Kara the gatekeeper

Monday, September 26, 2005

“May sakit si ate. She can’t go
out tonight.” The little girl peering through the gate says dismissively. She wipes
a smear of chocolate from her mouth and takes another bite from the bar of Nestle
crunch in her hand.

I stood in front of this house in Santa Mesa Heights face to face with
the enemy and surprisingly, I have met my match in this five year old girl
wearing a Spongebob squarepants shirt. In the past, I have squared off with
older brothers, shot the crap with crabby fathers while withstanding “Don’t
even think about fucking my daughter” looks darted at me. But five year old
little girls? Jesus, this could get messy.

“Oh really? Why not?” I ask flashing a smile that teeters between sarcastic
and threatening.

The little girl just stands there and mulls over the situation. She
filches glances at my Red Civic parked across the street and bites off another
block from her chocolate bar.

“Ampanget ng kotse mo eh.” She
said casually.

I find her answer really funny; I mean motherfucker, this kid’s a blast.
If she doesn’t puff out from chocolate overload by the time she turns eighteen,
man oh man, her panty is going to be hard to get into.

“Tell you what, what if I give you this; do you think ate would go out with me?” I said
holding a bag of Hershey’s cookies and cream nuggets.

She just stands there and runs that one over. She wipes her smudged
fingers on her shirt; she’s actually considering my proposal. The cogwheels
inside her sugar-rushed five year-old brain are ticking—“More chocolates, ugly ’99
civic, chubby guy wearing a muscle shirt that looks awful on him, weird looking
hair due to hair wax applied a little too liberally. He smells funky too, is
that Fahrenheit? Hmmm, this could work!” She takes the bag of chocolates
through an opening between the bars of the gate and shifts her glance back to
the open door behind her.

“Ate Kat!? There’s someone
looking for you!” She called out.

“Kara! Who’s there?” A
voice yells back from somewhere inside the house.

Kara opens the gate and
rushes back into the house leaving the front door open. I step into the yard and
stood in front of the already open door which feels really weird. A whiff of
the ‘Home aroma’ greets me. I don’t know if anybody else notices this but every
house has this unique scent going on. Don’t laugh but I actually wrote a term
paper on this subject for my social science class back in UERM. I couldn’t
remember why, but being the notorious procrastinator that I am, I probably
wrote it with alcohol and marijuana from a weekend party holding my hand. My
professor, Dr. Caguisano gave me a flat 1 with a really nice comment written
below the last page: “Stop doing drugs. And stop masturbating in the fire exit
during lunch time.”

I wasn’t doing drugs
dammit; masturbating in the fire exit, yes, but drugs? Come on. Seriously, I
find the entire ‘House Aroma’ phenomenon really interesting. Don’t you ever
wonder where the scent comes from? Old wooden furniture? Chemicals from
cleaning products maybe? Soap? Semen?

Kat’s house smells
amazingly pleasant and amicable. There are houses that smell like burning pubic
hair but this one really smells welcoming.

A couple of minutes pass
before Kat came to the door to welcome me and boy did she look great. Shoulder-length
straight hair. Form-fitting white shirt with a butterfly print on it. Petite
but curvy—no; very curvy.

She stood there in the
doorway smiling. “Hi Mike!” She says combing her hair. This could be good; I
can feel that there’s no first date nervousness going on between either of us.
A good sign indeed.

“Hi Kat; sorry it took me
a while to find your place. It has been years since I’ve last been around this
neighborhood.” I said, leaning in to give her a peck on the cheek, which, is
something I probably shouldn’t have done because after that we just sort of
stood there grinning at each other like retards.

“Nice earrings by the
way. Where did you get them?” I ask, trying to end the awkwardness.

“Thank you. I got them
for fifty pesos in a Tiangge.”

“Cool.” What the fuck
Mike?! Did you just say ‘Cool’?

“So you met Kara?” She
asks me.

“Yeah! Your sister’s a
blast I tell you. Which reminds me Kat, I bought you chocolates but from the look
of things earlier, I wasn’t going to get past Kara so I bribed her with it.” I said trying to be cute.

“Haha thanks; yeah I
thought I saw her run in holding a bag of something. I apologize for her Mike;
Kara scared the last guy I was supposed to go out with before I even realized
he was here.” She says.

“Well obviously, that
last guy didn’t bring any chocolates, cheap bastard.”

She laughed hard at that.
Kat has this weird laugh; it’s the sort of laugh that would stand out when you
let it out even in the noisiest of places.

She grabs her handbag,
throws her jacket over her shoulders and we start walking down the front path.
What to do, what to do? Be chivalrous and offer to carry her bag for her? Open
the passenger door of my car for her? But I figured that there might be a
chance that she’s one of those bleeding heart feminist types so I decided
against any of those. Instead, I just walk around her side and sort of ushered
her in which is a pretty stupid thing to do come to think of it.

We were off to a good
start if you ask me. We’re still cracking jokes and laughing as I drop to
reverse and back out of their street. Kat’s already playing with my car stereo
and checking out the contents of my glove compartment.

I wave to Kara as we
drive away. She’s peering out one of the house’s bay windows.

She sticks her tongue out
at me.