Date: Tue, 13 Apr 2004 23:35:53 -0700 (PDT)
From: rob <robbie_is_still@yahoo.com>
Subject: Similar Differences 5

Standard warnings apply. Actually, the site already has warnings. Just to
make sure, here're more. ^_^ Most of this is actually fiction but some
situations have been taken from real life. The names of the characters are
made up/fictional - if there are people with the same names somewhere out
there, that is purely coincidental.

As with most stories, the author retains all rights to this story. Without
the permission of the author, no reproductions or links to other sites are
allowed.

This deals with male homosexual love. If you are not of legal age (18 or
21, it depends actually where), or if you live/are in a place where
material such as this is illegal, or if you are simply offended by
homosexuality and/or homosexual themes, please leave.

This story has no sex scenes in it. ^_^


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Chapter 5: Stormy Weather

I drove to school, feeling like a mess - possibly even looking like one,
but I didn't care.

Despite feeling as if I were run over by a truck, as if all the energy had
been siphoned from my body into some crack in the ground, I still couldn't
sleep the night before.

I even tried counting the stars on my ceiling, but I found difficulty in
doing so. Each didn't seem like glowing. Instead, they were blindingly
bright - sharply contrasting against the dark canvass of my ceiling. They
all pierced through me, pricking my eyes. Like cruel theives robbing me of
sleep.

Outside the wind was picking up, the overcast sky was a dull
gray. Actually, everything was gray - the pavement rolling under the car,
the buildings flying by.

So the first typhoon of the year was about to arrive. Classes were
cancelled for the elementary and high school levels, but I didn't receive
any news about universities closing.

Besides, I didn't feel like being home just then.

Annulment. Mom has been thinking about it for weeks, seeing priets,
lawyers, friends, she told me. Apparently, dad was fooling around - one of
the reasons why he was gone for really long periods of time. She found out
quite recently when in fact the affair had been going on for God knows how
long. Since divorce wasn't allowed here, she opted to annul the marriage,
or dissolve the marriage as if it never happened - as if it was flawed from
the beginning.

Did that mean I was going to become a bastard in the truest sense of the
word? I didn't know, but philosophically, if I were to look at it, if there
was no marriage from the beginning, then my sister and I - we were
conceived out of wedlock.

But maybe there was a loophole somewhere. I didn't know.

I know, though, that it meant a lot of things. Mom had been talking with
dad's family - when they heard that he was fooling around, they didn't
believe at first. Until she presented evidence. Hard evidence. Letters,
recordings.

Even a confession from the mistress.

Her even efficiency scared me. She had hired a private investigator to
gather the things up. When the mistress found out that this was probably
her chance at marrying my dad, she immediately jumped into the pool without
'testing the waters.'

Eventually, when dad's family finally admitted that he was fooling around,
they moved all the responsibilities to his younger brother. And the burden
of management fell to his sons - my cousins.

Heck, I didn't have to take up management after all!

But the bottomline was it didn't bother them much. They only moved
management to Uncle Willy because they didn't want the family money going
to 'that woman.'

Concubinage was practiced in China before. This was just a modern
incarnation.

Parking wasn't that difficult - there wasn't anyone else at school it
seemed.

And leaving the house early proved to be a wrong decision. On my way to the
Council's room, I found out from a janitor that classes were cancelled.

Seeing as the typhoon was intensifying, I decided to stay put. It was
getting to be too dangerous to drive out. Armed with my backpack filled
with assignments and other assorted paperwork, I tried storming the
library. Unfortunately, it was closed. Luckily, I had a key to the Student
Council's room, where, I remembered, I had left other things to work on.

It would've been fine - if only the storm drainage wasn't beside
it. Hearing the constant rush of water, accompanied by an orchestra of
frogs, just irritated me.

Croak. Croak. Whoosh. Whoosh. Croak Whoosh. Whooocroakooosh.

I couldn't concentrate even if I tried.

Walking around an empty campus felt acutely, yet strangely, comforting,
beneath the covered walks, in spite of getting wet by the horizonal spray
of the pouring rain. Hearing your footsteps echo down hallways and not
drowning in a multitude of voices.

On a sudden whim, I trekked up to the top floor of the Arts Building where
an exhibit hall was. The Arts Building sat on a hill, elevating it
somewhat. From that exhibit hall, one could see all the important buildings
within the main campus.

Luckily, the janitor was just on his way out, ready to retire after
mopping. After promising to lock it when I was done, he allowed me to
enter.

That hall was a little larger than a full basketball court. It could've
been a basketball court, actually, if not for the fairly low ceiling and
the large clear glass windows on both its sides. It spanned the whole
building in width.

Its wooden floor, newly mopped, reflected my image as I walked across its
surface - my face seeming small relative to my feet.

Dance organizations practiced here, plays were held here. But then it was
empty.

Since I was searching for as much quiet as I could get, I sat right in the
middle. Settling into the atmosphere, I laid my papers all out, arranging
them like a sidewalk vendor does his wares. From where I sat, I could
clearly see the sights outside, like a frozen moving picture.

Trees swaying savagely.

Branches coming off, flying.

Plastic bags looking like frightened doves - white, shivering in the wind.

It was all actually violently beautiful.

In the distance, billboard posters had been folded up, exposing their bare
steel scaffolding frames. There were no cars on the roads.

Everything was strangely peaceful - from the scenes outside, to the sound
of the rain on the windowpanes and the occasional, momentary howl of the
wind, to the coolness of the thick air.

I was able to work like a demon - speedily, efficiently. The pile of things
'to do' seemed to flow into the pile of things 'done' like liquid.

It made me almost insanely happy.

Caught up in the flurry of accomplishing so much, when the exhibit hall's
door opened with a click, I completely forgot that I wasn't the only person
in the world.

Kyle stood there, jacket dripping wet, holding a soggy sandwich bag.

The next time someone arrives unexpectedly, I'll know it'd be Kyle.

"There you are." It wasn't the most moving thing he said to me, but it
relieved me just the same. "I've been looking all over for you. I tried
calling your house earlier to say that we didn't have class and for you to
stay home but your mom told me you left extra early."

Soon he was seated beside me.

"I knew that the caf would be closed, so I brought lunch for both of us."
He smiled.

It appeared as if he was planning to wait. "Kyle, I'm working. What'll you
do?"

"Don't let me bother you. I'll just be here."

For a while all we could hear to accompany the rain was the soft, scratchy
scribblings my pen made on paper. Scribble, scribble, scribble. The shuffle
of sorting papers. Scribble. It was only after fifteen minutes that I heard
him speak again.

"Os," scribble, "I heard what happened from your mom," scribble,
scratch. The rip of tearing paper. The rip of new paper from the pad. "I,"
scribble, "I don't know what to say."

Looking up from my paperwork, I could see that he was scared. Worried.

For me.

"You don't have to say anything."

I didn't realize it, but I had started to cry. I couldn't stop it. They'd
come, one by one, water droplets forming streams down my cheeks.

I hadn't cried in a long while. I couldn't even remember when the last time
I cried was.

I never cried. I didn't. And then, there I was:

Crying like a child.

"Hey, hey," he said, comfortingly. "It's okay. It's okay," he pulled me to
him and closed his jacket around both of us, whispering into my ear.

He was warm.


--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

In fairness, my parents kept my sister and I away from the annulment
process as much as possible. July turned into August, August into
September, September into October. All was quiet at home.

At school, though, more and more things came popping up about Kyle and I. I
honestly didn't know where they were coming from so I couldn't quell
them. Kyle, for his part, was a bit worried as well - but mostly, he'd just
pretend as if there was nothing going around.

Meetings those days were full of surreptitious looks my way.

As time went by, the looks got longer. And there were more and more of
them.


--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Kyle's father, Mr. Lopez, had a heart attack late in October. Though I knew
they weren't close, it still surprised me that though November had come,
Kyle hadn't gone to visit him.

"He doesn't want me there."

"How can you be so sure?"

One afternoon, we were lounging about in his house - him watching TV on his
bed, and sprawled across his belly was me - reading a book. By then, we had
gotten used to affectionate physical contact.

It was a lazy day - the first semester had ended sometime the month before
and the second hadn't begun.

"Os, he just doesn't."

"Kyle."

"Os, don't push it." As much as I was getting irritated myself, I think he
was feeling it even more - I could tell by how tense his muscles got.

"Okay," I trailed off - and that seemed to get to him.

"What's it to you anyway? He's my dad and it's my life."

"Right, right," I started. At that point I was seated on the bed, trying to
stare him down - a difficult task considering that he was standing
already. "But he's your dad and you aren't really busy doing stuff, right?"

That wasn't what I wanted to say, but I couldn't form the right words.

"Os, drop it."

For the time being, I did.

But when, a week later, he was watching TV and I was going over project
proposals for the Management Association (again in his room) and Maria came
storming in, I knew I had to say something more.

"Sir Kyle. Your father," she was out of breath.

Immediately, I stopped what I was doing. Kyle acted like it was nothing at
all.

"Maria, you could've told me over the intercom. You didn't have to run all
the way up here."

I was struck by how bratty he could be.

"But sir," she tried, "something went wrong with his operation today. He's
in the ICU."

Kyle was quiet for a while; I didn't want to open my mouth while Maria was
there.

"Okay. You may go now."

That was it? That's all he had to say?

"But sir," Maria began to protest.

"Just go."

Looking dejected, she trudged out the door.

"That's it?" I asked.

"What's it?" He retorted, angry.

"That's all you're going to say?"

"What else should I say?"

"Kyle, he's your dad."

Quietly, but steadily, he answered. "You don't understand."

"Then make me." I really couldn't understand what was wrong. Fine, they
might have had issues, but...

"When mom died, dad blamed me for it, okay?"

When he said that, even my thoughts stopped like traffic. "What?"

Slowly, shakily, he answered. "Mom died but she's been sick for a long time
- since I was born."

"But that doesn't make sense." It was insensitive but it came out.

"It doesn't, but that's how he sees it, okay?" I was about to make him
cry. I could see him fighting it.

It felt horrible.

"Kyle, I'm sorry." Meddling wasn't clearly my best subject. "But your dad's
dying. You don't want to lose your dad before, I don't know, patching
things up?" I tried approaching him, to hold him the way he'd hold me. But
he didn't let me.

Choking a little, he told me exactly what he told Maria.

"Just go."

He didn't look my way.

At that, I didn't know whether I should've been angry at him or at myself.

I ended up leaving, cursing myself on the way home.


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For two days I didn't hear from Kyle. I didn't know how his dad was doing
either. Classes were about to resume soon - I wanted so bad to talk to him,
but when I'd call him up, Maria would just tell me he was out or doing
something - apologetically. If I'd ask her how Mr. Lopez was doing, she'd
just say that she didn't know.

The third night, as I was contemplating on dialling Kyle's, he called,
sounding somber. "Os, would you come with me to the hospital?"


--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Hospitals are places of healing, they say. But they could just as easily be
places of death - even more than cemeteries. I couldn't help but think this
as I was standing in the white hall, seeing nurses in white floating around
as if in slow motion.

On our way up to the suite, I spotted a newborn, tiny and pink, wrapped in
a soft blue cloth. The next floor, though, a really old man came rolling
along, being pushed in a wheelchair by a nurse.

It's as if the old man's soul was ready to leave and maybe settle into the
baby downstairs.

Trying to remain calm, to get the jitters out of my system, I leaned
against the wall of the hallway, waiting for Kyle to come out. I knew he
needed time alone with his father.

Isn't it strange? Almost all hospitals share a certain smell.

I was broken from my reverie by the metallic screech of the suite's tight
door hinges. Kyle came out, red, puffy-eyed.

I hugged him as soon as I could.


--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Mr. Lopez was taken out of ICU and put into a regular suite for
recuperation. It seemed as if the air between father and son was cleared up
a bit, though I don't really know what they talked about while I was
outside.

As soon as I entered with him, and as soon as I saw Mr. Lopez - for the
first time - I knew I'd recognize him as Kyle's dad even if we were
strangers passing each other by on the street.

He was a regular Kyle. Or rather, Kyle was a regular Mr. Lopez. Only
younger.

They both had the same soft hair, straight teeth. Kyle was just slimmer -
and it seemed as if Mr. Lopez's eyes had lost the sparkle of youth. At
least partially.

Adjusting the bed so that he could sit somewhat upright, he said, "Hello,
Osmond. Kyle's told me a lot about you."

Not as much as I think he should, I thought before saying good evening in
return. If Kyle did say everything, I wouldn't have been called 'Osmond,'
would I?

Mr. Lopez was actually quite nice. He even had food delivered up for us
from a high-end restaurant near the hospital - I had to (politely) fend off
his attempts at having crab fat. He just had a bypass operation and he was
already thinking of clogging up his other arteries?

It would've been an altogether good evening - if not for the news he broke.

"Oh, Kyle. I just remembered. Sandy Montemayor - you remember her, Sara's
mom? They said they'll be visiting for a while. I think they're planning to
move back," he happily announced.

I didn't know what Kyle registered right then: he wasn't happy, or sad, or
angry, or anything.

He just looked surprised.

Mr. Lopez noticed. "You know, Osmond," he proudly said, "Sara and Kyle,
well!" and started laughing heartily - proudly - like a father usually does
when it comes to the topic of sons and girls.


--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

I'd stopped going to school with Kyle when the rumors got out of hand -
sort of to nullify them. In the afternoons, though, I'd just go to his
house, arriving there about an hour after he'd get there himself.

When school started, Sara'd accompany Kyle all over the University. They'd
both see their mutual friends; she'd go off finding her own old friends
while he'd be in class.

She'd ride home with him - and sometimes I'd follow them. Though not in a
stalker-sense.

Sara.

Those lazy days at Kyle's were still lazy days at Kyle's. Only now, there
was a girl there with him.

I can't lie. It secretly made my blood boil, seeing how she'd play with his
hair, or how she'd kiss him softly on the cheek when her mom would come to
pick her up in the evening.

Those times, I just held back whatever I could hold back.

And what made it worse was that she was perfect. Virtually perfect.

Pretty. Witty. Smart. Rich.

She had everything I didn't have, from money to uterus, as funny as it
sounds.

And Kyle. For some reason, he turned cold towards me. Not immediately,
sure. But when we'd be alone, sometimes he wouldn't talk or initiate
conversation. When I'd phone him, he sometimes couldn't come to pick up for
one lame reason after the other. 'Sometimes' turned into 'oftentimes.'

We were drifting apart.

We were drifting apart for legitimate reasons.

That made it worse.


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Since that party I caused a ruckus in, Lara and I haven't been talking
much, which is why I was a bit surprised that she came marching into my
room one day.

"Ossie."

Flustered, I tried to hide the box of two shirts I was wrapping behind my
back. I just ended up ripping the gift wrapper.

Kyle's birthday was sometime in December - I got him one shirt for his
birthday and another one for Christmas, saving up my allowance since that
time he gave me the dark blue shirt for my own birthday.

Like the last time we talked, Lara wasn't in the best of moods.

"Ossie, you know, it's bad enough that you ruined my name at that
party. But you know what's worse? When they start talking about 'Lara's
brother'!"

I honestly didn't know what she was talking about, except for the vague
impression that it had something to do with the rumors going around.

"Ossie, fix up your act, will you? God! If I haven't heard from Chastity
and her cousin, I would never have known! You know it's bad enough to have
a fag brother? But you really strive for the best, don't you? You're not
just a fag, you're also a gold-digger."

"What?!" I screamed.

"They say that you and Kyle would meet up and drive home together. Can you
explain that? And how about the time at the hospital? What was with your
PDA in the hospital hallway?"

This was really getting out of hand. "It was an innocent hug, that's all."

"Well, how can you explain how - in the span of one summer all of a sudden
you're the greatest chums? Huh?"

Clenching my fists, locking my jaw, I just kept quiet.

"What did you do, Ossie? Did you promise him high grades to get into his
pants?"

Now that hurt. Really. "What?!"

"Just stay away from him. People are talking. I couldn't care less but it's
ruining me."

"We're just friends." Actually, that's what we called each other.

"Don't give me that cliched excuse. Just stay away from him."


--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Running into Kyle at the cafeteria, I simply had to ask, "Where's Sara?"

Stopping, standing in the middle of the caf at lunchtime, I knew people
could see us, but I didn't care.

"Oh," he said, feeling a little self-conscious, "she's visiting her
grandmom in the province."

"Oh," I replied. I didn't move. Some part of me was hoping that he'd to
invite me over like he used to - a little shrewd, but I wasn't the
aggressive type at all.

Besides, I wanted assurance that we were okay. Maybe not good, but at least
'okay.'

"Os," he started, taking a deep breath, as if readying himself for what he
was about to say next, "Os, I don't think we should be seeing each other
much anymore."

And he left.

I tried my best to keep from crying and I was partially successful.

It was only when I lay down to try to sleep that night - it was only when I
saw all those stars on my ceiling.

It was only then that I felt the warm trails cutting through the dryness of
my face.

I've never felt as small as I did then.

Never.