Furball

Perfect conversation with Carlos and Emmanuel over goto, late night after working with the students’ extracurricular poetry. What could I say about that conversation? Motivating, edifying. Pushed me to dream farther. A rather selfish way of thinking, depicting the conversation’s effect on me rather than its true nature. I hope the later part of this paragraph will remedy that as well as answer the question of the conversation’s fate. Meanwhile, let me describe the goodbyes. We three called it a night. When the night agreed to its name, we paid the cashier our almost forgotten bills, grabbed our bags, and unpacked our destinations. Then we threw them destinations skyward. Caloy’s destination dropped on his kuya’s place in Batangas. Mine, on the Demarses unit. No one quite followed where Emman’s destination went, but he had an idea and was confident about the idea. We all believed that a growth of confidence is well worth an MIA destination. So, goodbye and Caloy hailed his jeep, Emman pedaled his bike, and I walked the blocks to home. I was thinking about our perfect conversation when it hit me: I didn’t know where the conversation went. I mean, we were throwing the furball to and fro, watching it change color and dance along our trajectories. We were happy and surprised and developed ideas in turns. The furball was thrown and caught even while we were eating, even with just tentative throws and side glances. There were no-look passes. Thus, I found it right to consider that we were catching it because it wanted to be caught. Indeed, it was one agile conversation. Up the stairs to the Demarses door, I thought that it didn’t matter. No one had exclusive rights to that conversation, but if either Caloy or Emman took it home, well, the conversation picked its ride. When I opened the door, a flood of air rushed out, throwing me back a couple of steps. It was when I stepped in to turn on the lights and face what I faced that I realized my ill-hid hope to find the conversation waiting for me, maybe gnawing at my slippers, or up nosing through the shelves, or ahead on the bead, muttering nothings in its sleep. But I hit the lights. What was at the door with the air was silence. She was grinning at me. I could not smile back because aside from the fact that she was wearing nothing, her lips were to red and all the floor held evidence of rainbow hair.