After three years of working as a stewardess for the domestic flights of Philippine Airlines, and after undergoing several training and assessments, Leah was finally living her dream of being one of those who served as a business class stewardess for PAL's international flights.

She had already been to as far as Paris and California. She was very competent and very professional that she even received certain merits on her career. She was even offered a position in the corporate ladder months later, a good space in the PAL head office that promised lucrative income, but her heart remained on exploring places she'd never been.



On the other hand, Remma consumed her time moving in from once city to another, looking for a more promising career avenue, looking for a more stable life. In her first year after university she lived in Drummondville in Quebec, and then moved to Ottawa the year after that. Then she decided to run away from her chaotic life in Canada, and so she moved to Los Angeles and finally found her passion. Donald and Leandro had lost contact with her as an effect, and Remma seemed to be too occupied paving her own path.



Donald graduated without much recognition. When he failed to excel in the Web Development sector, he was opted to follow a lower path, something he slowly learned to embrace and love. He proceeded to take up some units in Education and, in 2004, passed the licensure exam for teachers. Following his achievement he applied for a teaching position in a state college in their town, and in 2005 was taking up a masteral study in Computer to upgrade himself to professorship.



Leandro had spent most his time digging on books and classes and projects that he had little time for himself or for a vacation. His feet were completely on two pedals to pursue the thing he wanted most: the fulfillment of his dream.

He had traveled from Houston to France and London. He had attended different exhibits and experiments conducted by renowned scientists. He had spent alot of time in the observatories. He had witnessed rocket launching and spacecraft landing. To him, these were all fragments of a picture he needed to put together for him to achieve his dream.

And during those times his mind was slowly pulled away from all his personal troubles that he sometimes regarded as distractions. He had also slowly forgotten that there were also personal things that needed to be considered, needed to be faced, and needed to be fulfilled.

And some of those forgotten things was his promise to Donald that he would be back, and of his promise to find Remma with the hope that she would somehow realize that love was indeed a process that needed to be learned to feel. All of those things, they were all slowly fading with time.



Donald woke up one morning in October of 2006 with a strange, numb feeling in his arms. When he faced a mirror he noticed for the first time the seemingly skinny arms, as if muscles were drawn out. And his left arm seemed to be unusually slightly twitched.

He canceled his class that day; he was supposed to give a preliminary exam but decided to conduct it the next day. He went to Tagbilaran with his cousin on the wheels to see his doctor. After half an hour of examination, his doctor referred him to a neurologist. Although his doctor said nothing serious about his finding, either he preferred to give the burden to the neurologist or he was honestly unsure, he still felt something was wrong, and it's serious.

When he visited the neurologist that same day, and after scrutinizing the test results, he was diagnosed of a motor neuron disease, a terminal illness for men above 50. And he was only 25. The doctor said his was a rare case. But even so, the disease was rapid and unstoppable. His body felt limp when he knew he was on a slow spiral journey downward to death.

It was a shocking, devastating news for him and his family, but he chose not to let people know outside the walls of their home. He wouldn't tell Leandro and Remma; he didn't want to derail them away from their lives and get them involve in his personal fight.

He still went to school; he wanted to try to live a normal life while the disease had not yet consumed his strength and body. But slowly and constantly, his body began to succumb. But not his courage to continue living, and certainly not his will to fight it.

One day, when he was at the park sitting on a bench alone, he was staring solemnly into the vast open sea and beyond. He was there for some time, watching the coming and leaving of time, staring at the occasional fishing boats at the sea below, and at the sea birds whose cries sometimes broke the silence. In his mind was a movie playing, jumping from the old days to the present and back.

When the sun had set he looked around him, from the unfinished lighthouse behind him to the old kiosk near the acacia tree and beyond it to the only entrance of the park. Then he realized something; he smiled when he knew what needed to be done.



One night, a week before Christmas, he got a call from Leandro. Though their friendship were getting back to normal, he still hadn't seen his friend since their first year in college. He had been looking forward to go fishing with him again, but he also understood how difficult it was for Leandro to follow such a wonderful but tough dream. So he just kept on waiting, and once in a while he felt contented and happy to hear him on the phone.

"In August they will be sending me on a mission to Mars," Leandro reported.

"You're now an astronaut? And did you just say Mars?" Donald exclaimed enthusiastically. "That makes you the youngest astronaut, right?"

Leandro smiled at this. "Right now I'm undergoing a series of simulations and training, and by early February I will be in Tokyo."

"Life is good, Lean. You're finally living it," Donald said happily. "Bring me home photographs of stars, up close, will you?"

Leandro chuckled. A pause. "Look, I'm so sorry I failed you. But I'm not forgetting my promise. I'm truly, terribly sorry I still can't come home."

"Don't worry 'bout it," Donald assured him. "I can wait."

After a while, Leandro asked, "So how's everything with you out there?"

Donald paused to look at himself, then said, "I'm good. I'm the same happy Donald now."

"I bet many students are now enrolling to a Computer major, huh."

Donald laughed. "That must be a school's credit."

They both laughed.

"So you're not settling down yet?" Leandro asked.

Donald paused for a moment. "Got no suitor yet."

"I mean, seriously?"

"No. Looks like I'm still enjoying my single life. Maybe I'll come to it one of these days," Donald answered. "You?"

"Nah. Looks like we're both doomed."

They laughed.

"About Remma, got any news from her?" Leandro asked.

"No. I haven't heard from her for ages now," Donald said. "I kind of miss her, you know."

"Yeah, miss her, too," Leandro replied. "I called her parents last month in Calgary, but still they didn't know how to reach her. Said she's now in L.A., and she sometimes called them, but wouldn't give her number. She calls them on a payphone."

"I wonder how she's been."

"After the fight with her parents, I have a feeling she's still not alright."

"Maybe she'll call one of us this Christmas."

A pause. Then Donald said, "Lean, Merry Christmas."

"Merry Christmas, too, friend."



His flight to Tokyo was delayed for one hour, and he was stuck there at the gate lobby. Pissed and outraged, he needed to cool himself and went to a nearby cafeteria. He was having a drink when he saw a familiar face passing by. He swore he knew her; he couldn't be wrong.

Pulling a trolley, she was walking graciously along the aisle toward a reserved lounge. She was tall and slender and confident. Her dark long hair neatly clipped to her head, her face flashed a smile so vibrant. She was stunning and beautiful on her stewardess uniform. A PAL logo pinned on her left side of the dress.

"Leah?"

The woman turned to see who was calling her. Her face beamed when she saw him. "Oh, my God! Leandro?"



"This is my first year on international flights," Leah crossed her legs as she talked. They were at the cafeteria waiting for the announcement of their flights.

"You have a place here in L.A.?" he asked.

"Near Long Beach," she replied and then sipped her coffee. After she replaced the cup to the saucer, she asked, "You're living now in California?"

After sipping his coffee, he said, "No. I'm residing in Houston. Came here for a meeting yesterday, and now I'm off to Tokyo."

"I'm taking a flight to Manila in about thirty minutes now," she said as she glanced at her wristwatch.

"You're going to Bohol, too?"

"No. But I'm taking a vacation in May next year. You're going there for the fiesta?"

"It seems vague as of now. Not sure yet,"he said. He leaned back on his seat before he continued, "Tell me how are things over there."

"So much have changed. So many things," Leah replied. "You should go home sometimes." Leah stirred her coffee. She was thinking for a while on something, but then dismissed it. "I talk to Donald once in a while."

"You see each other?"

"No. On the phone, most of the time. He's completely back to his own self again after you two were back in good terms."

Leandro looked down at his trousers. "That was part of life, y'know. But it was very remorseful."

Leah glanced at him apologetically. "It's been a long time, and I can't believe why I'm digging it. I'm sorry."

Leandro looker at her. "Do you know that life has made you become someone you wanted?"

"I'm asking you that same question."

"Oh, man," he groaned. "I made it appear like I'm bragging about it."

"No, you're not. You're just holding things too tight," Leah quickly responded. "And you look dry."

"What are you saying?"

"All I'm saying is that," she uncrossed her leg and continued, "you need to give yourself a time off. You need a break."

A woman's voice from the overhead speaker announced that a PAL flight had just arrived. Leah heard it said, "Well, it's good to see you. I gotta run now."

Leandro stood as she did. "This'll not be the last meeting, I hope?"

Leah smiled and said, "Let's see."



The news about the Mars mission had spread faster than wildfire and caused so much obsession. Local televisions and newspapers in the Philippines allotted longer airtime and longer columns on covering the whole event, and radio stations talked about it more than any events in the recent local history. It was the very first time that a Filipino would take off into the outer space.

Donald missed no coverage on the news, and collected clips and pictures from the newspapers. He had quit his job as a secondary Computer teacher in a state school, not because he had lost his passion but because his illness had weaken his arms and legs.

But even so, he had found another passion on which he poured most of his time. That afternoon he went to the park and observed the progress, and he went home early this evening with a more lighter feeling. Now he was sitting on his parent's house facing the television, watching the ongoing replay about the takeoff.

The news program had taken a break when the phone rang. He had a hard time walking across the living room to answer it. He picked it up on the ninth ring.

"Hello?" he was breathing hard when he spoke.

"Donald?" came the voice. It was Leah. "Is that you?"

"Yeah," he struggled. "It's me."

"What happened to your voice?"

"Nothing. Just got a hoarse voice."

"You've seen the news?"

"Uh-huh," he said. "Watched it just a while ago." He paused to breathe. He was having difficulty speaking lately. He wondered if the disease had already invaded the muscles used for speech.

"We've met, accidentally, at the L.A. airport last February," she reported.

"Ah, on his way to Tokyo," he said it affirmatively.

"Yes," she said. "He told you that we've met?"

"No. He hasn't called yet. How is he?"

"He seems haggard, but he's good. He's a grown man now."

He cleared his throat. It was dry; he needed water. "You see each other again after that?"

Leah hesitated. "Yeah, four or five times I think."

Donald said nothing.

"I'll be coming home in May. My vacation request was granted," she said. "And Leandro said he will be coming, too."

Donald felt suddenly elated. "Wonderful."



Phoemela, Leandro's youngest sister, after she passed the licensure exam for Physical Therapists, decided to focus her services to the patients in the rural areas of the province. She would be driving from one town to another to visit and give home-based therapies, mostly to injured patients and sometimes to those who suffered from strokes. It was her first case to attend a patient with motor neuron patient. And it was not just another patient; it was her brother's best friend.

Donald couldn't stand by himself anymore; his illness had partially shutdown his feet and arms. It turned out that the disease was more aggressive and rapid than it was expected. And the doctors were helpless, yet Phoemela was not giving up hope on him as much as he was not giving up on himself.

He was on a wheelchair when she arrived. Before she started the session, Donald held her arm lightly and spoke with much difficulty, delivering those words almost by syllable. "You told him?"

Phoemela shook her head. "I made a promise to you. I can't break a promise."

"Good."

"How are your parents?"

Phoemela carefully and slowly stretched his legs. "They're fine. They said to give their best regards to you."

"You're all been good to me."

She looked up at him and said, "Because to us you're more of a family."

"They told him?"

"No. They won't tell."

"Good."

She and her family respected him and what he had asked from them. They might had not understood why, but they did not bother to know. Even if it means breaking the heart of their own Leandro, a promise made was a promise kept.

After the session she offered to take him back to his room. When they were inside, she noticed a picture hanged on the wall. It was the same to one of those pictures his brother had sent them five days ago. It was a picture of the outer space in all its grandeur. The same picture they had in their house was a 4R size. The one she saw right now was blown into an 8"x10" and beautifully framed.



Saturday night on the third week of October. They were sitting on a garden in a fine restaurant in Las Vegas. It was the first time they had met after he arrived from his month-long space travel. He'd been so busy in the first two weeks after his team had arrived, and she had been to Asia and Europe in the third week.

"We'll be having a ball this second Friday of December. It's a big event," Leah said, changing the topic. "I want you to come with me."

Leandro stopped eating and looked at her. "Are you sure it's OK?"

"Actually, we are supposed to be bringing with us our spouses," she looked down at her food and continued, "or partners."

"Oh," Leandro said, "Sure."

"You're not busy?"

Leandro sliced a small amount of meat from the spare rib. "I don't recall an appointment for that day."

"It will be held in San Francisco. And it's far, you know, given the fact that you're in Houston."

"It's fine. It's no big deal."

Leah smiled and thanked him.

Their conversation drifted two or three more topics, when Leah talked about Donald.

"I've called him in mid-August, the day after the takeoff," Leah said after taking a sip from a glass of wine. "I told him you'll be coming for the fiesta."

Leandro went silent for a moment and when he spoke again. "It's not that I'm perturbed by it or something, but I've noticed that every time we sit and talk we always have a line about him. And I'm not being rude. He's my friend."

"Because I'm worried about him."

"What do you mean you're worried?"

"He sounded not OK, but he's not saying anything. I called home and my mother said he's sick or something. You have to call him, Leandro."



Late that night he sent her to her room in the hotel. They were there at the door standing face to face, saying nothing. When she stared back at him, something urged him to kiss her. He slowly moved closer to her, and she met him halfway and close her eyes as they kissed. When they parted their lips, she was still closing her eyes while he was looking down, unsure of what he might hear from her after such act.

When he heard no word from her, he said, "Good night, Leah."

"Good night," she replied softly. As he was walking away toward his room, she was still there at the door leaning against it.



When he called Donald the following day, his friend's mother, Mrs. Ricarda Gulle, answered the phone.

"Is he alright?"

Mrs. Gulle was silent for a moment. "He's fine. He's just tired."

"I've heard something's wrong with his voice."

"Oh, don't worry about it. It's nothing."

"Please tell him I called."

"Sure, I'll tell him," she said.

"Do you think he's all stressed out by his job?"

She went silent again. "He's --- not working anymore. He quit his job."

Leandro was purely surprised. "What? Why? When?"

"It was his decision, and we respect whatever he thinks is best for him. But don't worry, he's fine."



When they arrived at the venue that Friday night on the second week of December, the guests were stunned to see the most famous Filipino man coming in. He was one of their own, and people gathered around him extending hands and exchanging smiles.

Leah walked beside him as they waded through the crowd in gowns and tuxedos, until they had reached the table where they were to be seated. As they approached the table, an elegant woman in black who was talking to a woman and two men, more likely guests, turned around to face them. And by the time he saw her, his world suddenly stopped revolving. It was Remma.

Leah was not surprised at all, in fact, she was expecting to see her there. She knew sometime in September that Remma worked in an affiliate office in San Francisco as a Marketing Director, and learned that the event was organized mainly by her office. Remma was with the company for a long time now, but she didn't knew about because she'd never been to San Francisco and Remma had been using a different surname. As a matter of fact, this was their very first encounter.

On the other hand, Remma was completely abashed. Like the rest of the people that night, she had not expected to see him there. She followed every story that had spread across the country about him, partly because she was his friend and partly because something deep within her told her to. She admired how far her friend had gone to reach his once childish dream. And now he was walking toward her, he and his living dream. But her mind still couldn't think of the most plausible reason why he was there.



In the gardens outside the hotel, the two of them sat side by side on a metal outdoor bench. There seemed to be two different worlds that were revolving that night: the hubbub of voices and music inside the hotel, and the stillness of the night around them outside. Leah had excused herself to give them time to talk and keep up with each other.

"We've been trying to reach you. It's been a very long time and you haven't even called us," Leandro heard himself ask.

"I was running away from a past that's been too harsh for me," Remma answered.

"The same past that I had?"

"No. Lean," Remma turned her head toward him but couldn't look at him. "I was married."

Leandro wasn't sure if he could let those words in. He wasn't sure if his heart was drowning again or shattering. Or numb. "How come you never told us about it?"

"It was a mistake, OK? It was one of those stupid things I've done. I suffered so much, and so desperate to be all over it. I was so confused and moving without direction. I was so dumb and stupid. But I guess love makes you dumb sometimes," she said, sulking. "I was just trying to bring myself back together."

"When you called me back then, and told me you can't come home," Leandro said, recalling that very day she first called him. "Was that because ---"

Remma nodded.

Leandro looked away.

"Lean, I was so scared. I was too weak to tell you because I know I would only break you," she reasoned as she rubbed her hands subconsciously over her knees. "And it was too hard for me to give up Donald."

"You broke me when you told me you don't love me. Why didn't just drop it all?"

Remma couldn't think of a reason. "I've been causing so much misery to myself to those people around me. I don't know what to do anymore."

Silence.

"How are things turning up for you now?" Leandro asked.

"That part of me is completely behind me now. Things are OK now, I guess," she said, wiping her tears as she was composing herself. "Although sometimes I think that I have already gone this far but still couldn't figure out what I really want to do with my life. And sometimes I push myself to turn around and look back at the things behind me, looking for the things that I've done significant enough to justify why I'm here, or why I still exist."

"We all come to that at some points in our lives. I am sure that, like most people, you're gonna find them...what you're looking for."

"No. I couldn't, and I thought that perhaps I never would. But then I saw you on TV. And before I knew it I see you everywhere. I see you in my mind. And whenever I see you, something inside is starting to come alive. And everything that's troubling me, all those uncertainties, they're gone. Things suddenly changed, Leandro. And I don't know why," Remma uttered. "And now you're here."

Leandro pondered on what she was saying. "You still have that feeling for Donald?"

"No. I couldn't understand it, too. But it just disappeared over time."

"Perhaps you still love him after all. You saw him through me. When you see me, you are looking into your past. And they're getting clear again. And maybe that's what make things so different now."

"No, no," Remma shook her head as she stood and walked a few steps away. "There's just this something else that came rushing in recently, stirring me. It's something beyond explanation, something strange."

"Remma---"

"At first I thought they're making no sense at all. But now---I think I do," she paused as she thought about what she had just said, and then turned around to face him. "Yeah, I think I do."

"What is it?" Leandro asked.

"I think I'm falling in love with you."

"That's crazy," Leandro said, unbelieving. All this time those were the very words he'd been longing to hear from her. All this time he refused to believe that she didn't love him at all because he knew somehow she would learn to love him back. And this was what he had really wanted her to feel for him. And now that he heard her say it, he wondered why he didn't feel completely happy. He still felt incomplete. And now, deep inside him, he began to question his own feelings for her.

"I know. But it's this crazy thing that makes me feel sane and human."

"Look, Rem, you're just being impulsive and confused. You're just bluffing."

"I'm not bluffing," she insisted. She walked back to him and kneeled before him. She held him in the face with both her hands and guided him to look at her. "Leandro, look at me in the eyes and tell me you still love me. Tell me you're still in love with me. It's not late for everything. It's never too late, Leandro. You're right, you couldn't just wake one day and say you love someone. And I know it's absurd that it took me this long to realize that I'm in love with you."

Leandro couldn't understand his own emotion. They were rising and whirling altogether inside him again, screaming and fighting at each other, needing to be heard, needing to be clearly heard.

"Leandro, do you still love me?"

Deep inside him he was measuring how deep was his feelings for her. But after a short silence, Leandro heard himself said, "I don't know."

"Search your heart for me," Remma said, begging.

"All these years I've been hoping that one day I could find you and see you again. It's what's been encouraging me to keep going. I thought I could make you love me, and now you do," he paused, searching again for something inside him, something he needed to know to understand his own feelings for her. Then he looked at her and said, "But it's all gone. It all fade away. I don't love you anymore."

He stood up and was about to walk away when Remma held him in his arm and made him face her. And almost instantly she kissed him hungrily and longingly on his lips and stayed there for a long while. But she felt nothing but his cold, unresponsive lips and a lifeless kiss.



Leah was standing quietly at the threshold, looking out into the gardens and into the two of them. She didn't even recognized the beauty of the gardens or the sparkling of the lights. She saw them kissing and, before they parted their lips, she turned away and walked inside until she was lost in a sea of people in merriment.



Back in the garden, she was still kissing him. When their lips parted, Leandro closed his eyes. He was certain those feelings for her had died inside that he didn't even notice it was gone. And when he was searching for an answer, his heart finally shouted the emotion that his heart wanted him to hear. And this time he listened. He knew the answer clearly now. Yes, he loved someone. But not Remma.

When he opened his eyes he said, "I'm sorry. I have to go."

He walked away to find the woman that his heart was fighting for.



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