Secrets of the Red Swing

Everyone has some place where you spend most of your time with your friends. It may be a place under a shady tree, a car, a room, a field. It is where you spend most of your time eating, talking or simply, sitting with your friends, just bonding.

For us, it was the red swing. It was located at a vacant lot a block away from our houses. It was a red four-person swing – the one with a “floor”, and swings back and forth, and can be locked so it sits still. It’s mostly red with some touches of white. It’s not really new – there were some rust spots here and there. But it served its purpose.

The swing was also near our places of interest. Another block away, you can go to the village arcade. In the same vacant lot was where Aling Nena sells her famous isaw, kwek kwek and sago-gulaman that we love to spend our money on. The swing was located under big acacia trees, so it provided shade as well.

I don’t know who left that swing there. It was just…there. And it was where three of my friends – Jason, Erika and Raymond – and I usually hung out.

Of course, there were other people who used the swing before us. Eventually, we “earned” the swing. During elementary, we would run there after doing our assignments with our pocket money and we’d buy isaw from Aling Nena. She puts tomato paste on her isaw, which makes it taste different. I love mine with lots of the vinegar mix she makes. Aling Nena always reserves her isaw to us. Even if my mom scolded me and warned me not to eat that, I still did. So far, nothing’s happened to me.

After eating, we would sit at the swing and think of imaginary tales that involved the swing. Sometimes it would be our magic carriage. Sometimes it would be a space ship. Sometimes, it would be a house. When it was a house, Raymond and Erika would play as our parents. They always looked like a good pair.

High school was the same. I thought we’d grow out of our swing phase. But we found our swing as a sanctuary from the pressure of school and peers. We aren’t in the same sections, see, so we don’t see each other much during classes. So we made up by hanging out at the swing. There, we did our assignments, and talked. How much we talked! We talked about school, who was dating who, what this teacher did to that class, what hilarious thing happened during this class, who we didn’t like, who we liked, and who we liked liked. We told our secrets, which, fortunately, didn’t get out of the swing’s premises.

The swing was also where we comforted ourselves when we were down. Sometimes, we would just sit there, and feel the silence. And we’d leave still feeling okay. Like it was the nicest talk we ever had.

Aling Nena was still there. Now her daughter Alma helps Aling Nena sell her isaw. And I still love the same kind of isaw.

The swing was where we headed after the prom. We were still in our formal attires, and we sat there, talking about our night. Erika and Raymond on one side, Jason and I on the other. When Erika won prom queen during senior year, we had a mini celebration with her on the swing.

We also spent a lot of nights sitting there, singing our hearts out. Sometimes, Jason would bring a small radio for us to listen to, sometimes Raymond would bring his guitar. Sometimes, we’d just spend hours reading each other’s mobile phones, reading and forwarding each other’s text messages. There are also times when we’d tell each other ghost stories and scared each other silly that we had to accompany each other going home, with Raymond going home last since he doesn’t really scare easily.

The swing was also where Raymond and Erika became “them”. I always suspected them to be together. They became official right there at the red swing.

Of course, there are times when we are not complete. Sometimes, it would be only me and Erika or me and Raymond or me and Jason or just them without me. Mostly, Erika and Raymond would be somewhere, so it just left Jason and me. It wasn’t the same, but it was still nice.

The swing was the one who witnessed our victories after high school graduation. We brought our togas and our awards there, just relishing the fact that we are graduates, and that we are finally entering another world: college.

College changed some things for us. We were not going to the same schools anymore. But we still managed, somehow, to get to the swing at least thrice a week, to catch up with each other’s lives and to do our assignments and such. The swing was where we comforted ourselves when we failed some subjects and where we celebrated when we got high grades. The swing was where we ranted about our new professors, our crappy schedule and other things worth ranting about.

And the swing was where I first fell in love.

It was one day, when Raymond and Erika were still at school. I arrived there and saw Jason sitting at the swing, writing something in a notebook. I approached him and smiled, plopping down the seat in front of him.

“Uy,” I said, pulling out a handout from my bag.

“Uy,” he said back. “Gusto mo isaw? Libre kita.”

“Huh? Ikaw, manlilibre? Wow! Ano nakain mo ngayon?” I said, laughing.

Jason insisted, so I obliged. He bought me two sticks of isaw – with lots of tomato paste and dipped in the vinegar mix.

I smiled as I got it, and started to eat. We started talking about our days, and how this went and how that went and how much we envy Erika and Raymond (in a good way, that is). It was in mid swallow when I glanced at Jason and met his eyes and felt that my heart skipped a beat.

He smiled at me, and then looked closely. I gulped, pushing down the meat that was still in my throat. He reached out and rubbed a part of my cheek.

“You have tomato paste right here,” he said with a smile.

I smiled back. But I felt different.

After doing our assignments, I sat down beside him and we just talked, like the old times. I leaned my head on his shoulder and felt butterflies in my stomach. He brushed some of my hair back and leaned his head on my head. He reached for my hand and held it.

We were quiet. We didn’t say much. Then later on, I stood up and he stood up and he dropped me off our house. I watched him walk away, my heart beating fast and my mind asking questions that it has never asked before. I didn’t know when or how or why – I just knew that it was it. I was in love. I am in love.

I was confused for a while. I decided to talk to Erika on the swing, when we were alone, and she offered an advice, which didn’t really help. I didn’t know if Jason felt the same way as I did, or if I was just a friend. He paid attention to me a lot, and he treated me food a lot…but I really didn’t know.

If the swing had a mouth, it could just blab everything that I’ve told Erika and Raymond about my feelings for Jason. And maybe, it would’ve told me what Jason really felt for me. Sometimes I wish it was that…but then I didn’t.

Eventually, we reached our “busy” years in college. Thesis, reports, practicum, on-job-trainings and all the other things that made our lives a living hell. We didn’t get to go to the swing as often as we did before. Erika and Raymond were still together, I was still in love with Jason, and I still didn’t know what he feels for me.

I guess it never occurred to me to just tell – I was afraid to know what he would say. Even if Erika and Raymond encouraged me so, I was just too chicken. I didn’t know what Raymond learns when he talks to him – I was afraid to ask that too. Eventually, I guess I forgot about it. I was just too busy with school. But whenever we’d see each other again at the swing, my heart gives a leap.

We graduated college, and Erika pursued her medicine degree, while we worked. Raymond proposed to Erika, and they were to be married when Erika graduates. The swing was still there and we still liked Aling Nena’s isaw, which is now Alma’s isaw since Aling Nena was too weak to go out. Alma is now selling with her son and daughter, Tisoy and Karen. It makes us feel good that we were one of the reasons that Aling Nena raised Alma in a good home at least and that we are helping Alma raise her children.

And I never told Jason how I felt.

It was one Saturday morning when I decided to go to the swing and saw that it was gone.

Jason was there too, that morning, and he looked sadly at the sign posted there.

“This is the new location of the (insert name of village here) convenience store.”

We never knew where the swing went. Alma with her children moved someplace else, and we didn’t know where too. We were sad about the swing. It was gone.

The new convenience store was up within a few months. I don’t go there often – when the need arises, and then I will. The place where it stood was just too…boring to go to, now that our beloved swing and the famous isaw we all love are gone.

And I never told Jason how I felt.

Eventually, Erika and Raymond got married, but we were like lost sheep looking for a place to celebrate it on our own. We ended up celebrating in their new house, but it just wasn’t the same.

The swing was what we missed most. Childhood memories and all the secrets it held. It was the one that watched us grow up, learned everything that we had about ourselves, and it was the place where I was planning to tell Jason the way I really feel. But it was gone.

I never really told Jason how I feel. I got married, he got married but not to each other. My first love was an official flunk. And only the red swing knew all about it.

One day, while I was driving to the mall, I saw a familiar swing at the sidewalk – you know, where some people sell dog cages and everything? I parked my car and went there immediately. It wasn’t the same as our swing, but it was a swing, and it was red.

Now that swing sits in a vacant lot that we bought. My husband didn’t really understand why the fuss, and so did Jason’s wife. We still go there once in a while to visit, but we let other children and our children hang out there. It is their time, really, not ours. There was no isaw-an there anymore, but someone sells turon and kwek kwek, which is good enough.

But we could never really replace the red swing.

I still haven’t told Jason how I felt for him before. Maybe I will, maybe I won’t. At least we have a red swing that would be soon filled with our secrets and other secrets.

Good thing swings don’t have mouths.

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