Chapter 6

May 2013

I was at my grandmother's house where Papa stayed after he left. It was 20 minutes away from ours and was situated on the most rural part of our town. This was also where most of my relatives from my father's side resided.

"Kuya, I want to play too!" I whined to my cousin, Donny Francisco. He and his friends along with my other cousins were about play and he wouldn't let me join them.

"You can't, Nene! You're a girl!" he stated, calling me by my moniker. All my relatives from my father's side called me Nene too.

"So what?" I whined some more, almost close to crying.

"It's dangerous for you", he said as they started to leave to play.

"Stay here for a while, Nene", Rene Mercado, my other cousin, advised to me and consoled me by saying "We'll go to the stream after we play. You like going to the stream, right?"

I didn't have any girl cousins from my father's side, so I had no one to play with except for them. It was okay, actually, because I had always loved their company but sometimes they just didn't appreciate mine because I was a girl.

My eyes watered when they left. Papa was out doing some errands and Lula, my grandmother, was at her friend's house. A sob erupted from my throat as I began to cry harder. I was left alone.

~

The sun was already setting by the time I got home. I went straight to my bed and laid down. We had finished filming three scenes and the entire time, James didn't talked to me. He wouldn't even look at me when I was ordering him. As much as I hated to admit, it did bothered me. It frustrated me to an extent that I literally snapped on everyone who was trying to talk to me.

I breathed in a lungful of air to calm myself down and stared at the ceiling as if it had the answer to the hardest question I had so far that was James.

My eyelids drooped as I grew tired. I yawned and decided to take a short nap.

•••

My body jerked as I jolted awake from a senseless dream. Trying to process my surroundings, I realized that it was already dark. I sat up and reached for my bedside lamp. I flicked it open and saw that it was already midnight on the clock beside it.

I groaned. I had wasted time I could've used choreographing our dance routine. Oh goodness.

I hastily stood and realized that I was still in my clothes from earlier. I felt utterly dirty so I went to the bathroom and took a short shower.

I wrapped my hair on a towel and let it nestled above my head when I got out from the bathroom. I then searched for my phone and found it still in my backpack on the floor. Was I too tired that I couldn't even put my backpack on the table?

I shook my head and opened my phone. I decided to turn on my Wi-Fi to check if I have some messages. And I did have some, it was from our chat group, someone I didn't know, Louise and...James. I frowned.

He wasn't online so I opened our conversation and read his chats from five hours earlier.

There, I read his messages that were just saying, "Tati!" and "Hey!" and his last message was, "Goodnight! Sweat dreams!"

My frown got deeper. What was this guy up to?

I closed our conversation and marked it as unread. I didn't want to reply and it was too late to reply anyway...at least for me. I set my phone aside and went outside to the kitchen to grab something to eat.

When I went back to my room with two peanut butter sandwiches and a bottle of water, I saw my phone light up. I reached for it as I put my food at my bedside table and sat on my bed. It was James again.

I didn't opened it but I saw he sent, "Tati!" I pursed my lips, contemplating whether or not to reply. I sighed and muted his messages. I closed the app and went to Instagram, liking every post of the Kpop and Western artists I was following. I grabbed one of my peanut butter sandwich and started munching.

With nothing else to see on Instagram, I went to Twitter to check for updates on what was happening in the world, but instead all I saw were sad and depressing tweets. My mood dampened so I decided to tweet something too just to get rid of the negative thoughts.

'i am no exception to those who would love to feel the warmth of love. it's just that i am already used to the coldness of the dark.'

'i dont want to open my gates to anyone when i know that my mind, my soul, my heart are still under renovation.'

'it's so hard to move on and move forward when your past is holding you back.'

'i need someone to help me but i dont want to be helped.'

I tweeted each and sighed. I should really delete my Twitter account. It was getting more toxic every day and I was being too dependent on it.

But yet again, I couldn't. It did comforted me someway somehow.

"It brings you negativity, you idiot!" my subconscious retorted.

I ignored it and just closed the app. I then opened the Messenger again to...well, to check messages. "You just want to see if James is still messaging you", my subconscious wryly said. I ignored it again, not wanting to admit what she said.

I immediately saw James' latest message. "Are you okay?"

My brows furrowed, quite lost why he would ask that out of the blue. Then I remembered my tweets. I put my sandwich down and opened our conversation, curious to what he might say once I replied. I immediately saw his other messages sent earlier, mostly saying, "Tati!"

I replied, "Of course, I am."

He immediately saw my message and typed something, "Finally! You replied!"

"What do you want?" I asked in which he responded to, "I saw you tweets. Are you okay? Do you need someone to talk to?"

I knew it!

I immediately replied, "I'm fine."

"Why are you still up then? You should sleep some more. Don't tire yourself," he replied back.

I frowned. Where was he going with this? Before I could reply, he sent another message.

"I'm sorry. For snapping at you earlier. I actually didn't know what got into me. You didn't deserve. I was just being irrational and childish. I'm really if I made you feel bad. I didn't mean to."

I stared at his message in utter disbelief. I took my time to process what he just said. It...it was just baffling.

After I got over it, I replied, "It's fine. You must've just tired."

"But I should've considered your feelings. You must've been MORE tired than me, than the rest of us actually", he replied and I felt my heart swelled with overwhelming feeling.

I immediately replied, "It's fine, James. Really. I'm okay. Kinda used to it."

"You shouldn't be."

"Unfortunately, I am."

He took longer to reply this time. He must be speechless with my negativity.

After some time, my brows knitted into a frown when I receive his reply, "Can I talk to you tomorrow?"

I contemplated before I replied, "Okay."

"Okay! You should sleep now. We'll have a long day tomorrow. Goodnight, Tati! Sweet dreams!"

"Night."

"See you tom!" was his last reply.

I didn't reply anymore and turned off my phone's Wi-Fi. I set it aside and grabbed my sandwich again. While eating, I tried to guess what James might want to say to me. Maybe he just wanted to talk about the birthday surprise.

My eyes rounded when I realized something. Oh shoot! The birthday surprise! I forgot!

I put my sandwich down again, now panicking. I hadn't planned anything yet. Oh goodness, how could I forgot?!

"Just worry about it tomorrow with James. You should eat then sleep first", my subconscious advised. It was the first time she wasn't cruel to me so I heeded to what she said. I finished eating my peanut butter sandwiches then drank the whole bottle of water. I then brushed my teeth and decided to read a few pages of what I have been reading, just to let my stomach to digest the food I ate before I sleep.

•••

"Cut!" I shouted while pointing my stick to the actors. We just finished filming the twenty-first scene.

"You guys can have your lunch now", I said, "Come back before one, okay?"

"Tati, you should treat us for lunch!" Anthony Doyola shouted from somewhere.

"I don't have money!" I shouted back.

"Sure, you don't", he replied with sarcasm. I shook my head. I honestly had no idea why most of my classmates always wanted me to treat them. Did I look like I have that much money?

"Come on, Tati. Let's go", Livvy said beside me.

"Oh, I packed my own lunch", I responded, "You know I don't like lomi."

"Then, just eat with us in the lomian", she retorted.

"I have to do something", I glanced at her and chuckled when I saw her glaring at me. "Just make sure you'll eat, Tati, or else I'll skin you alive", she threatened. I chuckled even more.

"I didn't know you cared for me that much, Livvy", I replied. She just rolled her eyes at me and said, "Well, I'll go now. I'll just tell them you'll eat somewhere else."

I nodded as she turned to leave. I put my backpack on my shoulder and also started to leave. I walked along the familiar path of flagstones and reached the garden. I settled on the chaise and took out my notebook and pen from my backpack along with my lunch.

I was going to think of a plan for the birthday surprise by myself seeing that James seemed to forgot that he was supposed to talk to me. He hasn't even approached me nor talked to me directly. I honestly couldn't understand that guy.

I would talk to my classmates about this tomorrow because I shouldn't and couldn't do this one on my own.

While I was thinking of what we could do, I grabbed my peanut butter sandwich and took a bite. A small smile crept on my face when the taste of the peanut butter enveloped my mouth. I couldn't emphasize more just how I loved peanut butter sandwich.

As I continue to marvel at the taste, someone talked behind me, startling me.

"That's your lunch?" James asked from nowhere. Why did it seem that he loved to startle me?

"Obviously", I replied as dry as I could, "What are you doing here?"

"I told you I want to talk to you."

I scoffed and murmured, "You didn't even glanced at me this whole morning."

"What?" he asked as he neared me.

"Nothing" I said, "What do you want to talk about?"

He sat on the chaise like he did yesterday.

I looked at him with distaste, "You do know that although this chaise is quite big, it's only for one person, right?"

"So what?" he taunted and I just rolled my eyes at him.

"Have you eaten?" I asked while munching my sandwich, "You want some?"

"What? No!" he replied, "That's your only lunch and you're gonna give to me?"

I shrugged, "I actually packed five."

He gaped at me, "You could finish that?!"

"If I wanted to, yes, I definitely could", I answered just as I finished eating the first one.

He smiled, seemingly amused, and said, "I'll eat later."

I frowned, "What is it that you wanted to tell me that you neglected your well-being?" I asked as I grabbed another sandwich, "You know, I don't really appreciate it when one neglects something as important as eating just to say something to me that's not probably import—"

"—I want to court you", he blurted out.