Salingkit by Cyan Abad-Jugo

Author:Cyan Abad-Jugo [Abad-Jugo, Cyan]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9789712729508
Publisher: Anvil Publishing, Inc.
Published: 2017-10-10T00:00:00+00:00

TITO Simon’s favorite pastime in Baguio was to drive around the streets and look at the houses made of brick, stone, and wood. Some even looked like log cabins. Goro liked the ones made of red brick best, with an attic window and a chimney on the roof that puffed smoke. In her mind, that was the picture of a perfect home. In their hotel, when the fireplace in the common room was lit at night and the room began to smell of burning pine, she imagined it was snowing outside and that they were in another country altogether. She would clutch her black jacket around her, stare at the fire, and listen to the pinecones popping from time to time. Beside her, she dreamed, sat Martin Gore, strumming a guitar or humming a Depeche Mode tune.

“We could retire here, Leanna,” Tito Simon said, stretching on the sofa beside her after finishing his cup of coffee.

Tita Leanna looked up from her book about angels and said, “What? Already thinking about retiring?” She whispered something into his ear.

“You’re too old,” Tito Simon said gruffly, but he mussed his wife’s hair as he said it.

“Such negativity!” Tita Leanna exclaimed, but she did not look so angry either.

Kuya Alan, sitting across from Goro and drinking a cup of chocolate just like she was, grinned. He told his cousin, “Patty doesn’t mind the idea of living away from the city. Maybe we could live in a fishing village near the sea.”

“Or maybe you can go to the mountains and join the NPA,” Tito Simon said.

His son decided to ignore him. “You see, Kit,” Kuya Alan said, “it is important that you agree. Does it not bother you that your boy is a Marcos crony?”

She groaned. Kuya Alan’s conversations always seemed to loop back to the subject of Bensy. How could she stand someone who admired or followed Marcos? How could such a one have a clear conscience? How could Bensy have any sort of principle? How would they ever raise their children without fighting? She was absolutely exhausted forever hearing about Bensy.

As she chewed savagely on a marshmallow, she caught Lola Celi’s eye. Lola Celi said, “You know, Alan, some people fall in love with their opposites. If you and Patty agree all the time, I’d be very worried. You don’t want to live with just an extension of yourself, do you? What would be the fun in that?”

Lola Celi had been busy poring over the newspapers from abroad. Beside her, Lola Sol sat quietly crocheting yet another doily for some unimaginable uncovered surface in her home.

“Oh Lola,” Kuya Alan said, “of course we argue too. What I’m trying to tell Kit here is that you have to agree on the important things.”

Tita Leanna sighed. “Oh youth,” she said, elbowing Tito Simon. “It all seems so easy for them, doesn’t it? When you’re my age—”

“There,” Tito Simon raised his empty cup. “Now you’ve admitted your age at last!”

In the warmth of their banter and in the snug fit of her armchair, Goro turned contentedly back to the fire.

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