“So, how many family members do you have? Any siblings?” Orange, a work colleague of mine, asked. I had just met him.
“I have a younger brother” was what I used to say when people asked me how many siblings I have.
“I have a younger brother… and a sister, but we’re not blood related.” I replied to Orange. His eyebrows furrowed, eyes shifted left and right then returned my gaze. “It’s a long and complicated story, let me tell you about it.”
***
We were all sat in the living room.
It was the year 2016. The humid, scorching heat reminded me that it was still summer break, a month away from school starting. I laid down on the couch, placed the bowl of chips on the table, and waited for my friends to choose a movie. Since they had taken quite a while, I grabbed my phone to look through my socials.
As I travelled from one app to another, the notification bar popped up.
Kristina: ‘Jae, I need help.’
I clicked the message right away, and answered: ‘Sure, what happened?’
'I’m with the others right now, you’re on your way, right?’ She texted back, telling me that she’d explain the whole situation briefly, and asked me to put her on speaker while she’s talking about it for everyone to hear. I suddenly sat up, my right leg endlessly tapping against my living room floors.
I wondered what it was about.
I explained about the phone call I just had with Kristina to my friends. The movie had just began, and we all took our places on the couch. I kept glancing from my phone to the television, then from the television back to my phone, as if I was playing a game of catch with my ringtone.
Riiing riiing! I picked up without a second to spare.
Sniffling. That was all we heard. We all looked up from the phone placed on the center table and exchanged concerned looks. My friend Prince bit at his fingernails, Renz looked for the television remote. “She must have been crying,” I mouthed to them soundlessly. The movie was now put on pause, filling the air with a tense silence as Kristina occasionally sniffled at the other end of the line. We needed to let her know we were at this end, so I spoke up. “We’re here for you, don’t worry. Tell us what happened, take your time.” We remained quiet, letting our silence comfort her.
“This morning, I woke up with a text message from my mom. She said that she wasn’t going to be here for a while. She left me with her bank card and some cash… she went to the Philippines, but I don’t know why yet. The landlord… she asked me to leave first then come back when my mom has paid our rent… she wasn’t mean, don’t worry. But I don’t know what to do.” I gave Hanna a look because she was the one who usually would knew what to say. To my surprise, she only met my eyes then looked back at my phone screen. I guessed no one could find what words to say.
“Come over first, we’ll sort it out.” I blurted out.
Kristina had always been one of the friends I could count on. No matter how many memories we’ve had together, I would never forget how we met for the first time. She had always known how to calm my nerves. “I’m so nervous right now, I can’t breathe,” I said aloud in a show choir audition. Kristina stood next to me, smiling nervously, and replied in a low, almost inaudible voice, “Me too, we’ll be fine! Just breathe.” I looked at her, noticing her big, dark, brown eyes, and porcelain skin. She has ears like Dumbo, I remember thinking. I returned a smile, and we breathed in unison, forgetting why I was unable to breathe in the first place.
Ding dong.
I opened the door to see Kristina with a small suitcase in her hand. Her eyes staring back at me were puffy and red. She dropped the luggage at her side, and we all ran to hug her. I had never seen her like this. She had always been the person who picked me up when I was feeling down, and in that moment, it looked like she wouldn't be able to do that anymore.
We all agreed to continue watching the movie to calm her down. “Thank you, guys, for being here for me,” She cried out, out of nowhere. We all huddled up around her, giving her one big group hug. “I don’t know what I’m going to do.”
I need to find a way to help her. There’s always a way.
I grabbed my phone from the table. “Mii, can I ask you a favor?”
I gave my mom a short version of the story, and next thing I knew, she bombarded me with a bunch of questions.
“What exactly happened?”
“Hala, where’s her mom?”
“Why did she leave? I don’t understand!”
Then finally, “Is Kristina, okay? Hm, would two weeks sound good for now? Until she hears from her mom?”
My mom said through the phone speaker, I looked at Kristina for confirmation, and she nodded.
As soon as I put the phone down, she hugged me so tightly, I almost couldn’t breathe. “Thank you so much, Jae!” I hugged her back. Though she had a huge smile plastered on her face, I knew it was just a mask, a cover-up. “Just think of it like the sleepovers we always have, but a very long one!”
Our first night together was a lot of fun. Kristina experienced what it was like having dinner in the Gonzales household, filled with entertaining conversations of work, school, and life in general. She also got to see what it was like sharing a bed with someone else, “Woah, so this what it feels like to have a sibling!” she told me jokingly, and I laughed along with her. I remembered that line specifically because that was when it hit me, that I will be another big sister to someone else other than my little brother. It was midnight, so I thought that we should call it a day, especially because she had such a long one.
“Goodnight, Ate Jae” she murmured slowly, falling asleep. Her words echoed in my head; its rhythm was as if I was counting sheep to sleep. That was first time she called me Ate. As I fell asleep next to her, I thought:
Although I have a brother, I’ve always wanted a sister. Who would’ve thought that I’d have another person, a friend to be precise, to call me Ate? Kristina became the sister I never thought I’d have.
***
“That’s crazy!” Orange exclaimed, “Wait! Is she still living with you?”
“Well, those two weeks became five years, and ever since then I’ve been an Ateh to two.”