Dayun Mo (Fiction)

In the night of 2007 right after I graduated high school, my mother decided we should leave the country for the summer. It’s only May, where days were still flushed from the deadness of spring and the flowers atop of my sister’s grave barely began to wither. I looked at her and said, “But it’s not even June yet.”

“It’s summer now in the Philippines, Mark,” was what she responded. “Our provincial town’s feast would help you enlighten your spirit.”

Nothing was enlightening to my spirit anymore. That night, I took my luggage and packed my clothes. I decided to just sleep my days away in the Philippines, in the small town of Quinoguitan, Bohol, where my mother and I grew up. At the airport, it’s just now my mother and I. My father was busy at the troop surge in Iraq, and for half of my lifetime, he always was. I even struggle to remember his face.

This is the first time I’m coming home without my little sister.

After almost twenty hours in the air, and a two-hour drive, my mother knocked at the door. “Ayo,” she said. “Niabot na mi…” What she meant was, Tao po, we’re here.

My grandmother of seventy welcomed us with warm greetings with a frantic smile. “Dayun mo, dayun mo,” she said. “Pahuway sa.” That means, “welcome, welcome!” and “take a rest”.

She brought us a cup of coffee and pillow beds where her sewn floral patterns were now faded. The house stood the same: cross-stitched frames of flowers, Jesus, and landscapes hung above the unpainted walls. The wooden closet of biscuits and sewing materials possessed splinters and cavities among its surface. The huge windows are barred with pink iron-curved window grills, now rusty. The house was pretty huge, but the doors’ hinges were still weak as I remembered. The other family members drew in the living room when we came in.

“Is this Mark? He’s now grown up,” my grandmother said, turning at me. “I hope he can still speak bisaya.”

I returned with a small smile, saying, “Akung inahan istoryahun man ko sa bisaya og masuko si-ya.” In another language, my mother speaks to me in Bisaya when she’s mad. The living room was met with laughter, with my aunts huddling over my mother.

“You should be gentle with him, Mira,” my grandmother turned to my mom. Her name is Mira, short for Miracle. They were one religious family. Tita Hestia was the only one with no Christian-related name, but she was still named after a god. “Especially with what happened.”

Darkness sombered over the living room; the crickets began to sound louder in my ears.

“Kahadlok-a oy,” Tita Delilah expresses fears nervously, with her face of frowned eyebrows. “This is why I just stay here. In the States, people are crazy. Intruders are everywhere.”

Crazy people are everywhere, Tita Delilah, I thought.

“SHH! Paghilom diha,” Tita Hestia said. She meant, be quiet.

My mother broke her silence. “What’s crazier is that the gunner was from our neighborhood,” she said, with a lump caught in her throat. She tried hard not to cry.

Grandmother’s face darkened. “Hija, just have faith and pray,” she spoke, touching my mother’s hands. “Tomorrow, we’ll pray further for Gabriel’s soul.”

I forgot about Tito Gabriel. Tito Gabriel was my mother’s oldest and only brother in the household. He died from “natural causes”, to which they mean he died from sleeping. He never woke up and the family often say his soul was claimed by the soul collectors who knock at night. The rumor was that he opened the door willingly. If that was true, why would you welcome the grim reaper if he was at your door? It’s like begging an intruder to take your life. Just lock the door.

Lock the door, that’s what I thought. A locked door couldn’t save my sister’s life. When the intruder was armed, there was nothing you could do. But what I can do is think for a moment on ways I could’ve saved her life. What they told me is that I should pray for her soul, to finally rest in peace. No matter how many times I prayed, it wouldn’t bring her back. What could a God do when the shooter killed my sister across the classroom? He did nothing.

KNOCK KNOCK KNOCK. My mother knocked at my room. “Are you there, Mark?” She asked. “Please open the door, don’t lock yourself up.”

I brushed the tears off my cheeks that I silently fought, with my face against the pillow. I opened the door and silently went back to bed. I opened my beeping phone and started shuffling at my messages randomly even if I didn’t receive any.

“Honey, you can’t stay here forever,” she said with concern, stroking my shoulder with her soft hand. “Why don’t you go with me to the cemetery tomorrow?”

When I figured it out, I expressed my anger. “Is that why you want to go here earlier in the summer? That Lola said to pray for Tito’s soul?” I glared at her.

“It’s not only that, I just want you to be connected with your family again.”

I spat the words I immediately thought of. “You couldn’t even visit your daughter’s grave.”

My mother’s touch left my right shoulder lingering from her care. That night, I awoke hungry, forgetting that I skipped dinner. I left my small bedroom and the friction of the hinges of my door went CREAK CREAK and had to hurry to the cabinet. The wooden cabinet that displayed packed crackers and biscuits like hopia and otap. “I didn’t know this was locked,” I breathed. I shackled the cabinet and scrambled for the keys only to be left defeated.

My floor slippers thankfully softened the sound of my footsteps so as to not awaken anybody. Just then, my vision caught a glimpse of a dark figure in the shadow of the curtain dividing the kitchen and from where I stood. The figure was looking out at the kitchen window by the sink. The moonlight shone over the figure’s body and it seemed to be eating something. I slowly slid the curtain aside.

“It’s just you,” I whispered in relief. “I thought it was something else.”

It was my cousin Rachie, Tita Delilah’s daughter. She was the same age as I. I grew up with her until I moved abroad when I began high school.

“I didn’t know you came! Here, take some,” offering the food that she was eating. “It’s mango graham. I know they’re going to finish all of these tomorrow with nothing left for me, so now I’m ahead of it. They’re Tita Hestia’s.”

After taking a couple of spoonfuls, I asked, “Has the food cabinet always been locked?”

“It is. I don’t remember where they put the key. But I’m sure they gave it to them.”

“Them?”

“I don’t know. Sila. Them.”

“Lola always gives things to strange people,” I said.

“Don’t be like that. You never talk about our townspeople like that until you moved abroad.”

“No, I do not,” I asserted.

“Ask Lola for food if you want. But I usually never wake her up. I found the food myself — this one, I got from the fridge. But the cabinet stays untouched.”

“Oh, they will probably give it tomorrow at the first day’s feast.”

“Probably,” she said. “I should go to bed. They want me to lead the prayer tomorrow for the first lunch.”

“I wonder why they always assume we’re religious,” I said, grunting a tone. “Maybe it’s a generational thing.”

Rachie gave me a smile. “I actually got used to it. I found solace in praying. I don’t even have to devote myself entirely to it. But it’s like having faith.”

I scoffed contemptuously. “That’s not true.” Thinking about my sentiments earlier, it’s harder now for me to have faith.

“It is,” she said. “Just stay quiet. Maybe you’ll find peace of mind in silence. They don’t like it when we’re a little loud. They don’t like people like you and me.”

Scratching my head, I didn’t quite understand what she meant.

“Na-a lagi masuko,” she said. “Na-a masuko og di ta maghilom. So, just pray. It heals your kasing-kasing.” She meant my heart.

The next morning, I awoke feeling groggy. I went to sleep with a dehydrated mouth, so the soreness from the sweet mango chafed my throat. I attempted to find something to gargle in the sink, but to no success. The family caught me at the dining table, with the food for the feast prepared. Bright red lechon centered the table with fruits surrounding it. White plates glinted its pearly whites with the silverware neatly arranged. Everybody was standing looking at me.

Tita Delilah forced me to join the first lunch’s prayer, to which Rachie was leading. When everybody’s eyes closed for the prayer, I stole a glance at my mother, who awoke five hours earlier than I.

“Give us this day our daily bread and forgive us our trespasses,” my cousin spoke in a thick, rich Visayan accent. “As we forgive those who trespass against us…”

Looking still at my mother, she suddenly opened her eyes mid-prayer and caught me. There was a sad expression on her face. After eating lunch, she went into my bedroom.

“Are you sure you don’t want to go to your uncle’s grave?”

“Why would I? I don’t know him,” I scoffed.

“Then we’re leaving. My sisters and I, and your Lola,” she said. “We’ll be back soon. You and Rachie should greet visitors and make them eat. You know how feasts are so busy feeding everyone.”

That day, Rachie and I welcomed visitors. Some of them are familiar, some of them are strangers to me. But it felt good to let everyone know that we were holding such a feast, enough to feed a whole town, even if I grew quite skeptical.

“That’s it? You let everyone through?” I asked Rachie. “I don’t remember doing this as a kid.”

“Because you don’t remember faces when you were younger. We just used to play in the streets. This isn’t your ordinary American feast, is it?” I nodded at her. “We feed even the poor, homeless ones.”

For a minute, I wished the world was as kind as our family. But not a little too kind. To me, not everyone deserves to be welcomed. The night was setting fast, and as I was tidying up the table, Rachie was doing the dishes. PLANK PLANK was the sound of the plates on the dry dish rack. I helped her wipe them dry before storing them in the plate cabinet, next to the biscuit cabinet. I glimpsed over the window and wondered what time it was. My mother and my aunts do not usually stay out this late. The house was gloomily quiet, and suddenly grew lonely. The crickets started to sound a little louder than last time.

It was around 10 o’clock in the evening when I checked Rachie’s bedroom and found that she had fallen asleep. I realized I had time to waste in the lonely home, without my aunts tattling about my dead sister. Living in the States was exactly like this — isolated.

Suddenly at 10:37 p.m. the crickets began to stop. The thoughts grew louder in my head, with no one to talk to. The lamps were dark so I attempted to find several candles and light the living room. A few seconds later, I heard a KNOCK KNOCK. Then, the knocking grew a little louder KNOCK KNOCK KNOCK. My first thought was that my mother wouldn’t knock like that, and my aunts and my Lola would usually say something.

I bravely grunted a tone, “It’s too late for a feast now!”

“Ayo, ayo,” the voice said. It was coarse and gritty and slow, like a man’s. “Padayon mi.”

“I’m sorry but it’s a little late now. Please go home.”

A silent pause.

“Wa pa ko nikaon,” the voice returned, as if begging.

Gulping my throat, I hesitated to speak, but continued. “H-hold on, let me just check with my parents.” That time, I wanted to wake up Rachie. I was about to silently walk towards her bedroom when the voice yelled,

“Viva Sta Ana! Viva Quinoguitan! Maayong kapistahan, Quinoguitan!”

My first instinct was to blow out the candles on the coffee table and go to my bedroom instead of waking Rachie up. They didn’t say who they were. A silent pause again and the night went colder. Sweats began to fill my face. There is an air-vent window in my bedroom overlooking the front porch. My bedroom was closest to the main door. If only I could get a chance to see who they were…

“Gigutom na ko, gigutom na mi….”

I heard not one voice, but two. So I forced myself to crouch and see.

There, three adult men in white shirts and straw hats were standing on the front porch of the house, almost looking like they were ready to serenade. But I couldn’t make out what they were holding because it was very dark. Maybe they really were hungry men. I gathered the courage to stand in front of the door but when I was about to reach the doorknob, to my right I heard a PSSSST! It was Rachie, with a look of horror. She shook her head silently and slowly and mouthed no.

KNOCK KNOCK KNOCK. The knocks grew louder. I walked slowly towards Rachie. She never said a word, and instead, went to her bedroom. I heard a lock on her door. KNOCK KNOCK KNOCK KNOCK KNOCK KNOCK. One of the men grabbed the doorknob and started shaking and twisting it aggressively. BAM BAM BAM! They began to kick the front door. I hurried to my bedroom, facing Rachie’s, but I left the door barely opened.

KNOCK KNOCK KNOCK KNOCK KNOCK. “Mark?” One of the voices said.

My heart dropped. My knees felt weak as I let the gravity pull me down. I sat near the door and listened. How did they know my name? “Mark? Mira? Tia?”

“Ablihi! Ablihi!” They yelled, almost as if they’re out of patience. It means, open, open.

BAM BAM BAM! They kicked the door open again. A silent pause again. I looked at Rachie’s bedroom door, hoped and prayed that she would open it and come with me. Strangely, the pause went a little longer unlike the last. When I was about to stand up, the front door went CREAK CREAK, like its hinges began to spread wide open. My heart was beating out of my chest. DUG DUG DUG DUG. They were inside.

I began to touch my arm and silently rub it as if to calm myself and wake myself up from a bad dream. This is where the blood rushed to my head. Maybe these were the soul-collectors who visited my Tito Gabriel, stealing his life in a steadfast slumber. Tita Hestia told me that once this happens, I shouldn’t open the door for them, and to remain quiet until they’re gone. The problem was that I answered them once or twice, so they knew I was here. Now, I contradicted myself. How foolish I am, finding myself silently praying to a God I never knew. “Our father, who art in heaven…”

The last thing I knew was that I stole a glimpse from my bedroom once again, and when I saw the intruders, the moonlight shone on them, revealing their nature. The three men were still wearing white shirts, but this time, red markings from the front and back showed words in the Latin alphabet. The straw hat kept them from revealing their faces. There were scars in their limbs, both legs and arms. One of them has a candle lit, the other a wooden cross with a rosary tied around it. The third man behind the two was the one who spooked me. He was the one with the most scars, his body burned dark red from it, almost like they were slices, but his body intact. In his right hand was a bolo. My body went numb when I found out they were armed.

Few seconds passed and I heard a sound of a key being twisted and recognized that it was the biscuit cabinet that creaked open.

My only instinct right then and there was to close my bedroom door. CLICK!

I breathed and waited. They were upon me.

“Mark?” One of the men spoke dimly. “Nahibalo ko sa imong gibati.”

They know what I felt, they said. My heart beat raced, but my breathing softened. “Nahibalo ko sa nahitabo sa imong igsu-on.” They know what happened to my sister. Nothing in this world can fill the cavern in my soul after what has happened to my sister. But hearing this from what I know are monsters comforted the darkness in me. “Abli-hi sa. Abli-hi sa ‘ko ba.” He demanded to open the door. “Kay muabot na ka sa imong kapalaran.” When he told me I was about to meet my fate, I imagined my sister’s state in a better lifetime, and maybe in return if I am taken away, it will bring her back. “Kung tugoton ko nimo, himoon ko ikaw og gahom na wala’y pildi, may bala ug apoy…”

If you let me, I’ll make you invincible, nor bullets or fire will hurt you…

When I reached for the doorknob, it felt hot. I smelled a strange fragrance around the room. My body surrendered and my head flustered. I crawled over to my bed and tears fell down. They won’t hurt me, they won’t hurt me… God is near, God is near…

That morning, the sunlight that hit my face woke me. Startled, I got up, struggled, and a hot flash ran through my body. I rushed over to the living room, and to my surprise, everyone was there.

“You look terrible…” My grandmother told me. “Where did you go?”

“There was no soul-collector. You’re all liars,” the words sting bitterly in my mouth. “No such thing as angels, demons, a God.”

“Mijo, what are you talking about?” My Tita Hestia frowned upon me.

“Last night,” my voice trembled. “Intruders went here, in this very house, slammed the door open, almost killing me. They were no soul-collectors. They were townspeople, I think, they wore straw hats and bolos — ”

My mother grabbed me. “Mark, I think we should talk.” She pulled me aside and together we went to my bedroom. “That’s not funny, what you did back there. You humiliated me.”

“Mom, I almost died.”

“The door was fine. No one entered the premises.”

My fist was clubbed, rattling in fear and anger. I was running out of breath. “You don’t believe me…”

“Son, I really don’t know what to say. Nothing else to say than to forgive yourself,” her voice raised a tone. “Something about you is so closed, so caged. I can’t reach for you anymore, my dear. If you could just open up your heart and not deny it feelings…”

“Feelings of what?”

Her eyes widened. “Grief.”

“Well, why aren’t you grieving your daughter?”

Her face tensed. “For God’s sake, Mark, don’t tell me how to grieve. Where were you the night I took her to the hospital? You were gone. You drove away from it all. You left me here.”

“It was your fault. You made her go to school after being sick.”

“I am not a god that can bring her back. Not a bone in her body is invincible. You and I couldn’t save her so let’s save ourselves from the blame. For once, take this pain and leave it elsewhere. Not here. Not where they can see and hear things.”

I heard my mom scoff before leaving me in my bedroom. “You’re not the only one around here whose sibling has died in front of their eyes.”