A year was supposed to be a long time. For Felix, it was just the same day, repeated 365 times. After the requisite dorm hunting, the gnawing doubts, and the quiet, unsettled ache of a heartbreak that refused to scar over, he finally graduated. Northerners University was his choice, or rather, the choice that had been made for him.
The graduation photos told the whole story. In every shot, he was dazed, his eyes drawn to the blue light of his phone as if hypnotized, searching for a message that would never appear, from a man he knew was gone.
A smile was even too much for him, mustering one only when the stage lights blinded him. His father's approval came as it always did: a sharp pinch to the arm and an "earnest" slap to the back of the head that was meant to knock the sorrow out of him but only drove it deeper into his bones.
The worst of it was the crowd. The hall was a roaring sea of celebration, but its glamour, the flashing lights and thunderous praise, was just static. To Felix, the world had been rendered in monochrome ever since the day he lost its only color: Gray.
A year. A whole calendar of days had bled into one another, and still, the words he longed for remained unsaid, unheard. Still, he was hopelessly entangled in a web of his own weaving.
He was tracing the series of cracks on a sidewalk that had barely survived the last earthquake, a good distance from the fragrant chaos of the palengke, when he decided he was close to snapping. For weeks, Amor had been rambling about the tragic melodrama of her own life, and while she never said it outright, the implication was clear: her problems were heavier than his. Now, his ankles were burning, raw from being dragged around the town square like some prize animal.
"I heard Tita's going to give me a new makeup set, ack!" Amor squealed, her thumbs flying across her phone screen. Felix trailed behind her, a beast of burden laden with five shopping bags, grunting under the oppressive fist of the tropical heat.
"Oh, goodie," he breathed, the words wilting the moment they left his lips. "Amor, can we take a break?" The bags hit the ground with a thud, and a wave of relief, cool and immediate, washed over him.
"God, we've been at this for two hours! Look at me, I am a mess." He was. His white shirt was soaked with sweat, his hair a frantic mess. Each time he'd complained, Amor had simply waved it off with a breezy, "You're fine."
"Besides," she said, not looking up, "we won't be here much longer. Mom said they just arrived in Vigan. They're on their way."
That was quick. An hour, maybe less, and they would be in Sinait. A five-minute tricycle ride, engine sputtering, would take them to the coast, to Dadalaquiten Norte, the small seaside barangay they called home. A place of dainty floating cottages and gentle waves, a world away from the life her cousin was leaving behind.
"So, will they be staying?" The question slipped out before he could stop it. Maybe a sullen English boy would add a different flavor to his otherwise forlorn summer.
"Not sure," Amor mumbled, pinching her chin as she typed. "But it seems like it." Her gaze finally lifted from her screen and fell on him. She saw him as he was: arms resting on his knees, staring blankly into the distance where the heat warped the horizon. A man with no grip, a husk of the boy who once held so much charm.
She knew Gray had been his anchor. And though she sometimes wished she could snap the boy in two with her bare hands, she wouldn't. Because it was clear as day that Gray, for all the pain he'd caused, had also made Felix the happiest he'd ever been.
"Is it him? Again?" Her voice was soft, heavy with a weariness that went beyond their shopping marathon.
Felix snapped back to reality. "Wha—who?"
Amor met his surprised gaze with a sad smile and a scoff. He had tried to move on, he really had. But there was always that bleak, bitter taste of failure each time he tried and found himself still waiting.
"He's gone, Felix. Gone from your life. It's over," she said. The words were stones, each one landing with a dull, painful thud. How was he supposed to let years of memories just slide away?
"I know, I ju—"
"He already accepted that. Why can't you?"
There it was. The question he feared most because it opened the door to a thought he couldn't bear: that for Gray, every shared laugh, every secret, every scantling of their time together was disposable.
"Felix… help yourself. He isn't your life," she said, her voice softening.
But he was the part of it that made sense, a voice screamed inside him. He was the fiber that embroidered my heart.
"Haa… I know, I know," he uttered in surrender. "Can we just get home?" It was a plea.
The silence that followed was heavy, the kind Amor hated. She took a deep breath, ready to change the channel. "Oh my god! We can give Mat a tour! I bet he'll love the beaches!"
Felix smirked, a familiar reflex. It was a kindness, her clumsy attempt to stitch his mood back together. "It's just a beach, Amor. The last thing a boy from England will want after a twenty-hour trip is a walking tour of the barangay." He saw her smug grin forming. "You just want to show him off. Absolutely predictable."
"Nooo, I would never," she said, the lie sweet and obvious. She was a vixen, a lover of attention, but her heart was good.
As she rifled through one of the bags, pulling out a small gift she'd bought, a different light sparked in her eyes. It was a distinctive warmth Felix rarely saw—a flicker of pure, unvarnished sincerity. And in that flicker, he understood. Amor had no siblings. He was the closest thing she had, but they weren't blood. Her excitement wasn't just about a new audience; it was about a cousin. About family. Maybe she didn't just want a friend; maybe she wanted a brother.
"Do you think he'll like them?" she asked, her voice suddenly small.
Who knew? But seeing the effort, the genuine hope in her face, Felix's own cynical heart softened. He wouldn't say it out loud, not to her, but it was impossible not to appreciate it.
"I mean, I wouldn't," he joked, shrugging with a sly grin.
"I'm serious!" she cried, kicking his shin. He groaned, but the sound was wrapped in laughter.
"Alright, alright," he said, backing away with a smile. He pushed his hair from his sweaty forehead, his gaze softening. "Look, I'm sure he'll appreciate the gesture."
"Really?"
He didn't know for sure, but he knew her heart was in the right place, and sometimes, that was all it took. He gave her a reassuring nod and grumbled, "Yes. Now call a tricycle, for heaven's sake, and let's go home."
"Ugh, fine."