Chapter 4: The Gang

Josh made many other confessions to Kate; about how he felt as an only child, just like Kate, and his mother being a caregiver in the UK like so many other Filipino professionals lured by greener pastures overseas and driven away by her mother country’s lack of opportunities. She would care for so many patients and children but not the one she missed the most: her own child. She dreamed of someday bringing Josh to the UK on a residence card but with the UK leaving the EU and protectionist politics creeping in, that dream was taking longer and becoming more remote.

This explained why Josh never lacked money or material things. He was practically loaded and had the best imported sneakers and comic books shipped on his birthdays. He could afford to eat at restaurants every day, which he did because his father was usually too wasted to look after him. Apparently, the LDR with his wife had driven Mr. Guerrero to loneliness, the bottle and into the arms of a different woman each night.

It was kind of backwards but Mr. Guerrero had started to live the single life and Josh was in fact the more mature of the two. Of course neither he nor Josh told his mom about it but somehow his mom knew (Josh suspected it was because a relative or neighbor had informed her) and there were talks that his mom wanted a divorce. Josh simply thought it was long overdue because early on, he had noticed that his mom and dad talked less and less over the phone and, on the rare occasion that they did, they argued.     

Hearing all these things, Kate felt that Josh was more mature than everyone gave him credit for. Being the alpha male in his group also meant he had leadership potential. Kate was convinced his involvement in a gang and petty school pranks was just a temporary phase, something that most male students went through. Why, even university students had their brotherhood troubles – initiations, inter-frat scuffles. And when it came down to it, she, Lor and the Bali Girls weren’t the Mean Girls but they were no angels either. It didn’t mean she supported or encouraged cliques, just that she understood.

In hindsight, Kate had been rationalizing The Retaliators’ actions like copying homework in the men’s bathroom (forcibly taken from a teacher’s pet), cheating during exams, cutting classes, gambling, vaping and doing blow, putting whoopee cushion on the teacher’s chair and duct-taping a student to the wall. It was Kate’s theory that, because of CITS’ high academic orientation, the varsity teams for both men’s basketball and women’s volleyball were next to non-existent. Kate knew because SHE was captain of CITS’ volleyball team and they had entered the conference-level competition, where they were promptly and effortlessly eliminated. Kate thought the disorganized organized sport was a viable explanation for all the pent-up teenage male energy.

The usual places Josh and The Retaliators hung out were the rooftop and The Bowl. The first was part of the brand new school building and was supposed to be off-limits to students but somehow The Retaliators had a duplicate of its door key. The second, The Bowl, was a two-acre natural depression enclosed by forested, undeveloped land and was in effect like a park. It was a ten-minute walk northeast of the academic buildings and Josh had invited Kate plenty of times but she accepted only twice.

Part of the problem was because Josh usually went with his gang, and Kate, apart from Bernadette the Super Glue, would be the only girl if she didn’t bring a chaperone. The Retaliators brought guitars, a soccer ball, comic books, cigs and e-cigs, gum, firecrackers and, Kate was sure, plenty other stuff that wasn’t wholesome, which was why she was scared to be with Josh at The Bowl.

But the main problem was Josh’s Roman hands and Russian fingers. Understanding the problems of early pregnancy not from the antiquated and Church-approved sex ed videos they were forced to watch in MAPEH but from real-life examples like her neighbors, Kate was determined to hold on to her virginity till she was 100% certain of her feelings. This was the cause of many an argument between her and Josh, the worst of them had him calling her a prude and blaming her for not “putting out.” No matter how hard they argued and how many times he invited her to his house, she was adamant. She said that if Josh truly loved her, he should be willing to wait till she was ready.

“And when would that be?” Josh asked with a frustrated look.

“When we’re married.”

That sent him into a rage. Kate didn’t think his wait would be that long but it was a good go-to answer. She didn’t care about the other girls in school who either confessed or lied that they’d done it. For her, everything needed to be perfect. The perfect guy, the perfect place, the perfect moment. It drove Josh crazy when he couldn’t understand what she meant by getting her “in the mood.”    

Every time she said no, Josh would sulk and they might even have a cold war for a few days. But he was always gentlemanly enough to stop touching her when she told him to. He said it was because he respected her. Kate suspected it was because he knew how stubborn she was about the issue.