The Prodigal Son's Sister
Yes, the prodigal son had a sister.
The prodigal son’s younger sister was rather low-key and forgettable, someone perhaps you would see in class, then later at the mall, but overall, just another pretty face.
When her good-for-nothing bastard brother suddenly left and gave Mommy a mild heart attack, she didn’t give a shit, in fact she felt great. Just as long as the allowance kept on coming (her parents still saw her as a good daughter) and the Eclipse got gas, she was good.
She was putting correction tape over a wrong line in her composition in English 10 when the text from her Mom arrived, “Your brother’s back. Meet us at Saisaki’s after your class, Daddy’s throwing a party. Hope you could make it by 6:30.”
She asked if she could be excused, left the classroom and went to the CR. When she reached the CR, she screamed and howled and threw her correction tape at the mirror, slightly cracking the glass. It was totally unfair. He blew half of his trust fund on two months of sex and pot. How could that bastard get a fucking party when she, the studious, obedient daughter did not even get as much as a single merienda in her honor? Hell, every semester she would get an honor award at school long after he stopped getting honor awards. It was so fucking unfair.
She immediately texted their older brother the news. His response was equally, if not more unfeeling. A lawyer, he curtly replied that as far as he was concerned, he didn’t have a brother, and at the news of the so-called party, announced that he was probably closer to not having a pair of parents as well.
The Eclipse was number-coded that day, so she had to commute. She took the jeep out of her state-university school out to Katipunan. She was so pissed, just raging mad. The jeep ride did not help. She eased herself between the sweaty jock and the two noisy middle-aged women whose topic of conversation revolved around When she got off the jeep under the flyover, she decided to buy a pack of cigarettes at Mini-Stop. A soft-pack of Marlboro Reds.
She stared intently at the Marlboro logo. “Veni, Vidi, Vici.” Haha. Her brother most definitely came, he saw many things, but sure did not conquer anything. He came home with his tail between his legs, a loser and a coward.
She approached the little girl who was selling candies on the corner and asked if she could light her cigarette. The little girl quietly obliged. She lit her cigarette, inhaled sharply, and then blew a puff of smoke in the air. It was almost dusk, the skyline changing in hue as the headlights from the passing cars began to light up Katipunan.
Leaving them was bad enough; even bothering to return was worse.
Her first stick done, she lit up another one.
For crying out loud, he almost killed Mommy. Daddy was worried sick as well. Didn’t he even have the heart to contact the two of them during those two months?
Let’s not forget his education-that is, if he actually ever considered his pathetic three-year stay in one of the country’s most expensive and capitalist universities a serious education. He threw that all away.
And all this time she never, not once, gave herself the right to be affected or concerned with all her brother’s bullshit.
She didn’t realize she was already halfway through her cigarettes. Moreover, she was crying, her tears running down her warm cheeks as she sobbed in the thick, humid air.
She took the lighter from its worn out string on the lighter girl’s cigarette box and the flame jumped from the lighter before her eyes. She turned to the lighter girl to thank her, but the urchin’s face suddenly changed. She blinked again. Yup, definitely changed. Through the lighter girl’s eyes, she saw a girl who was suffering in silence. She saw a girl who chose to swallow all the shit the world threw at her, and do nothing. She saw a girl battered emotionally, if not physically. She saw herself.
She wanted to get rid of that girl. That girl was no more. But she paused. She hesitated when she saw the fear in the girl's eyes.
What the hell, she thought.
She slowly lifted the lighter flame to eye level, then swung the lighter at the girl’s face.