“Whu-hu-hu-Who gave you my phone?” Kate repeated the question.

“Whu-hu-hu… Are you an owl?” her mother said, mocking her. “Speak properly and clean up this mess. Don’t think for a minute that you can play hooky today. Now that you’re here, for once can you please make your bed and pick up these things? Honestly, how can you live like this? And how is it possible that all your stuff is on the floor!”

“Ma!” Kate cried out. “This is important! What did the boy look like?”

Her ma was a bit stunned by the urgency in her voice.

“Like I said, a good kid but not very neat. A bit of an average Juan. Definitely polite. Why? What does it matter? Is he your boyfriend. Huh? Huh?”

“Maybe,” Kate answered, then corrected herself: “No. I’m back to being single.”

“Is this the reason why you’re at home and not at school, Rapunzel Kate Lapuz?”

Kate didn’t answer.

Here’s the nub, Mrs. Lapuz thought to herself.

“You haven’t introduced your boyfriend to me yet and you’re already broken up?” Mrs. Lapuz said, sounding more sensitive, before changing the topic. “Why, when I was your age I had long courtships and relationships before I ended one. And I had plenty of suitors, too. There was this one guy who…”

“Ma!” Kate whined. “I don’t wanna hear about your past relationships. I just wanna think pa is your first and only love, OK?”

“Well, I gotta be honest that he wasn’t. I was popular,” her ma said. Then, seeing Kate’s half-disgusted expression, she said: “Oh all right! But honestly! Did I raise you in a barn? When was the last time you cleaned this room? There could be snakes crawling in –”

“Was he tangible?” Kate asked in a whisper.

“What?” Her ma heard the question perfectly but she just had to ask. She had known for a long time her daughter was sometimes weird, but it could be very taxing. And today was not a good day because earlier her husband had talked her into letting Kate be absent from school. She felt as though her daughter had pulled a fast one on her, and her patience was wearing thin.

“Tangible,” Kate repeated. “Did you touch him?”

“OF COURSE NOT!” Mrs. Lapuz screamed. “Why should I? Do you want me to go to jail for child molestation or something? What’s gotten into you? Did you hear a word I said?”

Kate became tight-lipped. Her lips were literally a thin slit on her face, which was still as white as a sheet. Her eyes were saucer-wide as they took in the unholy vision of her resurrected phone. But her stomach spoke for her. To be precise, it growled.

“Harump!” her ma interjected. “At least your stomach has a brain. Get changed and have lunch with me. You’re wearing your uniform three days early for school.”

Mrs. Lapuz left the room and stomped down the wooden stairs. Lunch sounded—and smelled—like a great idea. Kate thought she’d put off getting changed till after lunch. Partly it was because she was starving, but mostly it was because her closet was at the head of the bed and near the ghost phone.

She slowly stood and walked to the door, not taking her big eyes off the gadget and making sure to give it the widest berth possible. In case it leapt up to her face or something. She already had one foot out the door when her phone beeped to notify her of an SMS.

Kate screamed and ran down the stairs.

****

After having lunch and taking a shower, Kate felt rejuvenated and was back to her sane, or at least reasonable, self. The first thing she did was boot up her laptop, which was blue, its lid smothered with puppy, volleyball and witty stickers. Before it, she had had a clunky PC but she had saved up working part-time at the diner where her ma also worked. Every day after school, for most of her junior high years, she bussed tables and washed dishes. She also bought portable Bluetooth speakers from CD-R King with her hard-earned moolah.

The second thing she did was start ‘7 Rings’ on Spotify before moving on to Facebook, the most enduring social media platform in the Philippines. She had a ton of PMs from Lor, Dion and the Bali Girls (which was what her besties called their small clique who had bonded over volleyball). She avoided these private messages because once seen, they couldn’t be unseen and, if left unanswered, tended to acquire the urgency of a live grenade, especially between couples and girls. She just had to content herself with looking at the notifications and previews while taking care not to click them. They were probably all the same anyway, just asking how she was: superfluous clones of the text messages on her phone.

Speaking of which, she had made peace with her back-from-beyond-the-grave phone. In fact, it was now getting charged on her bed after she had picked it up like a radioactive mutant fish.

Now that she thought about it, it was possible for someone to go down to the creek, get her phone and then deliver it to her ma. It would’ve been extremely hard but humanly possible. It was actually also incredibly sweet. But till she found out who her real-life guardian angel was, the act would just have to remain unsung and ghosty.

It could either be Dion, or Josh trying to win you back, her heart theorized. Those are the only guys who: A. Know who your mom is and where she works and B. Know your number and can ring your phone to know where you dumped it.

Seriously? her brain said. Just stick to what you're good at, heart, and leave all the fact vs. opinion sorting to the pro. Dion I can understand, but that jerk Josh is the reason that phone got thrown in the first place and why we’re in this gigantic mess. Stop defending him and putting a halo on his head. He’s never gonna change. Once a devil always a devil!

Look, her heart said gently. There’s no direct evidence that Josh was the guy Bernadette was making out with on the call. For all we know, it could just be the Super Glue’s ploy to drive Kate and Josh farther apart.

God you’re stupid, her brain said. I told you from the start Josh is no good for Kate. He’s nothing but trouble. A trash wannabe gangster.

No, he isn’t, her heart said.

Yes, he is.

Is not!

Is too!

Shut up, heart! Kate screamed inwardly. Her heart sort of deflated while her brain blew a raspberry. I followed you the last time and look where it got us. God, I just wanna reach twelfth grade and graduate without becoming a social pariah or effing up my future. Now I can’t even step out to the porch without feeling eyes on me. How do you suppose I’m gonna face everybody on Monday?

Everybody literally meant the entire school. The problem was probably not as serious as she thought, but at the rate of how rumors spread in high school, Kate knew she wasn’t just being paranoid. She heard her speakers go blip blip buzz buzz and she thought that her schoolmates’ phones were probably blasting away about her right that instant, but since she was the main topic, she was out of the loop. She could almost feel the invisible transmissions zipping past over her head.