Midnight Windows

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PERHAPS the warmest welcome greeting anyone could ever receive from a host was the one Ray had with Madam Awring's giatay kinabuhia yelled in a fractured due to old age, yet formidable force in front of his face, which also secured reception as the landlady and other lodgers accounted how average it was.

Apparently, this happened after Ray's adventure as a jeepney commuter who almost had his wallet stolen by dumb luck, and as a reluctant, clueless backpacker towards Awring and Tikoy's Boarding. Very much, Ray had truly, recently felt the best manifestation for Filipino hospitality.

But these chronicles of Ray's standard ventral head happened after Madam Awring's abandoning of Ray's figure at the front door, before retreating inside the house and telling everyone in the room to, 

"Asa naman akong Vick's vaporub intawn santimaan! Hawan kay mangita ko!" Awring's voice was senile and bygone but home lady had made her point.

Men and women in white blouse and slacks seated by the TV airing Kassie and Marga's stint in Kadenang Ginto, slowly evacuated to the corners of the living room with their eyes still transfixed to the screen, until their abrupt go Kassie dai, dili jud magpalupig sa mga bigaon and Margaret bigatla kang bataa ka, prompted Madam Awring to stare at them with annoyance and they became leaping frogs in a swamp. A couple of girls who were busy with their chika by the sink rambled their way upstairs as a man in his early 20s, Ray guessed, who was clad with a towel over his trunk and lower extremities quickly scanned Ray from head to toe & exclaimed,

"Oy, bay Roger! Lamia naman nato ani."

Ray looked at him confusedly. He glanced to the watery path riddled with tsinelas marks whom this man who called him Roger had walked through, and the water gallon container he's carrying alongside a water dipper with a Tide bar soap and wet clothes inside held by the other hand. Ray isn't sure if he has done laundry or took a bath outside. Could be both.

"Ah, abi'g lami na kay'g lawas kalimtan na dayon ta." He playfully touched Ray's biceps. "O, sauna bukog paman ni tanan. Daw bi, taas na sad kaayo ta da. Kuyog ka inom unya?" Flustered, Ray doesn't know how to tell the stranger that he's not Roger or that while he appreciates that he described him as lami, he just wants to get inside, rest, and maybe practice dying as well.

"I-"

"Oy, Roger! Nibalik man lagi ka? Mahal ang Sogo og Queensland sa?" One of the gentlemen in white uniform mischievously grinned, and glided past his lot to Ray and whoever this man who called him Roger first beside him is. Everyone's now looking at Ray, since Kadenang Ginto's Abangan teaser and ending credits for the episode has already rolled and gone with the Bonakid commercial. Ray regarded Madam Awring closely because if there's anyone who could save him at this point, it would be the landlady.

"Bernard?"

A female midget with mousy brown hair suddenly sprouted behind Ray, the stranger who called him Roger first and the man who most probably spent most of his savings for hair mousses and is also the one who referred to Ray as Roger second.

"Ngano naa ka diri oy?"

"Hoy, dai Lucia! Dili mana's Bernard, umagad mana niya." A woman in white stood up and squinted at Ray.

"Ay, ikaw diay tong iyang umagad! Bayota ka ha, ga igat igat na diay ka diri's syudad." Midget, mousy hair re-calibrated her assumption excitedly. Seeing how Ray did not approve, she inspected him closely.