The House on 13th Street

Chapter 1 - The House on 13th Street

03/01/2016, 7:56 A.M.

I work late at night as a customer service representative. My shift starts at 10 in the evening up until 7 in the morning. The work is mundane and thankless, but hey, it provides me my bread and butter and keeps me inches away from starving to death. Apparently, I'm stuck in this home-work-home cycle for almost a year now and nothing has come knocking at my door ever since. But, let me just clear things up, I am not living a boring life. I'm all fun and adventure; the kind that, you know, adults like me can only understand. Anyway, I'm writing this not to narrate how basically boring my job is, but I'm here to tell you something which I'm not really sure you'd believe in. Yet, I'm still tenacious to let you hear it. It happened just three days ago, and the details of it still give me these irritating spine-tingling sensations.

DAY ONE
02/27/16

I am Adam, 24, a literature student who ended up working in the BPO industry. Don't ask why, the reasons are futile. For almost a year now, I've been living in a decent apartment in a suburban subdivision. The funniest thing here is that my workplace is just 5 minutes away from my apartment, and Nancy, my girlfriend, lives just a couple of blocks away from mine. So, we always see each other every day. But, three days ago, Nancy told me that she needs to visit her sick granny in their province in Ilocos. She told me that she's actually dying and has long to see her favorite granddaughter. I said yes of course. Who wouldn't? It's her family. And we've just been seeing for eight months, I would be a total jerk if I act like an asshole not allowing her to go there. She'd be pissed for sure.

I live on 9th Street. I always reach my apartment by just saying "Nueve" to the motor driver. It's the nickname of the place, and I don't have the right amount of interest to try asking why, even though I'd been so nosy a lot of times. There's a destroyed light post beside an abandoned junk shop in front of my apartment, and that's where I usually tell the driver to pull over. But three days ago, while riding a motorcycle on my way home, the driver, who was a little too old to be working as a driver, suddenly told me something.

"You live in Nuebe?" he asked. The rain was hitting his face. Good thing, I brought a leather jacket with me and hid under its tutelage, away from the fever-threatening rainfall. It was already 7:30 in the morning but it seemed like it was still about to dawn. The place was still dark and, sadly, ultimately gloomy and was giving the feeling of dread.

"Yes, Manong," I answered. I called him Manong because obviously I don't know him. I knew all the drivers in the subdivision. There's Freddie, Agustin, Berto, Magno, Jimboy, Lot-lot, Merto, Casiano and Aling Ganda (who is the only female driver in the subdivision). But, this one driver, I haven't met yet.

"Don't call me Manong. I'm Norman. Berto's father. Berto's sick. He needed to rest. That poor child," he said. Now I see.

"You asked if I live in Nuebe. Why so?" Against the pouring rain, I tried to clear my vision and looked at his face on the side mirrors. He's really old. The dark lines circling his eyes tell it all.

"So, you already have heard about the incident on "Trese"?" he asked. "Trese" refers to 13th street. I haven't been there. The last time I was there was when Nancy and I looked for someone named Douglas, a computer repair man, to fix Nancy's laptop. But since then, I haven't explored that side of the subdivision that much. I always prefer to just stay in my apartment and watch some series. Or think of a new story to write. I'm a frustrated writer if you may ask.

"No. Been here for a year now. But no. I'm not sure what you're talking about," I answered. From where we were, I could almost see the light post and the abandoned junk shop against the heavy lines of rain.

"Oh, is that so? I think it was up in the internet. I'm not really sure, you know. I don't even know how to use the internet," he laughed, the one that fathers give when they're telling some bad jokes. "But Berto said it was posted there by someone. Blogger? Is that the correct word?"