The suspicion in his voice was so gentle that I didn’t notice it until his gaze cast down to the shirt. He knew me too well, and no matter how much I tried to hide, he could see the truth on my face when he looked up, as much as I could see the truth in his, as the well of our unspoken understandings—the day I soiled my pants, the time he got aroused beneath me—deepened at that moment. I wondered if he could tolerate my last wish to be with him, not even sex, not even naked in bed, but just a kiss, or even to hold his hand in the way he would someday hold the hand of a woman he loved.

“We should go back,” Samuel said, and I lost my chance. Nothing seemed amiss the rest of that day, as we joined our friends for dinner and last goodbyes, the promise to see each other again, along with a hug. It was the last time I touched his flesh, smelled his skin, and I wondered if I would ever feel this kind of love, with someone who loved me the same way.

—

Nanay Coro knocked on my door in the middle of the night; it was time. Our bags were already packed and in the van, so the only thing left was goodbye.

“Remember that I love you always,” my grandmother said as she hugged me, but the way she said it—“Tandaan mo lagi na mahal kita”—I couldn’t tell if she meant that I should always remember she loves me or if I should remember that she will always love me. I chose the second meaning, the love between us permanent even when our time together was not.

My grandmother decided not to come to the airport, and I heard her wail as soon as the engine turned on. I waved back as the van sped away, grateful that I couldn’t see the details of her face.

My family boarded a Korean Air flight to Los Angeles a few hours later. It was August 21, 1990, the anniversary of Ninoy Aquino’s assassination, though no one else seemed to notice the auspicious date. I would leave my beloved country on the day Ninoy returned to sacrifice his life, and I felt like a traitor. I told myself a new story, that I could come back and settle in the Philippines, once I had the chance to learn what America was like.