Lakambini by May Navarro

The night has began to cool, the air seeping through the bamboo slats of the hut. Oriang drew her shawl closer and tasted the sauce on the earthen pot. Nowhere near the adobo she used to have during family Sunday meals but still, it will be a feast with more potatoes than chicken parts. Her comrades found some native chicken wandering near the hut and happily caught these for her. It’s been awhile since they had some meat. Living in the mountains for weeks before coming to Cavite have been hard, digging rootcrops and hacking sap vines for water. Tonight they’ll partake chicken steeped in vinegar and garlic with mounds of warm rice. Then she heard a slight commotion and looked out the window, She saw people congregating, jubilant with someone’s arrival. “Supremo! “ someone called. Her husband had arrived.

Coming back from the camp in Tejeros, he went past her with no word. She knew it wouldn’t be a celebration tonight. His somber mood reflected the same one when he lost in San Juan, when the Spanish guards defeated them when its reinforcements arrived, he lost many Katipunero brothers there. She herself witnessed the slaughter, riding her mare on the sidelines, watching from afar as he tried to raid the powder room of the colonizers and heard the bursts of gunshots and curses and screams in Spanish. It was the same look he had in every defeat. But this one had a sting it seems. He looked downtrodden, his bolo haphazardly thrown on the table, his crumpled and dented strawhat at his feet. He let out a  sigh and slumped on a bamboo bench. Unfazed about this blight, Oriang took out large spread of banana leaf and smoothed it on the table. She then poured some contents of the adobo, careful to leave enough for the others, the rich scent wafting inside the hut. He smiled and eagerly scooped the chicken bits with his hand.

After dinner, Oriang gathered her needles and thread to sew some of his worn and yellowed shirts. She took off her payneta and let her hair flow freely, taking advantage of the breeze. He sat in front of her, his head leaned back, his eyes closed.

“They demoted me..” he said, his voice hoarse. She didn’t say anything, letting the rustling of the leaves outside fill the gap of her silence. She knew there are still words he had to say like a wound that needs to fester with coagulated blood still willing to flow. They were in Cavite to unify the two warring groups of the revolutionary group he established, the Katipunan and as its leader, he felt he had to intervene.  But this meeting turned into an election he didn’t foresee. As he continued, she learned that they wanted Emilio, a Caviteño to lead a revolutionary government not him. He who pierced the silence of the Motherland and rattled the Spanish government.  She can hear his deep sighs and noticed his closed fist, clenching his arm.

 “After everything, Oriang, everything… ” he lamented.

Everything, she thought. What does that encompass really?  Fleeing for your life, surviving a fire, losing a child and living in the mountains for this fight for independence, does that cover it? Isn’t that enough sacrifice for this cause? What more can they possibly want from him?

            “I almost killed that Tirona..calling me unlettered, unqualified even for a post they spat at me”, he continued in anguish.

Oriang didn’t say a word. His defeat in San Juan had grazed his pride but now it was hacked in pieces. Recalling his sacrifices, she remembered their son and felt the familiar pain. He was named Andres too, like his father. He was barely three and died of smallpox. They couldn’t reach to get medicines on time. He was giddy and playful boy. Andres used to carve him play daggers and wooden boxes from discarded lumber.  But they didn’t have time to mourn him because they had to flee. It was day in August when they buried him.  Andres face had been gaunt, emotionless while looking at the men placing their child to the ground. She held tightly at his arm as their son was being lowered to the pit and let out a faint scream as a primal pain gutted her. She tried hard to steady herself as her legs wobbled and threatened to give way. But Oriang didn’t fall.

“Maybe wanting a free county is not enough,” Andres continued in the cool night.“Because why would they want to believe me, I’m not an ilustrado like Rizal. Maybe they’ve treated him with more respect” he mocked.

Then he stood up and paced the bamboo floors, creaking at each step. Then in a sudden fit, he kicked a wooden chair that came crashing into the nipa wall. “Mga punyeta!” he yelled. “Andres!” Oriang wailed, dropping her threads. She made her way to the fallen chair.

“I’m sorry he said, following her. She looks at him, his eyes filmed with defeat. Their betrayal flicked his armor, pricking the braggadocio he insolently waved. But Oriang refused to acknowledge his defeat. There was too much at stake. The Supremo has to have the tenacity to lead the people.  She touched his shoulder. “We will go past this, like we always do” she said. Her face determined in the darkened room, her frail frame undeterred. He nodded and went to his men.

It had been a few days when the frantic knocks came on the door. Her heart lurched as she remembered the same sounds that awakened her at night in Caloocan when the Guardia Civil came. But this time it was different. Emilio’s men were here. With thundering hoove steps, they fired shots and Oriang saw some of her Katipunero brothers fell, others beaten.  She held her Remington rifle tight but Andres told her to flee before they arrived. She tried hiding in a thicket but was captured with Andres and his brother, Procopio and brought to Naic for trial.

His meeting with other Katipuneros a few days ago had been the subject for this sedition trial.  The trial lasted for days and they were placed in a dingy cellar with only one window.  It was stuffy and overheated. Andres was weak from his wounds, a gunshot in the arm and stab wounds on his neck. He was also feverish. Oriang ripped portions of her tapis to bind his wounds and dipped some of it in water and dabbed it on his body to lower his fever. With an old, musky blanket she covered him. Her solitude often awakened by her worries of his fate, triggering sobs that are stifled when he stirs.

It had been the ninth of May and it was the night of her birthday. Andres heard her cries. He touched her hand. “What is it?” he asked weakly. “Nothing” she replied. “Please..”  he pressed. She was silent then replied.  “It’s just my birthday…I’m sorry I’m being a baby..” He smiled. “Happy birthday, mahal“ he said. She leaned to meet his lips. “I’m sorry we couldn’t celebrate tonight…” he sighed. “You deserve a grand celebration, Oriang with lots of food, lots of friends, lots of laughter, he said “Maybe your parents were right..I can’t give you a good life” he said. She jerked and looked at him. “Don’t say that“ she admonished. Andres smiled and wearily closed his eyes.

When he fell asleep, Oriang remembered how she has changed, from a daughter of a gobernadorcillo to a revolutionary. And how escaping from the Guardia Civil have became apart of her life when she married Andres.  Like riding a carromata in darkened alleys  while clutching critical Katipunan documents or paddling a riverboat in Pasig River to get away from the Spaniards. Perilous as it was, she loved the river part of her escape, the lapping water, the moon that suffused the river with its light, the silence. Far from the travails, the torture, the anguish. She found a stillness there, a comfort she often brings back as she goes through the chaos, the cries again.

The next day the verdict came out, its content was unknown. When the guards arrived at their door, Oriang held on to Andres as long as she can, grabbing his shirt, holding on to his leg until they forcibly ripped them apart. They led him to a hammock because he was too weakened to walk.  Her cries teamed with the tempest that arrived that day. The wind whined as it broke the tree branches and the rain fell hard, angry and steady. She begged the guards not to take his husband and let her go to Heneral Miong and beg for his life or at least let him recover from his wounds before taking him away. They agreed. Holding up her saya tightly, she crossed a furious river while holding on to the sides of white-washed boulders embedded in the water. But when she arrived in the camp, the Heneral wasn’t there.

When she went returned, she saw some guards carrying the blanket they used and the hammock lay in a pile. “Where is he? Where are they?” she screamed frantically. They didn’t answer and walked away. “Please, please, sirs, where are they?” she asked each soldier, grabbing the sides of their uniform, begging and kneeling along their path. Finally, someone said. “We left them in the mountains.”

Oriang ran. In her wooden clogs, she hauled herself up the rocks that littered the slope, grabbing the branches, vines that covered a soggy trail. The rain drummed her face as she clambered on the mud-covered rocks and protruding tree roots. She searched the mountain, going through the thick cogon grasses, scraping herself and calling out his name. She didn’t find him. Days passed and other Katipuneros went up and stayed with her, bringing her food and clothes. But she didn’t eat, accepting only buko shards to abate her hunger. She was filthy and her saya was soiled from dirt, her fingernails ragged and scratches adorned her hands and shoulders.

No, they could not have done it, she thought. We are brothers. Filipinos. No. She refused to believe that they can commit an atrocious act to a brother. After all he did, this was it? Fate can’t be that cruel. No. She wanted to believe he was alive even if the gritty mountains mocked her with its immovable stance, bearing witness to her harried state. No, this can’t be the end. We will always go past anything.

Then he arrived. Julio. One of their trusted friends.  They led him to Oriang. He was aghast at her despondent state but remained collected. She had a slight stench that whiffed in the air. “Oriang, you have to go down..,please don’t do this to yourself  ” he said urgently. She looked at him in his white rolled-up polo and blue trousers with a pistol hanging on his side. Nakpil, she sometimes calls him, is a scrubbed face she haven’t seen in weeks.“ I haven’t found him yet, Julio” she said, barely a whisper. Her lips were dry and her hair was down and unruly, her payneta dangling on the side. They were at a peak of a valley, the sun simmering on their heads. “We already scoured the mountains” he said then shook his head. Her eyes remained fixed on the shrubs below. Yes, fate can be unkind. It can. With that, she drew a deep breath and let the searing numbness she fought for days finally subdue her.  Then she looked at Julio’s kind face and noticed the darkness edging on his side, slowly filling the afternoon light then her legs gave way.