Behind Curtains (ONGOING)

Kabanata 50

Kabanata 50

Missus

Evil had no face. They could adorn themselves in the most special feelings. All dressed up, to make you feel good momentarily; only to make you feel even more miserable once the high expires. Like rust that cuts you. Always stinging a little; always taunting to kill you as you bleed.

Evil could be in drabs. They could have faces of even the ugliest; of women we should be more understanding and considerate of. They could be of men we were almost always conditioned to heed to; to give in to.

Hindi mahalaga ang kasarian nito. Kung masama, masama. If they ruined something good, made anyone feel terrible, harassed you; caused you trauma. Masama iyon. Hindi pwera babae o kung sino mang Pontio pilato ang gumawa. No advocacy of any sort should even think of half-ass saving it. If it's Evil, cruel, vile... objectivity shouldn't even cross anyone's mind about.

Cheating is a crime. There shouldn't be any gray area about it. Justifying it is fucked up. If it is immoral and could cause the deepest miseries, krimen 'yon. Dishonorable. A disgrace. 

Cheating was never borne out of love. Even the word Lust felt short against it. Cheating was pure evil.

The kind of evil you can always control and move away from, and yet...giving in to its temptation seems to be the norm. 

I was 10 when my Dad cheated on my mother. It was more than 10 years of a life well-lived. Of childhood and should-be eternal bliss of innocence. Of a good life.

But it didn't last. 10 years, and that was the end of it. Sampung taon lang.

And at 10, it wouldn't have been something anyone could've easily caught on. It was the little fights that escalated into more terrifying ones. The taunting conversations, the curses, the screaming matches. The hushed arguments in the middle of the night. Of evenings that feel too long because instead of being home by six, Dad would be home at dawn—with my mother knowing exactly where he's been.

I always got mad at her for always berating him over something that I believed she was just paranoid about. In my head, she was just a spoiled brat who had a very bad personality. That she was just a wife being paranoid about Dad's working hours when he was only being a professional and busy. Because she just wants all my Dad's attention to herself.

At natanto ko rin na, sa mga nakakagalit na mga akusa ko noon sa kanya, ano naman din ang naging kaibahan ko? I assumed. She assumed. Only, she was right. Only, she wasn't assuming things. It was a hunch. A gut punch. And eventually, people... talked. 

And with a hired private investigator, she proved herself right.

I don't know whether my dad's cheating was supposed to be kept a secret from us. But when I told her off about her ugly attitude everyday, I guess she couldn't take it, she easily revealed all that she knew to me. She couldn't take the fact that I was insulting her over something that wasn't even her fault. That no one was on her side even at home.

I don't know how I reacted by then.

She told me in the most crass way. I was just 10, and yet, she told me that my father was fucking another woman. And that she found that out in a lot of ways. In a way, she also found it out through me.

She always had me innocently tag along whenever my Dad was out on random errands. I was present on company parties in behalf of her. To be stealth. To tell her things I've come to observed. Of what things my father did while at parties. Of people he talked to. Women he unwarrantly flirted with.