Beauty and Madness

An hour and a half…

Of doing nothing but tinker with the latest apps in my iPhone while sipping a cup of Starbucks iced mocha is quite boring. Passing the time in a corner chair, while trying to be unobtrusive as one could be was never easy in a very busy café especially if it’s the favorite hangout of half the people who you deal with in the workplace everyday.

She’s late again. Promises are really made to be broken. And old habits certainly die hard. But this time, enough is enough. I’m fed up and I’m mad as hell.

Makati is hell at this time of the year; Hot and sticky, polluted and dirty, noisy and ugly. This urban jungle in the middle of what has been a mosquito infested swamp before they were reclaimed by the old rich that owns much of the land has long been my favorite playground.

Makati has been synonymous with the best days of my life: Of care-free days and tranquil nights; of raging adventures and mindless tortures; of the beauty and the beast inside me…

Yes, I’m back in the hunt again trying to recapture those days when I was the king of the world. It’s been a year since I last venture into the abyss of my existence. I thought I was through walking into that dark road less traveled.

But was I wrong. There’s no light at the end of the tunnel but only darkness. Darkness that I need to groped for a rope to find my way out. And then I saw the light.

I realized that I was in my room and the golden rays that passed through the curtains which warmly tickled my skin were from a solitary incandescent lamp hanging from above.

And behind the curtains, I saw my dear old Myla-- suspended in mid-air, swaying from side to side, her bulging eyes looking but not seeing through me, her purple tongue sticking out in a facial grimace that is both beautiful and ugly.

Peeping Time

The day is ending…

I got my binoculars and started to scan the horizon. Then I see her, all alone sitting on top of the ledge in one of the skyscrapers in Makati. I thought it strange to see this lovely girl there all by herself.

Then darkness finally caught up with the sun. Thus, my “peeping time” is over.

I pulled down the blinds of my condo unit and took a shower and went out to watch Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets in nearby Glorietta.

But my thoughts are still filled with the girl sitting on top of the building.

The next day, as is my ritual I again picked up my binoculars and then again I saw here there. And she really fascinates me; I can’t take my eyes off her even from a distance.

What was she thinking about?

Is she a lonely soul hoping to find the answer to her life’s questions by sitting there and looking
at the horizon?

Is she talking to her God?

So, one day I made a promise to myself that one day I will be there with her.

Two weeks after the end of Halloween I decided to pay her a surprise visit.

I was able to enter the elevator without the guard noticing me and landed at the top of the building and find her sitting there.

Slowly I tread the lonely path that would help her ease her miseries.

The next thing I saw was her falling like a scarecrow into the ground below.

Amid the commotion downstairs, I sneaked myself away from the crowd and proceeded to Glorietta 4 food court to have a meal of chicken and pasta.

The next day, I brought out my binoculars and scanned the horizon and the skyscrapers until my eyes darted into the building where the nameless girl used to sit in her solitude.

She’s gone.

Funny I kinda missed her presence in that building and my afternoons will never be the same again.

That night, I decided to get rid of my binoculars for good.

A day or two later, my fond memories of her faded into the jaded Makati sunset.

Just like that.

Easy does it

I woke up this morning with a throbbing ache in my head. I went straight to the medicine cabinet and got 2 tablets of Tylenol and popped them simultaneously into my mouth chased by a glass of ice- cold orange juice.

I sat down on the dining chair and I started to leaf through the pages of the Philippine Daily Inquirer for my daily dose of the latest happenings in the local scene as well as around the world.

I asked the maid for a cup of black coffee and lighted a stick of Marlboro Lights and puffed the cigarette away for a minute or two and continued my morning readings.

I put down the newspaper, took a quick hot shower, got dressed and went out to drive myself in my black Ford SUV to work. I turned on the radio and tuned in on my favorite FM station playing Classical Music as my car cruised along the lonely stretch of Roxas Boulevard.

The traffic was heavy at the corner of the old Buendia Avenue now renamed after that Senator from the old rich family whose name at the moment escapes me because I’m beginning to get a bit sleepy. :)

So I bid my time…

My car is literally crawling on a very slow traffic of vehicles in a very congested road in a very congested city.

Damn this traffic and damn the officials who can’t get their acts together and just turned a blind eye on this mess!

Damn! Damn! Damn! Damn!

My patience is starting to slip away. The anxiety of being stuck in traffic for hours while tons and tons of unfinished paper work are waiting for me at the office is gnawing into my nerves.

I rolled down the glass window and lighted a stick of cigarette as I watch the white smoke made its way into the open air followed by thoughts of all the things that had happened and could have happened in my life.

My thoughts are running in circles aided by the chaos that is unfolding into my very eyes; aided further by the blaring sounds of the horns of the cars around me whose impatient drivers are also caught in this monstrous traffic jam.

Then it moved.

Yes, finally the traffic moves.

I shifted my gear and followed the car behind me. I will be in the office on time so I thought when all of a sudden the car in front of me suddenly made a stop! Then I realized that we were now caught in another red light on the corner of the South Super Highway. Damn…

I then lighted another cigarette stick. Fuck it, I was now chain-smoking since about an hour ago all because of this #$*!? traffic!

Finally the traffic light turned into green.

Go! Go! Go!

I then stepped on the accelerator like crazy and watched as the sight of the cars and the buildings turned into a blur. Wahoo!

I soon find myself into the parking lot on the third floor of the building near the Asian Institute of Management where I worked for a multinational company.

I slowly gt out of my car, fixed my YSL tie and proceeded to the gun-metal colored entrance of the elevator that will carry me up to the sixth floor. But like the roads outside where it was crawling with traffic, the elevator is also one hell of a mess! It’s full of sweaty people trying to squeeze themselves in, so that they can still be on time to punch the clock and not be late for office.

Madness!

I figured out that it’s better to use the stairs than- wait. So, I went to the stairwell and made my way up. I stopped by at the fifth floor to freshen myself up. I looked into my wristwatch and read 7:30 am. I was early.

Then I saw her.

She was standing near the window and smoking her Marlboro. It was the smoke before the proverbial fire, eh?

I look around and noticed that we were alone. I smiled to myself and walked stealthily towards her.

Gliding like a panther, light as a feather…

Before she could react I manage to grab her by the neck and the back part of her leather belt, lifted her effortlessly and threw her with all my might out of the open window!

I heard a loud shrieked of fear followed by a loud thud as I casually walked into the stairs and reached the door of my office on the sixth floor.

The authorities ruled it a suicide.

A flash of triumph beamed in my face.

I could not believe it.

Once again, it was so damned fast, it was so damned easy.

The Lady And Me

I woke up early in the morning with a throbbing pain in my head. I have no recollection whatsoever of the things that happened the previous night.

So, imagine my surprise when I found a body in my bathroom lying in a pool of her own blood!

I closed my eyes and took a deep breath trying to shake off the cobwebs in my head. I tried to remember the things that occurred the night before…

Then I remember driving into an upscale club along Jupiter Street in Makati to unwind after a hard day in the office where I went straight to the bar and ordered two shots of Johnnie Walker Single Malt Whisky. This was quickly followed by a glass of Carlos I Brandy that left a burning sensation in my throat.

My head began to swirl as I grabbed a bottle of Corona and watched the people on the dance floor dancing to the rhythm of the techno music.

Then, in the corner of my eye I caught her gyrating on the ledge in wild abandon with eyes closed as if in a trance and laughing at the top of her lungs.

“Probably high on E!” I muttered to myself as I continued to watch her dance. She’s wearing a red backless top that left just a bit to imagination the two large tits that were beneath it and in tight blue denim accented with red pumps that gave one a funny impression of her being a trying hard --- Vamp!

I continued my binge and tried the cocktail called Screaming Orgasm and Sex on the Forest respectively that was quickly chased by a shot of Stolichnaya Vodka. After I while, I asked for another round of the sweet Vodka and smelled a familiar scent in the air that brought back memories of Diana, my first sweetheart and victim…

It was her favorite Escada perfume and for a moment I was lost in deep thought and when I did finally come out of it , I felt that old familiar feeling that someone is staring at you behind your back. So, I turned around and lo and behold, found the Vamp looking straight into my eyes and smiling at me with her perfect white teeth and was now sitting right next to me in the bar and drinking a Zombie.

I told the bartender that the lady’s drink is on me. She smiled again and thanked me and started a conversation that range from small talk to the absurd to trivial matters but we did not really care for we enjoyed each other’s company.

She asked me to join her in the dance floor an offer that I find quite hard to refuse. And so we danced. And we danced all right until we kissed and kissed and kissed unmindful of the rowdy crowd on the dance floor. I smelled her sweet breath even under the obvious influence of alcohol and felt her tongue in my mouth and I felt something. Her tongue is pushing something into my mouth!

And she succeeded and then whispered in my ear that I should join her in her trip. I swallowed the damn pill and that was the last thing I remembered…

My recollections were abruptly cut short by the doorbell ringing. I took a towel and wrapped it around my torso and answered the door. It was just the Mailman delivering my Time Magazine subscriptions. I went back inside and stared at the body lying prostrate in rigor mortis in front of me and pondered on what to do with her next.

In a sudden rush of adrenaline, I picked her up and brought her to the kitchen. I dropped her on the Mahogany table where I expertly chopped her with the Butcher’s knife into several small pieces taking good care of her head, tits, fingers, and toes as I carefully and meticulously sorted them from the rest of her body.

I put them inside a black plastic bag and put the rest of her into a denim duffel bag, brought them out and laid them on the passenger seat of my Ford Ranger in the garage.

I washed up and cleaned up the mess, sprayed Clorox and Lysol and mopped the floor until not a trace of her was left. Satisfied, I took a long hot shower and cleaned myself. Afterwards, I set the alarm clock and jumped right back into the bed and zzzz’s my way into dreamland…

The buzzing of the clock jolted me back into my senses. It was already past 12 in the morning. I dressed up and went out driving into the nearest Mercury Drug Store outlet and bought a pair of size 7 surgical gloves and a can of Lemon air freshener.

While the rest of Metro Manila was sound asleep, I was out there driving around the narrow side streets of Makati and Manila; from Bangkal to Palanan to San Andres and Malate in Manila, tossing the chopped meat out of the window into the waiting mouths of hungry stray dogs that populated the area as I passed by.

After the duffle bag was empty of its contents, I turned toward Forbes Street until I reach Pritil in Tondo and followed the narrow asphalted road until I went out northwards towards Navotas.

When I passed by the old Smokey Mountain dumping site, I slowed down and tossed the empty duffel bag together with the black plastic bag out of the window and into the mound of thrash on the roadside.I drove for several minutes until I came out on Rizal Avenue and quietly headed for my flat in downtown Manila.

Two and a half hours of roaming around and driving into the dead of night and erasing the last traces of her was peanuts!

The next morning the tabloids screamed with the news that human body parts of what investigators believed to have once belonged to a woman in her early 20's were found near Smokey Mountains by scavengers. My office mates had an animated discussion that day about the “Chop-chop Lady” and they were expounding their various theories on the reason behind the killing.

When I told them about my version they brushed it off and shrugged their shoulders and just laughed at the glaring absurdity of my claims.

Then a curious office mate sidled up to me and in a soft voice asked me, “What are you smiling at?”

I answered him with a crazy grin on my face, “you know, I was out there with that poor girl last night and yes, I did the damn thing!”