The serpents whose voice did enthrall
Like the siren’s tempting call,
In Hantic’s wide cavernous hall
Forever they were buried all.
ORYOL
The words left Federico’s lips unwillingly. He thought back to how this all started, the quiet nights bent in front of in the glaring light, his fingers dancing on the keyboard. He didn’t know why she wanted to meet here of all places, but it was the only way she would see him.
The light reflected on the broken glass beside him, the rusted barbed wire and the empty windows were silent witnesses to his waiting.
Frederico was the type of person that people didn’t remember. He spent the last few years avoiding the raucous frenzy that characterized the lives of his other twenty-something peers. A good night for him was watching a re-run of his favorite teleserye.
Most people would scoff at the overacted drama and the predictable plotlines, but he held onto those like he would an old friend. Part of him thought it was his way of experiencing things that would never happen to him in the real world.
“A secondhand life,” he thought.
More learned and wiser than Handyong
Whose fascinating eye, lovelier to see
As if it were a sweet gesture
Beckoning him seductively.
His voice broke the stillness. Every word felt like destiny, as if something compelled him to orate in front of an invisible audience.
Federico knew where the words were coming from, of course. He had learned each one for her. He didn’t know why she asked to have him memorize the English translation, there was so much lost in the changing of languages, but he wanted to do it, his heart would never forgive him if he didn’t.
“It’s my favorite piece of literature.” That was her first message. She answered his question about her username and they started talking about epic stories and humble poets. Like him she was fascinated by larger than life tales of love and loss. She said it was an escape from the monotony of her everyday life.
He didn’t think anyone that interesting could have a boring life. She dampened his attempts to woo her by always changing the subject, but they both knew it pointless.
It was only a few strings of text sent through a chatbox that changed Federico’s whole world. Suddenly, he wasn’t alone and he could live life the way it was meant to be lived. The secondhand life gave way to morning greetings and late-night messages.
He finally felt whole.
Handyong bound it a thousand ways
It only scoffed and mocked around
With its crowned sagacity
It always untied the knots.
The words washed over him like a soothing river. Federico imagined the story had come to life before him, the brave warrior facing the seductive snake, Oryol managing to escape every trick Handyong could think of.
He wondered if that could have been him in a different life. Would he have been brave enough to fight the monsters plaguing Bicol? Or would he have ran away like the chicken he believed himself to be?
Federico checked the time on his phone. Five minutes to midnight. Five minutes until he would meet the girl destiny thought opportune to have them cross paths.
His mind raced. What if she didn’t show up? She said to meet in an abandoned building, what were you thinking? There’s no way a girl like that would ever want to meet with a guy like you. She probably isn’t even real, you’ve been catfished. You fell for her game, no one could ever love you for you.
The voices were echoing in his mind through the caverns of his confidence, and past the valleys of his self-esteem.
He breathed in deep.
How many times without a rest,
He searched her in to the woods,
He thought that what had lured him on
Believing the voice of a siren there!
Then he heard music.
“Those were beautiful words.”
He wished she would never stop.
“At that point in the story she was watching him. Trying to make sure he was worthy. She was intrigued by a man foolish enough to fight her kin.”
But inconsistent in its act
Oryol itself did help Handyong
To all the monsters must conquer
That have infested the Bicol land.
“That part of the story made me wonder. Why do you think she fought with him? She was certainly going against her father’s wishes helping the hero. Was she so foolish to think that she could become one?”
She looked at him, the moonlight almost bending in her deep set eyes. He struggled to find more words, something, anything that wasn’t what he memorized. He failed.
Together they fought victoriously
Against the giant crocodiles they won
After the battles and onslaught
No scratchy wounds to him was wrought.
She embraced him; he could feel her warm breath on his ear.
“Do you think she loved him?”
Federico could feel the air escape his lungs as they were crushed by something he could not see. As the last vestiges of consciousness left him his mind thought of only one thing.
She was beautiful.
————————–
Written by Karl Gaverza
Copyright © Karl Gaverza
Inspired by the Ibalong epic – full text can be seen at https://
Oryol Illustration by Sofia Marie Cuarto
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