He eased away from the rowdy group and slumped down on the bay walls. Oblivious to the noisy crowd behind him, he drew his knees up to his chin, his soulful eyes intent on the sinking sun.

A consoling arm fell over his shoulders, the hug he would have cherished. They sat together, each seeking comfort in the other’s presence, and finding it.

**afterword: this is a little literary experiment i've been trying the past few days. saw it on some other blog, and thought i'd try to adopt the idea myself. it's free to interpretation and open to suggestion. please tell me what you think. it may seem vague, but that's part of the style, i think.**

Wonder

The rain fell in torrents, but the bedroom window met it full force. Innocent eyes sparkled at the sight; lanky fingers spelled out words and traced landscapes on the frosted glass. Somewhere below,  cheering ensued as lights clicked back on.

She knocked on the doorsill. "Come back downstairs, the electricity's back on."

"Thanks Mom," he turned around, grinning, "but I'm fine right here."

**afterword: since my first one got good props, here's another one. it's not one with romantic undertones though, i'm gonna try and see if it still holds the same effect, or if i should stick to lovey-dovey shorts. they're supposed to stir emotions, or basically make you feel warm inside. haha. comments are being begged for, and please refer to my previous entry if you haven't yet.

oh yeah, try to find what's similar with the two entries. a sort of "theme" i've been sticking to for all the ones i've made.**

Another Kind of Love

I first saw her, idly waiting by a security checkpoint. I slow down as we lock eyes, then smile as she gets rushed through the xray. She glances back one last time before boarding.

I mourn a bit before confidently continuing on. My eyes start scouring the terminal again, while I scream "Next?" in my mind.

Quick, simple, noncommittal. I just love airports.

**haha, another little quickie i figured out during a stopover. purely fictional, crafted by my selfish, overbearing ego during an hour-long lag. this just means that i'm back home where i belong, home after a long first-slash-fourth day of classes. more on that later.**

wonder why i'm feeling so excited right around now...

oh wait, let me take a stab at that. maybe because blast prepaid internet is so damn amazing! not only does it work at optimal speeds and give reliable connections for a prepaid internet service provider (and believe me, i can compare, as with the dozens of other services i've tried over the years), but it also gives a personalized reloadable account, where i just have to reload it with a new card once it runs out, and i get my own username and password and everything!

and to add to that, they also offered their own xlr8 technology with the whole package (am i so slow that it took 3 minutes of idle mind-wandering to figure out that xlr8 is actually a clever spinoff of "accelerate"?) it claims to speed up internet browsing by up to 6 times, and as i'm watching it on the system tray, the icon boasts "xlr8: effective speed broadband". now, i really can't speak for that, but i must say, it does seem a lot faster. or am i just overexcited once again...

don't think that this is just a plug for blast internet. it just felt so overwhelming (even if just for such a little thing, i know i'm so pathetic). just wish i had discovered it a bit sooner. now, to finish a few assignments, then to revamp my mp3 player songlist with around 30 new downloads by tomorrow.

hehe, i feel like a child again (not that i'm not a child anymore, but you get the point).

it's been a little over a week since i returned to manila, bringing along quite a nice souvenir: my whole family. yep, the entire gang has flown in from somewhere in the usa back home to manila. it's just a brief vacation, around 2 months, but it's a time i've learned to cherish for what it's worth. and so far, it's been ho-hum. school and being away at manila has taken a toll on family time, but it's not a big deal, really. what's really been bugging me are the other matters, namely the financial ones.

like i said, less than 2 weeks in, and i think we've spent more on luxury expenses that what me and my dad have spent the last 4 years alone. dinner plans, shopping sprees, gadgetry galore, i'm sure there's been more spent when i wasn't around. of course, it's a bit justified when you come from a place with a living cost dozens of times higher than here, but getting away with all that spending is just plain robbery. specially since i can't get a piece of that action for myself.

living in the us isn't exactly cheap, which means that not much stuff can be bought. now when you come here, everything seems to be dirt cheap compared to foreign prices, and along with that comes the irresistable urge to splurge. it doesn't help that my siblings have become a bit materialistic and extravagant, asking for nearly everything they set their eyes upon. while here i am, still overcome with a nagging sense of guilt when i so much as ask my dad for a sale-priced shirt or layaway pair of jeans. i can't so much as make a sound while watching my brother and sister going around the department store, throwing stuff into baskets as my dad hands out the cash.

case in point: we come home last saturday, after the first of many shopping sprees. my yaya says a package came in, and my dad says with a glimmer in his eyes, "kuya (pertaining to my older brother) open it." he opens it and lo and behold, a brand new nokia 66_ _ (never kept track after the 3310) stares us in the face. and of course, who gets it? the balikbayan son of course, while the all-filipino son continues his struggles with his 4+ year-old phone, with a scratch-happy casing and funky battery life. but then again, who am i to complain? all i can do is harbor seeds of jealousy and hatred in my mind and rant when the opportunity arises.

don't take it the wrong way, i still love my family, it's just that i'm a bit materialistic myself, and not being financially nurtured is taking a toll on my sanity. spending my own saved money isn't quite as gratifying as just milking my dad for it.

oh god, why couldn't i have been made selfish and guilt-resistant like the rest of them?

fun as they were, this week's highlight wasn't the cm fun run, the h2g2 film showing (although it was mind-deadening and hilarious), nor the hellishly toxic comparative anat 1st quiz (50 items, and take note, it was the first. long quizzes and dep exams will come to haunt us soon). nope, none of the above. what made my week was something of a more 'controversial' nature.

remember an entry i logged here sometime last april? louder than words, ring a bell? though don't try finding it now if you haven't read it yet. current circumstances have brought on censorship calls on my part. anyway, it was an inconspicuous entry, seemingly like all my previous ones, yet certain elements have stirred in my friends and classmates an inexplicable force, that of ravenous gossips searching for the juicy truth. so weird that it would only come up now.

for those who've read the entry, and possibly peeked at or made comments, you'd probably understand why. the smidgen of controversy it aroused in my comments page doesn't even compare to what it's been like in class. it's been a long week of inquiries and probing questions. whispers behind my back, mischievous smiles and howling laughter with my every move. hints and references coming in from every direction. circular meetings and secret societies dissecting my entry and noting every part of its anatomy (oh if only vertebrate anat was that simple). people shouting out fractions and checking off criteria as if on a questionnaire. i never could have anticipated such a cult following from a harmless little entry like that. it had crossed my mind that hardly anyone from the class follows my blog anymore. who would have thought that my scanty bit of expressive lit could escalate into a full-scale chismis onslaught.

now, as the center of all this hullabaloo, i can't exactly say it's been easy. if there's been a perk in any of this, it's that my blog has sparked interest in the masses and has been getting a little bit more traffic than usual. but other than that, it's been harsh. i've been living the life of a celebrity, watching my every move, dodging all the prying eyes on me (to imed people who read this: yes, you can kill me when we get back to class). attention (albeit of a different, less desirable kind) being lavished upon me incessantly. it's been a bit harder joining my friends, because you just know they're talking about you and you can't just push yourself into a conversation like that. whenever we're walking and they suddenly pull back and break into laughter, i can just look back and grin a little, then continue on my way. only recently have i heard some of their prospective guesses, and i can say, you don't wanna know. imaginative mouths will know no bounds.

but hey, can't say they didn't warn me. it was my decision to write and post all that. and they have asked me to tell them to stop, if i can't take it any more. but hey, i know that even if i do take a stand and tell them off, it will hardly garner an effect (which i don't blame on anyone, it's just how the group dynamics work). since then i've taken a stand of apathy and ignorance to the whole thing. silence and changing-the-topic statements have been coming in handy. i think it's also been a test on tolerance on my part, one which i am determined to pass.

it'll all die down, eventually.