Chapter 1

//Sta. Mesa, Manila, 2019//

He wakes up in a bed, in a hotel room.

     He’s just lying there, very still, holding his breath, as if trying to hold the passing of time; trying to keep time from moving any more forward. There is another boy beside him, asleep, seemingly unaware of his presence.

     ‘Does he remember’, he asked himself, ‘what happened last night?’ Trying to keep the memory of their night alive through his own will. Of course, he knows that it isn’t possible. He knows that ‘he’ will forget – like they always do, like they always have.

     ‘Is it my fault,’ he wondered, ‘is it my fault on why we keep repeating this life, not being successful of anything?’ He knows it isn’t his partner’s fault. He knows it isn’t his partners’ faults either. His head was aching. He seems to remember something:

          ‘Lucas? Lucas? Where are you?!’

     Voices echo on the wind, multiple people trying to call on his name. He’s running for his life. His tattoos – four stars on each of his arm – a symbol for every life he has ever lived, and will be living. A star for every deity that he’s ever mocked. A star for every partner he will ever love.

     The headache stops. He looks back on the bed. The boy next to him is still sleeping. His name is Daniel. He watched as Daniel’s chest move up and down as he takes every breath. His tanned skin complementing his fluffy black-brown hair, the scar along the right side of his chest. Small details that he has long memorized throughout his lifetimes.

     Last night, he told Daniel that his name was Jett. Of course, he had to lie, sadly because he cannot say his real name – one of these vicious details that has been part of his curse. Like thorns in a rose’s stem, worth only as a flower once they are removed. Who are we, if they are to see through our white lies? What is a person, if not only for the contributions they share with the world? However, there are thorns that cannot be removed – memories, photographs, names, sacrifices.

     For the past month, he has been Christian, Zach, Michael – however, two nights ago, when he was Erick, he met Daniel again and got to know him for the nth time. He said that he has this feeling of being in love with a boy named Jett – he just hasn’t met him yet.

     So today, he is Jett.

     Daniel stirs in his sleep, and he feels the familiar ache he has in his chest as he witnesses him stretch and roll towards his side – he still doesn’t wake, not yet at least. His face is now inches from him, his lips parted as he yawned softly in his sleep, his eyes covered with his fluffy hair.

     Once, the darkness teased him while they were strolling in Taguig, told him that he had a ‘type’, making it seem like all the men he chose – and even the women he looked at – looks exactly like ‘him’.

     The same fluffy blackish-brown hair, the same soft pleading eyes, and the same rounded cheeks.

     That was awfully unfair. That wasn’t the darkness’ fault. The darkness only looked the way it did because he had given it that shape. He chose what he wanted to see, and he wanted to always see a shape of ‘him’.

     ‘Do you remember,’ he asked, ‘when only you were just darkness and shadows?’

     ‘Jett,’ he chuckled as he replied in a deep voice, ‘I am the night. I am batman.’

     It is now another morning, in another city, in what seem to be another century, another god-forsaken timeline. The sunlight cut through the hotel’s curtains. Daniel rolls to the other side, transitioning into the end of his sleep. The boy who is – was Jett – holds his breath again trying to imagine a version of this day where Daniel wakes up and sees him, ‘remembers’ him; where he strokes his cheeks and say, “Good Morning, Love”.

     Sadly, that is not going to happen. It will be a repeated vacant expression from him. A familiar situation wherein he tries to fill the gaps of his memory of where ‘Luke’ should be. He has seen that face enough. He didn’t want to see it again. He slides out of the bed, grabs his clothes before he wakes up and walks out of the rented hotel room.

     In the hotel’s main bathroom, he catches his arms in the mirror and notices what he has always been trying to hide: the eight stars, four on each arm. You could even say that he owns his own stars. He leans into the glass and fogs the glass with his breath. He points his fingertip and tries to write his own name.

          L-   U-

     The fog disappears. He knows it’s not the mirror. He knows it’s not his tongue. He knows it’s not the pen, books, paper, not even blood. He ‘has’ tried to tell anyone about his curse.

          ‘Luke.’

          ‘Lucas.’

          ‘Matthews.’

     To no avail. The books, they remain empty. The papers, the ink will always be blotched. The blood, will dry up before he can write letters with them. His vocal cords, silenced in any way he tries to utter his name. He suddenly feels guilt as he sees his face in the mirror. It only reflects anger and frustration.

     Daniel is a writer. His journal is always in his bag, always handy in case he gets new ideas.

     He performs every Friday at a lounge in Quezon City, every night after his shift at work. Failures can be seen from the scribbled lines in his journal once you flip through – if he even trusts you enough to hold it, let alone read what’s inside. However, in his right hand, he started wearing a white threaded bracelet – although he cannot remember when that habit started, his fondness of cats, and his love of theme parks. The things that last, even when memories don’t.

     Daniel rises very slowly, so Luke already ordered food for the both of them. Daniel doesn’t eat any of it, but it’s already there on the bedside table. A box of his favorite food, fast food fried chicken with pineapple juice for a drink. Next to it was an open condom packet, a relic of their sweet love-making, because it felt like love at first sight. Because Luke wasn’t willing to let the night end. He wasn’t ready to let go.

     Luke lifts his paper cup, inhales the scent of black coffee that has been screaming his name since it arrived, ready to introduce the caffeine in his system; inhaling the memories that induces the heartaches.

     By the seaside in Pasay. A church in Antipolo. One of the rented houses in Baguio.

     The past so crisp and clear along with the present – but only to him.

     It is a cold morning in Sta. Mesa, the hotel window is fogged so he pulls the blanket from of the couches and wraps it around his toned naked body. Their bags taking up the sofa’s seating capacity, a stray cat that Daniel has found yesterday is sleeping on the chair-couch, so he sits along the closed window instead; periodically wiping the fog that builds up every time.

     The cat feels his presence and looks at him as he takes his first sip of coffee. Luke wonders if the same cat remembers.

     His hands are warmer now. He sets the cup down on the carpeted floor. He takes his phone out and plays La Vie En Rose to its quietest volume. He hears Daniel stirring, he is stirring as he looks back over to their bed. Every part of him starts to feel guilt and dread.

     Luke could have left – he ‘should’ have left – ran out of the hotel while Daniel was still sleeping, their morning is no more than an extension of their night. Once the clock stroked twelve, they were no longer together. Their relationship was already inexistent at the hands of time. It’s too late, he closes his eyes and continues to listen to the song; he keeps his head down as he feel the movement of the bed, the sound of the mattress’ springs, he keeps his eyes closed even when he can feel that Daniel is staring right at him, fully unclothed. He will just sit there, taking in an everything that is happening. Trying to piece together the events that have happened last night. Was he drunk? How come he had no memory of it? When did he agree to have sex with a boy that he just met?  Why doesn’t he remember any of it?

     He knows that Daniel will not interrupt as long as the song continues, so he savors every moment of it until the very last note. He opens his eyes and pretends like it’s just any other day.

     “Good morning,” Luke greeted. His voice was cheerful, his accent, so upbeat.

     “Uh, good morning,” he replies as he runs his hand through his hair, looking like the way he always does. His biceps forming, not a single strand of armpit hair, the scar on the right side of his chest moving slowly, a little confused but surprised to see a cute guy next to a window inside a hotel, and wearing nothing except a blanket to cover his private parts.

     “Hmm, Jett,” Luke smiled. He was trying to supply his name from the night before. To reignite something that was already gone. “It’s okay, if you don’t remember,” his smile fades.

     Daniel blushed. He grabbed his underwear from last night, puts it on, and makes his way to the chair where the cat was. He sits there in embarrassment. “I’m sorry. . . this is not me. Is this always you? I’m sorry, I am not that kind of guy.”

     Luke smiles, “Don’t worry, I’m not that kind of guy either.”

     Daniel smiles in agreement. Sunlight streaks from the window into their room, illuminating both their faces. Daniel looks at Luke’s phone and says, “Where did you know that song?”

     “I had some time,” Luke’s smile disappears, “and a lot of heartbreaks.”

     Daniel felt really awkward; he tried to scan the room to see if he could find his phone, “What would you like for breakfast? Hot coffee or iced? Maybe some orange juice?” He was frantically trying to feel the bed for his phone.

     “I already ordered,” Luke responded as he pointed to the food on the bedside table, “your food is getting cold.”

     Luke tried stretching his legs but he bumped on his phone and it accidentally played a recording of a classical song. It was without lyrics, but he knows the song very well. Daniel’s face lights up and he listens to the recording until it abruptly stops.

     “What was that? Was that one of yours?” Daniel asks with great interest. His eyes glowing with what seem to be a glow that gives inspiration to anyone prone to moments of inspiration. “It sounds very familiar; did you write that?”

     “No, it’s in your phone, you passed me the recording last night,” Luke replied with a heavy breath.

     He wasn’t lying. Daniel even hummed the song to him before they made love last night to set the mood.

     “What?” He raised one of his brows; he checks his phone to see if he did have it. Indeed, he has. It was one of the newer ones in his recordings. He reached for the cup of orange juice and slowly took a sip, “Wow, I must have been drugged. Did you, do it?”

     Luke shakes his head, “No, I would never do that to anyone.” Luke is telling the truth as he was accused like this, multiple lifetimes ago.

     “Do you remember anything else?” Daniel asks. He scrolled in his phone to see any more parts of the recording but he can’t see anything else. He doesn’t know it, but this was the song that would be his background for when he finally performs his poetry piece - Violin Sonata in E minor, Op. 82: III. Allegro, non troppo.

     Luke smiles as he utters the words:

          ‘It is I who was the fool

          It is I who needs the reignition;

          It is I who will use a tool

          To create a better and brand-new rendition;’

     This was his chance, his loophole. He cannot leave his mark in any timeline, but if he’s really careful, he can share his mark and give it to someone else. It’s not concrete, but inspiration is really not.

     “I should go,” Luke stands up. He stops the song, started to put his clothes on one by one, heading for the bedside table to collect his belongings.

     “What? But I don’t even know you.” Daniel argues in confusion.

     Luke turns to him, “Exactly, what reason do I have to stay?”

     “But I want to get to know you,” Daniel responds, setting down his phone, looking into his eyes. This is the moment the breaks his heart the most. It is unfair, this is when he feels most frustrated. Luke has spent countless lifetimes trying to get to know him, but Daniel has spent only hours in forgetting him. “Please, slow down, stop,” Daniel grabbed his arm.

     He hates it. Luke hates everything that is happening. He shouldn’t have stayed. He should have run the moment he woke up before him. But there was hope. That maybe this time his partner will remember, that this time, it will finally be over.

     'It is only you, and us who remembers,' says a whispering cackle in his ears.

     “Why are you in such a rush, Jett?” asks the confused Daniel. “Let me at least take you out to breakfast, please.”

     Luke is already tired of this game again so he lies about doing something in work. He doesn’t stop moving, because it will eventually start over again. He can meet the love of his life, at a bar and he can turn it into a meet and date instead of an unremembered one-night stand. None of it matters anyway.

     “Jett, wait please,” Daniel says as he tightened his grip on his Luke’s arm. “I have a performance tonight, sort of. I will be reciting this poem that I had been writing for weeks, you should come. It’s on…”

     Luke knows where it is, surely, right? That is only where they met for the first time, and the fifth, and the ninth. It’s just sad and frustrating because whenever he agrees to come, he sees that dazzling smile with those pleading eyes – but it always ends the same.

     “I’ll try,” Luke responds, but is looking away.

     “Promise?” Daniel asks as he loosens his grip in Luke’s arm.

     “I said, I’ll try. Don’t forget me in the meantime,” Luke replies with words full of hope. He runs out of their room. Once he was out of the hotel building, he looks up to the sky and says, “Please, don’t.”

     Sadly, Luke knows, as he steps on to the escalator of the Light Rail Transit, as he swipes his beep card in the revolving door – it’s already happening. By the time he enters the train, he’ll be gone from his memory.