She is eating, always eating, like an agitated, captive animal. She holds a bowl of rice with dilis, anchovy-size dried salted fish, on her lap. She likes to eat with her hands, and is comfortable enough around me to do so. She gestures toward the ivory-colored, U-shaped Philco radio on the table by her bed. “Turn it on for me, hija—my hands are greasy,” she says. The radio was once my brother Raul’s, but he now owns a sleek black transistor model my father brought from Hong Kong. Next to her radio, my lola has placed a chipped, crudely painted clay statue of San Martin de Porres.
“What’s on, Lola?” I ask, although I know the answer. She smiles at me, a hint of mischief in her twinkling eyes, which sweep over my skinny body. I am almost as tall as she is, and this amuses her greatly. “Love Letters! Love Letters is coming on, in exactly three and a half minutes,” Lola Narcisa replies. “Sit down, Rio—get comfortable and don’t ask too many questions. The others will be coming as soon as their chores are done.” This is one of her lucid nights; she recognizes me as her granddaughter and affectionately orders me around. I turn the knob on the radio to get clearer reception. She takes a handful of rice and fish and pops it expertly into her mouth. Then she chews with a worried look on her face, temporarily forgetting I am there. I wonder if she is thinking about my grandfather. Just as abruptly, she focuses on me again. “Rio, does your mother know you’re here?” She asks. I nod. “Did you finish your homework?” I hesitate, then nod my head again. Lola Narcisa looks sternly at me. “I don’t believe you, Rio.” She pauses and studies my disappointed face before sighing and patting my hand. “All right, hija—you can stay. But if your mother comes to get you, I won’t stop her. You understand? It’s very late, and you have school tomorrow. Tomorrow is Monday, isn’t it? Uh-hmm! I don’t want your mother making sumpung and blaming me for your bad habits!” She wheezes and clears her throat, putting the now empty bowl next to San Martin de Porres. “Uh-hmm. Sige, hija—I’m going to wash my hands. Then when I come back, you can sit down near me, right here on the bed…”
Love Letters has been on the air for years, the most popular radio serial in Manila. Even the President boasts of being an avid fan. Many of the episodes have been adapted into successful movies by Mabuhay Studios. Top movie stars still perform as guests on the show, including the biggest and most beloved—Nestor Noralez and Barbara Villanueva. Nestor and Barbara are engaged to marry in real life but keep postponing the wedding. Nestor sadly admits in numerous interviews that for him, “Hard work and Lady Success come first.” Barbara is just as understanding and loyal to Nestor as the characters she portrays.
My grandmother’s crazy for Love Letters because the plots are so sad and complicated. Every week, there’s a new story, which always involves a love letter. An episode comes on every night of the week, each story beginning on a Sunday and ending on a Saturday. Everyone weeps at the inevitable, tragic conclusion on the seventh night.
According to my father, Love Letters appeals to the lowest common denominator. My Uncle Agustin’s version of the lowest common denominator is the “bakya crowd.” It’s the same reason the Gonzagas refuse to listen to Tagalog songs, or go to Tagalog movies. I don’t care about any of that. As far as Love Letters goes, I’m hooked—and though I’d definitely die if cousin Pucha ever found out, I cry unabashedly in the company of Lola Narcisa and all the servants.
Without fail, someone dies on Love Letters. There’s always a lesson to be learned, and it’s always a painful one. Just like our Tagalog movies, the serial is heavy with pure love, blood debts, luscious revenge, the wisdom of mothers, and the enduring sorrow of Our Blessed Virgin Barbara Villanueva. It’s a delicious tradition, the way we weep without shame. If Pucha could see me, I’d never hear the end of it. She has no use for Barbara Villanueva, Patsy Pimentel, or Nestor Noralez, whom she calls “The King Of Corny.” She has no use for anyone who isn’t Kim Novak, or Rock Hudson.
LOVE LETTER #99
Dalisay (Barbara Villanueva) is a beautiful young servant who’s been deflowered by the handsome Mario (Cesar Carmelo), the son of wealthy landowner Don Pedro de Leon (Nestor Noralez) and his wife, the haughty mestiza Doña Hilda (Patsy Pimentel).
Dalisay writes Mario a love letter as soon as she discovers she is pregnant. Mario is away at a military school in Baguio. To make matters worse, Dalisay must function in her role as servant in Don Pedro’s hacienda as if nothing has happened, especially under the suspicious scrutiny of the arrogant and possessive Doña Hilda, who calls her only son “a gift from God.” Dalisay, of course, has no one to turn to or confide in.
The letter is intercepted by the snoopy headmaster Pating (Nestor Noralez) at Mario’s military school. Pating doesn’t tell Mario about the letter, but instead sends it back to Mario’s horrified parents. Don Pedro and Doña Hilda have their hearts set on their son marrying Elvira (Patsy Pimentel), the daughter of the town mayor. Elvira is actually in love with a soldier of humble origins, but she is willing to marry Mario to please her parents.
The beautiful young servant is cruelly thrown out of the house on a stormy night, and there is no place she can run to but her widower father’s hut on the outskirts of town. Dalisay’s father, Mang Berto (Nestor Noralez), is a poor tenant farmer who works Don Pedro’s land. Mang Berto vows to take care of his innocent daughter, and accepts responsibility for the care of her unborn child. Everyone in the small town is scandalized, and treats the miserable Dalisay with scorn.
Mario wants to come home for Christmas and profess his love for the poor servant girl at the risk of being disowned by his powerful father. He still has no idea about Dalisay’s condition. Doña Hilda is worried about the possible outcome of her beloved son’s impending visit, and decides the only practical solution is to get rid of Dalisay by staging an accident. The unsuspecting young girl awaits the birth of her child, meekly resigned to the fact that Mario refuses to see her.
Meanwhile….
Barbara Villanueva’s melodious voice sings an ominous invocation against witches: “Asin, suca / get-teng, luya / bawang, lasona”…“Salt, vinegar / scissors, ginger / garlic, onion”…An invocation against death, to protect her unborn child.
It is raining outside, a torrential rain, a sign that the typhoon season is about to begin. I can smell the rain, a thickness in the air. The furious downpour clatters against the tiles on our roof, beating a mist up from the ground. I pray the streets will flood and there will be no school tomorrow. It is a godsend, this sudden storm, this lightning and thunder and static on the radio. My yaya Lorenza is terrified and cowers in the kitchen every time the thunder crackles and explodes. She is tearfully cleaning grains of rice, picking out the tiny pebbles and white worms before the rice can be cooked by Pacita. “Dios ko, dios ko, dios ko,” she mutters, biting her lip and making signs of the cross. She will be the last to join us in my grandmother’s room, where we are all concentrating hard on the story inside the radio. My parents and brother seem distant and harmless, although they are only a few rooms away. My mother has forgotten all about me and assumes Lorenza has put me to bed. I am curled up under the crocheted bedspread on my lola’s bed. Lola Narcisa rocks in her chair. Aida, Pacita, Fely, and the chauffeur Macario sit or stand in various corners of the room, straining to listen.
I try to blot from my mind the image of my grandfather Whitman sick in the hospital, the shabby American Hospital with its drab green walls, drab green smells, and the hovering presence of the hospital’s supervising staff of melancholy American doctors. Like my grandfather, they are leftovers from recent wars, voluntary exiles whose fair skin is tinged a blotchy red from the tropical sun or too much alcohol; like his, their clothes and skin reek of rum and Lucky Strikes. It is not an unpleasant scent, something soothing I associate with old American men and my grandfather Whitman, whom I love.
My Lola Narcisa claims that her husband is the first white man stricken with bangungot. She seems almost proud of his nightmare sickness, a delirious fever in which he sweats, sleep
s, and screams. Most bangungot victims die overnight in their sleep. It is a mysterious illness which usually claims men. My grandfather’s case is even stranger than most—he’s been sick like this for weeks. At first, the American doctors diagnosed malaria. After a week, they patrolled the corridor outside my grandfather’s private room, consulting each other worriedly and coming up with more, far-fetched theories. Bangungot is ruled out of the picture by the chief of staff, Dr. Leary, who dismisses the tropical malady as native superstition, a figment of the overwrought Filipino imagination.
I have been to the hospital only once, with my lola and the cook Pacita. My parents have forbidden me to go back; when I ask why, my father replies, “You are much too young to be around sick people.
“It’s best to remember your grandfather as a healthy man.” What they don’t seem to understand is that unlike Raul, I’m not afraid.
When Love Letters is over, the servants file out of the room, murmuring good-night and thanks to my grandmother. Lorenza even comes back with another bowl of snacks for Lola Narcisa: minced red salted duck eggs dabbed with vinegar, more rice with crunchy dilis. Happy and lost in her radio reverie, my grandmother nods and smiles at no one in particular. Lorenza turns to give me one last warning before leaving the room. “Rio, if you don’t go to bed in your own room, your mother will chop my head off.” I grin at her and put my finger to my lips. “I won’t tell, Lorenza. Promise.”
My grandmother dabs her eyes with one of my grandfather’s oversized handkerchiefs. The Love Letters theme song is playing, a saccharine instrumental melody replete with organ and violins. The somber voice of the male announcer intones, “Tune in for the next episode of Love Letters at the same time tomorrow night. And so, until then…”
Hunching her bony shoulders, Lola Narcisa leans in closer to the radio, as if by doing so she can prolong her precious drama one more second. An eerie, high-pitched sound is followed by the voice of the same radio announcer, this time more cheery and impersonal. “This is DZRK, Radiomanila, signing off for the evening. At the sound of the tone, it’s exactly twelve midnight, in the Blessed Year of the Family Rosary. Remember: The family that prays together, stays together.”
Forgotten not just by my mother but by everyone, I sit drowsily on the lumpy bed watching my grandmother eat and cry. Tomorrow they’ll find me asleep, next to her. I know I should go down the hallway to my own room, but the house is too big and dark, all the lights turned off by the reliable Fely and Lorenza. As I watch my rapt grandmother, I too begin to cry.
It’s another movie. A Place in the Sun—condemned by the Archdiocese of Manila as vile and obscene. I don’t understand the commotion, why Pucha and I have to sneak off and pretend we’re going to see Debbie Reynolds in Bundle of Joy. Fortunately for us, Pucha’s older brother Mikey is our chaperone for the day. He wants to see Elizabeth Taylor naked.
We are all bewildered by the movie, which is probably too American for us. Mikey falls asleep halfway through it, after Shelley Winters drowns. I decide that even if I don’t understand it, I like this movie. In my eyes, it is unjust that Montgomery Clift is executed for Shelley Winters’ murder. While Mikey snores away, Pucha and I sit tensely in the dark, waiting for the obscene images that never appear. Pucha is enthralled, although I don’t think she gets it either. She has found a new idol in Montgomery Clift. All she can say afterward at the Café España is, “Shelley Winters is so ordinary. She deserves to die. Que pobrecito, Montgomery!” All Mikey can say is, “You owe me one, girls…”
The back of Montgomery Clift’s shoulder in giant close-up on the movie screen. Elizabeth Taylor’s breathtaking face is turned up toward him, imploring a forbidden kiss. They are drunk with their own beauty and love, that much I understand. Only half of Elizabeth Taylor’s face is visible—one violet eye, one arched black eyebrow framed by her short, glossy black hair. She is glowing, on fire in soft focus.
Jane Wyman bends over a comatose Rock Hudson. She tells him she loves him, she will be with him forever in the rustic cottage by the frozen lake. He finally opens his eyes. A deer wanders up to the picture window. Sentimental music interrupts the pastoral silence, swelling to a poignant crescendo as the closing credits roll along. As no doctor ever could, the power of Jane Wyman’s love has cured Rock Hudson and pulled him from death, like Sleeping Beauty.
I try to imagine Lola Narcisa bending over my grandfather’s bed like Jane, an angel of mercy whispering so softly in his ear that none of us can make out what she is saying. My grandfather the white man tosses his head from side to side, still locked in his eternal nightmare after all these years. He barks like a dog, grunts and sputters like an old car. My grandmother wipes the drool from the corners of his mouth while my Rita Hayworth mother, Dolores Logan Gonzaga, stands as far away from her father’s bed as possible. She seems terrified and bewildered by this image of her dying father.
He groans Chicago, Chicago, Chicago, with such longing I shut my eyes and the movie projector goes off in my head. Concrete, glass, and in the background, cardboard cut-out skyscrapers. June Allyson descends from a winding staircase, wearing a ballgown made of gold-flecked, plastic shower curtains. My grandfather mutters repeatedly in his frenzied sleep: Chicago, Chica-go…
He shrieks, as if someone or something has finally caught up with him. The anguish in his voice, in the way his body twists and jerks epileptically on the hospital bed, is unbearable. The anxious American doctors have been waiting for a sign. They rush into the room, trailed by eager nurses ready with gleaming, stainless steel bedpans, ominous catheters, and intravenous attachments bursting with glucose and pints of fresh black blood. My mother Dolores covers her eyes. She is shaking and sobbing with grief. “DON’T TOUCH HIM!” my Lola Narcisa screams in English at Doctor Leary. Everyone stops dead in their tracks, stunned that the shriveled brown woman has so loudly and finally spoken.
I am confused by the thought of Elizabeth Taylor’s one violet eye luminous in black and white, the pristine illusion of elegant deer peacefully grazing outside Rock Hudson’s picture window. In this hospital room, there is only our sense of foreboding, heightened by the grayness of bedsheets and medical uniforms, the dim fluorescent lights, the lizards watching from the corners of the ceiling. My grandfather is dying. My mother has been tranquilized and waits for my father, who has telephoned the nurse’s station to let her know he is on his way. Our family priest, Father Manuel, has been summoned. No one seems to remember or care that my grandfather Whitman is an avowed atheist, that his hatred for the Catholic clergy runs deep. “Don’t wake him,” Lola Narcisa keeps pleading in English. “If you wake him, he dies. Uh-hmmm.” She nods her head. “Better to leave him dreaming.”
Typhoon rages outside. She waits in the chair next to the bed, eyes glazed and gone. Buzzing static emanates from the radio. She rocks, ever so slightly. It is a rhythm only she can feel and hear. The air is crackling, electric. I feel a chill, and cover myself with one of my grandmother’s shawls. Above my lola’s head, a speckled lizard disappears behind the safety of the velvet painting. On a tin plate resting on the windowsill, the katol incense has burned down into an ashy, smoldering heap, the smoke still dense and fragrant. The ancient Philco radio is alive, hissing and humming to my Lola Narcisa, its dreadful music somehow soothing her.
The King of Coconuts
BECAUSE, THEY WOULD SAY. Simply because.
Because he tells the President what to do. Because he dances well. Because he tells the First Lady off. Because he dances well and collects art. Because he calls the General Nicky. Because he owns a 10,000-acre hacienda named Las Palmas. Because he employs a private army of mercenaries. Because he collects primitive art, renaissance art, and modern art. Because he owns silver madonnas, rotting statues of unknown saints, and jeweled altars lifted intact from the bowels of bombed-out churches. Because his house is not a home but a museum. Because he smokes cigars. Because he flies his own yellow helicopter. Because he plays golf with a five handicap. Because he play
s polo and breeds horses. Because he breeds horses for fun and profit. Because he is a greedy man, a generous man. Because his wealth is self-made, not inherited. Because he owns everything we need, including a munitions factory. Because he dances well: the boogie, the fox-trot, the waltz, the cha-cha, the mambo, the hustle, the bump. Because he dances a competent tango. Because he owns The Metro Manila Daily, Celebrity Pinoy Weekly, Radiomanila, TruCola Soft Drinks, plus controlling interests in Mabuhay Movie Studios, Apollo Records, and the Monte Vista Golf and Country Club. Because he conceived and constructed SPORTEX, a futuristic department store in the suburb of Makati. Because he was once nominated for president and declined to run. Because he plays poker and wins. Because he is short, and smells like expensive citrus. Because he has elegant silver hair, big ears, slanted Japanese eyes, and the aquiline nose of a Spanish mestizo. Because his skin is dark and leathery from too much sun. Because he is married to a stunning, selfish beauty with a caustic tongue. Because most people envy his wife. Because most people are jealous. Because his downfall is eagerly awaited, his downfall is assumed. Because his wife has had her tubes tied. Because he’s always wanted sons. Because his only legitimate child is female. Because she is not exceptional or beautiful; because she hardly speaks. Because her name is Rosario but she is burdened with the nickname Baby. Because her mother dislikes her and almost admits it. Because her father flaunts his mistresses. Because her mother is discreet. Because her father has exquisite manners, and her mother is famous for being rude. Because her father threatens to acknowledge his bastard sons. Because he employs them in menial jobs. Because his bastard sons worship him, love him, plot against him.
Because he dances well, and collects art. Because he never finished school. Because men, women, and children are drawn to him, like moths to a flame. Because he is unable to maintain a full erection. Because it doesn’t matter. Because he no longer drinks. Because he maintains a high-protein diet, and has trouble moving his bowels. Because he suffers from hemorrhoids, and has been operated on twice. Because he has premonitions about his death and believes in God. Because he dreams of cancer eating away his brain, his liver, his stomach, his balls. Because he dreams of morphine, how it won’t be enough.
Dogeaters Page 2
