It Comes in Threes 2

The driver actually had the guts to squeeze the hurtling bus into the narrow lanes underneath the Ortigas flyover. Needless to say, the inevitable occurred. He swerved slightly to the right, and the rear wheels caught the gutter.

I had visions of being splayed across EDSA, complete with the requisite dismembered limbs, et al.

I was jolted out of my gruesome reverie by my knees that were banged against the wooden slots of the seat in front of me. The bus came to a screeching halt in the middle of the lane. Good thing it was night time, and there were no vehicles in front or at the back of us. Otherwise, it would've turned out to be the perfect smash up.

Shaken up (literally and otherwise), I had half-the mind to get off the bus before it really met the Big One. But wait. I was only in Ortigas, correct.  I had neither the intention nor the time to huff all the way to Shaw.

So I remained glued to my seat, and crossed my fingers that the bus wouldn't encounter any mishap in between the distance of Ortigas and Shaw.

-----

I heard my mom shouting through the screened door of my room the moment my alarm went off at 9:30 p.m.

"Anak, wake up! There's fire!"

Again?

It was less than a year since from the last fire in the neighborhood. A couple of months ago, a house at the back of ours also went down in flames. I was a little bit scared then because I could feel on my face the heat radiating from the blaze, even if it was still another house away.

When I got out of my room and went directly to our front. There was still sleep in my eyes, but it was jolted away as I saw the enormous conflagration that was going on.

It wasn't the big house in front of use, thank goodness. Rather, it was the house behind it. What I immediately noticed though was that the were two marked differences between this occurrence and that of the previous one. The first was that the cool night picked a particularly bad time to be windy. The second was that there were trees crackling in the fire. Translated, there were actually glowing bits of cinders raining down all over the neighborhood.

Spell F-U-C-K-I-N-G-S-H-I-T.

I was a whole lot more scared this time around. Looking back, I think I actually crossed over into the realm of panic the moment I started bellowing to the husband of our helper to get up to the roof and start hosing it down. I myself went to the side entrance of our house, connected a hose, opened up the faucet, and tried to water down the immediate area of our surroundings. It was a good thing our neighbor beside was already on top of things. Literally. Not only was he hosing down his own roof, he was actually spraying ours with water as well.

It was a good thing that the fire trucks were fast to respond to the emergency; not too soon after they arrived, a ferocious explosion ripped through the raging inferno. The gathered crowed a gave a collective shriek, and I saw them scamper away on their slippered feet as fast as they could. "Gas tanks, most probably," I muttered to myself. Still, as far as I could see, the firemen were starting to have a firm grip on the situation. There were more and more fire trucks arriving even as I went back inside the house.

-----

As I ate my dinner in haste, I glimpsed at the wall clock in our sala. 10:20 p.m. Just enough time to catch a quick smoke and head off to the shower. In the background, I could still hear the water that was being gushed out.

I chewed hurriedly on the last morsel of chicken on my plate and reminded myself that I still had to commute. I also made a note to check the mail as soon as I got to the office.

All of a sudden, an ominous thought flitted across the jumble of my mind.

Wait. It comes in threes, doesn't it?

I reached for my pack, and lit up a stick. The sense of foreboding refused to dissipate. It was unlike the smoke from the cigarette, curling up slowly and disappearing into thin air.

(fin)