That night, I remembered what loneliness and sadness felt once again.

What do you feel when you're all alone at home and all you have for company are pets and the television? Those guys were my companions that night. But all they cared about was food and having a roof under their heads.

Dad is still in Bataan, working. Mom is arranging travel papers somewhere, and my brother has already left for his call center job. I wanted to tell my brother, "Won't you stay for a while? The rice will be cooked soon and I'll just heat the leftovers", but I couldn't. Like there was a gap between us that stretched miles away, I feared I wouldn't reach him. So he left without saying a word, without eating anything.

Loneliness really dawned upon me that night. I realized not even manga could make me company, because in the end, after you finished reading it, there would still be no one. Craving for dessert, I went out to buy myself an ice cream. What a kid. Buying an ice cream to munch the loneliness away. But there was no ice cream. The store had run out of them. So I went back home like a kid who had no candy.

As if a ritual, I would always pass under a curtain of palm leaves. It made me feel ok, somehow. Loneliness made me both sad and happy at the same time anyway. Weird.