Nevergirl's

Once upon a time, you taught me to ride bikes. You taught me to play chess, read, draw, swim, and speak my mind. You taught me to plot a ship’s course, recognize stars, play Sicilian defense, reason, use nanchucks, get skinned knees without crying. You taught me to be my own person first, a daughter second. There’s one thing you forgot to teach me, however: how to tell you I love you in a language I know, in a language that you would understand. 

Your second wife, she used to grumble about how soft you were, how much too kind, to the students who stayed in boarding houses nearby. She couldn’t understand why you lent them money each time their allowance came late, why you paid for items they end up hocking off to pay for tuition even though you had no use for them, why you’re always bringing stray ones over for lunch or dinner. But I do, and each time I remember why, I grin, look for you in the stars, and cry. A told me what you told her five years ago: you help students like her because somewhere in Cebu, you have a student, too. You don’t always know how she is, couldn’t always see how she’s doing, but you hope that by showing students kindness, someone somewhere would show your daughter the same kindness if and when she needs it.

We never talk – at least not that way. We’re as tough as the neighborhood we live in and tough people don’t just go up to each other to get mushy. They say “I love you” in different ways: buying Jet Lee movies because their dads enjoy them, for example, or getting him shirts he pretends to love but never wears because he really doesn’t. They also buy truckloads of Ma-Ling for him. But mostly, they blog and get weepy because they don’t know how to say what they want to say.

And so here I am again, trying to say I love you in a language I know, in a language you would understand. Above me, the sky remains immense and unbroken. The stars remain beautiful, unyielding, and certain. But I cling to the stars and the sky because no matter how tenuous, it’s the one connection I share with you while you sleep, unaware of daughters who weep because they don’t know how to show their fathers the link between constancy and stars, physics and love.