I

It was when Desiree was half stabbing, half cutting the slice of bread in front of her. She just finished meeting another guy her mother wanted her to meet and it felt like torture, that was from her point of view of course.

‘So,’ Mrs. Co started and inched closer to her daughter who was sitting across from her. ‘How was your date yesterday? Did you and Eddy have lots of things in common?’

She sighed, put down her fork, and told her, ‘Mom, I had enough of this.’

The kitchen walls echoed her words and left her mother speechless while she slowly rose up and made her way out of the house.

Desiree ran away from home. Kind of.

She had planned this, she was almost too excited to go to the date earlier that Mrs. Co thought she was finally seeing the whole picture she kept on showing her but, boy, little this mother knew that her daughter made a deal with herself that after the sixteenth, that’s correct, the sixteenth blind date she set her up to, Desiree would take a short break to let her realize that she shouldn’t butt in too much with her love life.

She hailed a ride to the bus terminal going to Baguio but added another stop to get her things from the company locker assigned to her. The sky was clear that specific Tuesday morning made her satisfied and guilty at the same time.

Sure, her mother just wanted her to find someone and naturally date them but she wanted her to date the sons of her friends. They didn’t have a company to save, an arranged marriage to deal with, but Mrs. Co could win a Ms. Sunshine award. As a result, Desiree had to meet at least a guy or two every three months.

‘But baby,’ she recalled her saying, ‘you are already 23. Three years from now, you will be 26, and isn’t that a little late to start getting to know someone?’

She massaged her frowning eyebrows to relax as ‘baby’ and ‘too old’ used in a statement bothered her. She dismissed the thoughts and pulled out her phone to double-check the things that she would need in this sweet little escapade.

Food, check. Money, check. Books, check. Clothes, check. Her phone would be left inside the company’s locker so her mother wouldn’t contact and ask her to go home. She didn’t hate her mother, she was just tired.

Her filed leave was for two weeks, this was the first time she used the paid vacation leaves her company offers so it had been considered approved even before submitting it to her supervisors. She also scheduled an email to be sent to her best friend, Avah, on Friday.

‘Hey, potato. I know by now that my parents had contacted you lots of times but tell them not to worry as I’m just in Baguio and I would be back next week. Love, Ree,’ she read.

Right after she gathered all her things she boarded the bus scheduled at three that afternoon. She had checked the SNS accounts of her parents’ friend, trying to find something about the summerhouse she was about to go to. She saw a recent picture, posted by a mom of the guy she once met, that showed the exact cottage she remembers.

She drowsed off while thinking about that house as they used to go there when she was younger and wondered why they stopped visiting it.

Soon, she heard the bus conductor yelling ‘Baguio!’ that woke her up in an instant. She needed another ride, even though it was only ten minutes away by car, the road is stiff and steep, plus the zigzags, and it was already nine in the evening.

She stepped out of the cab then felt the chilly breeze that September night. Crisp trees were swooshing as if they were singing together. ‘What a peaceful place I need right now,’ she thought.

Practically hopping along the stone-paved road, Desiree was excitedly dragged her luggage behind her. It was the same three-bedroom oak house that she kept on thinking about. She searched for the adorable garden gnome by the lamp post and dug a box for the house keys. Thanking her luck, she widely opened the door and saw that nothing changed. She went to the leftmost room on the second floor, the very same one she used to use back then.

‘At last!’ she squealed as she dropped like a log on the bed and drifted back to sleep... but not for long.

She heard a loud bang and in seconds, the bedroom door swung open, then a tall guy was making his way to her. His fierce eyes, strong and rough features were lighted by the dim light inside the area. The annoyed expression he was wearing and the clenched fists added panic to Desiree.

‘Who are you!?’ he asked, shouted.

She grabbed her bag and got an umbrella out as a defense, if that would count as one, then said, ‘Who are you, and what are you doing at our house?’

‘Your house? This is mine, you trespasser,’ he laughed in disbelief, who was this crazy girl claiming his property and even welcomed herself in. He dodged her pointed umbrella and dragged her out of the house, along with her bags, and shut the door.

Confused, she was so confused, about what was happening right before she woke up. Great, was this the vacation she wanted, being kicked out in her, their, own house? The thought of calling her mom flashed to her to confirm all of these then remembered she didn’t bring her phone.

She was sorting her thoughts when a sudden gust of wind blew and chills ran down her spine. ‘Assumingly, he’s now the owner. What am I supposed to do now?’ she asked herself.

She paused for a moment then started rummaging through her bag, searching for her pouch, and, oh, dear, she left it inside on the bedside table. She swallowed her remaining pride and knocked, ‘Hello! I need a favor!’

‘What do you want?’ he shouted back, ‘did she send you here? Tell her I don’t want to.’

Unsure if she was still following their conversation, she gave him more details to pull him to her page. ‘I don’t know about her and that sending thing but I need my pouch back. It’s in the last room on the left.’

She heard no sounds so she continued, ‘Please. I can’t leave without it. My money’s in there.’

Still no sounds from the other side of the wooden wall and Desiree was starting to get annoyed as the wind blew another chilly one as she hugged and rubbed herself warm.

‘Going to a summerhouse when it is not summer is not cool,’ she thought. ‘Why did you choose September when it was the peak of the monsoon season? It was because I don’t want to rush with the crowd but the breezes are seriously chilly and cold.’

The crisp trees’ swooshing sounds were not as lovely as they were earlier as it now seemed like they were laughing at her miseries. Her teeth chattered, she made her way to the outdoor log bench to hide from the freezing wind, however, in a blink, heavy rain poured and she began to sob.

‘Why is this happening?!’ she screamed at the sky.

The door burst open and that guy was standing there motioning her to come inside while showing her jade-colored pouch. She immediately accepted the offer as she didn’t want to be in the rain with her best plaid skirt she just bought.

Soaked and dripping wet, she shut the door behind and he gave her a towel while saying, ‘You look like that girl from the picture hanging on that room so I let you in. My conscience can’t take letting someone be in the rain but that doesn’t mean that I trust you.’

She wanted to say ‘as if I trust you’ but she nodded and muttered thanks.

‘Dry yourself. Since you told me that this was your house, I believe you know your way and can turn on the heater,’ he continued, ‘you can leave tomorrow since there going down this road while raining would be plain dumb.’

‘Thanks again. For the record, I’m not someone your mother sent. I don’t even know her, nor you.’ Desiree stated with a smile to assure him.

‘Whether you do or not, just be sure to wake up early and get yourself out of my house,’ was his answer that wiped the smile she got on her face.

She spread out her stuff open while making the bath, to check if there were any wet things and luckily there weren’t. Then there was a knock, ‘Hey. Open up. I forgot to ask your name.’

She creaked the door slightly open and shyly asked, ‘It’s Desiree. Why?’

‘Don’t think ahead of yourself. I’m not interested in girls like you. It’s for security purposes, in case you’ll do something to me, I have some information.’

Her nerve started twitching with those remarks, ‘Excuse me!? What did you say, mister?’

He rolled his eyes then smirked. ‘My name’s Lucio if you are being shy to ask.’

‘I don’t want to know,’ she exclaimed.

‘Oh, really?’ he shrugged, not falling for her words, and walked away. He clicked his phone open as he reached his room downstairs and searched ‘Desiree’  but couldn’t narrow down his results. He sure knew that she wasn’t from Baguio, her packed bags as proof.

‘Who would not know that a property of theirs had been sold?’ he asked himself while taking a nice hot bath. ‘Only an idiot.’

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