CHAPTER 9: THE PINK PAINT
1051 Words
LINA'S POV
The storm left us with mud.
And quiet.
The kind of quiet that comes after you’ve said too much and survived it.
I woke up first. 6:02am. My back hurt from the kitchen floor. Dreo was still asleep. Back to me. An inch of space between us. He didn’t cross it. Not even in sleep.
The house was broken.
The south wall was gone. Rain had stopped, but water still dripped from the ceiling like the house was crying and didn’t know how to stop.
But the kitchen was intact.
And he was still here.
He didn’t leave after Friday.
Because Friday came and went.
I didn’t mention it. Neither did he.
---
“Coffee,” he said without opening his eyes.
I blinked. “How did you know I was awake?”
“You breathe different when you’re awake.”
I sat up. “That’s creepy.”
“It’s fact.”
He opened his eyes then. Looked at the ceiling. At the hole. “We have to fix it.”
“We don’t have wood.”
“We have time.”
I stared at him. “What?”
He stood up. Stretched. His shirt was still damp. “I didn’t buy the bus ticket.”
The words hit me like the storm did.
“You stayed.”
“I stayed,” he said. Simple. Like he was saying ‘it’s raining.’
I didn’t know what to do with my hands. So I held my mug. “Why?”
He looked at the shattered sunflower on the floor. The stem in the mug. Still green. “Because it’s not dead yet.”
---
We didn’t talk about it again.
We worked instead.
Mayor Luis came that morning. With cash. With papers. With that pitying smile.
“Ms. Vera,” he said. “I heard about the wall. 1.5M now. Final offer. Before the next storm.”
I stood in the doorway. The broken doorway. “No.”
His smile dropped. “Excuse me?”
“I said no.”
“You’re making a mistake. This house—”
“Is mine,” I said. “And I’m not selling.”
Dreo was behind me. Silent. Tools in his hand. He didn’t say a word. He didn’t have to.
Mayor Luis left.
The house exhaled.
---
That afternoon, Aling Teresing came with paint.
“Pink,” she said. She set three cans on the floor. “Yung sabi mo dati. Para kay Lola.”
I hadn’t told anyone about the pink.
Except him.
I looked at Dreo. He was looking at the cans. Not at me.
“Para saan?” I asked Aling.
“Para mabuhay ulit,” she said. “Bahay na hindi na libingan.”
She left.
We stared at the paint.
“I don’t know how to paint,” I said.
“I do,” Dreo said.
“When?”
“When I was 14. My dad made me paint his shop. Over and over. Said I had to learn to make ugly things look new.”
He opened a can. The smell filled the kitchen. Sweet. Clean. Not like rot.
He handed me a brush.
It was heavy.
“Where do we start?” I asked.
“The wall that’s left,” he said.
---
We started at 3pm.
No music. No talk. Just the sound of brushes on wood.
He did the high parts. I did the low.
My arm hurt. My hands hurt. Pink got on my jeans. On my face. On his.
He didn’t wipe it.
Neither did I.
“Your Lola,” he said after an hour. First words in 60 minutes. “Why pink?”
“Because she said houses should look like hope,” I said. “Even if they’re falling.”
He nodded. Painted slower.
“You,” I said. “Why did you come back?”
He stopped. Brush mid-air.
“I didn’t ask you to,” I added fast. “I just… want to know.”
He dipped the brush again. “Because you left the door open.”
“That was an accident.”
“No,” he said. “It wasn’t. You did it on purpose. Night 6. Night 12. Last night.”
I went still.
“You wanted to see if I’d come in,” he said. He didn’t look at me. “And I did.”
The paint dripped on my foot. I didn’t move.
“Why did you stay on the porch for 12 nights?” I asked.
“Because coming in meant I couldn’t leave,” he said.
“And now?”
He finally looked at me. Pink on his cheek. Sweat on his neck. “Now I’m inside.”
---
We finished the wall at 8pm.
It wasn’t perfect. There were streaks. Missed spots. Places where the old brown stain showed through like a scar.
But it was pink.
And it was dry.
We sat on the floor. Against the new wall. Legs stretched out.
No food again. Just water.
“I’m scared,” I said.
“Of what?”
“That this is all we get,” I said. “Two people. A wall. A storm. And nothing after.”
He didn’t answer right away.
He reached for the paint can. Dipped his finger.
And he drew on the wall.
A small line. Then another.
A stem.
Then a circle.
A sunflower.
Crooked. Childish. Pink on pink.
Like Mimi’s.
He looked at me. “It’s not nothing.”
I pressed my palm to the wall. Beside his sunflower. My hand was smaller. Shaking.
“Don’t leave,” I said.
He didn’t say yes.
He didn’t say no.
He just put his hand over mine. On the wall.
Our fingers didn’t touch.
But the paint did.
---
That night, I slept in the pink room.
On the floor. No mattress. Just the blanket.
He slept on the porch.
But the door?
I didn’t close it.
Not an inch.
Not all the way.
It stayed open.
And at 3am, I heard him move.
Footsteps.
He didn’t come in.
But he didn’t leave either.
He sat down.
I could hear him breathing.
All night.
---
In the morning, the sunflower had a new leaf.
Small. Green. Alive.
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*[End Chapter 9]*
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- Writer
