I had always wondered how love felt like. Was what everyone else saying true? When you were in love, were there really butterflies wreaking havoc in your tummy, and sparks running down your spine? Time and time again, I would wonder. Each time with more bewilderment than the last. 

And then came the 18th night of 2018.

What was left of the Christmas season still hung in the air; truly, Christmas was celebrated the longest in the Philippines. The students were back to school for a new term, and the food hubs were packed with more people than my social anxiety could carry.

Regardless, dinner with an old friend, Hazu, went well. Catching up felt like driving from one end of a bridge to the other, and in a snap, time had moved its hands.

"Bye, Hazu!" I bade, almost not wanting to part. I was almost sure it would take us weeks before we see each other again, even when we literally stayed in the same campus.

You know it was Hazu you were with when she was wearing a long-sleeved and checkered polo, and shorts you could have sworn were skirts. She would also end up buying some coffee one way or the other, and would influence you to go buy one even when it was bad for you. 

(One time, she influenced me to buy smoothie when I had bad cough and cold by saying, "Having something really cold when you have cold is good for you!" Naively, I ended up getting worse.)

That 18th night of 2018, Hazu wasn't able to influence me with the coffee. Instead, we bade each other good-bye, and hoped to have dinner sometime soon.

Walking back to the boarding house, I heard a voice so familiar it took me back to the nights in my room and I would hear the same voice bellow, "Balut!"

Every night, without fail, I would hear that one word with that same, familiar voice, calling out for potential customers deep into the night.

And I couldn't be bothered.

I didn't even like balut, anyway. He could go sell his items wherever and however he wanted, while me? I would file away his voice into a compartment in my brain entitled, "Shouldn't bother me."

I had never really put a face to that voice, though, until that night.

That 18th night in 2018, when I heard the same voice call out "Balut!" once again, I had the same old thought, "Oh, there goes Manong Mag-babalut again."

Except this time, it was different.

Stood in front of me was a woman. An old woman. Looking too tired and weary in her slipping eyeglasses and messy bun, the old woman would look around to the passersby. It took me a while to notice, but there, slung on her arm, was a green basket, with fish crackers hanging off of its sides. 

"Probably another vendor," I would have thought. I could have, except I heard the same voice again.

"Balut!" 

There it was again. A lot closer this time.

When the woman reached out to the man stood a little behind her, it hit me. 

I would assume he was the woman's husband, but he could hardly pull his feet to walk--his slippers would scrape the ground noisily as he did. Regardless, he kept going.

It was like watching a marathon with only an injured, but determined man left. You would want to stop him, let him rest, but you couldn't.

Because you would feel it. A tug at your heartstrings. A whisper in your ear telling you, "They're precious and strong and wonderful."

Few meters away, I could feel the struggle. The struggle to walk was real, but the determination even more so.

The man, in a clear, loud voice, would yell out, "Balut!" and his wife, with a hand supporting him as he walked, would carry a basket of the balut he would proudly sell out.

Still, I watched. There in front of me was an old couple, working together for a living. One could hardly walk, so the other made up for it. And you know what?

It was as beautiful as it was painful. 

My heart swelled for each step they took together, and each "Balut!" the man would bellow out. And my heart broke as I looked around us.

People passed them by, paying no heed. And you know what sucks? Any other night, I could have been one of them.

It was the 18th night of 2018, from an old couple selling balut together, I saw love.

Aira's Notes: A remake of a post from nearly two weeks ago. I promised to redo it better, because that old couple selling balut in the streets that showed me what love is? They deserve so much better than a half-assed post.