Aalis na nga pala ako. Pupunta ako sa malayo. Doon sa hindi ninyo na maaabot. Nakakapagod din kasi. Nakakapagod maging bahagi ng laro ninyo kung saan ako naman ang laging talo. Nakakapagod manood sa kasiyahan ninyo. Nakakapagod mapagkaisahan ng mapaglarong mundo. Nakakasawang ipilit ang mga bagay na kahit anong gawin ko ay alam ko namang hindi mangyayari. Nakakasawang makibahagi. Nakakasawang makibagay. Nakakasawang makantsawan at maiwang nag-iisa.

Sa pag-alis ko, dala ko ang ating masasayang alaala. Masaya ako na naging bahagi ng isang mundo kung saan ang kasiyahan ay makukuha mo nang hindi mo na kailangang magpakahirap. Nakita ko kung paanong mangyari iyon. Nakakalungkot man isipin na nagaganap ang kasiyahan sa harap ko at hindi ako naging bahagi nito, masaya na rin ako na naging buhay akong saksi sa kung paanong maging masaya ang maraming tao sa paglalakbay nating ito.

Huwag ninyong kalimutan ang bawat masasayang sandali, ang bawat kantayawan, at ang bawat pinagdaanan. Hindi ko makakalimutan ang lahat ng iyon. Sa ating patuloy na pakikipagsapalaran sa mundo, nakita kong sabay-sabay tayong hinulma ng bawat pagpapagal tungo sa pagkamit ng mga bagay na makakapagpasaya sa atin. Nakita ko kung paanong naging mabuti tayong mga tao sa bawat pinagdaanan, kaya ang aking dalangin ay patuloy nating ilakip sa ating pakikipagsapalran sa umiinog na mundo ang bawat kaalaman na makapaghuhubog sa atin upang maging mas mabuting mga tao. 

Huwag kang magmadali, kaibigan. Kayong lahat. Tayong lahat. Huwag tayong magmadaling matuto upang mahanap na kaagad ang kaligayahan at ang kaganapan ng ating mga pangarap. Hayaan nating unti-unti nating magamay ang buhay. Hayaan nating tayo mismo ang makadiskubre kung paanong magiging kapaki-pakinabang ang ating buhay at kung paano natin masasabing natuto tayo. Hayaan nating magkamali tayo. Intayin natin ang tamang panahon upang masabi nating natuto tayo.

Aalis na ako, kaibigan. Iiwanan na muna kita. Bibilisan ko ang takbo upang hindi ka makahabol. Sa ngayon, kailangan mo munang mapag-isa at tahakin ang landas nang wala ako sa tabi mo. Baka sakali kasi na mas mabuti iyan. Baka mas mabuti iyan upang mas maging matatag ka, at lalong higit, upang malaman mo ang kahalagahan ko. Baka sakali lang naman. 

I dreamed about sex again.

The dream starts with me going out of my room, walking downstairs, getting out of the house, crossing the street, and knocking at Belinda’s house just in front of ours. She opened the door and smiled at me. I asked her if she’s doing well; she said she was. She told me that I should get in because she was cooking something and she couldn’t stay outside really long. It was either I leave or I stay. Of course, I stayed.

She was baking. The smell of cookies was the house’s perfume that afternoon. The first batch was ready, so she offered me some. Belinda, my childhood best friend, loves cookies and milk. She always bakes all these cookies of different shapes and flavors, and then she would dip it into her milk for miryenda. We were on the living room, and I was just looking at her, marveling how much she has grown. We are both in college, and who would have thought that this girl in front of me, who was once a very messy kid, is everybody’s dream girl now? Well, who could say know to her beauty and those healthy boobies?

She was drinking milk when some of it spilled and went all over her clothes. She said she would go upstairs to change. As I looked at her wet clothes, I got a boner and asked her, wondering, where her parents were. She said they went to a party and would come home tonight. And then, she went upstairs.

I didn’t think twice. I hurried upstairs and went to her room. When I opened the door, she was shocked and had to cover her breast with her still-wet blouse because she had just removed it. I grabbed her and pushed her to her bed. She was shocked. I crawled to her and grabbed her hands, just so she couldn’t escape. She shouted, so right away, I gagged her with my handkerchief. I used her blanket to tie her hands, and I went on with my thing. I was so horny. Things were fast and I found myself exploding inside her. 

I looked at her and I saw tears. I can’t take it. It made me feel guilty. I killed her because I can’t take it. I can’t stand to look into her eyes.

It was the noise of sirens that woke me up that morning. Apparently, police cars are swarming at Belinda’s house.

There are a lot of things that I don’t know. For one, I don’t know where to start. I don’t know what lies ahead. I don’t know if today is gonna be great. I don’t know if I will make it big someday. I don’t know if I am walking that right path. I don’t know if I would do well at school over again. I don’t know if things that happen are actually meant to be or if they happen because people make them, regardless of whether they are meant to happen or not, of whether people are meant to make them happen. I don’t know what happens to everybody else at any other place at the moment. I don’t know what people feel. I don’t know if I am doing the right thing. I don’t know what to hope for. I don’t even know if hoping for is just proper enough to be done. I don’t know if people are living it up the life they are given. I don’t know how this life should be liven up. I don’t know if people are seeing today as a great morning. I don’t know if this morning is actually a great one. I don’t know a lot of things, yes. I don’t know if it is worth knowing them anyway.

Probably, it is just fine not to know everything. In fact, that’s a good thing. Sometimes, when we know too much, we tend to overthink and thing way ahead that we forget to dwell with what we have know. When we know something about what’s gonna happen, we worry about the comeuppance of our actions, and the result of that, and the result of the results, and so on. We forget what happens now because we think too much about what happens next.

Of course, you will know if things are meant to be learnt or if you should wait for them to transpire. Don’t take this literally and don’t apply this to practically everything. Know only what you should know.

Stop worrying about the things that you don’t know. Let things unfold at the right moment. 

To find love, stop looking. Surely, it’s going to be really hard. It would break you apart without anyone taking part in the process. It would tend to break you. It would be sad; it would drain all the happiness you try to feel even if the world seems to present you the perfect forms of happiness and not give you even one form anyway. It would be like watching from an endless roll of film reels that play all day; you just get to watch and get nothing but envy and even more loneliness. Those happy people around you would only remind you how alone you are. It would be that tough.

But hey, to find love, stop looking. Stop looking around and stop wishing that you get what other people have. Stop and wait. While waiting, live. By living, I mean enjoying what and who you have at the moment. Every moment you spend lamenting what you don’t have takes away the moments you should have spent enjoying what you still have. By the time you realize that, those things are already gone and that’s when you become alone. Don’t let that happen. Just wait and let things take shape by will. Anyway, love and happiness would feel twice the ecstasy when you don’t force them to happen. Let them do their job. They would know when it’s time.

Date a guy who writes. He will take you to a journey into a blissful fantasy. He will make your make-believe’s come true right in front of your eyes through his wit with letters. He will make a thousand ship launch into a dreadful battle for your beauty. He can save you from years of longing up in the highest tower. He can bring you back to life with just a kiss. He can fist fight with dragons, warlords, wizards, and trolls just to make you the queen of the kingdom. He can be your knight and your champion, your prince and your savior, your tribute and your hero.

Date a guy who writes. His words will take you to Never Never Land. With him, you will travel the world in days. You will experience magic at its best. With a writer by your side, you will know what it is like to smile genuinely with the words spoken with a heart that truly cares. He will share with you the stories that could touch your life. He will tell you his stories. You can unravel all the sides with truth and honesty. You will know who is really behind the stories. You will feel how special it is to stay close to his heart.

Date a guy who writes. He will weave your happy endings and will make them real. He will make those endings last forever, until you wouldn’t have to call them endings anymore. He will show you the realities in all the tales you learned to love. He will not stop with fantasies. He will make it happen for you. 

(Source: sirseaweedbrain)

My name is Isabela and I used to be second best. Things would usually change, but I wonder why, every time I get to get to the top, I only end up mourning.

When I was in grade school, my best friend Monina and I were a tag team because we always land the top spots in academics. Of course, I was second place. It was fine with me because Monina is my best friend and I am so proud of her. It was always consistent during the years. In Grade 3, however, since our school, which was situated in a rural area, will be awarding medals and scholarships instead of just ribbons because the newly elected mayor pledged sponsorship, I started craving for the topmost spot. Days before recognition, Monina and I were walking to school when, all of sudden, a truck appeared at a curve we were about to pass. She got hit. I cried a lot most especially when I was being awarded the gold medal and the scholarship grant during the recognition program.

Years after, I was always rank 1. In Grade 6, however, I found myself in competition with this boy named Aeron. He was exceptionally good in Mathematics. Well, I was really excelling as well, but he became the favorite because he was new when he transferred in Grade 5. He wasn’t much of a threat because he was the Math genius and nothing more. I was just surprised when he aced all subjects in Grade 6.

He was announced Valedictorian. My classmates were whispering that it should have been me had he not transferred to our class. I told them that it was fine because what’s important is that we would all graduate. We closed the conversation with a group hug with all our eyes teary with a mixture of joy and sadness.

On the day of graduation, Aeron was found dead in our very classroom. I came to school late that day and was aghast when I found out what happened. Apparently, Aeron told his parents that he would go to school earlier and would just meet them there because he would meet one of our classmates. And there he was found instead, bathing in a pool of fresh blood.

My valedictory address became a eulogy to Aeron.

I became number 1 again when I entered high school. I was even attending competitions on almost all the subjects. Of course, I ended up being the champion. There was this decathlon where we were to compete at finals with a group of students from a prestigious private school. Our scores were on a race towards the end of the game, and after the break, the brainiest player of our rival group was nowhere to be found. They were disqualified, and we became the champion. 

The player was later found dead inside the girls’ bathroom. They say that she must have hit her head to death by accident because the floor was really slippery. I was sad because I even congratulated her in advance during the break when I walked pass her in the comfort room.

On a journalism seminar, I found myself competing again with this girl from another school, who was first in every category where I landed second the year before. She was sort of my competition. Like me, she was the editor-in-chief of their school that time. However, the night before the awarding ceremony, she was found dead in her quarters, with pens stuck deep in both her eyes. It was really horrifying for everybody. It gave me extra chills because just a few hours before that she smiled at me at dinner. 

The management, despite the scene and the police surveying the area, decided to still award the certificates to the winners. I was 1st place in news writing, feature writing, and column writing.

Now, I am an incoming 4th year high school student. I was feeling a bit bad because Clayton, my classmate, was just a few points away from me by the end of our 3rd year. I hope that it wouldn’t be a hindrance to my becoming the Valedictorian. Well, anyway, whatever happens, I know there is a way.

I wasn’t really going to deal with this seriously, but after Kyo’s post, I realized that we should be talking this thing out. 

This is to settle things once and for all. It is tiring to talk among our subgroups about how we feel bad about the other group. With that, we will only end up solving nothing.

Yup. We felt bad. Imagine how we looked like total idiots, waiting for what’s gonna happen next, waiting for us to all go somewhere else that afternoon. Imagine how we were waiting for you guys and you aren’t even moving. Imagine the awkwardness. And then, you aren’t gonna come with us. And then, things we were not involved were to happen and we weren’t informed about it. How about that?

Let’s not narrate what happened; let’s go into what should have been done and why we are acting like this. Naturally, we were expecting that we will all bond at the meetup. It has been the protocol for us. Well, it is not that required for it to be called a protocol (we have other friends who don’t spend much time with us during meetups and we understand that), but it was something understood among us. 

We weren’t invited. Sure. We are not after the food or the party (I can’t imagine eating somewhere I am not welcome). The thing is, you should have told us. I mean, who are we not to understand? We are not kids anymore. We wouldn’t cry over parties we are to miss. Just tell us. It is awkward, but you should have told us. Your part was that, ours is to understand. How can we do our part then?

I am bitter. I am bitter not because we weren’t invited. I am bitter because I love you all guys and we shouldn’t be like this. We all know that you have all the right to have new friends who get to have more bonding with you than us, but then, we are friends, too. If this certain event is not for our group, it is OK. All you have to do is to inform us, just so we wouldn’t be wondering what the hell was the problem. I am bitter because I have the right. I treat you as friends close to my heart. I am bitter because you somehow forgot that.

After the incident, we posted things. That is the least that we could do. We don’t have the right to confront you about choosing other friends because you have that privilege. If we confront you, it would look as if we are taking away that right from you. That is the reason why all we could do is to wrap our pain in words that are woven out of the longings for the people we miss, for you. I only made this particular post because it is pretty obvious that we are fighting no matter how we try to hide it.

Let’s face this with open minds ready to take anything humbly. We have to face this that way if we want to stay strong.

I love you all and I don’t know what to say anymore. I just hope we could fix this. This is too small a clamor to destroy us all.

Again, I am here in this same office and have been doing the same routine for the last ten years. People would ask me if this is tiring. Hell no. I love this job, and I am here to stay.

My name is Randolf and I have been still enjoying my job as a copyeditor. We edit files for scientists, professors, and engineers around the globe. We edit their works on this and that as per grammar and style. Each project has its own set of manuals with various styles to follow. In one project, hyphenations are not changed at all. In another, only punctuation marks are checked for proper usage and consistency. Full editing is required in many. Things like that.

This job is one boring job, I know. All day, you would have a face-to-face duel with your computer, typing all day to make changes in every file here and there. Worse, you would do it again tomorrow and the day after that. You would encounter authors whose sentence constructions are out of this world. You get to edit research papers with topics you don’t even know about and terms that make you bleed. Don’t you dare make changes that alter the meaning. Don’t dare fix what’s not even broken to start with.

I entered the building with a smile. I said hello to the guard. I think he’s new here because his face is not familiar to me. I smiled, and he was reluctant. I climbed up to the fourth floor, stepping aside as my supervisor rushed out to go to the bathroom. I didn’t get to greet her because I think she’s in a hurry. Probably, something is about to burst.

I sat on my chair and opened my PC. It’s late night and I chose this shift because these has been part of my routine. I stood up to get a file to work on. No one is around now. I hate this silence. This creeps me out every time. It brings back the memories that I’ve always wanted to keep on some big chest in some stock room. The silence reminds me of that one night that I’d rather forget.

Ten years ago, around this time of the night, I rushed to work because I have a file to finish. I came from a party because we celebrated my being promoted as the manager. I was planning to just finish the said file tomorrow, but the people from the other department already needed my file, so I had no choice but to give it a go. Anyway, my apartment is just a few blocks from here. 

With nothing but silence to accompany me on a busy night, I was already working on the said file when, suddenly, I felt something extremely painful in my head. Blood dripped to my cheeks, and I fell. I looked up to see Mimi, the previous manager. She was holding a large metal rod, looking at me with a face and stead as if she had just made a homerun after hitting the ball. 

It wasn’t my fault that she lost her job. It wasn’t my fault that she has become incompetent and that people filed a case against her unfairness and lack of competency as a manager. It wasn’t my fault that all her other secrets, including falsification of receipts for financial reports and the apparent loss of funds, have been brought up. It wasn’t my fault that I got accepted as the new manager. It wasn’t my fault that I needed the job, too.

She killed me anyway.

Ever since that night, I have been doing exactly the same thing. I have been working and working, one file after another, doing the same thing and not even getting tired of it. This has been my job for a very long time. Mimi or any another manager can never stop me from doing my job.

I heard someone come, so I looked up. I saw the frightened face of another employee as he ran away after seeing me. Maybe, he needs to go to the bathroom, too. 

Lately, I have been being told of the lessons I have never learned, which kinda sucks. After a long time of posting one-liners as a scapegoat to not express the right emotions to the right people, along with short posts that only give people something but not give it completely, I am back with this hell of a post where you hear me talk about things that are practically not worth the time and effort. For one, I am extremely sad, and if you don’t want your happy day with butterflies and rainbows on the backdrop be ruined with pain and drama, I advise you to scroll past this and instead be fooled by how life is like happily flying along the clouds with your own Pegasus. I have problems with how to keep a relationship without delving into it too much that there isn’t life to live anymore. I don’t like to hate my being responsible for my family because I really like to help them, but sometimes, responsibilities like that tend to stand in the way of finding the happiness that everybody deserves, everybody including me. As much as I want to control my relationships with other people, no matter the degree, it is not for me to decide. Relationships are the connections we make with other people, and they should also have their say in this matter. For now, all I wish for is friendship. Having a special someone is not my priority now, but if someone comes (or if someone chooses to stay instead), I want us to have fun and enjoy our moment. That has always been what I envision as of the moment. I like enjoying conversations and hangouts without having to worry about each other’s sensitivity issues. I like doing things together without being asked to do them out of responsibility. You enjoy the connection and not the label. You enjoy the company and not the title. You enjoy the memories and not the must-do’s. You enjoy the feeling and not the responsibility. At this moment, that’s one ideal relationship. And then, we will grow past early adulthood knowing a lot about each other. We wouldn’t know if it’s gonna be us in the end until we get there. We will leave our families in stable lives and will get to focus on our own, finding each other together again, this time ready for the next move. That is how things work for people like us, for people who aren’t blessed with the riches where others bathe in. This is how priorities should be set. For me, the picture seems perfect, only it won’t be happening anymore. 

I didn’t stop to think things over the moment I heard it from our neighbor. I ran home right away.

Erik and I have been arguing about things since last night. He would usually come home with a flower for me, sometimes just one rose with a ribbon tied around its already thorn-free stem and, on other occasions, a bouquet of flowers that really smelled like heaven. If not, he would surprise me with a kiss, or he would suddenly tickle me while I was cooking dinner for us to share. We would watch TV shows until late night or would watch some movies together. He would even make it a point that we would watch horror films only to scare me out. I would then hide under his arm whenever the ghosts in the movies appear on the screen. I would end up sleeping with my head on his lap. The next thing I knew, I was in our bedroom, and he was hugging me real tight in the coldness of the night.

Those days are over. For the last few months, all we have been doing is to argue over everything. He easily gets mad just because I readied the wrong tie for him or just because the food isn’t ready just yet. His temper has become much of a problem. Our nights have become sleepless because we stopped talking and teasing each other at bed time. I would lay in bed not facing him, crying over the happy days that have gone away.

I didn’t even explain anything to my manager when he asked me where I was going. The explaining would have to wait.

I met Erik back in college. He was this geek who was the editor-in-chief of our publication back then. I was the managing editor. We were together all the time because of the duties that we play. There was this one journalism seminar in Baguio when we had to attend with a few others. He told me how much he loved me while we were walking in a path of pine trees that wallow in the breeze of that cold night. I didn’t say a word. I just held his hand and continued walking.

I know he was meeting someone else. Ever since he introduced me to Kris, his workmate, I know that something was going on, the way they laugh while looking at each other’s eyes at dinner one night, the way Kris picks up Erik almost everyday, the way they spend working nights together while I lie in bed alone. And then this, Erik doesn’t even see me anymore. I was existent only because I provide him with what he needs, but really, I was only a background and someone has taken over my spotlight.

My jaw dropped when I reached home. Our house is trapped in a repertoire of fire dancing and twirling in a holocaust of destruction. I ran past the firetrucks and the crowd of people who have been lured into fire’s hypnotic powers. It was as if everything was in slow motion as I ran toward our door, not minding the heat of the dancing demon.

Erik is inside. I have to save him.

I didn’t mind the firemen who were trying to stop me. My adrenaline beat them, and I plunged into the sea of fire. Despite everything that happened, I still love Erik. I will never be able to forgive myself if I let him succumb to ashes without me trying to save the best of him. This morning, we had a fight because I confirmed my speculations about Kris and him when I read it from my husband’s phone. Apparently, Kristian is deeply in love with Erik, and he wanted to take it a notch higher.

I sped up and went to the kitchen, sidestepping whenever a fist of fire would explode near me. I reached for the refrigerator and grabbed all the big jars that I could carry. I grabbed the jar that contains his hands, then the once with his heart and insides. The next one that I was able to grab contains Erik’s eyes. I looked at it as I would look at him at night before we sleep. I love him. This fire will never burn all his parts into pieces.

Suddenly, something heavy fell straight at me. I was knocked off, and as smoke suffocated me to death, I tried to get up but failed. 

I saw his eye on the floor, along with his other parts and the shattered jar. It looked at me as I closed my eyes.

We can always say what we feel like saying. We can express our opinion whatever way we want as long as we are not stepping over someone’s individuality. What we express is what we believe and not necessarily the sole truth of all existence.

Disagreeing with someone else’s views is but healthy. It is a way of exchanging ideas and airing out what you think, hoping that, in the end, both parties would benefit by learning something. We can always do rebuttals, but we should do it the right way.

Innuendos tend to be tiring, and as long as you have good intentions and you consider each other as friends, there will always be a good way to say what you feel like saying to another person.

Darn it.

(Source: sirseaweedbrain)

One good thing about being mature is that it is with maturity that we learn to accept the hardest of things. Well, we have to remember that maturity does not necessarily come as we age, but it is molded by experiences from which we ought to have learned.

Pain is something that is hard to accept. We don’t actually have that much of a power to bear the pain than is more than the physical. We find it really hard to the point that we just give up and blame the world for all out miseries. For sure, we will get by. We always do. However, we suffer during the process. Worse, the process of eradicating pain shall take long. It is just ironic that we have to experience the things that we don’t really like longer than those that we enjoy. It has to be that because we have to learn.

As a form of escape, we pretend to be OK. We try to live each day thinking positive about things, but then, we will be living in brummagem lives, fooling people and ourselves. We pretend because we tend to think that, if we act as if everything is fine, one day, without us expecting, we actually are already feeling just as great as that before the pain. We fool ourselves, thinking that we can escape when, in fact, breaking our bubbles, we couldn’t.

With maturity, on the other hand, we learn to accept things little by little. We chew every bite and accept the bitter taste, and then we swallow what we chew. Sure, it has to be painful, but maturity becomes this anesthesia that makes us numb for a little while. The pain will not be removed, but it makes us feel less just so we can’t survive the operation. With maturity, we learn to accept the things that are just not meant to be. We get the wake-up call, and we actually wake up from the lucid dreams of getting what we want even though we actually can’t. We are tapped to move forward and to accept that, no matter how we wish for them, there are just things that can’t be ours even if we badly want them.

I wouldn’t claim that I am mature enough to accept things like these. But then, I guess that I am walking to the right path. If I am not, I will try to walk back on track. I have to accept that things will not transpire the way I imagine them. It would have to be hard, but hey, as I would always say, learning the hard way makes the lessons harder to forget.

For my welcome salvo to the path I am choosing to take, not writing about these things could be a good start. As long as I could endure, this should be the last.

PS: I think I have already chosen the better song. :)

The problem, I guess, is that we are good at pointing things out to the point that we are doing such an action too explicitly.

We are too much of an observer. We complain about practically anything. Worse, we complain about what other people like, to think that it’s completely out or our business. Worst, we complain about the smallest things that other people like, which is just a waste of effort.

We hate everything about other people. That’s the rub. We hate people for liking some ice cream. We judge them just because they want to try it out when, in fact, we tried it ourselves. We hate them for going with the trend just when we have gone through it ourselves. We are unfair on that part. If it is us, it’s fine; if others do it, well, hell to the freakin’ no. 

We point out how people are bad at this and that, forgetting that we have been or are still bad at it, too. We have always been like that. We emphasize the bad traits in other people just because of the slightest things that they do. We enjoyed chatting with some robotic Internet chatmate, where we can actually add up the answers to our own questions, and when others do the same, we hate them for that. We act like this is our own respective world that, when other people join or meddle, we are violated and we don’t see the fairness in everything anymore.

We are selfish. We wanted the best things in life all to ourselves. We hate people when they join trends that they don’t completely know. Instead of sharing to them what they ought to know, we throw hate at them. When they want to watch something for hype’s sake, we hate them for not being able to read the book. Hey, there are a gazillion movies derived from books; have we read them all before watching? Why would one movie with such an enormous fan base be the basis of our judgment? Besides, movies are shown in advertisements. We even post about them. Who are we to blame and hate people for being curious and interested with those things that hit? This isn’t our own world, you know. We didn’t even produce the movie all to ourselves just so we can watch it on our own. Besides, everybody’s gonna pay the same amount for the movie, whether they have read the book or not.

Stop pointing out too much. Stop hating people for enjoying things in life. Never will we be able to judge people just because of those petty things. It wouldn’t do us any good and it won’t even make us a better person if we would slap them in the face with the fact that only we know this and that. In fact, it makes you even less of a person.

This is our world altogether. Don’t act as if the world is one person’s personal property.   

Random fact. I wrote a letter to someone who is also a guy. It was back in high school. He was a year ahead of me. We got to be together because we were both active. I was part of the dance group of the school, while he’s, well, good looking, the reason why, when we went out to represent the school in any competition, we were both always there.

Dion was this tall guy who was really simple. He got the looks, but despite that, he was humble and friendly to everyone. Our first encounter was when I was carrying our CD player and speakers from the faculty room to the practice hall. He was sitting at a bench along the pathway, and seeing that I was having a hard time carrying everything, he offered to help. At first, he jokingly bumped into me so I would wobble my way with all the heavy load. Then, he smiled and carried almost everything. By the time that we reached the hall, I was only carrying an extension cord.

After that incident, I would always volunteer for any errand to the faculty room, and then, we would see each other at the pathway. He would smile at me or would sometimes play around with whatever I am carrying. From there, we became really close. We even sat beside each other on the ride to the venue of wherever we would be performing. He became my best friend and my brother. 

I wrote a letter to him a few weeks before their graduation. I told him that I admire him. I made it clear that it wasn’t an admiration that is coated with malice. I admire his looks, his built, height, smile, and eyes. I admire his attitude. I told him that I wanna be just like him. That and nothing more.

After I gave him the letter, we didn’t get a chance to talk about it. He was busy with graduation stuff. It was just fine, not until this one day when I saw Therese holding a familiar piece of paper. She looked at me and had this smile that sort of irritated me. It was a smile of mock.

I was deeply insulted with that smile. It felt like she was playing with my emotions. She gave me that sarcastically about-to-burst-to-laughter smile for my efforts to hide what I actually felt and failed hiding. She realized the secret behind that letter. She realized my intentions, and the best she could over for my poor hopeless soul was to give me a piece of mockery. Thank you very much for that.

What the hell is wrong with Dion? Sure, he can tell his girlfriend that I wrote something for him, but to allow his girlfriend to make fun out of my letter is definitely insulting. Who else got to read the letter? His friends? The whole class? The whole school?

When I passed by Dion at the pathway, I didn’t look at him. He was about to stand to play another joke at me, but I wouldn’t allow it anymore. It was my turn.

The whole school was closed the next day. Police officers gathered and were surveying the perimeter. Media people were talking to school officials. Students who came to school early were crowding near the gates, each face drawn with confusion. Apparently, Therese was found dead; her body bathed with blood along the pathway to the faculty room.

Dion came running to me and punched me in the face.