Brett Battles - The Pull of Gravity

Over the two weeks before Larry’s arrival, Mariella continued to act happy for Isabel one minute, then sow the seeds of doubt the next.

“He has a big house there in California?” she asked.

“Four bedrooms,” Isabel told her.

“And he really lives there all alone? That’s hard to believe.”

At another time:

“He’s divorced, right?” Mariella asked.

“No, he’s never been married.”

“Why not?”

“He says he hasn’t found the right girl yet.”

“That’s good. Of course, he could be lying,” Mariella said, giving Isabel a wide grin to show she was joking.

One time when they were at the mall in San Fernando, shopping for a welcome-back present for Larry, the conversation went like this:

“What do you think of this shirt?” Isabel asked, holding up a light blue, button-up shirt.

Mariella wrinkled her nose. “Whatever you think he’ll like.”

Isabel put the shirt back, suddenly questioning her own taste.

They continued looking for a while, finding nothing that seemed right. When they’d taken a moment to get something to drink, Mariella said, “You know that everything I say to you is because I care about you and want to make sure you don’t get hurt, di ba ?”

“Sure,” Isabel said.

“Good. That’s good.” Mariella took a sip of her water. “So your Larry, you’re sure he’s not married, right?”

“What?” Isabel’s eyes widened in surprise.

“I know you told me he’d never been divorced,” Mariella said quickly. “I just wanted to make sure you actually asked him if he was married.”

“Of course I asked him,” Isabel said. “He’s not married. He’s never been married.”

Mariella laughed. “It’s okay. I didn’t think he was. I just wanted to make sure, di ba ? Sorry, sorry, sorry.”

And finally on the day before Larry arrived:

“If he’s not married, and he has no girlfriend, and he flies over here all the time to see you, why doesn’t he marry you and take you to California?” Mariella asked.

But this was one question Isabel had already been asking herself. And so far she’d only come up with one answer. “I don’t know,” she said.

I don’t remember much of anything from that time Larry came. I think I only saw him twice, his first night and his last. I’m pretty sure he brought me my usual gift of Marzen, and I do remember commenting to him on that last night that I was disappointed we didn’t get a chance to hang out more. But the ten days he was here turned out to be pretty eventful for me. And, as Isabel told me later, it was pretty eventful for them, too.

On all of his previous trips to the Philippines, Larry had spent very little time in Mariella’s company. He and Isabel might meet her for a drink one night, or, on a couple of occasions, share a meal. But that was about it. This time, though, was different. Mariella seemed to be with them wherever they went.

At first Larry didn’t seem to even notice. He told Isabel he was just happy to be with her. He told her over and over again how much he’d missed her. She liked the way he was always looking at her, as if she was the only person around. And so, because of this, when Mariella asked to go with them the first couple of nights, both Isabel and Larry said okay.

Apparently, Mariella was with them that first night they came to The Lounge. I never saw her, and Cathy, who would have said something to me, wasn’t there that night. In fact, as I was acutely aware, she hadn’t been there for several nights, so I guess that’s probably why Mariella showing up at The Lounge didn’t even register with me.

By Larry’s third night in town, Mariella stopped asking and just automatically tagged along. At first, even that didn’t seem to bother him, but by the fourth or fifth night, he’d apparently had enough.

“Can’t we have a night with just you and me?” he asked Isabel one night when they had a few moments alone together.

Mariella’s presence had actually been bothering Isabel longer than it had been bothering Larry, yet she was willing to put up with it if she was the only one who noticed. Now that Larry had said something, she told him, “I’ll talk to her.”

The next day while Larry was in the shower, Isabel called Mariella on her cell from Larry’s hotel room. Mariella told Isabel a story she heard about a girl who worked at Torpedoes who’d gotten into a fight with the mamasan, then moved directly into what she’d heard about another girl they both knew who’d moved to Australia with her new husband. Isabel listened patiently, not really sure how she was going to bring up the subject of that evening. Looking back later, Isabel realized that Mariella probably knew exactly why her cousin had called and was doing everything she could to keep Isabel off track. It worked for a while, but then Isabel was finally able to grab onto an opening.

“I think tonight Larry wants to take me out to a special dinner,” Isabel said, trying to keep the nervousness out of her voice. “Just him and me.”

“Oh,” Mariella said.

“It’s not that we don’t enjoy having you along…” Isabel said.

“No. I understand.” All the fun had left Mariella’s voice. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to get in the way. You have fun. I’ll leave you alone.”

“It’s not like that,” Isabel said. “You weren’t in the way. It’s just…”

“Please. I understand. Okay, I have to go now.”

“I’ll call you later, okay?” Isabel asked.

“I think I’m going to be busy. Maybe tomorrow. Bye.”

Mariella hung up before Isabel could say another word.

Mariella couldn’t have spun a more effective web of guilt around Isabel if she tried twice as hard. Now, instead of being happy to be with Larry and enjoying their time together, the whole day and into the night, Isabel worried about what Mariella thought about her.

Knowing Larry, I’m sure he probably noticed something was wrong not long after they went out, but Isabel said he didn’t say anything until that evening. They were at dinner, the seafood barbecue poolside at the Las Palmas Hotel.

Unusually for them, their conversation lagged. Larry tried numerous times to get it going, but Isabel was unresponsive. Her mind was a million miles away that night, she told me. She was sure Mariella was upset with her. She feared the next time she saw her cousin, Mariella would ignore her, shunning her the way Isabel had seen Mariella shun others in the past. She had no idea how much she had fallen under Mariella’s influence, and how much she'd come to need Mariella’s approval in everything she did.

At one point, when the conversation had fallen into one of those long silences, Isabel looked up and found Larry staring at her.

“Are you feeling okay?” he asked.

“I’m fine,” she said.

“It’s just that you’ve been staring at your food for the last five minutes but not eating anything.”

“I guess I’m not that hungry.”

“It’s more than that,” he said. “You’ve barely said a word to me since we got here.”

She tried to smile. “A headache, that’s all.”

“Are you feeling sick?”

“I don’t know,” she said.

Larry pushed his chair back. “I’ll get you some aspirin,” he said as he stood.

He looked so eager to help that she said, “Okay.” She didn’t think the aspirin would work, but hoped that getting it would distract Larry long enough to give her time to shake herself out of her funk.

It didn’t.

The dreaded encounter with Mariella came the next night. After dinner the night before, Larry had suggested they call it an early evening. And though Isabel’s sleep was not completely sound, she did wake up in the morning feeling better. By the time they went out that night, she was even in a good mood again.