In December 2007, I travelled to Carmen, Bohol to apply for delayed registration of my birth. I have to do it because all records of births before 1947 were declared lost or damaged. My birth certificate issued by the municipal civil registrar was no longer valid.
It was also an opportunity for me to visit Auring. She was all smile when she greeted me outside her house. She was alerted of my coming by her daughter Janet. I tarried outside and looked around. Up front were trellises of climbing beans, with tiny green pods breaking out of the blooms. There was a fenced vegetable garden to the left and cassava plot to the right. The sun, 45 degrees up to the west, was playing hide and seek with the shifting clouds. I took a second look at Auring’s abode. A two-floor structure was added to the right side of the old house. The front door was left opened when Auring got inside with my bag. I slipped inside. The living-dining room occupied half of the lower floor. The kitchen and the toilet occupied the other half. Only three people lived in the house – Auring, daughter Joy and grandson Ian.
“Ian, this is your Manong Terio.” Auring introduced me to the boy who emerged from the kitchen, eyes blinking.
“Mano po,” the lanky adolescent took my hand to touch his forehead and retreated near the dining table, opposite the window side where Auring arranged a stool for me.
“Ian helps me in house chores and in taking care of Joy.” Auring was beaming with pride as she talked about his grandson whom she openly adored.
Ian was Joy’s son born out of wedlock. He had a fair complexion and dark short-cropped hair. He looked embarrassed but timidly smiled at me.
“Ian even chips in for our food expenses. He earns P200 a week working for a peddler every Saturday and Monday. He is out of school. I can’t afford his college studies. But Zim would pay for his schooling when he graduates and gets a job.”
I knew Zim, Joy’s first son. His father, Rosario nicknamed Sario, was a son of my mother’s brother Blas. Joy met and cohabited with Sario when my cousin came to Carmen in 1985. But they broke up or rather Sario abandoned her which was not surprising, given his impulsive nature.
Jim had yet to meet his father who had his own family in Kibawe, Bukidnon. I met the bright and hopeful youth when I was still holding office at the DILG Provincial Office in Cagayan de Oro City. I helped him get a part time job at Xavier University where he enrolled as a scholar. I also gave him money for his PUJ fares. Unfortunately, he lost his scholarship and transferred to the less expensive Mindanao Polytechnic State College. Janet, Auring’s youngest, took care of his schooling. Janet’s husband, Cesar Bayukot, worked as a senior officer at the NTC Regional Office. The Bayukot residence at Xavier Heights Subdivision was always full of relatives from both sides of the family. Auring’s daughter Alma and son Bambi, who was my godson, also lived in the “city of golden friendship.” Both have their own families to worry about yet would gladly help their mother when she is in a tight squeeze.
We had a short conversation, mostly about the death of Dodong. I knew about Dodong’s illness and death through talks and texts. I even sent some amount to Auring after she told me about his illness, but I wanted more details.
“Dodong died one month after being diagnosed of kidney failure. We brought him to the Provincial Hospital at Tagbilaran, but Dodong insisted on checking out after overhearing the attending physician’s doom prediction of his illness. Besides, he knew we don’t have the money to pay for dialysis. He died here in the house.”
A shabby dog entered the living room and its scrubby ash furs blended with the gray cement floor as it sat quietly to listen to our conversation. I felt relieved when Auring shooed the dog outside. The dog badly needed a bath.
“That was Doggy, Dodong’s favorite pet. For one month Doggy would sneak out of the house and stay at Dodong’s grave from seven in the morning to five in the afternoon.”
With that surprising revelation, I felt compassion for the dog and decided I can tolerate his smell if he comes back chummy. I saw the public cemetery before I entered the house. To reach it, Doggy has to cross the gully or jog the longer route skirting it.
I had a fitful sleep at sea so Auring’s suggestion that I rest at the master’s bedroom upstairs was a welcome relief. The double-size bed was set against the backside wall. Stacked at the opposite wall were several luggage and boxes of household things. Three sacks bulging with things that were hardly used or had outlived their usefulness were lashed at the rafters. I opened the bedside window and had a short glimpse of the corn fields at the other side of the gully and the cemetery in the middle of the corn fields. It was time for harvest and the corn stalks and leaves were turning brown. I went to sleep thinking of the corpses of Juanie and Dodong decaying six feet below the ground, giving up to the natural process of the earth’s final claim of all living things that once drew sustenance from it.
It was already dark when I woke up. I descended the narrow and steep staircase. Ian had finished plucking and disemboweling the pullet chicken that earlier entered the dining-living room, not a bit intimidated by my presence. Auring had to shoo the tame chicken out and closed the door. Now, Auring was cooking a stew of the pullet’s tender meat.
I took a stool and soon my eyes were glued to the black-and-white TV set, watching a vernacular newscast by a television network in Cebu City.
Dinner was ready. I was about to lead the prayer before meal when I remembered Joy. I have not seen her yet and up to that moment, I was not yet prepared to see her. She lived in isolation in some part of the house. I inquired about her dinner.
“I already gave her dinner.” Auring passed my bowl of steaming chicken stew.
My nose caught the aroma of lemon grass.
“Does she eat well?” I asked after the prayer.
I slurped my first spoonful of broth. The pungent taste of ginger whetted my appetite.
“Yes, except when she is in her episodes. She has been acting normal for quite a time. She heard our conversations this afternoon and said she recognized your voice.”
“She recognized me?”
I decided to start with a green papaya cube in the chicken stew and my fork was directed to it.
“Did not mention your name but said our visitor comes from Mindanao.”
“How long has she been locked?”
“Four years. It is her fifth remission. Joy lost her mind when she was seventeen years old. She went to Manila to work as a housemaid. Juanie went after her when she stopped communicating with us. He located Joy at the Mandaluyong Mental Hospital. We had a hard time supporting and visiting her at the Davao City Mental Hospital so we took her home. There were years of lucidity but her sickness would return.”
“Doesn’t she complain?”
“Yes. Begs to be freed.”
“Why not?”
“I can’t. She could turn uncontrollable. With Dodong dead, no one can restrain her if she becomes violent or wanders or drifts away.”
I saw the pains and sorrows etched on her weather-lined face. Auring had her full share of tragedy. Her husband died of atrophied kidney nine years ago. Juanie was my closest distant blood relative. I met the couple when they were still in Iligan City, where Juanie drove a minicab to feed a family of five. The family transferred to Carmen in 1972 to flee from the turmoil brought about by the “Barracuda-Ilaga War” in the province. The bloody skirmishes of the “Ilaga” and the military against the “Barracuda” were spilling over in the fringes of the city.
“It’s really hard to face all the sorrows and hardships alone. But I pray hard to be strong for the sake of Joy and Ian.”
Auring was on the brink of tears. I could easily empathize with her. I came to know her when, I as a college student, I visited the couple and asked for small favors. She remained soft spoken and kindhearted, unchanged by the ravages of a cruel world.
The following day, I talked to Joy upon my return from the municipal hall. Her cell, fixed inside the empty room, looked like a zoo cage. There must have been breakout attempts since the wooden bars were reinforced with round steel bars. The room was well aerated. The backside of the building had no walling and offered a good view of the backyard and the sloping land beyond. Late afternoon air breezed inside.
“Hi! Remember me?” I waved my hand as I approached the cell.
Joy was setting on her bed – an elevated platform of lumber boards about two feet wide set against the entire length of the cell. She wore a striped t-shirt and green acrylic pants. Her long hair was tucked at the back. She was not yet ill the last time I saw her, so it must be a long time ago. In fact, I would not recognize her at all if by chance I meet her before this meeting.
“You are Nong Terio.” A reluctant smile registered on her face, creased with premature wrinkles, as she peered at me. “You live in Bukidnon. Yes, Valencia. How is, what is her name, Faith?” She appeared normal and her memory was good.
“She works in a bank. She lives with us. Who else do you know?”
“Only Faith and Ernest.”
I made a mental note of her cell as we talked. The small cell was just enough for a single person to perform the daily routine of sleeping, eating and resting. Joy could not go out of her cell so she relieved herself and took a bath inside. There was a water-sealed bowl at one end of the rectangular enclosure, installed on the level of the cement floor. It was clean and there was no smell, so Ian must have diligently done his assignment of fetching water and cleaning his mother’s cubbyhole. The cell was free from clutters except for some decor of clothes or remnants of clothing that its tenant had spider-tied on the lumber bars, probably during her bad swings of manic-depressive disorder.
“How are you? Are you OK inside?”
“Bored. I’m OK but mama Auring would not let me out.” She complained.
I let this pass. Life is not fair, I pondered gloomily. Just to stay alone for a week in this cell with nothing to do would be unbearable. Joy had been in this cell all day and night for four years with nothing to amuse herself or to talk to except the visions and voices inside her head. Poor Joy, it was bad luck that her mother carried her to term.
“Do you pray?”
“Yes.”
“Don’t forget to pray. I’ll pray for you.” I felt something in my throat as I said this. Henceforth, Joy will always be in my daily prayers. I bade farewell and returned to the other part of the house.
