Published by: Lloyd Agbulos
Date published: September 20, 2022
Time published: 8:23 AM
Category: Prose
Looking outside the jeepney, I notice many things: the busy chattering of students scattered on the streets, dynamic and fast, that they seem like little specks of light moving around, the roaring engines of vehicles, unforgiving even during nighttime, and the stars scattered above, shining like hope in the sky. The evening has enveloped everything in darkness, establishments have now lit up their cool fluorescent lights in contrast to the jeepney’s warm ones. The night air hugs me in its arms and wraps me in a wind so quiet and unnoticed, it almost feels like it’s nothing—but it’s there, clinging to my shoulders, whispering the moon’s secrets.
Looking inside the jeepney, my eyes find yours but I quickly look away, stricken with panic. I got caught. My heart hammers in my chest—screaming at me for letting my guard down, claws at my ribcage for being so obvious. I got caught. Sweat builds up in my palm, an ugly reminder of the occurrence that happened seconds earlier. I got caught. There are warning bells ringing inside my mind, telling me to at least do something—anything—get off this jeepney, run all the way from Muntinlupa to my house, and disappear (forever, if the universe allows me to).
The exhaustion from a 6-hour class evaporates from my back and is, instead, replaced with nervousness that starts from the bottom of my toes to the tip of my forehead. I probably look stupid—no, not probably—I do look stupid. I can’t bring myself to tilt my head up and act as if nothing happened. I want the universe to swallow me whole and never give me back to Earth. I want to—
“Chico, right?”
Did I hear that right?
I finally look up and I see the same pair of eyes I glimpsed at earlier. This time, though, I get a good sight of them beneath the orange lights of the jeepney, softer and rounder, benevolence swimming in their irises. The emotions I am experiencing—there are many of them— like the seas, cannot be eradicated or driven from my being; rather, they are transformed, consistently scouring. They seem to go on forever, like the waves, out to the horizon. I swallow all of these instantly, still terrified to be captured and seized.
I peek again, and you are still looking at me—like you know all of my secrets and they’re yours to keep.
“Yes, I’m Chico,” my voice shakes as I say these words, completely caught in the trap you have laid out for me. Your eyes disappear and turn into crescents, and somehow—somehow, I feel so whole.
“I know,” you laugh. Despite it being in a state of dread a while ago, my heart feels so open, so bare, and so spacious. I can feel everything: the soft cushion of the couch gently digging into my back, the soft vibration of the jeepney’s engine, and the chilly breeze of the night.
But I do not feel cold.
At the edge of the jeepney, there are just the two of us, and the only measure of distance is how closely we are bonded. You are an arm’s width away from me, and yet your warmth still seeps through the distance between us—this distance I wish to close someday, only if you let me.
Cartoon by: Sophia Kassandra Pagulayan
No comments:
Post a Comment