In which sixteen-year-old Adriel’s family moves back to the family homestead, taking her away from her friends and her boyfriend.

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In the light of all that happened afterwards, it would've been more appropriate if we had come to Bagong Silang on a stormy, gloomy day, or at least at night. But we didn't. It was early afternoon, and the sunshine was warm and golden on the wide rice fields that stretched out on both sides of the road.

I didn't pay much attention to it at first. I was sulking, thinking about all the friends I'd left behind. One friend in particular- my on-again, off-again boyfriend Bryan. I didn't suppose that our already uncertain relationship would last through a long-distance love affair, even though Bryan knew my cellphone number and my new address and had promised to keep in touch. There are lots of pretty girls in our city, and Bryan is the kind who constantly needs a girl around. Without me to hold and keep his attention in person, he'd probably get lonely and find somebody else.

It didn't help matters any when my brothers started teasing me. Probably they were only trying to make me laugh, but I wasn't in a particularly receptive mood. Ay, sometimes being an only girl with three brothers -one older, one younger, and one twin- can be such a bad trip!

My name is Adriel de los Santos. I'm sixteen, going on seventeen, like in the song. My twin brother is named Adrian, and we call him Ian for short. Our older brother is Allain, and he's eighteen going on nineteen. Our younger brother is Averill, and he just turned eight.

We were moving to Bagong Silang, which is the barrio our parents grew up in, because there was no one else to keep up the farm and the old house that had been the family homestead ever since the first de los Santoses had come to Mindanao with the first batch of Christian settlers in 1939. Our grandmother, Lola Carmen had succumbed to old age at last, and after she died, my Aunt Alisa, who had been taking care of her, decided to pack up and join her sister, my Aunt Arlene, in California. Dad's four other brothers and sisters were scattered all over the Philippines and the world, everywhere except the one place I wished they were so Dad wouldn't move us all back to Bagong Silang and we could stay in General Santos City forever. Getting stuck in the provinces for the whole summer, not to mention probably the rest of my life, was just too dreadful to think about!

I was a very small girl the last time I visited Bagong Silang, and contrary to what they say in books, I didn't remember a thing about it! When Lola died, Mom and Dad and Allain went to the funeral, but Ian and Averill and I didn't make it because we were having our finals around then. So this was really my first glimpse of the place in a long, long time.

If only Dad didn't feel so responsible! He was the youngest and the one named after our grandfather, Lolo Alberto, and he adored the place where he grew up. He even decided to run his flourishing furniture and construction business by phone from Silang. Besides, he said, the city was only an hour and a half away by car if things were really urgent enough to need his presence. Mom, who is just about the only fulltime mom I know of- all my friends' moms have jobs or are businesswomen; Mom just stays at home and takes care of us, and does gardening shows on the side to keep busy-went wild with happiness when she found out she was finally getting all the space she wanted for the garden of her dreams. Seems there were really, really big gardens at the old house in Silang, which she'd always coveted while she was growing up there.

Allain is something of a loner; give him peace and quiet, a guitar, a chord book, and pen and paper, and he's in seventh heaven, never mind where his earthly body happened to be. Averill, on the other hand, was too young to miss his friends in the city. He was thrilled when Dad told him he was going to have lots and lots of space to play in and a huge house to explore, and he was already looking forward to making new friends in Silang. Ian, like me, had friends, but he has always been the good son and he never made even a squeak of protest. I guess I'm just about the only rebel in the family. I swear, if I hadn't been born with a twin, Mom would say I'd been left in the trash can by some lumad and she'd just picked me up. Oh, well, maybe I'm this way to provide a balance for my good boy brothers dearest. Although it seems like our roles are reversed- boys are supposed to be the rebels, aren't they? But then nothing's perfect, right?

Well, anyway. I had been so happy because Ian and I had just graduated after four grueling years in section one of our class in Mindanao State University High School. And I mean tough, with all these grades to maintain; flunk, and you're out of there. It was all we could do to keep abreast of all that math, physics, calculus, and chemistry they kept throwing at us. Although, as we all very well knew, we wouldn't have any trouble keeping up when we were in college. Just think of all the Board Exam topnotchers who graduated from our school! Anyway, Ian and I had been accepted, with full academic scholarships, to our local Mindanao State University campus, which meant all that hard work had really paid off.

I had been looking forward to my best summer in ages. Warm sun, cool breezes, window shopping, malling, and movies with my friends. Total relaxation, with no school, no summer classes, no projects to think about. And then there's the beach, practically a staple. I had been planning to do a little snorkeling and learn to scuba-dive. Go on road trips with Bryan and my other friends. A whole beautiful summer, one last gimmick before we all went on to college. Then out of the blue Dad announced that we were all moving to some remote barrio out in the wilds someplace, and all my lovely plans went up in smoke. Goodbye, beach!

So there I was, sprawled in the very back of our L300 van, my backpack beside me, a carton of books at my feet, my Betty Boop and Hello Kitty pillows around me and my favorite stuffed toy on my lap. All the things I couldn't possibly live without, except for my friends: my best friend Shy, Shell, Connie, Addie, Jenna, Charisse, Dawn, Royce, Neil, Van and Bryan. I've known most of them since elementary school. They would all be going to college, too, but some of them would go to other schools or take other courses. We wouldn't be together anymore the way we were in high school. This one summer was all we had, and now I wouldn't even have it! It was so unfair!

In the seat in front of me, Ian was eagerly looking out of the window. In front of him, Allain was plucking soft chords from his beloved guitar, trying to compose a new song and getting jarred each time the van lurched into a rut or over a bump, which happened every few feet. Averill was in the front seat with Mom, who was following Dad's gray Altis. The kid was so excited he was firing questions left and right at a mile a minute. I tried to tune them all out and concentrate on feeling miserable.

“Oh, won't you just look, Love, it's a beautiful place!” Ian excitedly turned to look at me over his shoulder. I could tell the place appealed to his artistic nature. Normally I love pretty things- after all, Ian and I are twins- but I told myself, how could I love a place that took me away from all of my friends and the life I had always known?

In addition, I was fuming on being reminded that Mom had given me such a dumb nickname. Lovelove, for God's sake! I suppose she meant I was lovable, which isn't that bad, but it seems she didn't stop to think how it might sound when guys called me by it. I mean seriously! What am I, everybody's girlfriend? Yuck! I tightened my arms around the stuffed toy. Shy had given it to me for my sixteenth birthday. Probably I wouldn't see Shy again for a long, long time. And even when I did see her again, she wouldn't be with me all the time. I couldn't be with her- or Bryan- when I felt like it.

Allain put down his guitar and craned his neck as we passed what seemed to be the barrio center. On a hard-packed dirt court, several high school and college-age guys were playing basketball. Both of my brothers brightened at the same time-basketball is their all-time favorite game. They would have something to look forward to. But what about me? Me- the permanent, indispensable fixture of the gang- I would practically be neglected in this godforsaken place. So far I hadn't even glimpsed a girl my age around. What did the girls in this place do anyway- stay at home and do the laundry? And if there really were any girls free to hang out with, would they be as fun as the friends I'd left behind? As for the guys, would there ever be a boy to equal my Bryan, with his golden-boy looks, deep-set golden eyes, and wide, handsome smile? None of my friends ever called me by that sickly-sweet nickname “Love.” They didn't know it. To them, I was Rye, just as Ian was Ian

We left the barrio proper behind and started a long climb up a hill, finally pulling through tall iron gates into a cement-paved driveway. Overgrown gardens sprawled around a weather-beaten old-style house, the kind with ornate grilles, wide capiz-shell windows and a balcony. It would've looked like a haunted house in a movie- I kept expecting to see a beautiful girl in a white gown emerge on the balcony- except that it had been newly renovated and looked lived in. Mom was eyeing the garden expectantly; her dreams were coming true. She turned off the engine, and the boys opened the door, jumped out, and began pulling at their things- all the odds and ends we didn't want to trust to a mover's truck. I emerged more cautiously, holding on tightly to Bubblegum (the stuffed toy) and looking around me.

Dad unlocked the front door of the house, and we filed in. He began opening windows and doors.

Great. No air-conditioning. How would I ever survive?