A Visit to Awake

I can’t stand it! Why do they have to be this noisy? Can’t they give me a moment’s peace? It’s been like this since Mrs. Margaretta left. Everybody’s just damn irritating! Jules thought to himself.

The day went like any other school day. For Jules, it was a daily disappointment. He expected more than this. This was the second school he moved to. He wanted a better atmosphere, where the class is peaceful, his fellow boys interested in comic books and sports, and the girls cute and nice. But he knew this was just wishful thinking.

“Jules heads up— oops, sorry didn’t know you were talking to yourself again”, a classmate apologize. Jules threw back the bag that hit him.

“You know what?”

“What?”

“Don’t you know? The reason Marie is…”

“You’re kidding”

They’re at it again, babbling about whatever nonsense, Jules thought as he observed the whole class. To him it was the same routine and he couldn’t do anything about it. The class seemed like a great distortion of sight and sound.

The other boys were engage in their private civil war. Mon’s brigade positioned itself by the teacher’s desk. There was a good supply of chalk artillery but a lack of the proper defenses. On the other side, Dave’s comrades were way back and well-fortified with a barricade of chattering people. Paper-ball snipers were intermixed in the cluster of others, which provided great camouflage.

Indeed it was a war. The corpses of bags all scattered about; the bookworm peasants huddled behind their books for cover, the gossiping and the shouts horn throughout the room, bits of paper and chalk volleyed back and forth. To Jules everyone seem to be like utter strangers.

“Man, isn’t it so noisy.” Miguel said as he held his ears.
“Why did Ma’am leave?” Jules move his face closer. Miguel gave a shrug as he perch on his chair like a raven.

“Marie’s absent.” Wendy put in.

“So?” Jules replied.

“Haven’t you noticed, she’s been absent for a week.” Wendy whispered.

“I haven’t really—“

The Advisor stepped into the room and both companies retreated to their seats. The bookworms sat in their seats properly and the girls became mute. Jules wasn’t able to finish his answer. But suddenly, he felt a cold wet wind tap him on the shoulder.

“Class… we won’t have classes this morning—“ the class hum like bees on a summer day. “but instead… we are leaving to visit the wake of your classmate, Marie Inocencia.” With this, a long, soiled silence arose and cloak the whole room.

***************

Cars, people, and electric poles went by as the bus rode along EDSA. By the window, Jules watch unattentively the images passing by.

During the trip, he tried to recall the face of Marie Inocencia, but without any success. He knew. He knew her name by attendance, heard the teachers correct her answers, and she was always in class… so how come?

“Jules… do, do you know how she died? Wendy asks hesitantly as she nervously twiddled her fingers.

“I don’t know… I”, that was all he could say.

“I heard she drowned with her little sister in a pool.” Wendy said her eyes wide as saucers and her face white like a Japanese porcelain doll.

“You knew her, didn’t you, Jules… Jules?” Jules kept on digging into the back of his mind for some memory of her. A blank expression settled on the contours of Jules’ face. His eyes filled with a fear, a fear he connected to times when he did some great disaster. He sat motionless, a brown puppet without his strings.

A piece of paper flew into his paper flew into his face, triggering something in his brain. It was a windy morning; Jules stood by an intersection. A stray puppy was barking for attention. Jules shut his external senses to the pleas of the little pup. And in a flash of a moment, the sound of a fast object intermixed with a shrieking cry. Jules startled, look for the source of it.

Lying spattered on the side of the road was a heap of bloodied fur and ripped flesh. The fur once white now dyed in red. The eyes once alive with the light of joy now extinguished.

It only took a brink of a second for Jules to close his eyes and listen to the cars passing. A brink of a second for him to commit a crime. A death, he felt solely responsible for.

**************
One by one, they got out of the bus and into file. Strange it was the first and only time, the class obeyed without a fuss. Slowly, a procession of mourners pass the door. Miss Margaretta join by Miss Garble greeted Marie’s folk and gave homage to the coffin that supposedly containing the shell of Marie. None of the students was bold enough to approach so Miss Margaretta motioned to Cecil to be the first and for the others to follow in alphabetical order.

Jules was sure of the girl’s sadness as if they lost a relative. The boys were rather perplex. The blank feeling was still within Jules and as He look around and saw two coffins.

After finishing his prayers. He peered into the glass and as he beheld the powdered and lipsticked face, he felt no sorrow or ache instead bewilderment consume his being. “Why can’t I feel pain? Sadness yes, but no remorse.” Jules whispered as he approach the door.

“How exactly did Marie and her sister died?” Miss Garble asked Miss Margaretta.

“They were at the pool… and a man push them into the deepest part and—“

“But I thought—“ Miss Garble butted in.

Biting into the biscuit slowly, Jules meditated on the moments that pass. The parents stood like mechanical dolls, heads tilted down and faces long. Some of the girls’ faces were veiled with tears as they embrace one, another. But resentment erupted inside Jules as he saw a bunch of his classmates pocketing biscuits while the teachers weren’t watching. Something within him burned and as he stood there with his fists in his pockets, staring at Marie’s coffin. He felt he was to blame. For what , what did I do? I wasn’t there, it isn’t my fault. Stop it, mourning and keeping silent like I’m the guilty one. Such thoughts race through his mind. He knew she wasn’t coming back— But why don’t I feel grief?

**************
Minutes flew by, the bus arrived at school an hour before class dismissal. There was enough time to get on their respective bus services. Jules was again by the window, but this time a still, observant face replace the blank expression that mask him during the journey.

It seemed like the cars, people, and electric poles shifted. He could see the man selling bago-ong to the rich man in the Toyota. The sound of fish vendors yelling fresh fish cheap, of cigarette boys selling their packs, and of vehicles honking along the highway. Thoughts and feelings began to stew within him.

Then out of it all, a little voice burst from the shadows of his reflective conscious. How could you grieve over someone you never knew and never existed for you? Before it remained subsided amidst the noise of the early morning trip. But now it wrung his introspection.

It emptied his consciousness of all previous emotion and for the first time, it was clean like a newly polished lens. And as he peered again at his surroundings it was like a plant whose leaves were wet and receiving a new coat of green. Then, a great intruding pain spoon into his soul.

— The End —