C7: Evangeline

I signed in to my email to check for updates – probably a message from my boss giving me the workloads for today or probably from my subscriptions. I've always loved learning, which is why I subscribed to the newsletters of my favorite blogs and followed some YouTube channels that fit my line of interests – one of those is cooking, designing, drawing, and painting.

As I browse my email, I saw an unexpected message from my father.

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Elliot Perez:

Hello, dear daughter. It's been a while since we last talked. I'll be straight to the point: I miss your mother, and I want to look after her for some time. That will, however, will cause you to go here in the Philippines to look after our restaurant business. That said, I want us to switch places temporarily, or even for good and I want us to live together here.

I know that you have a life there – you have an apartment, a job, friends and a boyfriend. But I hope that you'll accept my offer. I'm getting old, and I can no longer stand the idea that our family is broken. I believe you've grown enough, and the person who wanted to harm you before is now gone.

This favor I'm asking will be sacrificial, but I guarantee you that once you move here, you'll have a decent job of handling the small business and continue selling your paintings in some art galleries or clients. I hope that you'll grant this small favor that I'm asking you. Temporarily, I want you to go here, and I'll visit your mother there and take care of her. I'll be using your apartment as my temporary residence. Once she's discharged, we're going to live there for good. Think about it.

Have a good day.

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He wants me to resign and handle the business. Move out eventually from North Carolina. Dad wants us to live in the Philippines. All of those said, it also means that I'll be separated from Justin. THAT'S the hardest part. I can't imagine being in a long-distance relationship. I don't even know if that works. You'll never know what a person can do when you're far away. I mean, it's not that I don't trust him, but it's just … hard.

Imagining it alone is already upsetting, but being there temporarily will buy me time to decide on everything. Even before dad mentioned that he wants me to resign, I'm already considering that since they no longer pay fairly. I worked there for 3 years and the workloads are getting heavy, but my salary isn't increasing. Sometimes it makes me think that it's no longer worth the effort.

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"Hi, Ms. Emma. I have a letter for you," I put my letter on Ms. Emma's desk, but before opening it, she looked at me, her eyes narrowed.

"Before anything else, what is this about?" she asked.

"Oh, I … it's a resignation letter. I wrote the details there. Don't get me wrong, Ms. Emma. I truly enjoyed my job here as your fashion designer and graphic artist but my father needs me to handle our business in the Philippines. The rest are in that letter."

Ms. Emma read the entire letter and paused, perhaps articulating her thoughts on how she'll respond to my letter.

"Alright. Give me four weeks."

"Thanks. I'll inform my dad about that." As I turned my back to leave, she added something that made me stop doing so.

"Hana Evangeline," I turned to look at her. "Having you as an employee was something to be thankful of. I've seen that you're always giving your best, I see your optimistic attitude on everything, and as you can see, your level of energy is enough to lighten up the entire office. I hope that I'll find someone who's like you. It saddens me that you're leaving, but I do believe that family is important. It's the biggest reason why I'm letting you go easily."

I nodded as I leave, and it was kind of unexpected for me, because it's my first time to hear her using my first name, 'Hana.' Hardly anyone calls me that. It's not a big deal, but it simply felt weird.

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As I arrived home, I put my bag down on the sofa and headed to my favorite room in this house – my art room.

I held the cold knob and pushed the door open, and the strong scent of paints awakened my senses. The room is filled with some blank canvases, some with almost-done artworks, some finished paintings hanged on the wall, and a box full of paints of different colors and brushes of different sizes. Some finished paintings have sticky notes above them, named after the person who bought that painting, with their contact numbers included. All the unsold ones are placed in the right corner, sorted according to sizes. Currently, I have four sold paintings waiting for pickup, twelve unsold ones and currently working on one.

My best friend Megan's birthday was just a few days ago, and she'll probably appreciate having a painting of herself. I painted her in a 16x24 canvas size – an artwork of her having a tea in a garden, wearing an 18th-century ball dress of a Victorian Duchess – the one with a white hat, blue floral printed ball gown with some touches of lace, matching it with a sapphire necklace and sapphire long earrings, with her facial expression stern. A cup of tea is between her fingers while she sits, and the garden is full of flowers of different kinds.

I remember her mentioning that she gets carried away often with the historical fiction books that she's reading, and is fascinated with shows and games set in history. I'm certain that she'll love this, but will surely laugh out loud. I'd be so honored to see her like that when I visit her for the first time a month from now.

The very idea of leaving this country has its pros and cons, but I'll need to find buyers of these unsold paintings within a month. One another thing that bothers me is how to tell Justin that I'll be leaving here for some time, or even for good. It's not like long-distance relationships won't work, but it's certainly hard to keep. There'll be this fact where you talk to that person in a different time of day – one who just woke up and one who's on his/her way to sleep (there'll be a 12-hour time difference between here and the Philippines), you'll talk to them via video call but not spend time next to them, sending gifts would be a hassle, and the last thing is this – if dad wants us to live there, where will Justin and I settle if we'll get married in the future?

I no longer know what to think. I have a month to tell him about the major adjustments, but at the same time, I don't want to hear anything from him.

I ran my fingers in my hair, my mind filled with different possibilities and options of decisions to choose from. I can't help but shout.

"Ugh … why am I sounding so foolish? It's completely illogical to not want to hear anything from someone who needs to be informed! What's wrong with me, really?!"

"Yeah, what's wrong?" I gasped as I hear the voice from behind. "Who needs to be informed about anything?"

I turned back to face him. Justin. Speak of the devil. He's the last person I'm expecting to meet this day, right this very moment.

"How did you get in?" I asked.

"You left the door open, so I went in. I'm here because," his eyes are filled with sorrow. At least in my opinion. "I need to talk to you."

Now that he's here, I think it's pointless to keep everything to myself. Justin needs to know everything.

"Actually, it's good that you're here because I want to tell you something, too."

"You go first," we said in chorus. He looked away, as if articulating his thoughts on how to spill the beans.

"I think it's best if I'll go first, since I can't bear it any longer," I haven't heard anything from him, but something's definitely off about this. He isn't acting like his normal self, because this isn't the normal tone of the Justin I knew all these years.

Justin bit his lip and heaved a breath. The silence between us was loud enough to make me deaf. My chest feels like it's tightening with each second that passes.

"I love you, Eve. I really do," he began. "But I don't think I deserve you."

"What are you saying?"

Justin fell on his knees and he began stuttering, as if biting each word that he lets out.

"I … I found myself dating another woman. At first, I thought I was simply enjoying her company, like … as friends. But I was wrong. She's a new co-worker, and we eat out together, go to places together. Until she asked what I'm feeling for her. I told her that I have a girlfriend which is you, but even if I want to keep our relationship and get rid of her, it feels like I no longer deserve to be forgiven by you. I'm sorry."

My heart sank after hearing his explanation. I wanted to hold back my tears, but they kept on falling as I visualize the scenarios in my head.

Tears filled with disappointment, pain, and empathy. Justin wants to keep the relationship, yet he thinks that he betrayed me enough and he no longer deserves to be forgiven. What's good about this at least is, he's humble and honest enough to admit everything instead of letting me find it out first.

I couldn't find the right words to respond to his confession. My legs lost its strength little by little until it was weakened enough to make me fall to the ground, with Justin the same level as me.

"Justin Spencer, what are you implying? Are you breaking up with me?"

"No. I don't want to unless it'll come from you. I want to save our relationship, but I just feel like trash now, I don't think I deserve you. But now that I'm back to my senses, I'll stay away from her, and that's the main reason why I'm planning to resign. I promise not to do anything like that again. But I want to apologize for everything. I'm sorry Eve for hurting you."

"You're an honest person, and I thank you for that." I bit my lip as I decide if I should prioritize justice over mercy. "I'm not angry, but hurt. I can forgive you, but it's also necessary for you to forgive yourself. Is there anything else that I should know?"

"You make it sound too easy as if you have no idea how much I hate myself right now. What made me feel so bad was when we went to her house, saying that she wants to share what she cooked. She said that she'll change her clothes and …"

"And?"

"We didn't do anything like sleeping together or anything like that. But I was tempted when she showed up wearing something too revealing. It felt wrong to see her like that, but I pretended as if nothing's wrong. I acted normally. When she served the food, she walked towards me and held my hand, then she opened up about something. She cried, and when I figured that she wanted to hug me, I told her that everything was wrong and I ran away … here. Just now."

I no longer know what to say. I want us to drop this issue. He promised that he'll stay away from her and he'll resign to accomplish that, and won't do anything like that again. He sounded sincere, and I want to believe that he won't betray me again. The problem now is I can't find the right words or think of how I'll deal with him. Sure, I love him, and I want to give a second chance. But at the same time, what I'll tell him would make things even more complicated than I thought it would.

"If you want to keep the relationship, but you think you don't deserve me, then what are you implying? What do you want to happen?" I asked.

He wiped his tears away and faced me, his eyes swollen and his cheeks red.

"I want some cool-off. If I'll keep on seeing you, I won't feel anything else but guilt. I need space and want to gather myself for a while, reflect and forgive myself first. I need to process everything. We have a lot of time."

"That's what I'm planning to tell you. My father wants to take care of my mother, and in exchange, I'll need to be in the Philippines to look forward to his restaurant business. I resigned earlier, and I'm going to sell my paintings as I wait for my last day in the company. After that, I'll leave. That also means that I can't be physically present here. We can still talk, but only online. I don't know how long will I be there. Dad also said that I stayed here long enough, and he wants our family to be together under one roof. He wants me to stay there for good. When I learned about all those things, I had no idea how to tell you about everything, because I want to make the relationship work, but I don't know how."

"We have a month then to fix this. You leaving or even moving to another country is something that I never thought of. If your dad wants you to stay there, what about us? What if we'll get married? Will I be required to live there, too? Because Eve, if it'll take me to settle to another country just to be with you, I will. After all, I want to start a new life. I can't be here anymore either."