Until the End of Everything

Prologue

Prologue

High School has become an integral part of everyone's lives.

In those six years of being a junior and a senior high school student, we have been introduced to a binary universe we couldn't understand back then; when we were too young to be taught how life is supposed to work. Thus, during this exact facet of our lives, we were constantly surprised by the mixed circumstances that enlightened us about the two faces of the world.

Apparently, in the binary universe, there are positive and negative. Happiness and sadness. Triumph and failure. Comfort and suffering. Light and dark. Goodness and evil. Something and nothing.

These ups and downs and lows and highs that we have encountered along the way which we may sometimes wish we could've stopped from changing or, in the first place, prevented from happening because of the later regrets. We wish we could've done better than what we actually did. But in the end, we end up reminding ourselves that everything falls exactly into place, and we don't have any choice but cherish it all.

And when we say 'all,' it means all of them.

Ang pinaghalong kaba't galak na naramdaman sa tuwing unang araw ng pasukan. Ang pagpasok nang maaga upang makapili ng magandang upuan. Ang pagbinyag sa bagong sapatos. Ang mga tsismisan habang nagle-leksyon ang guro. Ang pakikipag-asaran sa katabi. Ang pagtawanan ang kaklase habang nagsasalita sa harapan o kaya'y napiling magdasal. Ang pagkain kahit hindi pa oras ng meryenda o tanghalian. Ang pag-unahan sa kantina dahil kapag nahuli'y wala nang barya at tanging kendi na lamang ang maisusukli ng tindera. Ang pagtakas sa paglilinis bago mag-uwian. Ang pakikipag-tuksuhan sa mga kaibigan tungkol sa mga natitipuhan habang naglalakad pauwi.

Ngunit sa kabilang dako nito, naroon din ang mga pagkakataong nabasag ang ating batang puso. Ang maiwan ang proyektong pinaghirapan sa mismong huling araw ng pasahan. Ang pagkabigong maintindihan ang leksyon. Ang makuhanan o mapunitan ng papel dahil sa ingay habang nagsasagot. Ang pagbagsak sa mga pagsusulit. Ang mapatawag ang magulang dahil sa hindi kaaya-ayang nagawa sa eskuwelahan. Ang umiyak sa mga kaklase habang iniku-kuwento sa kanila ang dahilan ng pakikipaghiwalay sa mga nobya at nobyo.

We have experienced these all. We have been through it. And as former high school students, if we would be asked to summarize this long, long, long, adventure and how it contributes to our lives, it is the truth that for most people, high school shapes who we are meant to be.

But for an average student named Cassydee Mae Olivarez, high school has also enlightened her on who she is meant to be with. And it is the student-journalist and consistent academic excellence awardee named Caius John Buenaventura.

It is me. It is us.

Caius, at some point, completed my high school adventure. He made it even better, to be honest. He was my inspiration to wake up early in order to attend the Monday morning assembly, knowing that I could see him for an hour. He was one of my motivators to do my best in school so that I could tell myself that I somehow deserved him. He was the reason I blended with the crowd of people just to support him at various school events. He was the reason I discovered how far I could go to reach a man like him.

I smiled as I remembered the good old days of looking at him from afar.

Until now, it is a puzzle to me how the 'Cassydee Mae and Caius John' who were once apart and had two different worlds eventually became the 'Cassydee Mae and Caius John' who are about to hold and stay with each other in the world they both created.

Before, it was a young love with doubts, rejections, and heartbreaks. But this time, it is a mature relationship with a growing couple, enriched with trust, confidence, and humility. This time, hopefully, for better or for worse, for richer or for poorer, and in sickness and in health.