The apartment in Bagong Diwa
I remember the first time I set foot in the apartment. It wasn’t big, just a little over 20 sqm. And with the various clunky furniture that the owners had left for us to use but were forbidden to remove as part of the lease terms, it seemed even smaller.
“We’ll make this work,” I remember saying to myself, and saying to him, as we gingerly stepped over old pots and hangers.
That we had found a small but suitable place in the margins of Makati — not too close to the CBD as to be unaffordable, but not too far either as to be unwalkable — seemed auspicious enough.
Even our street name, “Bagong Diwa,” bore good tidings: We were to start anew, close to our jobs, our friends, and quaint, new places where we could drink and be merry.
I was, initially, not to live in the apartment. He was the one who was renting, and it was his name that was on the lease. But we were together in that stubborn, inseparable way that new lovers often are.
As someone who had never known any domicile aside from my childhood home, I came to love the apartment and everything it represented. Cohabitation with a romantic partner was previously something I had only seen in rom-coms or read in books. Making the choice to live together was empowering.
Within our walls, we could give voice to our most outrageous ideas, our most honest opinions of everyone and everything around us. We could also keep the world at bay when we needed to recuperate from our professional and social obligations.
As in many domestic arrangements, however, familiarity so easily blossomed into contempt. Often, this stemmed from small, trivial things that could have otherwise been brushed away.
Whose turn was it now to wash the dishes or refill the water dispenser? Whose socks and underwear were just haphazardly left outside the hamper?
Some, however, were more fundamental. His larger disposable income meant he shouldered more expenses than I did — a fact that frustrated us both, and inevitably led to unsavory arguments over who pulled much more weight in our daily life.
Our lives, too, had begun to take diverging paths. Leaving a stressful job at a PR agency, I found more time and resources to pursue new hobbies. I discovered triathlon, for which my newfound enthusiasm consistently kept me out of the apartment.
Meanwhile, as he moved up the corporate ladder, he piled in more work than he could handle. He was often exhausted and irritable. He also refused most of my invitations to join me in the outdoors. He didn’t know how to swim, didn’t like being in the sun, and was afraid of heights.
While I went out of town on weekends for open-water swims or long rides, he would just stay cooped up in bed playing video games.
He would miss all but one of my races. The first and only time he showed up, he was even in a sour mood, grumpy that he’d had to get up earlier than usual. Outside the apartment, there were very select activities we could do together.
Like fissures on a wall created by tremors, resentment steadily grew between us. He resented me for missing bill payments and for slacking off on my share of housekeeping. He thought I was immature, and resented me for a lack of investment in the future he had envisioned for us.
He had been in three other relationships; he was my first. I remember him telling me that he was tired of transients, and had hoped to find someone more permanent. I realize now that he had come to the apartment wanting to build a home, while I came there only wanting to play house.
I enjoyed the comforts and security of our cohabitation, but was unprepared for the responsibility. His expectations hung around us like the damp smell of laundry on rainy days. I balked at the musty smell of duty and obligation, and wanted to keep chasing the sun. In the process, I had come to overlook his own limitations and pleas for help.
The apartment then began to heave, too, under the growing weight of our disappointment. First, it was just a broken doorknob, made loose by the frequent slamming of doors. The AC unit then started breaking down frequently, soaking us in unbearable heat in the afternoons.
The place, after all, wasn’t new. We had just repurposed it, rearranged its contents to fit our whims. We could not stop its wear any more than we could make it new.
I remember my last day in the apartment. I had spent the entire week packing, fitting what I could of our four shared years together into two balikbayan boxes. They were heavy, so I had needed his help to bring them down the long flight of stairs.
At last, however, I had finally freed the apartment of clutter, and it had never looked brighter and airier. Outside, a moving van waited to take me elsewhere.
* * *
“Ralph,” 28, is currently in between jobs and will move to a new apartment this January.
