Francisco Jose - The Samsons - Two Novels

The zoo was almost deserted; we had a bench and the greenery to ourselves. Lily had looked at the giraffes and elephants with perfunctory interest. She wanted to talk.

“I did what you told me,” she finally said. “I took Mother and the young ones out. We went by taxi to the Luneta. For fresh air, I said. Toward evening we went to the Aristocrat and had fried chicken. We were very happy … then I told Mother. The young ones were too busy eating to listen.”

“What did she say?”

“She cried, right there in the restaurant, not loud, the tears just falling down her cheeks. She said I was the best person to decide, that she would pray no harm would come to me, that I would remain honorable.”

“You will have difficulty doing that, Lily. You are on a precipice, just one nudge and you will keel over.”

“I know,” she said sadly.

“You have known how it is to be embraced by a man. What happens when you have a customer you like, and you are there … in the dark?”

“It has not happened yet.”

“But it will happen!”

Silence, the bustle of children nearby, the tinkle of an ice cream vendor’s bell.

“I wish I could have you stop, Lily.”

She held my hand.

“When we are together like this, are you Number Seventeen or yourself?”

“I am myself, of course,” she said, eyes flashing. “I know you are not trying to garaje me.”

“I cannot afford it.”

“It is not that. I would not let you.”

“Because you do not care.”

Tenderness in her eyes, she opened her mouth as if to speak, but she stopped. After a while, she asked quietly, “What is it you really want from me? Do not joke now. Everyone who has been to the Colonial wants one thing.”

I wanted to assure her I was no different, that I wanted her, but I could not bring myself to tell her this although I was sure she knew.

“You will only leave me dangling,” she continued.

“I am not impotent!”

“That is not what I meant,” she said quickly. “You know, there will be many things on our minds, I will be thinking of my past, my job, how it will be, and it will not be enjoyable anymore.”

“I try to live for now,” I said.

“I have my mother, my brothers and sisters.”

“I know.”

“With us, nothing serious, that’s all.”

“I cannot be flippant with you,” I said. “I am sincere. Remember that.”

“But why me?” she asked. “There are so many girls in your school. They are not unwed mothers, and they do not have families to support. And most of all, they don’t work in massage parlors where they give sensation to six, eight men every day — old men, teenagers, businessmen. Why me? Why can you not be clear-headed?”

“I am.”

“Then keep away from me.”

“Do you want me to?”

“Yes,” she said, but without conviction.

I kissed her hand that had grasped a hundred penises.

“I don’t understand, Pepe,” she said.

“It’s fate.”

I was silent for a while, contemplating her face, the sad eyes, the small pert nose, the lips, and the soft line of her jaw.

“Ramona,” I breathed.

“What?”

“I am dreaming again,” I said. “Even with people, I sometimes forget I am here, here in Manila, here in this Barrio, here.”

“What are you trying to tell me?”

“Do not laugh. Ever since I was young I have always held one girl in my heart. You know, those crushes when you are a teenager. But this one has lasted.”

“Tell me about her.”

“She is dark brown — very kayumanggi , bas they say. Usually, the girl boys dream of are fair, mestiza.”

“But she is dark.”

“Yes, as dark as you. I will recognize her when I see her.”

“You mean you have not met her?”

“Yes, I have — but here, only in my mind.”

“Something like an ideal?”

“More than that. She is very real to me. I can hear her voice, and it is melodious and soft. I can see her, slim but not thin. And her breasts are small. She is slightly bowlegged. And her skin is clear and richly toned. And her eyebrows are unplucked.”

“But she does not exist.”

“She does, here,” I gestured toward my breast.

“ Ligaw tingin, kantot hanging. cBut this is worse because she does not even exist,” she sighed.

“I told you, she is here.”

“How did you first meet her?”

“In some melody Mother hummed when I was young. Ramona — if only she would be real someday.”

“Ramona — she even has a name. But it isn’t a very romantic name.”

“It is to me.”

“How did she get that name?”

“I don’t know all the words, ‘I hear the mission bells above … I dread the dawn when I wake to find you are gone …’ ”

“She isn’t here,” she said. “But I am.”

“And so is the night,” I said, “and it is a long, long night.”

“What are you trying to say?”

How could I tell her? Describe the murk where I had been, in my mind more than in what was around us?

“The world is dark,” I said, instead. Her hand tightened on mine. The sun blazed down, a boy selling ice cream came to us, but we did not want any. She had a new wristwatch, it was almost four. We had clung to words as if they were nuggets of wisdom, but the only truth was that we were together in this dismal place. How does the song go? “It’s only words, and words are all I have to take your heart away …” And now, while I was rich with words, I could not speak the right ones to impress upon her that sitting on this edge of perdition or clinging to this razor’s edge, as the old saying goes, is our only alternative.

* Syoki: Not masculine; homosexual.

† Cartulina: Cardboard, poster board.

‡ † Banca: A Philippine canoe.

§ Makibaka! Huwag Matakot!: Join! Don’t be afraid!

‖ Sugod: Advance!

a Lechon: A roast suckling pig.

b Kayumanggi: Skin color — not too dark, not too light.

c Ligaw tingin, kantot hangin: Courting by means of just looking.

Although Auntie Bettina said I could be a scholar if I only tried, I was surprised to get the highest grades and to be eligible for free tuition in the next school year. There would be two months of Brotherhood inactivity; we would not have any demonstrations till June or July when the universities would be full again and most of our members had returned to Manila from the provinces. I also found out that I had a talent for Spanish, and I studied it in the summer session, determined that after those two months — by June — I should at least be able to understand and converse a bit in it.

My determination was wrought out of anger. When I met Betsy, although I had already had a year of Spanish — grammar and such — I still could not speak the language. She was born to it; her family spoke it at home, together with English, Visayan, and Tagalog.

Now I also had a clearer image of the class against which we were pitted. I did not have to take political science or sociology to understand this. Instinct sufficed. Even in school, I knew my teachers, like Professor Hortenso, were different.

I tried attending to the rules, and it was not difficult, for these rules could be bent to accommodate friends, and I could, myself, assume a color to their liking. That is what we learn early. But I had been aware of what I was doing and I always had to be cautious with those I did not really know, particularly those who might be able to do me good. I was not worried about being harmed — how could anyone hurt me or drag me farther down from where I was?

But with Betsy I was never cautious; I just opened up, innards and all, as if I had known her all my life. She was a junior at Maryknoll, and like most Maryknoll girls, she talked too much.