Driving dilemma (Part 5)

By Virginia Pasalo

 

BACK in the Philippines, Anna was elected President of the Philippine Association of Recruitment Agencies (PARA) and was appointed by government as a member of the Board of Trustees representing the Management Sector at the Overseas Workers Welfare Administration (OWWA). She focused all attention to the demands of her job. The children had been trained well to take care of their own selves with very little supervision from the housekeeper, on occasions that she was out of town or on business trips abroad to promote the Philippines as a place to recruit well-trained and reliable workers.

At the OWWA, she was able to further advance her career, and found new friends. Among the ones she enjoyed hanging out with was a feminist and an environmentalist who would have been desirable to men if she did not open her mouth. But she opened her mouth too quickly in defense of oppressed women that men who initially thought she would be an easy target to go to bed with touched her body instead in their minds. In the board meetings, Anna and Isabel would often clash, in defense of their own sectors, but their love for coffee overshadowed the conflicting views and they would go out, leaving their differences in the conference table.

“I saw you getting off his car today.”

“Oh, that was Franklin, a colleague in the private sector.”

“A colleague? Oh, that smack on your cheek stayed so much longer,” she remarked teasingly, “he looks so handsome.”

Indeed, Franklin was handsome. He was tall, he has the bearing and the refinement of a gentleman. Women can feel his presence several meters wherever he stood. He has the smell of a lion that did not have to look for its prey. He was prey to women. Isabel knew this the first time he met him, in a meeting of stakeholders deliberating on labor issues,  as he harangued the duplicity of government in its overseas employment policies.

“He is a friend, not the sort you are thinking of.”

“What sort am I thinking of?”

“The sort that your mind is always preoccupied with. Drink your coffee.”

They laughed. Coffee time was story time, a sharing of more personal nature, and at times bordering on the inane.

“I would like to undress slowly before a man like that. I had a chance to do that long ago but I was a prude.”

“Really?” Isabel was not surprised, but she pressed on, “With Anton?”

“Yes, with Anton. I so love that man. He was an officer and a gentleman. So much a gentleman that all he was able to do was to kiss my hands.”

That was true, but only a half-truth. Lately, she also had desires for Ramon but stifled it because her upbringing demanded that women of her class must be with men of her class, she must fall in love with “the proper man”. Ramon was the family driver, a most inappropriate man before whom her clothes are in danger of slowly dropping off.

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