at the accountant’s office. We were fine. She didn’t even have to do her extra work anymore. And I was getting some pocket money from baby sitting.
But she got together with Sebastian anyway. We moved into his roomy home at the edge of town after only three months of dating. He had a surly housekeeper who did nothing but cook paella on Sundays and other Castilian goodies. She did an adequate job keeping house and we may never be friends but I will always be grateful to her.
I was having difficulty sleeping on my first night in the new house. I was tossing and turning when I heard my door creak open. It was Sebastian, slurring in Spanish with a knife in his right hand and a cigarette on the left.
He stubbed his cigarette with his toe and put his forefinger to his lip. He said “Don’t scream or I’ll hurt you.” Then he unbuckled his pants.
I froze for a minute but didn’t care if I got hurt. I was not going to let that filthy pig come near me. I screamed at the top of my lungs.
Nana, the housekeeper was first in my room. She aimed an old but still working shotgun at him.
“Put the knife down. You’re drunk. If you don’t want to sleep at the police station tonight, you best pull your pants up and get some coffee in you,” Nana said without blinking.
Sebastian did as he was told, but you could tell he was really pissed. Mom came in later, disoriented because it seemed she too had been drinking.
I was scared. I asked my Mom to sleep with me, but the sight of her drunk terrified me too. I didn’t know it but she’d been joining Sebastian in the bar more frequently during work hours. That’s why she got fired from her job. And why we had to move in with him.
It was Nana who came to my rescue. She packed my mattress, pillows and comforter into a bundle and dragged it to the adjoining room where she slept. She made sure I was comfortable. Then she told me, “Sleep child. You’ll be all right.”
The last sounds I heard were the windows being bolted and the triple locks on the door being engaged. I slept soundly.
In the morning, Nana remained her distant, remote self. She was not given to talking and overt friendliness, but it seemed that it had become her self-imposed duty to be my protector. She would stand guard outside the bathroom every time I took a bath or when I answered the call of nature. Often when I was doing my homework or sitting in the swing set, I’d find her within screaming distance.
Sebastian made no attempt on me again and I had an inkling it was because of Nana. But he and my mom seemed to be on a downward spiral and I was helpless to stop it. It started with slaps in the face while he pretended to joke around. Then their fights deteriorated to abusive rows that involved a lot of hitting and foul language. Once, it got so bad that my mom, drunk and in a fighting mood, slipped on the stairs and dragged Sebastian down with her. She bled between the legs, while he sustained a fractured leg.
We found Mom was two months pregnant and she lost the baby. She was inconsolable.
She avoided the bottle like it was perdition when we brought her home from the hospital. One night, as I was preparing for bed in Nana’s room, she came in and indicated she wanted to talk. I nodded.
“I’m sorry I dragged you into this. I should be a better Mom,” she started, hesitant.
“I just don’t understand the choices you’ve been making, Mom. You used to be sensible. I don’t understand why we’re here and why you’re with Sebastian,” I blurted out.
“I’m a single mom who didn’t even finish high school. Who would want me? I’m lucky someone like him loves me,” she was defensive.
“Someone like him? He does nothing but drink. His family doesn’t want him because he’s trouble. Aren’t you taking the whole love thy neighbor commandment too far?”
“And what do you want? For me to go back to my dead end job. Beg for it? I’d rather endure his drunken tirades that go back to backbreaking work,” she almost raised her voice.
“No. I just want my old Mom back. The one who was happy wherever she was. I forgot the last time I saw you smile,” I was sobbing.
She took me in her arms, and said, “Shhh, shhh. We’ll be okay. Don’t worry. I’ll fix this. Don’t cry, baby.” Then mom left me as Nana came in.
Nana stroked my hair as I wiped my tears. It was the first time she touched me.
My eyes were red and swollen from crying the night before. Sebastian was still in the hospital. I thought this was my chance to convince my Mom to change her mind and accept help from the people who love her. I called my Grandma, her Mom.
“Hi Grandma,” I greeted her as she picked up the phone.
“Your Mom’s doctor called me. I heard. How is she?” Grandma was gentle.
“She’s recovered, but I can’t convince her to leave. It’s like being trapped in hell,” I said.
“I’ll talk to her. I’ll come down with Grandpa tonight. How about you? Would you like to live with us for a while? We’ll get by, you know that,” she queried.
“I don’t want to leave Mom, especially now. She seems confused,” I replied.
“Okay, baby. You take care and stay within Nana’s sight,” she reminded me.
I hung up feeling a bit better and less helpless. But dinner didn’t go as I expected. Grandpa and Grandma came in good spirits, perhaps optimistic that they could convince their stubborn daughter to change course and leave Sebastian.
Grandma said she called some of her relatives and one of her nephews was willing to give Mom a job in his construction company in the next province. He would even help her finish high school, and perhaps go into college so she can help with the administrative chores in his company.
Mom found all of this distasteful and said so. The evening ended on a sour note as Grandma and Grandpa said curt goodbyes. Grandpa said he was going to see a lawyer so they can get custody of me. I wanted to cry.
Sebastian came home one month later and he was in full fighting form. I began to dread the nights because when it got dark and it was time for bed we would hear things get knocked around in the upstairs bedroom that Mom and Sebastian occupied.
In the mornings Nana would straighten it up so that you couldn’t tell violence took place there. When there was no school I would help Nana clean up the house and would be horrified by the sight of my Mom’s bedroom. There would be alcohol stains on the floor and blood spatter on the wall. The furniture would be in the most inappropriate places, sometimes some were half out the windows.
My heart would leap in my chest with terror when I saw my Mom in the mornings. There was one time her entire left arm was covered in bruises and her lip was broken in five places. Sometimes she couldn’t open her eye from the injuries that covered it. It made me so sick I called the police once. I cried in Nana’s arms when I heard my Mom refuse to press charges.
“I’m sorry kid. We can’t take action unless someone complains and your mom isn’t complaining,” the police officer said matter-of-factly.
Mom slapped me when the police left. It would be her last act of strength. The next day Nana brought her back to the hospital because she saw blood on the toilet in their bathroom.
She died of internal bleeding in the hospital and I didn’t know if I should laugh at this absurdly anticlimactic manner in which Mom left me. Because she was in a violent relationship, I expected her to bid me a gory goodbye. But she didn’t and I was sad that she didn’t even see me graduate high school, or read our story in a novel that has yet to be written.
But most of all I am sorry that she didn’t believe she deserved more than she settled for.
I was there when it happened, again and again over the years. I was there when he ripped the sheets and threw the beer bottles on the wall. When he punched her in the stomach and did a million abominable things to her. Because I am her daughter.
She met him at the local diner where she bused tables. The owners would not let her waitress because they thought she was too dumb to take orders and be pleasant to the customers. It did not pay much to keep both of us so she took on odd jobs with the neighbors cleaning their homes and doing their laundry on her off hours. We were not poor, but we were nearly there. And we were happy.
Mom had me when she was 16. I am another statistic of unwanted pregnancies in this country. I do not mind. I’m happy enough just knowing that Mom chose to have me instead of having me aborted, as her friends and family advised. I’m proud that Mom overcame her fears and her inadequacies to have me. If I could have one thing left in the world to keep me going, it would be this pride in my Mom.
Which puzzles me about her choice of men. I mean, if you did a smart thing like avoid abortion when you were a teenager, it would surely follow that you would have at least a decent taste in men. But her boyfriends look like they belong to a parade of losers. And I mean all of them.
But no one could be worse than Sebastian. She met him at the diner where she worked and they fell in love. No one knew much about his background like where he lived before he came to our town and where he got his money. He seemed to do nothing but drink in the local bar and eat sloppy joes for lunch at the diner.
My mom is not strictly pretty. She has neat features and a face that looks like it belongs to a nickelodeon show. And she has this way of making people smile. Grandma says it’s because mom was born happy, she could get run over by a truck and still be happy. Which I think explains me.
But I digress. We met Sebastian on my 13th summer and he was nice at first, even if back then, he already constantly reeked of alcohol. You could tell that if he wasn’t so screwed up, he could be a decent boyfriend and potential father. But he was screwed up. We learned eventually that he is living off his considerable trust fund, but he was not allowed back home in Spain because he was always getting into trouble.
I don’t know what mom saw in him, he wasn’t even nice to look at. He had a pockmarked face, his left eye was smaller than his right and he was squat, like a cross between a bull dog and a terrier. Was it his trust fund? I didn’t understand because we were getting by really well since Grandma decided to split her pension cheques with us and Grandpa took on a consultancy job at the accountant’s office. We were fine. She didn’t even have to do her extra work anymore. And I was getting some pocket money from baby sitting.
But she got together with Sebastian anyway. We moved into his roomy home at the edge of town after only three months of dating. He had a surly housekeeper who did nothing but cook paella on Sundays and other Castilian goodies. She did an adequate job keeping house and we may never be friends but I will always be grateful to her.
I was having difficulty sleeping on my first night in the new house. I was tossing and turning when I heard my door creak open. It was Sebastian, slurring in Spanish with a knife in his right hand and a cigarette on the left.
He stubbed his cigarette with his toe and put his forefinger to his lip. He said “Don’t scream or I’ll hurt you.” Then he unbuckled his pants.
I froze for a minute but didn’t care if I got hurt. I was not going to let that filthy pig come near me. I screamed at the top of my lungs.
Nana, the housekeeper was first in my room. She aimed an old but still working shotgun at him.
“Put the knife down. You’re drunk. If you don’t want to sleep at the police station tonight, you best pull your pants up and get some coffee in you,” Nana said without blinking.
Sebastian did as he was told, but you could tell he was really pissed. Mom came in later, disoriented because it seemed she too had been drinking.
I was scared. I asked my Mom to sleep with me, but the sight of her drunk terrified me too. I didn’t know it but she’d been joining Sebastian in the bar more frequently during work hours. That’s why she got fired from her job. And why we had to move in with him.
It was Nana who came to my rescue. She packed my mattress, pillows and comforter into a bundle and dragged it to the adjoining room where she slept. She made sure I was comfortable. Then she told me, “Sleep child. You’ll be all right.”
The last sounds I heard were the windows being bolted and the triple locks on the door being engaged. I slept soundly.
In the morning, Nana remained her distant, remote self. She was not given to talking and overt friendliness, but it seemed that it had become her self-imposed duty to be my protector. She would stand guard outside the bathroom every time I took a bath or when I answered the call of nature. Often when I was doing my homework or sitting in the swing set, I’d find her within screaming distance.
Sebastian made no attempt on me again and I had an inkling it was because of Nana. But he and my mom seemed to be on a downward spiral and I was helpless to stop it. It started with slaps in the face while he pretended to joke around. Then their fights deteriorated to abusive rows that involved a lot of hitting and foul language. Once, it got so bad that my mom, drunk and in a fighting mood, slipped on the stairs and dragged Sebastian down with her. She bled between the legs, while he sustained a fractured leg.
We found Mom was two months pregnant and she lost the baby. She was inconsolable.
She avoided the bottle like it was perdition when we brought her home from the hospital. One night, as I was preparing for bed in Nana’s room, she came in and indicated she wanted to talk. I nodded.
“I’m sorry I dragged you into this. I should be a better Mom,” she started, hesitant.
“I just don’t understand the choices you’ve been making, Mom. You used to be sensible. I don’t understand why we’re here and why you’re with Sebastian,” I blurted out.
“I’m a single mom who didn’t even finish high school. Who would want me? I’m lucky someone like him loves me,” she was defensive.
“Someone like him? He does nothing but drink. His family doesn’t want him because he’s trouble. Aren’t you taking the whole love thy neighbor commandment too far?”
“And what do you want? For me to go back to my dead end job. Beg for it? I’d rather endure his drunken tirades that go back to backbreaking work,” she almost raised her voice.
“No. I just want my old Mom back. The one who was happy wherever she was. I forgot the last time I saw you smile,” I was sobbing.
She took me in her arms, and said, “Shhh, shhh. We’ll be okay. Don’t worry. I’ll fix this. Don’t cry, baby.” Then mom left me as Nana came in.
Nana stroked my hair as I wiped my tears. It was the first time she touched me.
My eyes were red and swollen from crying the night before. Sebastian was still in the hospital. I thought this was my chance to convince my Mom to change her mind and accept help from the people who love her. I called my Grandma, her Mom.
“Hi Grandma,” I greeted her as she picked up the phone.
“Your Mom’s doctor called me. I heard. How is she?” Grandma was gentle.
“She’s recovered, but I can’t convince her to leave. It’s like being trapped in hell,” I said.
“I’ll talk to her. I’ll come down with Grandpa tonight. How about you? Would you like to live with us for a while? We’ll get by, you know that,” she queried.
“I don’t want to leave Mom, especially now. She seems confused,” I replied.
“Okay, baby. You take care and stay within Nana’s sight,” she reminded me.
I hung up feeling a bit better and less helpless. But dinner didn’t go as I expected. Grandpa and Grandma came in good spirits, perhaps optimistic that they could convince their stubborn daughter to change course and leave Sebastian.
Grandma said she called some of her relatives and one of her nephews was willing to give Mom a job in his construction company in the next province. He would even help her finish high school, and perhaps go into college so she can help with the administrative chores in his company.
Mom found all of this distasteful and said so. The evening ended on a sour note as Grandma and Grandpa said curt goodbyes. Grandpa said he was going to see a lawyer so they can get custody of me. I wanted to cry.
Sebastian came home one month later and he was in full fighting form. I began to dread the nights because when it got dark and it was time for bed we would hear things get knocked around in the upstairs bedroom that Mom and Sebastian occupied.
In the mornings Nana would straighten it up so that you couldn’t tell violence took place there. When there was no school I would help Nana clean up the house and would be horrified by the sight of my Mom’s bedroom. There would be alcohol stains on the floor and blood spatter on the wall. The furniture would be in the most inappropriate places, sometimes some were half out the windows.
My heart would leap in my chest with terror when I saw my Mom in the mornings. There was one time her entire left arm was covered in bruises and her lip was broken in five places. Sometimes she couldn’t open her eye from the injuries that covered it. It made me so sick I called the police once. I cried in Nana’s arms when I heard my Mom refuse to press charges.
“I’m sorry kid. We can’t take action unless someone complains and your mom isn’t complaining,” the police officer said matter-of-factly.
Mom slapped me when the police left. It would be her last act of strength. The next day Nana brought her back to the hospital because she saw blood on the toilet in their bathroom.
She died of internal bleeding in the hospital and I didn’t know if I should laugh at this absurdly anticlimactic manner in which Mom left me. Because she was in a violent relationship, I expected her to bid me a gory goodbye. But she didn’t and I was sad that she didn’t even see me graduate high school, or read our story in a novel that has yet to be written.
But most of all I am sorry that she didn’t believe she deserved more than she settled for.
Tuesday, April 6, 2010
Except
I would have loved you
If not for the tenderness in
Your voice
That bids me rest
My weary head
From the wars waged within
I would have loved you
If not for the angel eyes
That reflect the better parts of
Me
And make me see in their mirror
The person I could be
I would have fallen
If not for your
Near perfection
That reminds me
Of the divine heights
One could aspire to
In this life
I would have loved you
Had I not known
I would be held captive
By this emotion
Tied to you
For the rest of time
And when time ends,
The moments after that
I could not be tied
I cannot be a prisoner
When I know that
Time is not on my side
And there is only one life to live
And it cannot be lived
Enslaved
Captivated
By one who is a lesser god.
If not for the tenderness in
Your voice
That bids me rest
My weary head
From the wars waged within
I would have loved you
If not for the angel eyes
That reflect the better parts of
Me
And make me see in their mirror
The person I could be
I would have fallen
If not for your
Near perfection
That reminds me
Of the divine heights
One could aspire to
In this life
I would have loved you
Had I not known
I would be held captive
By this emotion
Tied to you
For the rest of time
And when time ends,
The moments after that
I could not be tied
I cannot be a prisoner
When I know that
Time is not on my side
And there is only one life to live
And it cannot be lived
Enslaved
Captivated
By one who is a lesser god.
Can you say magick?
Blinded
Blindness came to him like a quiet thief, stealing all his belongings one by one, until one day he realized his home was empty. That was how it felt, as the loss of vision crept upon him that year, when his diabetes took a turn for the worse. He would have preferred an amputated leg, or a quick death, but he accepted his fate with a begrudging grace, of which even God Himself would have approved.
The woman came upon him through an ad his mother placed in the only newspaper circulating in their remote town. She answered through letter and sent credentials and references that he would find later, are bogus. He was totally blind and he had no memory of her. So sometimes, when he could hear her pottering about in the kitchen, he indulged his imagination and made up stories of how she came to be here, and what she looked like.
On rainy days, he liked to think she had long straight hair and a slim figure, much like a boy’s. On warm days he bestowed her with curly hair and a curvaceous body. In between, she’d have short hair and a medium build. He got tired of his own game eventually, so he ventured to ask her to describe herself to him.
She refused.
He was flabbergasted. Any woman would have jumped at the chance to describe her best self to a blind man so her refusal baffled him.
He asked her again, every hour of every day. She was adamant. She did not budge. She kept silent about her history and her looks, but on any other subject she could talk endlessly. Like the different varieties of tomatoes in the garden. Or the flourishing herbs she planted one by one beneath the mango trees. Or the many ways she could cook the eggs the chickens laid every day. And her laugh. It was not the shy, tinkling laugh of a delicate maiden, but the robust outburst of someone who left her qualms along the sea a long time ago.
Her refusal only fueled his imagination even more. When her tone was low and hinted of sadness, he would think of her with a thin long face, droopy eyes and a straight sorrowful mouth. There were times, when she enumerated the herbs under the mango patch, he imagined her to be a rotund, flaxen haired garden fairy much like the lady who cooked for his family in his childhood. The combinations were endless, endless as the oceans that kissed the shore in front of his home. Yet with each guess, he imagined her shaking her head and smiling in amusement as he tried to describe her to herself.
The weeks she was with him stretched into months and he began to get used to her like one does to a broken in sofa or some other piece of furniture. He also got used to his lack of sight—he got around the house, which he knew like the back of his hand—with a stick. Memories served him well as he passed the days sitting in the lanai in the mornings, after which he moved to his terraced bedroom for a nap after lunch. Afternoons were spent making clay pots in the shed, where the clay was cleaned so that no sharp objects would cut his delicate skin. He had no idea what his pots looked like. She just guided him at the start and let his imagination take its course.
It was recommended by his doctor to his mother, his sole surviving family. The doctor said he should find something to occupy him; otherwise he would atrophy into a misanthropic patient.
It relaxed him, and he was told, his pots and plates were well received in the city, where his mother found a china shop to finish and sell his products on consignment. That they were made by a blind artist added to the novelty and value of his pottery.
He grew to love her, his companion. Not in the carnal manner that love between men and women is often depicted, but a kind of fraternal affection that exists between brother and sister, or best friends. Her prattle when she cooked soothed him. When they sat together in the evenings before turning in, he was comforted by her silent presence. She became a fixture in his life, a fixture he did not want to lose.
One day, he came into the kitchen for breakfast to find her in a holy temper. She found out the butcher had been double charging her for the meat for the past two months.
“Can’t you let it pass?” he asked trying to pacify her.
“I could kill that man. A liar, a cheater! I trusted him,” then she went off in a tirade delivered in a language unfamiliar to him.
“Calm down! It’s just money. Money you earn, but a life you cannot get it back,” he was laughing now.
“Why do you laugh? We have been cheated of money equivalent to your one month’s work.”
“I couldn’t care less. When someone cheats, the burden is on the cheater. What could you do with tainted money, eh?”
“So, I just let him go, just like that?”
“Just like that. Come now give me breakfast, I feel like making pots this morning.”
He wolfed down his bacon, eggs, and salsa and washed it all down with fresh carabao’s milk. He went into the shed after reading the paper.
He worked quietly, after she started him up. He worked efficiently. At midmorning, it rained and he smelled the smell of soil newly washed with heaven’s plenty. Then, he noticed something strange. He could see what he was doing! Somehow, he was not blind anymore!
“Cara! Cara! Come! I could see! I don’t know how, but I could see!”
She dropped the plate of vegetables in the kitchen, unconscious of anything else but celebrating the miracle with him.
“How? How did this…o Lord. Do you have a mirror? Quick. I need a mirror!”
“Why? Cara?”
He saw her for the first time and if truth be told, she was a scary sight. He’d never seen a woman as unattractive as her. Warts and hair grew randomly on her alabaster, transparent skin. Her nose was long and crooked and she was disfigured like a burn patient. He almost gagged .
“Cara?”
“I was cursed. By an old lady in the city who swindled thirty pesos from me. She put a spell on me. She said I would only break it if I let go of my greed. But I don’t understand, why were you healed? And why didn’t the spell break?”
“Tell me, why were you cursed?”
“I used to run a bogus operation. We used orphans and homeless children to get money from rich patrons. But I still maintain there was nothing wrong with what we were doing. We only got money from the wealthy and we may not have provided the children with a good shelter, but at least they did not starve. One day, a beggar asked me for thirty pesos to buy bread. But I saw her gamble it away. It made me mad, I nearly killed her. She cursed me then. But why do I still look the same? I realized after our talk in the kitchen you were right. Money is just money, but life is more important.”
“Well, have you let go of your greed? Isn’t that what you really look like?” He aimed for levity, she looked like she was about to bawl her eyes out.
“Not funny, mister. I had smooth, dark skin and hair the color of ebony. I am not this ghastly monster,” she was crying now.
“Well, maybe there was a delay in the cracking of the spell. There might be no radio signal where the enchanted creature that turned you into this is,” he tried to comfort her.
She told his mother through the phone of the restoration of his sight. She brought him to the doctor the following day and he was declared normal. His diabetes was cured as well. He did not resume his old job as a lawyer, but instead continued with his pottery. He was an even better artist when his eyesight was restored, because he got to study objects for inspiration that he found in his small seaside farm.
Cara lived with him still and he got used to her looks. He did not mind. To him she will always be the trusted, reliable friend who helped him get through his blindness.
One day, while she was harvesting tomatoes, Cara came upon a young woman with hair the color of iron, who asked for a drink.
She let her into the kitchen and marveled that her visitor was not repelled by her looks.
“The spell will not break. You will live with your looks for the rest of your days,” the young woman declared while sipping her glass of sweet spring water.
“I am sorry?”
“He does not love you in the way you want him to love you. Wishing back for your looks won’t make it happen,” she continued.
“I beg your pardon…”
“It does not matter if you admit it to anyone or not. It remains a fact. You love him and want to be his wife, but if that happens, your love of money will destroy him. You may have realized that money isn’t the most important thing in the world, but it is still important to you. If you get your looks back, he will still not love you, but he will try to love you as you want to be loved out of gratitude for you.”
“But why was he healed?”
“Because he helped you become a better person, if only by a small degree. That deserves a reward, don’t you agree?”
When the maiden left, Cara went to him and explained the miracle to him. She did not mention her love for him. She said the spell will not break anymore, not in her lifetime and she did not mind living as she was if only she will be allowed to stay with him.
He said, she need not fear he will drive her away and that he will always be grateful for her help when he was most helpless.
So they lived the rest of their days together in the small farm by the sea with the trees and herbs and tomatoes, with him thinking they loved each other as brother and sister, never knowing how close they were to destruction, if not for the protection of a higher power.
Blindness came to him like a quiet thief, stealing all his belongings one by one, until one day he realized his home was empty. That was how it felt, as the loss of vision crept upon him that year, when his diabetes took a turn for the worse. He would have preferred an amputated leg, or a quick death, but he accepted his fate with a begrudging grace, of which even God Himself would have approved.
The woman came upon him through an ad his mother placed in the only newspaper circulating in their remote town. She answered through letter and sent credentials and references that he would find later, are bogus. He was totally blind and he had no memory of her. So sometimes, when he could hear her pottering about in the kitchen, he indulged his imagination and made up stories of how she came to be here, and what she looked like.
On rainy days, he liked to think she had long straight hair and a slim figure, much like a boy’s. On warm days he bestowed her with curly hair and a curvaceous body. In between, she’d have short hair and a medium build. He got tired of his own game eventually, so he ventured to ask her to describe herself to him.
She refused.
He was flabbergasted. Any woman would have jumped at the chance to describe her best self to a blind man so her refusal baffled him.
He asked her again, every hour of every day. She was adamant. She did not budge. She kept silent about her history and her looks, but on any other subject she could talk endlessly. Like the different varieties of tomatoes in the garden. Or the flourishing herbs she planted one by one beneath the mango trees. Or the many ways she could cook the eggs the chickens laid every day. And her laugh. It was not the shy, tinkling laugh of a delicate maiden, but the robust outburst of someone who left her qualms along the sea a long time ago.
Her refusal only fueled his imagination even more. When her tone was low and hinted of sadness, he would think of her with a thin long face, droopy eyes and a straight sorrowful mouth. There were times, when she enumerated the herbs under the mango patch, he imagined her to be a rotund, flaxen haired garden fairy much like the lady who cooked for his family in his childhood. The combinations were endless, endless as the oceans that kissed the shore in front of his home. Yet with each guess, he imagined her shaking her head and smiling in amusement as he tried to describe her to herself.
The weeks she was with him stretched into months and he began to get used to her like one does to a broken in sofa or some other piece of furniture. He also got used to his lack of sight—he got around the house, which he knew like the back of his hand—with a stick. Memories served him well as he passed the days sitting in the lanai in the mornings, after which he moved to his terraced bedroom for a nap after lunch. Afternoons were spent making clay pots in the shed, where the clay was cleaned so that no sharp objects would cut his delicate skin. He had no idea what his pots looked like. She just guided him at the start and let his imagination take its course.
It was recommended by his doctor to his mother, his sole surviving family. The doctor said he should find something to occupy him; otherwise he would atrophy into a misanthropic patient.
It relaxed him, and he was told, his pots and plates were well received in the city, where his mother found a china shop to finish and sell his products on consignment. That they were made by a blind artist added to the novelty and value of his pottery.
He grew to love her, his companion. Not in the carnal manner that love between men and women is often depicted, but a kind of fraternal affection that exists between brother and sister, or best friends. Her prattle when she cooked soothed him. When they sat together in the evenings before turning in, he was comforted by her silent presence. She became a fixture in his life, a fixture he did not want to lose.
One day, he came into the kitchen for breakfast to find her in a holy temper. She found out the butcher had been double charging her for the meat for the past two months.
“Can’t you let it pass?” he asked trying to pacify her.
“I could kill that man. A liar, a cheater! I trusted him,” then she went off in a tirade delivered in a language unfamiliar to him.
“Calm down! It’s just money. Money you earn, but a life you cannot get it back,” he was laughing now.
“Why do you laugh? We have been cheated of money equivalent to your one month’s work.”
“I couldn’t care less. When someone cheats, the burden is on the cheater. What could you do with tainted money, eh?”
“So, I just let him go, just like that?”
“Just like that. Come now give me breakfast, I feel like making pots this morning.”
He wolfed down his bacon, eggs, and salsa and washed it all down with fresh carabao’s milk. He went into the shed after reading the paper.
He worked quietly, after she started him up. He worked efficiently. At midmorning, it rained and he smelled the smell of soil newly washed with heaven’s plenty. Then, he noticed something strange. He could see what he was doing! Somehow, he was not blind anymore!
“Cara! Cara! Come! I could see! I don’t know how, but I could see!”
She dropped the plate of vegetables in the kitchen, unconscious of anything else but celebrating the miracle with him.
“How? How did this…o Lord. Do you have a mirror? Quick. I need a mirror!”
“Why? Cara?”
He saw her for the first time and if truth be told, she was a scary sight. He’d never seen a woman as unattractive as her. Warts and hair grew randomly on her alabaster, transparent skin. Her nose was long and crooked and she was disfigured like a burn patient. He almost gagged .
“Cara?”
“I was cursed. By an old lady in the city who swindled thirty pesos from me. She put a spell on me. She said I would only break it if I let go of my greed. But I don’t understand, why were you healed? And why didn’t the spell break?”
“Tell me, why were you cursed?”
“I used to run a bogus operation. We used orphans and homeless children to get money from rich patrons. But I still maintain there was nothing wrong with what we were doing. We only got money from the wealthy and we may not have provided the children with a good shelter, but at least they did not starve. One day, a beggar asked me for thirty pesos to buy bread. But I saw her gamble it away. It made me mad, I nearly killed her. She cursed me then. But why do I still look the same? I realized after our talk in the kitchen you were right. Money is just money, but life is more important.”
“Well, have you let go of your greed? Isn’t that what you really look like?” He aimed for levity, she looked like she was about to bawl her eyes out.
“Not funny, mister. I had smooth, dark skin and hair the color of ebony. I am not this ghastly monster,” she was crying now.
“Well, maybe there was a delay in the cracking of the spell. There might be no radio signal where the enchanted creature that turned you into this is,” he tried to comfort her.
She told his mother through the phone of the restoration of his sight. She brought him to the doctor the following day and he was declared normal. His diabetes was cured as well. He did not resume his old job as a lawyer, but instead continued with his pottery. He was an even better artist when his eyesight was restored, because he got to study objects for inspiration that he found in his small seaside farm.
Cara lived with him still and he got used to her looks. He did not mind. To him she will always be the trusted, reliable friend who helped him get through his blindness.
One day, while she was harvesting tomatoes, Cara came upon a young woman with hair the color of iron, who asked for a drink.
She let her into the kitchen and marveled that her visitor was not repelled by her looks.
“The spell will not break. You will live with your looks for the rest of your days,” the young woman declared while sipping her glass of sweet spring water.
“I am sorry?”
“He does not love you in the way you want him to love you. Wishing back for your looks won’t make it happen,” she continued.
“I beg your pardon…”
“It does not matter if you admit it to anyone or not. It remains a fact. You love him and want to be his wife, but if that happens, your love of money will destroy him. You may have realized that money isn’t the most important thing in the world, but it is still important to you. If you get your looks back, he will still not love you, but he will try to love you as you want to be loved out of gratitude for you.”
“But why was he healed?”
“Because he helped you become a better person, if only by a small degree. That deserves a reward, don’t you agree?”
When the maiden left, Cara went to him and explained the miracle to him. She did not mention her love for him. She said the spell will not break anymore, not in her lifetime and she did not mind living as she was if only she will be allowed to stay with him.
He said, she need not fear he will drive her away and that he will always be grateful for her help when he was most helpless.
So they lived the rest of their days together in the small farm by the sea with the trees and herbs and tomatoes, with him thinking they loved each other as brother and sister, never knowing how close they were to destruction, if not for the protection of a higher power.
Monday, April 5, 2010
Buhol buhol
Lubid
Kung ang paglulubid ng buhangin
Ay kasalanan
At hindi katuwaan
Aanhin pa ang pagtitinginan
Na may hangganan
Hindi nasilip nino man
Ang kamalian
Ng paghingi ng pagtingin
Sa kulog na mahiyain
Sa dagat na mahinhin
Sa lawak ng paglikha
Doon ka lumuha
Mga mata’y piniga
Dahil hindi mo na kaya
Ang bigat ng iyong pasanin
Mga kasalanan ng mundong pariwara
Ang mga lihim na hindi
Maibunyag
Ang katahimikang
Diyos lamang ang may karapatang
Bumasag
Nagsusumamo
Sa pitong karagatan
Na ika’y pawalan
Pabayaan
Gumala sa mga sulok
Ng mundong hindi mo
Maitigil ang pag-ikot
Pagkat ang kalayaan para sa iyo
Ay ang pagkabigkis sa lubid na
Buhangin
Mga pananaw na likha ng
Lumisang bait
Mga kwento ng isang nilalalang
Na sa isip mo lamang nabubuhay
Pagka’t kung tutuusin
Mas malaya ka sa mga ibong lumilipad
Dahil ikaw kailanman ay hindi maikukulong
Ng mundong nalulong
Sa katotohanan.
Kung ang paglulubid ng buhangin
Ay kasalanan
At hindi katuwaan
Aanhin pa ang pagtitinginan
Na may hangganan
Hindi nasilip nino man
Ang kamalian
Ng paghingi ng pagtingin
Sa kulog na mahiyain
Sa dagat na mahinhin
Sa lawak ng paglikha
Doon ka lumuha
Mga mata’y piniga
Dahil hindi mo na kaya
Ang bigat ng iyong pasanin
Mga kasalanan ng mundong pariwara
Ang mga lihim na hindi
Maibunyag
Ang katahimikang
Diyos lamang ang may karapatang
Bumasag
Nagsusumamo
Sa pitong karagatan
Na ika’y pawalan
Pabayaan
Gumala sa mga sulok
Ng mundong hindi mo
Maitigil ang pag-ikot
Pagkat ang kalayaan para sa iyo
Ay ang pagkabigkis sa lubid na
Buhangin
Mga pananaw na likha ng
Lumisang bait
Mga kwento ng isang nilalalang
Na sa isip mo lamang nabubuhay
Pagka’t kung tutuusin
Mas malaya ka sa mga ibong lumilipad
Dahil ikaw kailanman ay hindi maikukulong
Ng mundong nalulong
Sa katotohanan.
Are you awake?
Predilection
There was nothing remarkable about him, if you saw him at the park, at work or at his mother’s. His name is Francis, perhaps a too ambitious name for someone who rarely left an impression on the people he met. His eyes were vacant, his hands nervy and his overall demeanor was one of apathy.
He lived for two of God’s creations: Miranda, his mother’s childless widowed neighbor and Zooey, his pet black Labrador.
Miranda’s husband left for the war with the communists three summers ago and never came back. He was a big man, who looked capable of anything. But he wasn’t capable of giving his wife a child and he wasn’t capable of surviving a war.
Miranda was Francis’s first love, he loved her still. But when they were much younger and of age to marry, he balked at the idea for the horror stories he heard of having sex with virgins disfigured his sexual preferences for life. Miranda, he knew was a virgin at the time when she indicated she would not find it unpleasant for him to be her husband. She let him feel her.
He preferred prostitutes, male and female. With the female ones, he did what husbands did with their wives, there was no sexual perversity about him when he was with women. Even in bed it can be said that Francis left no impression.
With males he stayed with them for less than twenty minutes. Francis was repulsed by the idea of inserting his peter into an orifice meant for another function. What he did with them was touch their scrotum in minute strokes, investigate the shades of flesh that make it up, and play with the testes they contain. That was all, touch and revel in their velvety softness, a softness that can be contained in the palm of the hand, unlike breasts that are too smooth and too large to hold.
Soon though, news of his peculiar practice spread among the practitioners in his town and the next and the next so that some of the prostitutes offered to let him touch them for free, if he would include the penis in his tactile games and let them come off in his hand.
Francis was so repelled by such requests that he stopped patronizing the brothels and did without this peculiar predilection for years. He did not want intercourse with men; he just wanted to touch their balls.
Until he took in a stray male dog that has already passed on, may God rest his canine soul. He was giving it a bath; its coat was mangy when it first came to him. His mother, who loved dogs, taught him when he was a kid about the proper way to groom a pet, and it included washing the genitals. He shampooed the dog’s coat. He was soaping the hairless skin that covered the dog’s privates (are they really?) until he came upon the balls. He soaped it for ten minutes, careful to touch the area with as much love a potter gives his clay while giving it form.
It shook him at first. He was an upright Christian in many ways, well liked and respected by those who knew him and managed to remember him and in a town with a scarcity of respectable women you can take to be your wife, patronage of the brothels was a non-issue. He liked to think he drew the line at animals, yet here was a solution to his problem. There will be balls to touch with no strange requests and secret snickers at the seriously peculiar activity he liked to engage in.
He resisted at first, until it became a habit. He let the dog sleep in his bed so he can touch its balls first thing in the morning and last thing at night. Sometimes he walks home for lunch, from the construction site where he works so he can touch his dog’s balls. After work, he relaxes with a beer and his dog’s balls. After doing the dinner dishes, there is more touching. Before going to sleep, he gives his dog’s balls a goodnight touch.
Francis has had three dogs so far and he is extremely satisfied with the arrangement. Nothing, he thought, would disturb the serenity such a discovery achieved in his life. Yet he ached for Miranda. Beautiful Miranda who was slim and curvy in the right places, her dark eyes always reflecting an understanding for him he did not see in other women. With her, he registered, he was not forgettable and after her husband died she confessed she was broken hearted when he did not ask her to marry him.
So tonight, he will rectify that oversight. She was no longer a virgin and the lukewarm affection he felt for her was without a doubt reciprocated, if not returned with interest.
He went to the barbers to get a moderately trendy new coiffure. He wore his best shirt and belatedly ironed his best pair of wool pants. He bought cream stargazers and put the velvet box with his grandmother’s yellow diamond ring in his breast pocket.
Miranda said yes and his mother was ecstatic. They married two weeks later. He left his claptrap apartment and moved into her spacious ranch style home left by her husband. He took his dog with him and she bought it a doghouse, which was placed on the lawn.
This new setup did not bother Francis at first but after a month of going without Zooey’s balls, he was on the edge of his sanity. He’d contrive to escape Miranda’s company and be alone with the Labrador for a few minutes but she’d soon call out to him and find him.
He could find no opportunity to scratch Zooey’s scrotum.
Francis soon began to resent his wife, making up his mind that Miranda was an overly dependent, clingy, oversexed slut who should get a life.
One weekend he scored Valium from his mother’s medicine cabinet and put it in Miranda’s nightly glass of milk. He tiptoed out of the master bedroom out to the lawn when he was sure she was deep in drug-induced sleep. He sighed and closed his eyes as the comfort of the dog’s balls permeated his bones. After he had his fix, he went indoors to wake up his wife and have uneventful intercourse with her.
He thought he found a way out of his predicament when the idea of locking himself with the dog in the bathroom crossed his mind. This worked for a week, but Miranda, who was nobody’s fool, started asking questions.
His excuse was that he didn’t like being alone in the bathroom. She offered to come with him instead. He refused saying the dog would be adequate company. She conceded, at least, that’s what he thought.
They took a trip out of town for a month to the city and stayed in a tony hotel, went to the theater and ate at nice restaurants. It was Miranda’s belated wedding present to Francis. The dog, of course, was left at his mother’s. Francis missed Zooey, at least missed his balls.
He was antsy by the time the plane landed in the airport and impatient to see his pet. He locked himself in the bathroom with Zooey first thing when they reached the house. Miranda didn’t say a word.
Miranda never said a word either after she found him at the doghouse in the middle of the night when she didn’t demand that he perform his marital duties with her. This made him bolder and he brought the dog in the bedroom to sleep with them.
This went on for two weeks. One day after work, he saw a closed van parked on the driveway. There were visitors, but not the kind he expected.
As he came in, a burly man in scrubs held his arms and with the assistance of two equally burly men, put him in a straitjacket. He will be brought to a mental asylum.
Miranda told him she will pay for his treatment, out of consideration for his mother. But she will divorce him. She had cameras installed throughout the house after he started locking himself in the bathroom with the dog and she told him she found him repulsive.
She said all this without raising her voice and with a sad, sardonic smile.
In the asylum, on his fourth month, his divorce papers arrived. It was accompanied by a Ziploc bag containing Zooey’s spotted balls. Francis’s scream could be heard throughout the halls.
There was nothing remarkable about him, if you saw him at the park, at work or at his mother’s. His name is Francis, perhaps a too ambitious name for someone who rarely left an impression on the people he met. His eyes were vacant, his hands nervy and his overall demeanor was one of apathy.
He lived for two of God’s creations: Miranda, his mother’s childless widowed neighbor and Zooey, his pet black Labrador.
Miranda’s husband left for the war with the communists three summers ago and never came back. He was a big man, who looked capable of anything. But he wasn’t capable of giving his wife a child and he wasn’t capable of surviving a war.
Miranda was Francis’s first love, he loved her still. But when they were much younger and of age to marry, he balked at the idea for the horror stories he heard of having sex with virgins disfigured his sexual preferences for life. Miranda, he knew was a virgin at the time when she indicated she would not find it unpleasant for him to be her husband. She let him feel her.
He preferred prostitutes, male and female. With the female ones, he did what husbands did with their wives, there was no sexual perversity about him when he was with women. Even in bed it can be said that Francis left no impression.
With males he stayed with them for less than twenty minutes. Francis was repulsed by the idea of inserting his peter into an orifice meant for another function. What he did with them was touch their scrotum in minute strokes, investigate the shades of flesh that make it up, and play with the testes they contain. That was all, touch and revel in their velvety softness, a softness that can be contained in the palm of the hand, unlike breasts that are too smooth and too large to hold.
Soon though, news of his peculiar practice spread among the practitioners in his town and the next and the next so that some of the prostitutes offered to let him touch them for free, if he would include the penis in his tactile games and let them come off in his hand.
Francis was so repelled by such requests that he stopped patronizing the brothels and did without this peculiar predilection for years. He did not want intercourse with men; he just wanted to touch their balls.
Until he took in a stray male dog that has already passed on, may God rest his canine soul. He was giving it a bath; its coat was mangy when it first came to him. His mother, who loved dogs, taught him when he was a kid about the proper way to groom a pet, and it included washing the genitals. He shampooed the dog’s coat. He was soaping the hairless skin that covered the dog’s privates (are they really?) until he came upon the balls. He soaped it for ten minutes, careful to touch the area with as much love a potter gives his clay while giving it form.
It shook him at first. He was an upright Christian in many ways, well liked and respected by those who knew him and managed to remember him and in a town with a scarcity of respectable women you can take to be your wife, patronage of the brothels was a non-issue. He liked to think he drew the line at animals, yet here was a solution to his problem. There will be balls to touch with no strange requests and secret snickers at the seriously peculiar activity he liked to engage in.
He resisted at first, until it became a habit. He let the dog sleep in his bed so he can touch its balls first thing in the morning and last thing at night. Sometimes he walks home for lunch, from the construction site where he works so he can touch his dog’s balls. After work, he relaxes with a beer and his dog’s balls. After doing the dinner dishes, there is more touching. Before going to sleep, he gives his dog’s balls a goodnight touch.
Francis has had three dogs so far and he is extremely satisfied with the arrangement. Nothing, he thought, would disturb the serenity such a discovery achieved in his life. Yet he ached for Miranda. Beautiful Miranda who was slim and curvy in the right places, her dark eyes always reflecting an understanding for him he did not see in other women. With her, he registered, he was not forgettable and after her husband died she confessed she was broken hearted when he did not ask her to marry him.
So tonight, he will rectify that oversight. She was no longer a virgin and the lukewarm affection he felt for her was without a doubt reciprocated, if not returned with interest.
He went to the barbers to get a moderately trendy new coiffure. He wore his best shirt and belatedly ironed his best pair of wool pants. He bought cream stargazers and put the velvet box with his grandmother’s yellow diamond ring in his breast pocket.
Miranda said yes and his mother was ecstatic. They married two weeks later. He left his claptrap apartment and moved into her spacious ranch style home left by her husband. He took his dog with him and she bought it a doghouse, which was placed on the lawn.
This new setup did not bother Francis at first but after a month of going without Zooey’s balls, he was on the edge of his sanity. He’d contrive to escape Miranda’s company and be alone with the Labrador for a few minutes but she’d soon call out to him and find him.
He could find no opportunity to scratch Zooey’s scrotum.
Francis soon began to resent his wife, making up his mind that Miranda was an overly dependent, clingy, oversexed slut who should get a life.
One weekend he scored Valium from his mother’s medicine cabinet and put it in Miranda’s nightly glass of milk. He tiptoed out of the master bedroom out to the lawn when he was sure she was deep in drug-induced sleep. He sighed and closed his eyes as the comfort of the dog’s balls permeated his bones. After he had his fix, he went indoors to wake up his wife and have uneventful intercourse with her.
He thought he found a way out of his predicament when the idea of locking himself with the dog in the bathroom crossed his mind. This worked for a week, but Miranda, who was nobody’s fool, started asking questions.
His excuse was that he didn’t like being alone in the bathroom. She offered to come with him instead. He refused saying the dog would be adequate company. She conceded, at least, that’s what he thought.
They took a trip out of town for a month to the city and stayed in a tony hotel, went to the theater and ate at nice restaurants. It was Miranda’s belated wedding present to Francis. The dog, of course, was left at his mother’s. Francis missed Zooey, at least missed his balls.
He was antsy by the time the plane landed in the airport and impatient to see his pet. He locked himself in the bathroom with Zooey first thing when they reached the house. Miranda didn’t say a word.
Miranda never said a word either after she found him at the doghouse in the middle of the night when she didn’t demand that he perform his marital duties with her. This made him bolder and he brought the dog in the bedroom to sleep with them.
This went on for two weeks. One day after work, he saw a closed van parked on the driveway. There were visitors, but not the kind he expected.
As he came in, a burly man in scrubs held his arms and with the assistance of two equally burly men, put him in a straitjacket. He will be brought to a mental asylum.
Miranda told him she will pay for his treatment, out of consideration for his mother. But she will divorce him. She had cameras installed throughout the house after he started locking himself in the bathroom with the dog and she told him she found him repulsive.
She said all this without raising her voice and with a sad, sardonic smile.
In the asylum, on his fourth month, his divorce papers arrived. It was accompanied by a Ziploc bag containing Zooey’s spotted balls. Francis’s scream could be heard throughout the halls.
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