Facing Crossroads

X - New Beginnings

                                                                    Theo

Shane’s phone lighted up again, for the nth time, vibrating on the floor. Getting a glimpse, I saw the word “Mom’, calling to her. She dropped the call and turned off her cellphone.

Whoa. I didn’t know we have a common parent problem.

Feigning ignorance, my eyes explored the stage, as the other members scanned it as well. We just finished all the props and the design, and just needed to polish some scenes. Farrah’s father sent a letter to Miss Marjorie saying that the doctor advised her to rest. Her fractured foot needed rest.

“Why don’t we just omit the scene where Wendy has to do that long jump?” I heard her say.

Her hands were on her waist, standing like a director in front of the stage. She hadn’t said yes about replacing Farrah yet but I could tell Jellaine was glad she wasn’t saying no as strongly as before.

“Farrah did the exhibition without using the harness,” I said. “I’m sure you would choose safety first, right?”

Shay glanced over me, eyes narrowing. Her shoulders dropped, eyes wandering the wide stage. “I’m not sure if I can do this play. I mean… I don’t want to ruin the act and I know a lot of people will be watching, including guys from some organization to scout talents. I don’t want to ruin this for them.”

“You can do it. You’ll find it in yourself that you can and you will.” I looked at her eyes. She looked half-frustrated and I know she could feel the weight of the situation. “This play is to give entertainment to people.”

“Not to performing arts students who are on the team. This is audition for them.”

“Relax,” I replied, biting my smile at her sudden outburst. “Jellaine trust you. Miss Marjorie too. I do too.”

“Relax?” She rolled her eyes. “Says the guy who would be comfortably standing at the back stage.”

I chuckled at her childish reaction. She really was a smart-ass most of the times. Her humor amused me and I welcomed it since I needed a good laugh right now.

“But you’ll earn a high grade at this one. And what would I get?”

She crossed her hands over her chest. “You’d get recognition. And as if an employer would be checking my Literature grade.” She motioned her hands, acting as if she was reading something. “Oh, look, Ms. Javier, you’ve got high grades in Lit, you’re hired for the managerial position. Yay!”

I just shook my head, chuckling. With that, I knew she would be saving us by playing the main lead, even with full doubt on her chest if she could do it right or not.

We walked at the very back of the auditorium, seeing everything from this point of view. The stage looked prepared. Well done to juniors who allotted their time in making this happen.

“Will Sandy going to watch?” Shay asked all of a sudden. Her usual husky voice was in an undertone. As if she was half-whispering.

“It’s… over.” I fidgeted for a moment, knowing that I spent my four years for nothing. “We’re…” I just shook my head, unable to speak it aloud. Doing so would solidify that our story really ended now, like there was no going back once I admitted to myself that I lost her too.

“Can’t it be fixed?”

I sighed, running down my hand on my face. “She don’t want to, that’s the problem.” I asked a common friend of ours who was attending the same university as Sandy to place a red rose to her locker cabinet every day. I sent her text messages in the morning as if we never broke up. I waited every night after her cheer dance practice to drive her home only to be ignored. But I still did it every day, just to show her how important she was to me.

Yet nothing seemed to work. She easily built a damn high of a wall around her, as if we didn’t share four years together.

Shane was silent for a moment. I could feel her gaze on me but I kept my eyes on the stage, pretending not to notice.

Then she spoke. “Maybe she needed some alone time. Maybe she needs to think things through, you know.”

A frown tugged on my forehead. “Is it you who broke up with Rocky?”

When I turned to her, she looked away. “Yes.”

“And is that how you feel when you guys broke up? You needed some alone time and think things through?”

Shay walked passed me, planting herself on one of the seats. I followed, leaving one chair as our distance.

“It’s different,” she said.

“Yeah? How so?” I challenged her.

She suddenly looked angry. The way her brows crooked, I could tell she was angry. But her eyes told another story.

“For one, you didn’t ask Sandy to try drugs and sell it, do you?” Shay uttered in a low tone.

Damn, I didn’t see that one coming.

“No you don’t,” she continued, head straight. “Because you seem like a good guy. Two, you’re not keeping her beyond curfew time whenever her father’s not at home, right? And I’m guessing you’re not getting her drunk after school even though you promised to her father that you wouldn’t do those kinds of things.”

Rocky Laranto was a famous soccer player in school. And notorious in doing m*******a.

“I’m glad you broke up with him,” I muttered in low tone.

She rested her head on the chair, legs spread out straight in front of her. “I should have done it before it got out of control.”

“Well, at least you’re free from his shadows now.”

I heard her sigh. “But I’m still stuck in the past,” she whispered, face looked solemn.

Shay met my eyes. Staring at her, I could clearly see the emptiness in her warm eyes. “Maybe you have to stop thinking things through, contemplating the ‘what could have beens’ because it’ll get you nowhere. Been there before, Shay.”

A sad smile crossed her lips. “I think you should apply that to yourself as well, Theo.”

“I plan to,” I said.

“Look, if Sandy really loves you, she’ll come back.”

Though I still had hope for us, it still made me chuckle. But Sandy’s denial of my existence hurt me more than it should. Pain had a way of snapping me back into reality. “Mmm-hmm, don’t give me that bull. It’s not like that all the time.”

She shrugged her shoulder, crossing one leg to the other. “I’m just sayin’.”

We both fell silent for a while.

I had never imagined that we would be having this conversation. The group of friends she had before was known as the elite group. It never even occurred to my mind that we would be sitting this close to one another, discussing our struggles and heartaches. I had a hard time talking my pain to someone openly yet she made me do so.

Miss Marjorie told me she was still dealing with her father’s death. And it was nice to know that her father did some good in his life- he cherished and protected his only girl.

But it also broke her.

“Don’t get stuck on your past, Shay. You have to keep walking.”

She closed her eyes. When she spoke, her voice was breaking. “I could still see how my father hurt them. And I hated him for it.”

“He did what he thought was right to protect you.”

She sniffed and quickly wiped her eyes. “Funny. That’s the exact thing he told me.”

“’Cause you know, you’re the only family he valued. So when there’s nothing left in life, you have to do things right. For the one you love.”

“Do you know what my father did to them?” she asked. She didn’t wait for my answer though. “When he found out what we were up to, I promise, it was like there was another man who possessed him that night. He made me go with him and we drove in the middle of the night. We stopped on the corner and I knew he had found out where we used to hang out after school. The Ridge Hub. He knew the bartender there and the man told him what was going on. After a minute or so, I saw Rocky being dragged outside the bar, men beating him up to a pulp, naked.”

I wasn’t aware I was gripping the arm rest too tight and was surprised that I was somehow mirroring her.

“I wanted to help him,” Shay continued, shaking her head. “But my dad won’t let me. He just said, ‘you would never see him’. I was so angry and scared thinking he would…”

Reaching out to her already ashen knuckles, I tried to ease her grip, distracting her. I could tell it was a painful story to remember. “Your father cares for you.”

“It doesn’t give him right to hurt them still,” she answered looking at me.

I rested my back, calming my stiffed shoulder. “Right and wrong are subjective. Just like good and bad.”

Shay laughed, in a sarcastic way. “That’s the biggest bullshit I’ve heard in my life.”

I watched her, her voice seeping through me. “My father used to say that. But I agree with you. That’s bullshit.”

She nodded, wiggling her finger on me. “Tell your father that.”

“Mmm,” I hummed. “I wish I could. But he stops coming home since I was ten. We stopped talking from then on.”

Her eyes were on me. I could feel it. “I’m sorry,” she said, almost in a whisper.

Shaking my head, I smiled at her. I didn’t want her to feel sorry for me. “No it’s fine.”

“So here we are, two people trying to make sense of the bulls their fathers told them,” she announced a little bit louder.

“One of them trapped in the past, the other will keep going,” I added.

She nudged me with her hand sharply. “I’ll start walking away too.”

Good. Raising my fist in the air, I muttered, “For new beginnings.”

“New beginnings!” she shouted, her voice echoing, getting the other’s attention. They all looked at us, curiosity in their eyes.

We both ducked our heads, laughing.