Creeping It Real
[FICTION] Harana (Serenade)
At first, Teban was shy.
He was hungry, but instead of heading off to my mother’s pancitan, he approached our garden and watched me water the plants. He pretended to marvel at the ylang-ylang and sampaguitas in bloom. “Your hands are good with Earth.” He started to talk about flowers and seeds and gardening. While everything made sense, I knew his intention. In the end, I confessed the hands he’s complimenting are not mine, but my mother’s.
“I don’t really like flowers,” I said.
Teban blushed in embarrassment. He motioned to leave but my heart unexpectedly jolted. “I don’t like flowers… but I like songs.” The girls in our village differ a lot in their affinities or hobbies, but a kundiman singer is a common desire. We look forward to the night we hear a man’s sweet voice.
I can’t remember when Teban started singing those songs, but I knew I liked them. No, I loved them—and I loved the way they are sung.
No longer shy and dependent on small talk, he’s now emboldened by music for he knew I could be his. He started with the easiest songs and he worked his way through the hard ones. Teban is gifted with pipes — so romantic I got bothered with the other girls around. He even ran out of songs that he looked for poetry to sing a couple of verses.
My father hates Teban. I know it, he doesn’t understand. Parents can be obsessively protective of a precious daughter at risk of elopement. But Teban would do no such thing — he has his voice. I was grateful my old man lets Teban sing as his way of respecting this culture of courtship so dearly beloved by our people. However, I know he’s just waiting to drop the bad news to my suitor.
Teban told me there’s even a kundiman song for such things. He once heard a song from a huntsman who had been out of luck because of a parent’s rejection of his love. The huntsman was so depressed, he cooked all the wild meat he hunted for and languished away in the kitchen.
“Would you eat your way through brokenheartedness?” I asked Teban, seriously.
Teban was ready to cry and yet he persisted. “Yes. I would eat my way through it all but tell me where to eat? I’ll be at your pancitan so I’d still get to see you.”
I fixed Teban a plate of pancit and let him feast on it. I already lost count of the plates of pancit he ate and the haranas he did. As he enjoyed the food, I looked at him and everything around us disappeared. Husband enjoying my homemade food, lovely furniture aplenty, kids running here and there. I thought he’s the one.
One night, I put on a dress. Teban told me this time, he would sing me a very special song. I knew something will make his harana “special.”
From the bed, I heard his golden voice. It’s approaching midnight already. It was unusually late for him to sing this late. The neighbors had already gone to sleep.
Teban was singing about his true love for me. A dog howled from afar and he stopped. My suitor continued singing, then unfamiliar voices started to blend with him. I thought of his own family, or his friends, or his people. Teban and his two companions approached our window. I saw his silhouette and what appeared to be that of his father and mother. The pale moon casts a soft light above our garden but the three people by the window shone brightly.
I motioned to approach my future in-laws, but the hands of my mother forbade me. Don’t go. She repeated those words as she slowly crawled back to my father hiding underneath the blanket.
Note: "Harana" (Serenade) by Noji Bajet is a work of fiction created for PhilSTAR L!fe's Halloween series "Creeping It Real." The names, characters, events, and places mentioned in the story came from the author's imagination. Any resemblance to actual happenings or persons—living or dead—is completely coincidental.
