Boarding House Chronicles pt 3

Scraps of food lay scattered all over the banggerahan in the dirty kitchen. Upon the sink, there stood a small bucket of MY San Assorted Biscuits now serving as a container of the rapid drips of water from the leaking faucet pipe. I stayed on there for a while watching the droplets of water create an evanescent sound in the midst of the blabbing boarders, the squealing pigs in the sty and the splashing of running water in the irrigation canal.
With less effort, I placed the tray of toiletries on the banggerahan ignoring the nauseous leftovers. I tore a sachet of toothpaste and begun brushing my teeth in alternate upward and sideward motion. As a queer habit, I counted every brush strokes I make. It took me thirty quick brush strokes before I noticed the pinkish stains mixed on the foam of toothpaste on the sink. I knew it was blood coming from my gums again, only lighter this time. I stared at the foam unwinkingly and the longer I gaze at it, the more it looks like a cotton candy scant of food color. Suddenly, I saw a silhouette of a man on the corner of my eyes. I quickly rinsed my mouth with clean water and hastily washed away the foam of toothpaste on the sink. When I looked up, a tall and dark guy was standing by my side, looking at me with a sinister smile.
“Are you going to a bloody battle? Why do you sharpen your teeth?” he asked in a swaggering manner.
It was the same funny and silly question I used to hear from my classmates back in high school. His question neither moved my lips to fake a smile nor opened my mouth to utter a word because it really annoyed me. I glared at him with sheer bravado and went on washing my face. I wasn’t sure if he intended to use the faucet after me or whatnot but he stood there motionless watching every movement I make. Aware of his watchful eyes, I fidgeted with the water glass and dropped it lightly in the bucket. I couldn’t stare at his face because I’m defiant to see the sinister smile I saw in him previously. It really scared the heck out me. I shut off the faucet, arranged my toiletries on the tray and hurried upstairs without looking back. I knew he was watching me while I was walking in haste and it’s sick that I can’t look back and glared at him again.
I entered my room and tried to recollect the uncomfortable moments I just spent in front of the sink. It was an awkward encounter with a total stranger. I suspected that he’s a new boarder in the house. I tried to remember the image of his face on my mind and I saw a mole below the right corner of his lower lip. He reminded me of Rocky Salumbides, a paragon blessed with good looks and a hot body. I began to undress him in my thoughts. I started on his plaided shirt, on his cropped pants and his shoes. I took off everything else on him until he’s stark naked before my eyes. Suddenly, I caught a glimpse of a huge rat bridging over the plywood partition of the rooms. It stopped creeping on the corner and stared at me, assessing my reaction perhaps. I shifted my eyes and looked at the void of space outside the window. I kept looking but not seeing. That dirty huge rat enabled me to realize that my wandering thoughts are way too far-fetched, impure and perverted. I pulled out a deep sigh, picked up my phone, opened and shut the door and went directly downstairs.

Boarding House Chronicles pt 2

The cool breeze diffused into the bamboo-knitted walls of the room, prickled the soles of my feet like frozen water. The clanking of the water pump beneath the window and the small rush of water from its shaft is a wakeup call to the snoring occupants of the room. The boisterous roars of three-wheeled vehicles can be heard against the sound of the window hinges swinging back and forth. Apparently, it’s 6 o’clock but I lingered in my bed with relish for comfort. The wind is unusually cool. I prognosticate that it will rain today. I pulled the covers upward and hid my eyes to hinder the first ray of sunlight that slipped through the window. I heard fast and heavy footsteps on the narrow and rickety staircase. Then I heard three softy knocks on the door. It was Jake, the tall and dark guy I met in the dirty kitchen last week.
“Mayor, may I borrow your broom?” he asked with a hoarse voice, suggesting that he’d just waken up.
I was elected mayor of the boarding house organization and everyone else here had since branded me with that title. I kinda like the authority I am holding now. When I ask them to fetch me water in the bathroom, they instantly do without any trouble. But it’s pathetic to think that they only obey me because I am the eldest boarder in the house.
“Mayor … your broom. Thanks.” Jake drawled out.
“No problem.” I replied. “What time are you gonna hit the school today?”
“Ahm. Later at 9:30 I guess.” He muttered with his lips partly closed.
Those lips – unusually wet all the time – which formed a sinister smile last week had become stirring, provoking and tempting. It lured me to savor its freshness. It kept me slack-jawed, drooling over it. It drove me nuts!
We discussed about random things yesterday under the Indian mango tree at the backyard. We talked about the viciousness of the school, its lapses in following its established protocol, its amenity and the people in it. It gave me a brain fart moment discussing these things with him. He told me insolently about his misdemeanors in the classroom at the Maritime Education department. He would yell at the teacher if he found the latter ridiculously disturbing. I thought this guy has an ego way too big for him. He seriously needed his butt paddled up because it’s obvious that it was never done to him growing up!
We talked about other things like our interests and guilty pleasures. He mentioned that he loves Harry Potter and Narnia movies. He even kept a complete collection at home. His confession vastly surprised me because at the way he behaves, anyone would expect that this guy watches Robin Padilla movies. I like his fashion too. I would always see him wear crumpled faded jeans and shirts with cool appliqués on them. He has piercings on his ears, on his nose and on his private parts. Of course I wouldn’t know that if he hadn’t told me. I just didn’t know what struck me but it gave me goose bumps knowing these flimsy, sleazy things about him.
I hear a lot from my board mates that I’m becoming unusually closer to him. Jake might have heard this too but it seems that he’s way too oblivious of the hearsay. I wish to have more placid moments with him in the future, under the shade of the Indian mango tree at the backyard. The next time it’ll happen again, the moon should be visible on the star-studded sky and the land breeze drifting the weeds on the meadow.

Brave Face

He held his red canvas bag and swung it across his slender shoulder on the right and bolted like a Dalmatian found a good bone. Reaching the metal handle of the glass door, he strode in a haughty catwalk style. His jaguar stilettos hammered the concrete floor in a resonating sound at every even step he made. Random students in all-white, tucked uniform herded together at the Student Lounge glanced at him as if scrutinizing his stature. He is tall and lean, his hair almost gray, his lashes flutter and his voice shrills. He gazed at the uniformed students sternly. I rushed to the glass door and called for him before he could cross the pavement to the Techno building. “Kling, come back. Hurry!” he pivoted gracefully and went back, gliding like a punk on his skateboard. “Imbierna! I have a class at 3:00, it’s a quarter left. You’re keeping me late, you faggot!” he exclaimed. He’s always full of bravado and conceit when he speaks. Sometimes I take time to question myself how much backbone does this guy hold to produce such a scornful voice. He looks so different, almost unpleasant but he behaves like he’s on a platform and I on the ground floor. I met him last month when I joined the University Student Council. He’s from the legislative and I’m from the executive. Though I’ve been seeing him around since last semester, it never occurred to me that we can be this close like we are now. Those times I treated him like a grotesque thing to behold. His skin looks like that of a long-tailed reptile – coarse and oddly white-spotted. For some time I thought he’s a nauseous thing to stand close by. But recently, my treatment of him has become warmer and more civil. I learned that his skin imperfection is a disease – not a communicable so it’s safe to allow my skin brushes his. He suffered a huge deal of sarcasm and humiliation growing up but it didn’t get the better of him. Instead he stood still and proud, intimidating the boneheads who ridiculed him. “It’s just a matter of bravery and contempt,” he said once “if you don’t correct them when they upset you, they’ll never learn to treat you with respect.” True that. Sometimes you have to be brave even if it’s just pretended courage if that requires people to treat you their equal. The preamble did not speak of a humane society with savage people living on it. Life is not fair outside but you have to fend it off. Every time I look at Klein I think about strange things; strange but prevailing things. His guts hid his imperfections. It’s amazing how he did even that. I remember him telling me about his embarrassing tete-a-tete with a college dean last year. “You are so dumb!” She cursed him. That’s what he prized after creating a fiasco as a facilitator in a Quiz Bee during the Intrams. He was shrinking like a balloon belching all its air. I can’t tell whether he told me the real thing that happened between them or not. But during that moment, I lost one strand of respect from the ex-dean. Never before have I thought such a high paid teacher brand a student as dumb. Kling’s condition already decimates his confidence and telling him he’s dumb would crush even more whatever amount of hope he had all his life. She is awful and I’m serious about that conviction. I have my own share of embarrassment once when I consulted her about my overlapping class schedules. She hasn’t driven me bonkers when she told me I’m a nuisance. I didn’t despise her for that but she scared the heck out of me. Klein must have felt the same terror. “I gotta go. I’ll be back in a bit though. Bye girl,” he uttered. His eyes darted across the glass sliding window. He left the office; his stilettos hammered the concrete floor and echoed his steps outside the half-closed glass door. He is oddly-looking. He flutters pulses when he talks. Certainly, he’s one hell of a daring guy.

Boarding House Chronicles

I tore the Business Gazette cover leaf and fanned the embers in the coal stove. The motion disturbed the subtle ashes, scared it away like a swarm of flies whipped by a stiff twig. I added cold coals in the stove and set the rice pot on it. Then I went on a corner of the kitchen and sat on a wood bench beside the kitchen table. I watched the boys intently doing a rough workout with dumbbells. I could see the moist of perspiration running down against their brown skin towards their half naked bodies. It gave me a grave feeling of nausea looking at their bodies wetted by sweat. I couldn’t bear the sight of them so I stood up and approached the stove again to examine the ashes interspersed among the cold coals and crumpled papers.

Jake stirred the noodles in his casserole with a large and elongated spoon, resisting the hot water vapor ascending from the boiling water. In our boarding house or maybe even in other boarding houses here, Lucky Me Pancit Canton is the staple food of the boarding students. You won’t find a room here without seeing a heap of pancit canton in the cupboards. You might also find the bold cans of tuna, corned beef, sardines and beef loaf but pancit canton is the dominant food supply. Apparently, it is because it’s affordable, quick and easy to prepare. I grinned at Jake as he wipes out the moist on his forehead – a mixture of water vapors, perspiration and dead skin cells. I turned halfway around and intended to sit back on the wood bench at a corner when a boy – his name I didn’t care to know – approached me with a handled rectangular box.

“Mayor, do you know cheese?” asked the boy with excitement on his face.
“What? Is that a food?” I replied with intentional sarcasm.
“Hahaha! Are you deaf? Can’t you see I’m holding a cheeseboard?” the boy asked irately.

It took me a moment to decide whether he meant that I’m deaf because I didn’t hear him say cheese or I’m blind because I didn’t see him carrying acheeseboard.

“Silly boy! You mean to say, chess?” I retort with an evil grin rather showing a sneering response.
“Whatever you call it! Do you know how to play this game?” he asked again with a bit of indignation in his voice.
“I dunno… Sorry.” I answered bashfully.

He twitched his mouth showing an evident implication of frustration. He went to the rooms and looked for a willing playmate. I shook my head and went back to the stove. I lifted the cover of the rice pot to check the temperature of the water. It’s warm and there were tiny bubbles moving in random direction. I returned the cover and then looked at Jake with an expressionless face. He moved his head towards me and threw his arm around my shoulder.

“You are so mean.” he whispered.

I chuckled upon hearing the message because his breath created a ticklish feeling in my ear and butterflies in my stomach. I removed his arm from my shoulder and pinched him on his bare back as I let out a shrill giggle.

I cherish those moments – it happened just an hour ago – and while writing this journal entry, I am wearing a big smile on my face.