Our shoes track mud as we walk through the football field behind the Ateneo building, having snuck past the silhouette of a security guard who spent a few too many minutes checking on his beat up motorcycle.
Her flats are probably ruined. While my sneakers are littered with earth which my parents will notice later, asking, “where on earth did you go?”, though in reply I know I will only be able to smile, still unpracticed as I am in white lies.
But I don’t worry. Worry is the last thing on my mind as we make that long stretch from the track and field oval to the clearing which overlooks the Marikina skyline. We could have taken the long way and skirted past the grass, but part of me is glad that we are here instead, footsteps sloshing through wet soil which reminds me of the downpour that arrived only hours ago.
There’s a thunderstorm nearby, and the clouds have formed a grey and lonely ring around the field. Out in the evening she points out a lightning strike, and I notice how those bursts of light bring out the features of a muddled sky. With every muted roar I note a previously unnoticed cloud, whose outlines become clear for short moments.
I point out a small **** in the soil, and make a cautious jump to the other side, ungraceful as I am. She’s nimbler and makes it across first, laughing as I fumble with my footsteps, more leftover rain seeping into my socks. And then, like that, we’ve made it to the football field’s far end; it’s quiet, save the occasional rumble of thunder, and I steal a glance at her, still taking it all in.
The Ateneo football field ends on an unfenced promontory, with brambles and crooked trees marking an entry into wilderness, the track and field oval a cautious boundary. This land, she says, is traced out by a faultline, the leap between the overlooking soil and skyscrapers below a memorial to a previous quake. The branches of trees frame our view with leaves that block out dim stars.
Out of her sling bag, she pulls out a towel, and stretches it onto the damp asphalt. We sit down on the cloth and stare over the cliff, wondering at how we arrived here. My reason is still catching up to my heartbeat, and all these spare and separate details seem to come together in sharp clarity — the aftermath of monsoon rains, the low glow of a night sky, the clouds which gather around us in smoky pillars and open up into the crescent moon, her voice.
Wreathed as it is in shadows I can still catch the small shape of her smile.
