Habang Buhay

8

"Luluhuran, pagsisilbihan, paglilingkuran, dadasalan..." Michelle murmurs as her eyes trail over Anntonia's face. She was lying beside Anntonia, on her side with her head resting on top of her hand. They've been home since the other day after a week of being in the hospital and Michelle has been taking care of Anntonia like she was precious China, ready to break after one wrong move.

"Michelle, what are you yapping on about," Anntonia's annoyed voice fills Michelle's ears before completely opening her eyes and glaring at her. "I'm trying to sleep here."

"Magpapaalipin, aalagaan, iingatan..." she continues on saying. She's probably butchered most of the words' pronunciations but the important thing is their meaning, anyway. 

"Is that like a chant or spell or what?" Anntonia eyes her, suspicion evident in her eyes. "Voodoo? Have you gone mad?"

"Madly in love with you," she retorts.

"I knew you were gonna say that," Anntonia rolls her eyes. "I just knew it."

"Time to change your bandages," she then announces as she gets up from the bed to go over to where she keeps all the medical supplies she's been using for the past 2 days.

"Really? Again?" Anntonia whines.

"Yeah, need to change it daily, remember? Check for bleeding, excessive inflammation, pus, and deadhesion."

"You're taking all this playing doctor a little too seriously," Anntonia tells her.

"I told you, I was supposed to go into med school if I didn't go into modelling and acting," she says as she rubs her hands with the alcohol before beginning.

"So you're fulfilling all your doctor dreams through me then?"

"Kinda like that, and I really just like taking care of you," she shrugs with a big smile. 

"No offense, but your ways aren't really fit for a doctor... Who kisses the top of a bandage after putting it on?"

"A kiss makes the healing process faster," Michelle says making Anntonia snort.

"A kiss on a wound can cause infection, silly," Anntonia, ever the realist, corrects her. She then points to her lips and with a smile, "You can just kiss me right here though."

"You let your doctor kiss you there?" Michelle raises her brows at her.

"Just this one doctor... Dr. Dee."

"You're lucky I'm a doctor that plays favorites then, Patient Porsild."

Anntonia rolls her eyes as she raises her shirt to expose her abdomen where the bandage sat on her right lower side. Michelle kneels down to begin her important task of taking care of her Anntonia. 

Luluhuran, pagsisilbihan, paglilingkuran...

"Just snap a photo, it's not art," Anntonia says impatiently a bit later. 

"Everything about you is art, baby," Michelle tells her as she tries to get a better angle of Anntonia's wound through her phone's camera.

"Michelle!"

"Fine, fine," she takes the photo, sends it to Dr. Santos, and puts her phone down on the bed before cleaning her hands with alcohol again. "It's looking good, bet it won't even scar. If it does we can have Dr. Belo take care of it."

"It doesn't matter, you're the only one who sees me naked, anyway," Anntonia says as she eyes her wound from her position, and then looks up at Michelle with a hint of fear in her eyes. "Unless you don't like it..."