Bodyguard
Posted at 10:07 PM

I did it! I killed Lucy! Finally, after 21 years, I was rid of him. He was always the jinx in the family. The ugly one. The one who was intellectually challenged. The one with all the bad vices. The weakest among his siblings. He tried to build a façade which implored strength, knowledge and courage – everything that he was not. But I knew him. I knew as if we were twins sustained and plucked from the same umbilical cord. I knew as if we were a single stimulus, transmitted to the human brain. And yes, as much as I wanted to deny it, I knew him because he was my brother. We used to be so close. Even though only a year separated us from being born together, there wasn’t a hint of envy in those eyes -- those eyes that would someday scheme against me. Mom would dress us in identical clothes and one could not spot who was the older. We played with the same Tonka trucks and G.I. Joe dolls. We would get into trouble together by entering the principal’s office without permission during our kindergarten years. I would punch his bully when he was aggravated. I was his sister-bodyguard and I enjoyed every second of it. At first, one would simply dismiss his childhood gestures as something that was done through pure innocence. He would stick his gum in my hair. He would bite my pale cheeks until they were as red as beets. But something told me that there was more than just the plain heck of it. I was to discover this only when we were already in College. I saw the first signs when we were in Elementary. I studied in a coed school, while he studied in a school exclusive for boys. I didn’t ask my parents why they suddenly transferred Lucy to a public school, a few blocks from our house back then. They just said that Lucy’s asthma was failing his frail body and that his small frame couldn’t handle the long journey to school anymore. It was soon to be discovered in a private conversation between my mom and I, that they were advised to keep Lucy within close watch. “Slow learner,” they called him. I never voiced this out to any of my other siblings. We grew apart when I took pre-Med. in UP Manila. Somehow, I didn’t have time to toil with his nonsensical stories and mislead aspirations. I was too busy studying. Besides, he had his friends, and I had mine. Somehow, there was a silent agreement between us; as if were introduced to a new freedom – I, from the burden of looking after him; and he, from the tiring fact of being compared to his younger sister. He had several accidents during this growing chaos. Once he ran over a small girl while we were going home from province. The girl was hit by our car while he was driving. Everyone was in empty shock and froze like stone golems at the sight of the child’s tragedy. I rushed to pick the girl to bring her to the hospital (although, I was a bit shaken, myself), while he stared in stark terror at what he’s done. The girl survived, but my brother, as much as I loathe calling him that now, had to face the emotional torture of witnessing my alertness in situations as such. “Ang alisto talaga ni yet, Ma, noh?”; like a mantra, he kept repeating. When I was in my juniors, he was supposed to have graduated a year prior to the advent of my classes. But as usual, he gave the same redundant reasons he used every year. The professor held an ire for him, his thesis partner was a mortal idiot, the subject was a burden from hell, etc. All this, when all the while it was his attitude and his college minions. He began hurting us physically, me in particular. Each negation I uttered in answer to his proposed arguments seemed to trigger an invisible button that made him go berserk. He would hound my mom for money; yell at her; call my dad a faggot; and utter other obscenities, unmindful of the hand that fed him. I would talk to my parents – to each of them, to both. But their minds were as closed as the shroud that veiled the question of life after death. My mom would continue on being passive, tears rolling down her cheek. And my dad, he would stick to his self-denial and utter things that would compromise for acceptance. My two other siblings would only shriek in fright; and sometimes, in agony as things were one by one flung at them. Everything was so ridiculous. “ I never considered you my sister, ” I recall hearing him. “ I don’t need you, “ he’d continue ranting. So angry he seemed. So lonely. He knew that he was alone. I was no longer there to protect him. No longer was I his bodyguard. Our parents kept him because it was their obligation. But they could no longer control him; contain his hate, his weakness. He could blame him all he wanted. They were already deaf to this. K & L were his siblings only in title. They shared the same loathing he bore fore his own family. Only intheir case, it was he they loathed. I still wonder if he knew this. Or was his mind too clouded by Mary Jane. My thinking leads me to the thought that it’s probably because I was also the one who discovered this vice of his, that he hated me the most. Poor thing. It was his only refuge and I had to give it away. Hmmm. Time is ticking. I have to do the deed before anyone wakes up. It was 10 o’clock or was it 12? He was throwing plates the way he used to. Lucifer; his secret name known only to me, my sister and younger brother; was approaching my mother; his eyes scarlet with the stuff he took in, his breath, of smoke and booze. I stabbed him right through the heart. I killed Lucy! He was dead. I had no choice! It was him or mother! It was him or us! Goodbye, Lucy. It was to be done to protect you from what life couldn’t give. Sleep. I woke up at 5 am to prepare for school. I heard him yelling downstairs. Lucy and his constant whining, his agonizing violence, his eternal loathing. I was planting vicious, mental kicks on his face. Tomorrow night, I shall kill him again! Until then, my dear pillow. * August 17, 2001 * Did you ever imagine planting vicious kicks on your mortal bullies? It’s the best. I wrote this little entry back when Lucy (not his real name of course)and I, were lapping the pool of enmity. Today, my troubles concerning him are so passé, thanks to a gentle angel named Jose. I’ll be posting an entry about the latter soon. And I hope you’ll enjoy it as much as my other entries. * Some part of the entry has been modified and exaggerated to suit the literature. It cannot be concluded that I am a basket case who dwells on the thought of death, suicide or murder. It can be presumed however, that I take pleasure from the beauty of words; aesthetics of tone and mood; and delight in using subjects such as the absurd