Reuniting With Strangers by Jennilee Austria-Bonifacio

Author:Jennilee Austria-Bonifacio [Austria-Bonifacio, Jennilee]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Fiction, Own Voices, World Literature, Southeast Asia, Philippines, Canada, 21st Century, Caretakers
ISBN: 9781771623599
Publisher: Douglas and McIntyre (2013) Ltd.
Published: 2023-09-09T00:00:00+00:00

* * *

The little townhouse is only two floors high, with a spindly old tree that looks like a skeleton against the ruddy bricks. It has a screen door that’s clinging to the door frame by a single hinge. The early March snow has melted, leaving the shrubs in the garden looking dead, their thin, bare branches exposed to reveal the frozen earth underneath.

As Ma and Edman gleefully snap selfies with the taxi driver and insist on friending him on Facebook, I pull my suitcases up the driveway and step inside the house. I know that I don’t need to knock at a place like this.

The floors are covered in a thick, dingy carpet that looks like it hasn’t been cleaned in a long time. The living room has a huge black leather couch that’s too big for the space and an old television that’s half the size of the one we have at home.

I find a set of carpeted stairs leading up to a narrow landing.

“Hello?” I call out.

“Huh, looks like you guys made it,” a voice from upstairs replies.

She stands at the top of the steps and I can’t help but stare. She looks so sloppy, with her baggy clothes and her terrible posture that makes her half a foot shorter than she really is. Her dry skin looks like it’s never been properly moisturized, but her hair is so oily that it looks like she hasn’t showered in days. Compared to my father, who is always so put-together, she looks like a whole other species. It seems impossible that we’re related.

“I shoulda picked you up from the airport, I know, but it woulda been stupid for me to go gunnin’ down the highway all the way to Toronto, what with the gas prices and all. You guys understand, right?”

“Of course,” I reply. “The Robert Q shuttle was fine. It wasn’t a bother at all, Ninang.”

She groans loudly. “Take Paulo’s room at the end of the hallway,” she says, brushing past me on the stairs.

The bedroom hasn’t been used in ages. There’s a closet with old green and gold Catholic school uniforms and a set of shelves with outdated encyclopaedias. I pull one out and find compressed Gravol boxes used as bookmarks.

Opening the blinds, I realize that instead of my old view of our lush macopa tree, I now have a horrific view of smokestacks that belch wispy clouds into the air. I’m glad I still have my new winter coat on because this scene makes me shiver. It can’t be safe to live this close to a chemical refinery. Canada is supposed to have some of the cleanest air on the planet; the Chinese girls at my private school said that their parents would bring it home in air canisters complete with inhalation nozzles. I make sure that the windows are double-locked and snap the dusty blinds shut.

I just know that this isn’t where I’m supposed to be. I’m from Taguig, Metro Manila—an amazing, bustling place where everyone—Pinoy or foreign—wants to be.

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