Phones and fathers

The first father that died in our family was my uncle-in-law. In the middle of the night, our land-line phone rang and the voice at the other end of the line asked for my mom. After a short conversation, my mom packed some stuff and my dad went to start the car. It was my aunt who had called. She wanted my parents to come to the hospital; my uncle had had a heart attack. I thought nothing of it and went back to sleep.

The next morning a phone call from my cousin woke me up. He asked me how his dad was, and why everyone was telling him to come home asap. I told him that his dad had had a heart attack but surely was fine now and just wanted to see his kids. My cousin’s voice was cracking, but I still thought nothing of it.

I tried to go back to sleep but the phone call seemed to harden my pillow. So I went over to my cousin’s house just beside ours—and pure, cold guilt ran up my spine with the realization that I had just told the biggest lie of my life. My uncle wasn’t fine. People were already awaiting his remains from the funeral home. My tito, who seemed so stern yet melted at his children’s embrace, was gone.

In the year 2008 my lolo (my mom’s father) was taken to the hospital because of pneumonia. I remember making his hospital room our tambayan, our place to hang out. My cousins and I would see him before and after work or school, and on whole days during weekends. I don’t know why, but even if my lolo was then already 80 years old, I still thought he was going to be fine and return home.

One day on my way to work, my phone rang. It was my tita calling, telling me to come home. My dear lolo, who would exclaim “Ang lamig (How cold it is)!” whenever he ate ice cream, whose form of lambing (endearment) was asking us his grandkids to cut his fingernails while he rocked on the tumba-tumba, was gone.

I wonder why, even if my tito had a heart attack, my lolo was in hospital for one straight week, and my dad was in cancer remission, I still thought they would come home and everything would be okay.

I can still see myself that fateful September day, packing my stuff at the office where I had spent the night working. I can still feel the phone in my hands as I read the caller ID. My cousin was calling, saying my brother wanted to speak with me: “Ate, kausapin ka ni Jay.” I thought they were just waiting for me to come home so we could spend the weekend together. I can still hear my brother’s voice ringing in my ear, telling me to come home, our dad had collapsed in the middle of a basketball game. “Ate, uwi ka na. Bumagsak si Daddy habang nagba-basketball.” I can still feel that lump in my throat as I said, “No, Jay, no, Jay”—just like in the movies, burdening my brother to take back the reality that came along with his phone call. I can still taste the bitterness of my tears as I took the longest bus ride of my life. I can still feel my mom’s despair as she held me tight.

The ringing in my ear, the lump in my throat, the bitterest of tears, the despair of a mother’s hug… These can only be drowned by our fondest memories of our dad—the way he would cut hot dogs in bite-size pieces all the Monday mornings when I was in college; the way he would send text messages to our relatives about his kids’ achievements, no matter how small; his Christmas routine of bringing ham to family members… All the memories with him have become precious.

Sometimes a phone call changes our lives forever. Sometimes you are told to come home for the reason you hate the most. Sometimes our fathers leave us, but leave us with people who we can trust to be at the other end of the line, to tell us the bad news that breaks their hearts as well.

CJ Mendoza, 29, writes for television.