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Friday, March 29, 2024

Waiting for an Angel

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When I was in college I moved into a dorm in Manila to get closer to the school I'd been attending. The dorm was nothing to write home about, but it was near this pub serving cold beer and tasty food, and it was called Pit Stop. It was right across from a cinema, and once I turned regular I noticed that the other guests were mostly white-collar workers: men who walked in to down a few bottles before heading home.

I also noticed this middle-aged gentleman who sat at a table near the kitchen”•a table that seemed to be reserved for him. He sat and drank alone, and I soon learned from a waiter that, indeed, the table was his. He dropped by around 6 p.m., brought there in his car by his driver, and around nine the driver returned to pick him up and take him home. He was in the pub every day except Sunday, when someone put his table and chair somewhere else.

I showed up around 7 p.m. after my last subject, and if I happened to sit at a table near his I'd see him reading a book, and from time to time peering outside or surveying the scene within as if expecting to see someone he'd been waiting to see for a long time. After failing to see who it was he was looking for he'd go back to his book, but he'd soon repeat the ritual.

Eventually he and a few other regulars became nodding acquaintances. And one Friday night when the place was full we got to know each other. He waved to me to join him after seeing me looking for a place to sit down, and then he asked the floor manager”•he called him Sam”•to ply us with food and beer.

He asked me to drop the "sir" when addressing him and to call him Danny, Danny Olaguer; I asked him to call me Rene, Rene Ibañez. He'd been reading Ernest Hemingway's The Sun Also Rises before pausing to ask me to join him. He said he liked Hemingway for his tough and terse prose, but his wife Doris was partial to Chekhov and John Steinbeck. He said he and Doris were English majors, and when I told him I was taking up journalism he said our courses were "cousins."

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That night he became more and more animated as we discussed English and American literature. Later, recalling his wife's partiality to Steinbeck, I said I'd read only one book by him so far”•East of Eden”•and that I thought it was brilliant. He agreed; he said he couldn't wait to tell Doris about it.

After that night he always invited me to join him once he saw me in the pub. He insisted on paying for everything, and once, when I protested, he said I could pay for one bottle of beer and that would be as good as paying for half of what we owed.

He asked a few questions about me and volunteered a few things about himself, but he was curious about my studies”•especially my English classes”•and the books we were assigned to read and to discuss in class. We took to discussing books and authors, and as he had read more books than I had he contributed more to our conversations than I did.

As I had observed early on he always took a book with him, and in the course of our meetings I saw him bring over titles that he said were absolute marvels. Those included Truman Capote's Music for Chameleons and In Cold Blood, Graham Greene's The Quiet American and The Human Factor, Tim O'Brien's Going After Cacciato and The Things They Carried, Raymond Chandler's The Big Sleep, Kazuo Ishiguro's The Remains of the Day, and John Le Carré's The Spy Who Came in from the Cold. Still, he always went back to Hemingway, and one book by the author that he always brought with him was his short stories. He said he wanted to write short stories, and in Hemingway's style.

Despite his enthusiasm for our discussions he kept to his ritual of peering outside and surveying the scene within for that someone he appeared to be waiting for. Impatient, I eventually asked him who it was he was looking for after telling him it was obvious he was expecting to see someone.

"Is it obvious?" he said.

"Yes."

He sighed; then he studied the table for about a minute before looking up.

"I'm waiting for an angel. I've been waiting for him for two years now." 

I said nothing and waited.

Forty-three years ago, he said, when he and his pregnant wife were both 21, he took her to this government hospital a few meters from Pit Stop to deliver their first child. They chose the hospital because they had no money. He said the hospital would, years later, be known as the baby factory, and for attracting thousands of indigent pregnant women who went there to pop because they didn't have the money to go to a private hospital.

While his wife was in labor he went down and walked into Pit Stop for a beer. He only had a few pesos to spare and was about to order a second bottle when a man selling sweepstakes tickets approached his table and urged him to buy some, saying he could get lucky.

He'd been planning to have three bottles, but he changed his mind when the man came over and then wondered if Doris wanted him back. He bought four tickets with the same numbers, settled his bill and went back to the hospital, where Doris soon gave birth to a boy.

Two days later they went back to the small room they'd been renting while working for a kitchen producing food for delivery to offices, schools and dormitories. A kindly woman in her 50s owned the kitchen and she liked them, but regretted they were overqualified for the work they were doing.

Danny almost forgot about the tickets, but a week after they returned home he found them inserted in Hemingway's book of short stories. He took the tickets to a ticket seller's booth, and he almost went into shock on learning he'd won a lot of money.

Doris cried when he told her the news. Their employer wished them the best after hearing about their good fortune, and then she told them she could sell them her business if they wanted.

They did buy the business and hired Mrs. Alvarez, the owner, as manager and adviser. They also retained the staff and hired more people as the business grew. Then one day Mrs. Alvarez suggested they buy a successful pig farm north of Manila that her older brother owned and they did, and likewise retained her brother's services. Both businesses thrived, and later they went into the food canning business to serve more customers.

Twenty years after he and his wife went into business Danny was a millionaire many times over. And after 20 years, at the ripe old age of 41, he decided to look for his angel”•the man who sold him the winning tickets”•to do right by him.

"Two years is a long time to be waiting for someone who may never come," I said.

"I know, but I'll keep waiting till he comes."

"You don't have to come here, you know. You can just pay someone to look out for him to tell him where to find you."

"I've done that. I've told Sam about it and he's now watching out for him. He's also alerted his waiters to do the same. You see, I like this place; I like coming here because it was here that my life was changed for the better. I'd like to see this guy to share my good fortune with him”•to invite him and his family if he has one”•to come live with us in comfort."

I KEPT coming over to the pub, but after about a year I moved to a dorm just across from my school”•a dorm I shared with two of my classmates. I told Danny I was moving out two weeks before I left the old dorm, and he wished me luck and asked me to drop by as often as I could.

I did visit the pub quite regularly after moving out of the old dorm, but soon I fell to joining my classmates in this pub not far from the new dorm. I stopped going to Pit Stop.

After two years, however, after graduation and before packing up to rejoin my parents at home south of Manila, I decided it was time to revisit the old pub to see Danny”•if he was still there”•to find out if he'd finally met his angel.

One of the waiters who opened the door for me, who knew me, smiled and asked me to go near the kitchen, where he said he'd bring a table and chair for me. He left and returned with two more waiters carrying a table and a chair, which they set up where Danny used to sit. I then wondered aloud where Sam was, and one of them said his replacement would soon come to meet me.

"Hello. You must be Rene," a pretty woman in her thirties said to me after approaching my table.

"Yes, ma'am."

"I'm Sally. Please enjoy yourself. Ask for anything. Everything will be on the house."

"Thanks, ma'am. Where's Danny?"

"He's not here, but he left a letter for you. Let me go get it."

Miss Sally had beer and food sent to me before coming over to hand me a letter in an envelope that she said had been waiting for me for three-and-a-half years. I quickly opened the envelope.

Rene: It's just too bad that you left me no number to reach you, and I didn't have the presence of mind to give you mine in case I wanted us to meet. I guess I felt indecisive, and maybe because, as you said once, two years is a long time to be waiting for someone who may never come.

I've found my angel. His name is Ric, and he's sixty. He walked into the pub about two-and-a-half years after you stopped showing up, and he had quite a story to tell.

It turns out he's an orphan with no siblings or known relatives. He stopped selling sweepstakes tickets about five years after he sold me the winning numbers. He used to shelter in this car dealership owned by a kind man, and one day the man, a Mr. Suarez, asked him to be some sort of caretaker and paid him handsomely. He enjoyed his undemanding work, but 18 years later Mr. Suarez died and his eldest son took over”•and then sent him packing.

He moved into a hovel owned by an old friend who earned a living shining shoes. He went back to selling sweepstakes tickets.

I told him to hop into the car when my driver showed up, then I asked him to take me to where he lived. He cried when I told his friend Rod to pack his belongings because I was also taking him. He said Rod was his only friend and as down and out as he was, and he thanked me for my generosity. They both cried when I introduced them to my parents, to Doris' parents and to our children Mike, Fred and Dolly. They're family now.

We can't wait for you to come and talk about the old times. Ric and Rod are also anxious to meet you.

Danny.

P.S. Please do come. We'll have a party. We'll send a car for you if you call any of the numbers I've listed here. Or you can drop by Pit Stop and Sally”•Miss Rodriguez”•will be happy to bring you over. 

Doris can't wait to discuss East of Eden with you, and I can't wait to show you the six short stories I've written so far.
 

Mr. Barrioquinto is a former associate editor and now editorial consultant for Manila Standard.

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