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Deep in the mountain villages of the Philippines, a boy must make his choice. Based on true events.
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Fiction
Literary
In midsummer Jinggoy went to see the man in the bush. A gentle breeze blew through the tiger grass, and the tinny sound of gongs rose up from the village below.
Raiders had come to Jinggoy’s village, and the machetes and spears of the village men were no match for the weapons the raiders carried. After a short skirmish, the villagers were made to line up.
“Remember who your masters are,” the raiders said. “Remember to whom you owe your dues.”
If he closed his eyes, Jinggoy could still see the ugly look on the face of their leader. He stood with the men of the village, as two of their maidens were dragged away.
“Rebellion is foolishness,” their leader said. “Nothing is secret to us, and all debts of disobedience must be paid for.”
After they left, the women went down to the creek. When they returned they bore the two girls wrapped in blankets of the dead. There had been whispers of blood debts, and tempers rose high as the men of the village argued who must avenge this taking of the lives and the innocence of their maidens.
“We can’t be cowards forever,” one of the men shouted.
Their anger turned to hopelessness when they realized that no matter how much they protested there was no fighting against a law that allowed the raiders to take what they felt was their due.
“There’s always the man in the bush,” an old man said.
“Shush,” the women said. “We must simply work harder. Do you think the law will stand on our side if we take up arms against our masters?”
Jinggoy felt the weight of their stares as they turned to look where he stood with his arm around his mother and his sister.
He didn’t need to be reminded of how his father had gone away to seek out the man in the bush. He didn’t need to remember how they’d woken up one morning to see his body hanging lifeless from the branches of a tree. He didn’t need to hear their unspoken accusations.
Your father went in search of the bushman, and now government raiders haunt us.
He stopped in his upward climb and looked down to where he could see the light of the fire and the ring of men and women gathered around it. Soon, they would perform baki. Even though their faith in the shaman was failing, even when they murmured about the failure of their sacrifices to appease the anger of the spirits, they continued to plead with them.
Jinggoy bit his lip and folded his hands into fists. No matter how many prayers they uttered, it was always the same. Each season, they offered up the very best of their harvest. Each season, they sacrificed the fattest sow and ten leghorns. Each season, the raiders came back and demanded dues. When the village could not pay, they took their payment in kind.
Jinggoy thought of his sister, Siya. Soft-spoken and kindhearted, she might be the next one taken.
He knew there was only one way to make sure his sister would be safe.
“There are other ways,” his teacher had said.
“There’s only been one way for us,” he’d replied. “At least, it’s better than just standing there and letting them take what they want.”
“If you study hard, you can go to the city. You can make your own way in life, and be free of all these,” his teacher responded.
Down in the village, the men beat on the gongs, and above the sound, the chanting of the shaman came to him on the wind.
“By the time I finish study everyone I love will have gone ahead to the spirit world,” he’d said. “This way, I can at least save Siya.”
“How? By throwing your life away?”
“You must promise to take my family with you when you go to the city,” he said to her.
“And what if they won’t go?”
“I’ll make sure they go,” he’d replied.
For all his wishing, Jinggoy knew he had to make this choice. Turning his back, he resumed his climb upwards.
He was halfway up the mountain when he found himself surrounded by the rebel guard.
“It’s late,” one of them spoke. And he thought he recognized the speaker. “What’s a boy doing in these mountains at this hour of night? Aren’t you afraid of the spirits who haunt these heights?”
“There are no spirits,” Jinggoy replied. “No spirits except dead ones, and I have come to see the man in the bush.”
He heard their laughter, but he did not mind it. Their laughter did not sound harsh or jeering; rather it was the laughter old uncles direct at a foolish boy.
“Go home,” one of the rebel men said. “Go back to your mother and grow up a little bit more. War is not for children. Leave it to us to avenge the deaths of those you have lost.”
“I’m not a child,” Jinggoy said. He stood up as straight as he could, threw back his shoulders and lifted his chin. “My father died in an ambush last summer, and the raiders have returned to take away our young maidens. My sister will soon become a woman. I have come to take my father’s place and to plead for the safe passage of my sister and my mother.”
“If you persist in this foolishness, you will never become a father,” another voice said. “There are other ways to fight a war, boy.”
“Nevertheless, I must see the man in the bush,” Jinggoy insisted.
There was no more laughter this time, and he could hear them whispering to each other.
“If you must see him, then you must see him,” one of the men finally said.
When he looked around him next, the men had vanished back into the shadows where they came from, and there was only one left standing in front of him.
“Come,” said the man. “You said you had urgent business with me. It takes a man’s courage to climb these mountains in the dark, and I want to see your face.”
The man turned and walked away, and Jinggoy followed after him.
Above them, the night sky was littered with a thousand stars, and Jinggoy could not help thinking of the songs he had learned from his teacher.
He thought of her now, and of the hours he’d spent listening to the songs she played over and over again on her little machine. At first, he’d been afraid to sing along with her. When he’d finally dared he’d been surprised to discover that he enjoyed it.
She had shown him a huge board with pictures and signs, and he came to understand that the signs meant the same thing as the pictures. Since then, he had gone to visit her every day, and she had read to him from the books that lined the walls of her little house.
“I can’t teach you forever,” she’d said to him. “In July, when school starts, I want to take you with me to the city. You can study there, you can learn more new things, and when you come back, you can give your family a better future.”
He’d listened to her, and he’d dreamed along, imagining himself in a shining white suit, dreaming of himself as a man everyone looked up to.
“Here.” The man’s voice jolted him out of dreaming.
They’d reached a small wooden hut. The door was halfway open, and a pale golden light streamed out onto the darkness of the mountain.
“I want to see your face,” the man said. “Step into the light.”
For a moment, Jinggoy’s eyes were dazzled by the glare. Then the glare was gone, and when he opened his eyes, everywhere on the mountain was dark again.
“I knew your father,” the man said. “He served me well.”
“They say you can give safe passage to the innocent,” Jinggoy said. “All I want is assurance that my mother and sister will get to safety. If you can do this, I will serve you as well as my father did.”
He did not say the other thing that was in his mind.
If you can do this, my father’s death will be avenged and his honor will be restored among my people.
The man’s gaze was heavy on him, and he stared ahead resolutely.
“I know you’ll serve me well,” the man replied. “If all goes as planned, by monsoon season, the raiders who preyed on your village will be gone. There is a debt of blood to be paid, and the few who are willing to lay down their lives do it for a nation.”
As the man spoke, Jinggoy heard the rattle of guns in the distance.
He shuddered, but he remembered the fear on the faces of the maidens and the horrible screams that rent the summer air.
“I will pay the price,” he said.
“There will be a great battle soon,” the man said. “We will need all the men we can get. The strike will be here, and in the cities as well. Win or lose, I will see to it your family gets to safety.”
He lifted the gun he carried from his shoulders and handed it to the boy. Light glinted off the barrel, and Jinggoy saw sadness in the man’s eyes.
“I wish things could be different,” said the man. “But you’ll need to practice.”
Slowly, Jinggoy reached out and accepted the dead weight of the gun.
“I’ll be ready,” he said.
“What about your dreams?” his mother asked.
“Dreams vanish in the daytime,” Jinggoy said.
“But you’re just a boy,” she cried.
“I am a man,” he said.
“We’ll find a way,” she said. “You may think otherwise, but you are too young to do this thing.”
But no matter how she wept, she could not move him or change his mind.
“I gave my word,” he said. “It is a man’s duty to protect what is his own.”
And he looked to where his sister was grinding roots into a fine paste. Tenderness filled his heart as he looked at her, and when she looked up to smile at him, he knew no price was too high.
“When it’s done, you must both go away from here,” he said to his mother. “The bushman will see to your safety. This he has promised me.”
“If only your father were still alive,” his mother said.
“Father perished for a cause,” the boy replied. “I must do what is required of a man.”
June came and went, and Jinggoy practiced every day. He hid from the teacher when she came looking for him.
“Promise you won’t tell her where I am,” he said to his mother.
In time, Siya took his place at the teacher’s house, and the teacher stopped looking for him.
“Monsoon season approaches,” Jinggoy’s mother said. Her fingers on his forehead were gentle.
He nodded his head and did not look at her. He had received the summons two weeks ago, and he knew the raiders were coming back to the village.
“Give me strength,” he prayed before the shrine of his father.
He bowed down before the black god who stood guard over his father’s grave.
“See, I have brought you rice wine and flesh. Take and eat. Give me victory over the enemy.”
The black god remained seated, his face like stone, but Jinggoy thought he felt warmth course through his veins.
He bowed his head down to the ground.
“I will not put you to shame, father,” he whispered.
The gun was a familiar weight between his shoulders. Jinggoy was used to carrying it now, and it did not hinder him from climbing up to the ledge the other men had shown him.
Somewhere, his fellow rebels were waiting for his signal. The enemy would arrive at this spot by nightfall, and the men would not attack until he had fired the first shot.
Already, he could smell their sweat. No matter how softly they walked, nothing could keep the smell of blood and killing from carrying on the wind.
Lying down on the narrow ledge, Jinggoy took the gun in his hands. He focused his sight on the passage that the enemy must use in order to get to his village.
He took a deep breath and thought of his mother and his sister. He thought of his father who had paid the price for their protection before him, and he wondered what his father would say to him now.
Down below, he could hear the tramp of feet in the underbrush.
“Blood for blood,” the man in the bush had said to him.
“Look, Jane, look. See Dick run.” The words from his teacher’s book came back to haunt him. He heard again her triumphant laughter from the first time he’d read those words aloud.
“Good man,” she’d said. He remembered her face bright with elation and wondered if he’d meet her again in another life.
The raiders broke into the clearing, their voices spoiling the quiet of the bush.
Jinggoy’s finger tightened on the trigger.
“I am no longer a boy,” he thought. “I am a man. I have a gun. I can take care of my own.”
Copyright 2007, Rochita Loenen-Ruiz. All rights reserved. Illustration: "Pieces of Jinggoy" by Kevin Shaw, Copyright 2007. All rights reserved.
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