On Sincerity and Honesty

They say that people you love the most are the most capable of hurting you. This is really true for me, it has happened and is happening to me now. "She" has been my girl ever since. Being the eldest and the only girl in our family has me wanting to have a baby sister to share all the girly staff with. She's the cousin who doesn't have any sibling - the real unica hija, the spoiled little princess who doesn't have anybody to play with. I have always been summoned to their house for weekend sleepovers so she'll have someone for company. I, of course, willingly obliged. I so loved the idea of spending some quality time with my cousins. (My other cousins were our neighbors so I get to play with them everyday - while she, on the other hand, lives on a different part of town with only a yaya to take care of her). And spending weekends at their house has plenty of benefits, someone to play with is one, then there's the free use of their Nintendo all day long, boardg ames, food and also playing with our distant cousin Ryan Neil Malto (w/c we have to climb over the bakod (to the other side of the village) so that we can play with him and/or ransack the fruits of their kamias tree.

It was safe to say that we have a very close relationship. There are times when I wasn't able to visit her, we would write each other letters (Those were the times that cellphones are not uso yet and PLDT have not reached Sitio Maligaya)

I don’t know how it happened, but as we grow older, we have slowly drifted apart. To be fair to her, she’s doing all her best to keep in touch – she being the more thoughtful one. She would make kulit so that I would meet her somewhere in Glorietta.

But now, things have really changed. It has started with her text, apologizing for making me envious when we were young. Because she felt that she has a more “fantabulous” childhood than mine. Perhaps she’s right, she has everything that she wants – materially. Her parent’s has given her all that she asks and all that she needs. I wouldn’t blame her for that for she’s an only child. For I believe that all those things given to her make up for all those times that her parents are not at home with her. Maybe that’s how she gauges happiness. While I, on the other hand, has long learned that materials things – alone - can never make you happy. I may not have that “fantabulous” childhood as she puts it, but I do have a FRUITFULL one. A childhood that I have been able to share with my mom, dad and baby brothers, a childhood that made me able to play with a lot of friends of my age, a childhood that has brought me closer to my tito’s and tita’s and my cousins, and most of all, a childhood full of memories and fun and laughter. And to me, at the end of the day, those things have made my childhood a lot more fantastic and fabulous to any degree.

But, It doesn’t really matter which childhood is fantabulous or fruitful. What hurt me the most is the knowledge that she has not been fully honest with me. All the while, I have been thinking and believing that she’s asking for me to stay with her because she truly, really and beyond doubt loves to be with me – the favorite cousin. Looking back now, it means that she has not been sharing all her toys because she just wants someone to play with but because she was just showing the off to me?

Ganon pala kababa ang tingin nya sa akin... And, I really believed that she’s sincere. How stupid of me....