Feelings
What’s up, duck?
By Emmanuelle
This story was told by someone I knew from the day he first walked on two plump unsteady feet. I didn’t get to know him when he was still crawling on all fours. He was then too engrossed with getting to know the floor and the earth.
There was a time long past when we were complete. Tatay, Nanay, I, Ditse, Diko and Bunso. I failed or might have refused to see the matter that was wrong, but it must have been too serious for my age. My mother quit and walked out on us. Tatay bundled the four of us back to his old hometown. He worked for six days and was only with us for a day, not necessarily Sunday. That was how we kids ended up in the care of my Lola Owa and my two unmarried Titas.
I could never forget Beh, our younger Tita, sighing and shrugging her shoulders, cryptically saying: every beginnings have their own just endings.
You see, Owa and Tita Bah and Tita Beh were collectively known as the town’s strangers. Not that they were truly strangers. They were stranger than fiction.
The three do not socialize. Owa spends most time reading or watching TV. She was once dean of one of the nation’s foremost schools and was probably among the pioneers of our infamous brain drain. Tita Bah is both nurse and doctor, and Tita Beh is a systems developer, among her other specialties.
Our caregivers’ standing, sometimes even sitting and lying down, joke was: the kids are served for dinner. Not that us kids are eaten for dinner. Dinner was the only time devoted wholely to us kids and we are served not only the best meal of the day, but lessons on life as well.
And it was in one of this learning-dinner that it was decided to give Ditse, Diko and Bunso one duck each to care for. To teach them the value of love and also it’s accompanying responsibilities.
It was fun at the start. On their own, the three kids built a makeshift cage to keep the ducklings from the predators, the three large watchdogs. Home from school, the three kids would march around the yard, Pied Pipers to three trailing tumbling tousled-brown-and-yellow ducklings. After the march, all six heads would be down there on the grass, poking underneath roots for worms to supplement the ducklings’ menu of soft rice and bananas.
One day, Diko’s duck got sick. We would all watch him unseen. He would cup the duck lovingly in both palms, raise his arms to heaven, and mumble words we cannot hear. Nevertheless, near evening, it died. Diko kept that information from us, perhaps hoping it would miraculously revive overnight.
Next morning, Bunso found her duck as stiff as Diko’s. She cried and bawled. It was her first big cry since Nanay left. Before they left for school, they found a black shoe box for the two dead ducks. They assigned the sun for first funeral watch.
When Bunso was still in school, Diko arranged for the burial. He dug a shallow grave at the corner of the garden. With the ducks-in-the-box in his arms, he marched slowly to the grave, the last of the ducks trailing tumbling behind him, quacking what’s up what’s up?
At dinner, the two were asked if they would like to replace their pets? Ditse asked would they like to have her duck for the while? Diko and Bunso had only one loud answer to both questions.
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