Manila, Mindoro, Manila - Part Two (of Six)
A different window into the same world.
Previously: Minutes later, as he stood naked before the bucket, he couldn’t help but feel that, for the first time since he was four, he was going to fail at taking a bath.
Matt Lang woke up at two-thirty in the morning, which was two-thirty in afternoon in Erie. If he were there, he would be outside in the summer sun; here, he was inside in the dark. The AC was jet powered; it could not have been over sixty degrees in the room. In this strange land, was there no happy medium between freezing and stifling? Andrea was sound asleep next to him, still dressed in the t-shirt and slacks she had been wearing earlier. He rummaged through his clothes until he found the one long-sleeved shirt he brought. He went to have a look outside.
He stood in the doorway and stared at an empty courtyard. The ground was dirt, and a lone tree grew in the far corner. An iron gate provided a break in the concrete rectangle that closed in the yard. Through the gate, Matt Lang could see the street, empty, quiet, illuminated by a street lamp on the corner. He watched a woman waddle into view. She stopped in front of the gate and wrapped her hands around the bars. She leaned her head against the gate, her wispy hair visible in the lamp light. Matt Lang saw a dog limping behind her. One of its back legs was broken and sticking to the side at an angle that made Matt a little nauseous. He was getting hot again, so he went back inside and went back to bed.
Four hours later he woke up and heard Andrea in the kitchen, talking with another woman, older and Filipina by the sound of her voice. Through his sleepiness, he caught pieces of conversation: activist, motorcycle, two children, again, daylight, reality. He propped himself on his elbows and heard the older woman say, clearly, before she left, Every day we wonder who will be next.
Matt Lang stepped into the kitchen, on the way to the bathroom. Andrea was standing by the burner, frying what looked like sardines.
As he pissed he wondered who the older woman was and what she was talking about, what who will be next meant, and if there was going to be anything else for breakfast, and if there wasn’t, was he going to be able to stomach the sardines? His stream looked like concentrated orange juice, but it smelled just like piss. He wondered about washing his hands. What were the rules? Could he use the bucket water for this? What other water was there? Seeing none, he used the bucket water. He dipped his hands in and pulled them right back out, certain that that was some breach of etiquette at best, that he had contaminated the entire water supply at worst. How could hand washing not be self-evident?
Back in the kitchen, Matt took a seat and asked about the woman, and the conversation. Andrea answered while piling rice on two plates, and placing sardines on the rice.
Her name is Ate Dora. Spelled A-t-e, but pronounced like that: Ah-tay. It’s an honorific, it means older sister. She’s been my primary support here, helped me make all my connections, set me up with all the women I’ve interviewed. She’s been at it a long time. We were talking about the latest killing. There was a strike at a Coca-Cola plant south of here and they sent in goons to break it up. That night the lead organizer disappeared. Two days later they found his body half-buried in a rice field ten kilometers away. He’d been shot in the back of the head and his tongue was cut out and stuffed in his shirt pocket.
Matt looked at his breakfast. Latest killing implied there had been prior killings, probably a string of killings. Andrea never mentioned any of this in her emails or over Skype. Matt cut a piece of the fish with the side of his spoon and scooped it up with an ample amount of rice. The whole bite tasted like oil and salt, even with all that rice.
I had no idea.
Most people don’t. That’s why I’m writing the book.
I thought your book was about sex workers.
A different window into the same world.
Matt and Andrea ate the rest of their breakfast. Matt needed several drinks of water to get through all that salty fish.
Thank you for reading. Up next:
They left Andrea’s apartment at a little after five-thirty that evening, Matt having gone back to bed after breakfast, fallen asleep, and dreamt about a leaky pipe that couldn’t be fixed, raw sewage dripping onto his arms and face as he worked.