The Loudest Unspoken, Page 2

hold would tighten till he bent his head close to her ears and say those words clearly. Like struck crystals, his voice would resonate. Always she would respond with alacrity, as if she needed to bridge that gap between his pronouncement and her response at the shortest time possible.

  To answer the question she looked for the meaning of his every word, every gesture but when it counted most, she couldn’t decide if she really knew him the way that he did her. Her memory got bruised in the process yet she didn’t find any meaning or order. She was hurt by this admission, more than anything else. If I didn’t know him, how did I love him? Did I really love him? This was a question that she knew all too well to answer.

  I did, yes. I still do, in fact.

  She lost him on the same kind of day, bright and sunny, and close to the same circumstances under which they met. This time he wasn’t looking for his friend or the information center. Apparently he was looking for himself. At first he was unusually restless yet reticent. He fiddled with his fingers as they sat under the shadow of the Indian mango tree in the gardens where a group of ethnic musicians was performing. They were playing a particularly lively folk song from Basilan or Sulu—she couldn’t be sure. When he finally got the nerve to speak the concert concluded and his words were drowned by the audience’s applause. But his stricken face was enough to cause her alarm.

  “What is it?”

  He leaned his elbows on his knees, his fists opening and closing. “I’m being unfair to you,” he finally managed.

  She thought he was being unfaithful.

  “No,” he reacted. “Of course not. I just feel—no, I know that I ought to give more in what we’re having and clearly I’m not. You deserve better.” A pause. “No, you deserve the best!”

  Suddenly she wished he were just being unfaithful. She opened her mouth to speak, to ask him why but he touched her lips with his delicate forefinger before pulling her close to his chest. His familiar scent of sage filled her nostrils and head. This scent would continue to haunt her for months afterwards.

  “I have to go,” he said after a few moments.

  It’s almost funny, she thought, the way things could get out of focus when you’re under extreme duress. Food and drink lost their appeal, rest and sleep became a luxury, deadlines got ignored, well-meaning friends the same. She squeezed her mind dry for some sense of what had happened between them and she crumbled under the weight of knowing the seeming randomness of his actions. Morbidly marveling at the speed in which her thoughts vacillated, she turned to alcohol for solace then grew tired of it when it didn’t deliver.

  She recalled a song with a line that declared time heals all wounds but she felt that time was what she didn’t have in the first place. When she avoided her friends, they understood in their own world-weary way. They stayed away, as she wished. They figured she could only go down so low in her vortex of misery and when she hits rock bottom, there was no other way to go but up. However, to her, the abyss seemed to stretch on forever.

  A year later she saw him again. It was at a concert and an outdoor art exhibit sponsored by the client of her new agency to launch its latest product: an alcoholic drink being marketed to the younger set. She didn’t recognize him at first. He had shed his longish hair in favor of a more conservative cut, his rumpled clothes to chinos and a collared shirt. But his smile retained its brilliant beauty. When he’d stepped closer he hesitated because he didn’t know whether to kiss or hug her. She opted for a firm handshake instead.

  When she had finally managed to speak she said the first thing that came to her mind. “Sold out, didn’t you?”

  He smiled as if he was caught with his fly open. “You did this, you know.”

  “Please.” She smiled but didn’t bother hiding her contempt.

  “No, really.” There was a tinge of mild panic in his voice. “You really had me thinking back then. This isn’t really selling out. It’s more of a compromise. I still need very little, but now I’m saving for the future.” A pause, then, “In case I have a family.”

  She beheld his steady gaze again. The familiar invitation for espresso—not shared this time, for surely he had been earning enough for two now, hung in the air like wind-blown Japanese lanterns. She felt her innards tighten, but only for a moment. A cool breeze blew in her direction, making the skin of her arms break into gooseflesh. Furthermore, it seemed to rouse her from her musings and dangerous thoughts. When she looked at his smiling face one more time, the past seemed to gain a clarity that she hadn’t noticed before, when she had looked real hard.

  Her questions, long hushed by grief, didn’t seem to hold the weight that they did then. The reason why he left her, which she pined for the last months, suddenly didn’t seem to matter as much.

  “How are you?” he said, awkwardly.

  “I’m great.” Even better, now that I’d seen you, she thought. “Listen,” she continued, “I have to get back to my friends.”

  She felt there was more he wanted to say but she didn’t care to hear it anymore. Enough had been said, she’d decided.

  “See you around, okay?”

  He nodded feebly.

  As she walked back to her friends she looked at the lights that brightened the park and showed the branches and leaves of the trees in crisp outline. Rock music went straight to her head. Memories of the changes she had undergone since unfolded themselves like the petals of flowers in bloom. She thought, he underwent changes as well. Perhaps even more than I did. His memory blew past her like absent-minded smoke. The irony of their relationship hit her hard then, looking back at it now she could only smile to herself. The only casualty was our relationship, she thought again. What was unspoken between them then was now lucid and eloquent, clear as day.

  Comprehension and acceptance finally came to her in waves she could almost see and she was pleased.

  ###

  About the Author

  M. Protacio-De Guzman was born in Manila, Philippines in 1973. He is a Registered Nurse but has worked in the non-profit public health sector for more than 15 years. His stories and poems have appeared in newspapers and magazines in his native country. He has also written for television. In addition, he has also been anthologized in the 3rd volume of the Philippines' landmark anthology of gay writing (2007). Aside from stories and poems, he writes stories for children. He also dabbles in art, photography, and design.

  M. Protacio-De Guzman is also the author of Testament

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