One Tricycle Ride Away

It was two days before the board exam. I was hoarse from shouting inspirational mantras from our review center's last day of final coaching in Aliw Theater. After the program, my friends decided to visit a nearby church to seek the help of every spiritual aid we could. It was also dark, rainy and slippery and after our trip, I was absolutely exhausted and stressed, and also with that jittery nervous feeling of confronting the face of death that Saturday.

But I have one more stop to go to before I collapse in a useless pile of anxiety in my bed. Your house. Because it's your birthday. And I wanted to be there for your simple celebration, just to show I remembered, and I care.

I arrived there past 7:30 PM. Please note that your house is farther than mine (and I have been travelling for two hours already) and if I had concocted the perfectly valid excuse of being utterly tired to attend your party, I would already have been fast asleep with my pillows and board exam worries the time I got to your house. 

I ate by myself because I don't know any of the people there. You were fairly decent in assisting me with food and I remember laughing at your cake because it has your face on it. 30 minutes later, I was done and there was nothing left to do. You were busy with your pals drinking outside and I guess I was ready to go home. 

I don't know if this is fair, but under the circumstances of the day, I really did expect you to accompany me to the transportation terminal one tricycle ride away, if not at home because, after all, you have a party to host. Doing so would only cost you at least 10 minutes. When I was about to leave, even your own mother told you, "Oh, ihatid mo naman siya.", but you made up some flimsy excuse of having to stay at your house and called your cousins to do the nuisance job for you.

Maybe if that was the first time that happened, the way you were always so lethargic in taking me home, much less offering it as if it was a tiring chore you sometimes have to do, I would have understood. But this was just a number in the long list of events that made this simple neglect all the more painful.

The next day, granted it was raining as hard as ever and there were already flooding in some areas, you didn't come. All I received was a single text. Not even a present, just like last year when you failed to get me even the cheapest of things. So this was now two years in a row where you forgot. Or probably didn't care enough to remember. I was hurt and disappointed. I knew it was wrong for me to expect things in return, but it's hard to justify a long term boy friend missing a day like this. 

Because you weren't there. I wasn't really having a party but I would have appreciated your presence. Because, after all, exactly the day after yours, it was my birthday too.