Our favorite place (Book 1 and 2)

Thirteen

"Come." Deanna held Jema's hand again and lead her to the door.

It was a three-story building. They went inside and it was a huge house but more of a hospital cause it was full of nurses and doctors.

The place has a full glass wall that can see the waves pounding on the rocks at the shore. Of course clinics should have patients, they were more or less 50, most of them are children. The equipment are state of a kind and latest technology.

The nurses are smiling at Deanna as well as the kids and other patients.

"Do you remember the time na sinabi ko sayo kung kanino galing etong island?" Deanna asked that interrupted Jema from fascinating the view.

"Yeah. Someone special." 

Maybe she's a doctor here, business woman. Hell, maybe she's a patient. Pero ang mahalaga, girlfriend nya yun. Or asawa. Jema thought.

"It was my first year staying at US and I was out drinking by myself. I know, its lame, drinking outside alone but I was homesick. When I met her.." Here we go. Jema said to herself. She wasn't ready to hear this story but Deanna kept on speaking. "..she was a stage 4 bone cancer patient."

Oh. She didn't expected that.

They were walking towards a garden and Deanna stopped to take a sit on the bench, then continued talking.

"She said that she only has less than 24 hours to live."

"Oh my God and she was at a bar?" So, if they just met, she was not her girlfriend?

"Right?!! That was my reaction too!! Sabi nya kasi wala naman daw alak dun sa taas. Anyways, after some chika, she called someone and minutes after she gave me a paper and a cheque. It was the deed of transfer of this island from her name to my name, and a cheque amounting, hear this, 10 million, dollars."

"Whoa!"

"Yea! I was like, baka budol 'to or something, so I said that to her and she said na kinabukasan, punta daw ako sa city hall and ask if that paper was legit. It really was. So, I shipped it here in the Philippines and asked my Dad to have it processed. And voila, I have an island. Believe it or not, that's how I got this. I looked up her name and went to her apartment. Her neighbor said that she just passed away that morning."

"Sorry."

Deanna just smiled.

"What's with the mini-hospital here?"

"Oh, I used the cheque to build that, and to buy the equipment."

"And the 'yacht'?"

"And the yacht." She nodded as she was saying that. Confirming Jema's question. "All of them are cancer patients. Some of them are being treated, some of them are just waiting for their right time. It's their choice. Ate manages that. Not me."

"How was she nga pala? Ate Cy?"

"She's good, still the same."

Cy and Jema used to be close when they are still together. They used to lunch out and bond.

"But the children are close to my heart. We play board games for those who has no enough strength to play basketball and volleyball."

"Ahh." Jema looked at the ocean. "So, she..."

"Jade. Jade Cruz. The one who gave me this island."

"Hmm. So Jade Cruz is not your g-gir... girl.. friend..?" Jema asked hesitantly.

Deanna chuckled. "I just told you, we met when she was just 24 hours to live."

"Izabella, yes or no lang ang sagot."