It was an early morning of the early days of December. The dawn was yet to be seen. It was freezing cold inside the bus that would take me from Nueva Ecija to Manila. Apparently, the passengers in front of me and at my back, directed the cool wind flowing through the ports of the bus’ air conditioner located above them, towards me. They just wanted to be spared from the biting cold at my expense. Never mind, this can be a little opportunity. It’s December, and thus in her country, Winter was already covering everything with her frosty embrace. It’s colder there. I shall endure this cold for her. I shall offer this for her. Is it possible? to make something like a deal that you shall endure one thing in order for the other to experience that thing less? or for that other to even be spared from suffering from such thing? Some people believe in it. Some people say that it cannot be. But I still endured the coldness. There’s hope that it can be true, and it is more than enough.

Nightly roadside sceneries blurred as the bus passed them by. Seemingly empty houses can be also seen. Usually, I enjoy wondering what it was like living in each of those houses and with those people living in it, or even around it. Music streamed from my phone towards my ears. The light vibration and hum of the bus can lull one to sleep along with the cold. I unlocked my phone to view at four distinct yet somehow same things. I got drowsy or dreamy rather. Even if I always do this every Saturday for my study in the graduate school, I cannot seem to get really used to waking up early. And before I fell asleep, a screeching noise reached my ears. It can be either a woman’s scream, or the sound of wheels grinding the road for a sudden halt of a vehicle. 

Either, may mean death.