It’s the fifth anniversary of Ate Lina’s departure when a woman no older than she’d been comes up to Lola’s door in the middle of the night to ask for her help. At the door, she conveys in a hushed voice that she wants Lola to pluck out her heart and extinguish the fire consuming it. I stared at her, momentarily shocked at the resemblance, before I remember myself. With a nod, I lead her into the living room and watch as she lies flat on the coffee table, her face pale and only slightly trembling. Lola manifests in front of her and perches crow-like, her face an impassive coconut shell. The other woman looks up at her without alarm. Her jaw is tight with a conviction born of pure desire, the kind, I think, that must accompany an irrevocable decision.
            "Sst," Lola says to me, gesturing to the archway with her lower lip. I nod and quietly exit, but do not fully leave, choosing instead to remain outside, behind the wall, peeking out every now and then to watch Lola’s practice.
            Once, she’d directly translated it as “heart-wrenching.” I did not understand, but knew it was a real thing. This was unlike my parents, who even after all these years, believed my summer weekend stories were just that—stories. “It’s rude to spread rumors about your Lola,” they’d say, heedless of how strange it was to refer to her as someone I owned.
            Especially since, once upon a time, she belonged to my sister.

​

​*     *     *​

​

            No one ever told me the side of the family to which Lola belonged, but when Ate Lina introduced me to her five years ago, she’d said, “Come on, I want you to meet my Lola.”
            It was June. The reason why we’d come was because our parents were in the Philippines visiting an elderly faceless tita who would die long before I set foot on that country’s soil. Our parents said they wouldn’t be back until late August at the earliest—the business of getting affairs in order and selling some ancient house, it seemed. They didn’t take Lina because she wanted to spend her summers working to save up for college, and they couldn’t take me because I had a form of arrhythmia, a fact we’d discovered earlier that year. I’d been looking forward to flying, because I was finally old enough, and because Lina had done so many times before. “You’re not missing much,” she’d said, but even she could tell I was disappointed by the fact, which was when she offered to take me to Lola’s.
            “What does Lola do?” I asked her on the way there.
            “She’s a healer.”
            “Can she heal my heart?”
            “Maybe. We’ll see.”
            She drove us there and when she turned into the driveway, Lola came out and stood on the porch, wearing a thin, blue-and-white striped jumper. Her hair was brown and short, her eyes hard-set, her mouth thin and oddly proportioned on her round face. She stared at us as we got out of the car, stared unblinkingly, despite the harsh sun.
            Ate Lina moved with a confidence I could never emulate, wearing a wide-brimmed sunhat, a pair of round sunglasses, and a dress that tried and failed to take advantage of the thin wind. It was an ensemble that she must have nabbed from one of those fashion magazines she kept hidden from our parents. She went around the back and took out our two suitcases, placing  mine into my hand.
            “Come on, Jemma,” she whispered, gesturing me forward.
            I refused to look anywhere but the asphalt, dragging my own bag with me. We ascended the steps, the wood creaking under us. Lola wore sandals whose leather straps had been thoroughly sun-bleached. Her toes were gnarled with bumps, ridges, and callouses.

            “Hi, Lola,” Ate Lina said. She kissed Lola on the cheek; the matron’s face barely moved. “You remember my sister, Jemma?” At my name, I involuntarily glanced up and caught Lola’s gaze. It was as inscrutable as the wood around her. “We’ll be staying with you while our parents are away.”
            Lola merely nodded. She turned and led us inside. Without a word, she pointed out the hallway, the living room with a Wurlitzer in it that looked like it hadn’t been touched in ages, the kitchen, and the two upstairs bedrooms, indicating that Lina and I would share one while Lola took the other. “It hasn’t changed a bit,” Lina exclaimed, and something vaguely resembling pleasure passed over Lola’s face before vanishing. She seemed pleased that she and I shared a room. “It’ll be like when we were younger,” she said, and I remember feeling happy that she remembered.
            Despite these arrangements, Lina would not be in the house all that much that summer. She worked in a pet shop on the boardwalk and was gone for most of the day. I’d asked her if I could come, just to help, but also because I wasn’t sure how to conduct myself or my time around Lola alone. Lina simply laughed and rubbed my head. “Lola’s not that scary, Jemma. Look, you’ll probably end up helping her around the house every now and then. It won’t be so
bad.”
            If Lola was offended by the implication, she never expressed it. Maybe a part of me would like to think that among her numerous wordless grunts and gestures was a sign of acceptance, even enjoyment of my company, of the same variety that I soon began to feel around her.
            In this way, I started to learn why Lola was a “healer.” The first instance occurred in late June, on a weekend. Lina, contrary to her habit, was out with “a friend.” She said that she probably would be out the whole two days, and I tried not to show my disappointment. Even though I caught the emphasis, I failed to understand it. That night, as I prepared to face a silent evening, a frantic knocking arrived, and when Lola let in the issuer, I discovered a young lady with a wan face and tears in her eyes and a scarf clutched in her hands—strange, given the sweltering summer heat. She looked between me and Lola, and then she asked, petulantly, “Are you the healer?”
            Lola grunted an affirmation.
            She took the lady by the hand and led her into the living room. The woman kept glancing at me, uncertainty scrawled on her face. Suddenly Lola said, “She will help. Do not worry. Lie here.” She pointed at the table.
            Dutifully, the woman did, her face contorting with mild discomfort. Lola then took me aside.
            “Lola, what are you doing?”
            “Helping. You will, too, anak.”
            “But I don’t understand.”
            “You will. Lina used to do this, and so will you. Listen and follow.”
            It was the most she’d spoken to me by that point, but the fact that Lina had, apparently, done this before proved the greater relief. I wanted, as all younger siblings do, to follow in her footsteps. If I, with my stringy brown hair, small frame, and slightly asymmetrical face could not mimic her rich black curls, her regal stature, and the matching smile on her lips and eyes, then I could, at least, copy Lina’s responsibilities to the letter. Lola had me grab jars of oils, gels, and other such things. In the meantime, she asked the woman questions, and received these answers: the woman loved a man from high school; but he was long dead, and she could not let go; she had found someone else, but felt her old love kept her from indulging in this new one. I understood little of it, but Lola remained impassive, calm, in the invincible way of adults, and perhaps this seemed safe, assuring, the way faith in others
sometimes must be.
            Lola poured the items into a yellow plastic bucket. She mumbled something and plunged her hands into the substance, swirling them around until bubbles splashed against the sides. She glanced up, as though remembering I was still there. “Wait outside and count to twenty twice.”
            I did. When I was done, the woman was standing, her eyes flaked with tears. She shook Lola’s hand profusely, and left soon after, a bright smile painted on her lips. The scarf she wore was wound around Lola’s hands, and there was cash folded within.
            “What did you do?” I asked Lola.
            Her beady eyes seemed distant, but she answered calmly, “I fixed her heart.”
            “Really? Can you fix mine?”
            She shook her head. At first I was dismayed—it was the same answer I’d heard from doctors over the years—but then Lola smiled and patted my cheek. It was not much of an assurance of anything, and yet, I still felt comforted.
            Lina returned on Monday, and immediately I tried to tell her what had happened. She nodded along and said, “Yeah, that’s what Lola does.” But she seemed preoccupied and moved stiffly through the house like she was in a daze. When it was time for dinner and I again brought up what Lola did, Lina hardly responded, picking at her rice and adobo, her cheek in her hand, and her brow furrowed. I looked at Lola for guidance, but she only had eyes for Lina. Eventually, I figured there wasn’t any need to bring it up—we all knew what it was, anyway.

​

​*     *     *

​​

            Something that our parents had asked us to do at the end of each week was give them a call—evening our time, morning theirs. They specified the hour because it was when they reportedly had friends over, and I realized later that they wanted to impress them with their international calling capabilities. Lola, however, didn’t have a phone, so Ate Lina and I would have to drive into town and use one of the payphones and talk to an operator. I once had one who must have been new, because she asked if the Philippines was in South America.
            It costs a dime to talk five minutes. Normally, Lina was the one who’d place the call. She’d tell the operator where to connect, insert the coin, wait a few, and then, quickly and brightly, she’d be talking to our parents, a smile on her face. She’d always reserve a minute or two for me at the end to say hello. A minute or two was all I needed, because even then I felt awkward talking on the phone, and while my parents asked me what was happening there, I
couldn’t help but think about how they had left me here for some house and some land I’d never seen, and any reason I had to talk to them dried up in a few words. After June, I also didn’t think to tell them about Lola’s practice—something suggested this was reserved for Lina and myself, and I should not share them with the world.
            Besides, it wouldn’t be long before our parents, perhaps sensing that I was done talking, would ask me to put Lina back on the line. Lina would take the call and end it, though not before giving my hand a squeeze.
            One evening in late July, she drove us out to town to conduct our weekly ritual. It was a few days before my ninth birthday. After she’d parked, she turned to me and said, “Actually, do you mind if you make the call? There’s something I need to do first.”
            I wasn’t sure. Lina squeezed my hand. “Hey, it’s all right. You’ve heard me do it a million times before. It’s just the one. I’ll be quick, don’t worry.”

            Eventually, I agreed, and she gave me a dime. She led me to the payphone and stood nearby while I painstakingly dialed all the buttons, holding the coin in front of the slot. When I placed the receiver against my ear,                 The operator cooly guided me through the usual steps, and after I’d inserted the coin and waited, the crackling feed gave way to my father’s voice: “Kumasta po, Lina?”
            “No, this is..."
            There was a pause, then a laugh. “Ah? Jemma, making a call all by yourself? When did you start growing up?” There was a flutter of Tagalog—a friend’s voice, a neighbor, maybe even one of those faceless relatives—and my father translated something back in both languages, laughing. If Lina had been there, I might have understood what was so funny.
            We talked about the usual nothings, and I asked about how things were there, without understanding his answer. Then my mother came on the line, her voice coming in slightly unclear because of the connection. We also spoke of the usual nothings.
            I remembered it was July, and said so.
            “It is,” Mom said. She waited. I waited. “Okay,” she said, “put your sister on the line.” I didn’t answer. My hand shook. Then the operator’s voice cut in to tell me that my five minutes were almost up, and I would need to insert another coin. “Jemma? Put your sister on the line. There’s a boy here, and I think she would like him. He’s going to America for school in the fall—”
            I didn’t hear the rest. I was too busy digging around my pockets for another dime, only to come up with lint and air. Nervously, I glanced around, but there was no one else on the street who could help me. The operator intoned cooly again that time was running short.
           “Jemma? Is Lina there?”

           “She is, I just—I need to find a coin—” I tried sticking a finger in the coin slot, hoping for spare change, but nothing emerged. “Um. What was that about a boy?” I asked, trying to be helpful.
           There was a crackle, and the operator informed me that I’d reached my time limit. She asked if I’d like to place another call. I did not.
           I left the payphone with my head down and wandered around for a bit. Lina hadn’t reappeared. I thought she’d run away, abandoning me to an awkward conversation with our parents. Resentment burned with guilt.
           I turned a corner and saw, with a start, that she was not ten feet away. She wasn’t alone; there was another woman there, about her age. They were sitting on a bench under one of the palm trees, and I could just make out the snippets of their conversation.
            “Do you really have to go?” Lina said.
            “Not much of a choice. Dad’s dragging all of us west. But he said you could come if you wanted.”
            “You know I can’t. At least, not now. Lola and Jemma—”
            “I know.” The other woman laughed, and I saw Lina blush. “It’s cute, really. I get it.”
            “Don’t make me ask you to wait.”
            “Oh, what do you know about waiting?”
            In the shade cast by that tree, I watched the other woman lean over and take Lina’s chin in her hand, craning her neck up. The kiss was long and silent, and when it was done, the other woman said, “There, something to remember me by. Hope you don’t mind the cliché.”
            “I don’t,” Lina said, giggling, and she leaned forward this time. “My turn.”

            My face burned, and I turned and rapidly walked back to the car. I hoped they didn’t hear me. I waited by the vehicle, a sensation of trespassing crawling over my skin.
            A few minutes later, Lina appeared—without the woman. She walked smilingly towards me. “Hey, how’d it go?” Then she saw the look on my face, and her smile faltered. “Oh. Bad?”
            “They wanted you,” was all I could say.
            She sighed, running a hand over the back of her head. “I’m sorry, Jemma. I know how they can be.”
            She unlocked the car doors, slipping into the driver’s side. I sat in the passenger’s, my arms crossed. I wanted to be angry, and I was, but I couldn’t understand why. Lina looked at me. The way she looked was like how Lola would look at her clients, just before they told her why they’d come; as such, I almost told her what I’d heard, and what I’d seen.
            Then she smiled. “How about an early birthday present to cheer you up? I’ll be there for the next call. I promise.”
            I felt a little happier, then, but only just.

​

​*     *     *

​

            But Ate Lina was not there for the next call. Nor the next, nor the next. I learned to scrounge around for spare change as much as I could, either on the sidewalk or on the beach, and some of Lola’s clients, perhaps compelled by my scrawniness or some other wellspring of pity, offered me what coins they had on hand. Lina would still drive me to the payphone, but she would then excuse herself, either by saying she needed to drop by a store, or check in on work, or Lola had asked her to run an errand—all lies. Whenever she came back, she radiated happiness. I resented that, resented how happy she was, while I had to deal with the discomfort of talking to parents who, by virtue of age and an ocean, were quickly becoming blurry strangers with each phone call.
            “Oh,” was my parents’ reaction to learning that Lina wasn’t present. Our calls reached the same time limit, and could go on longer with the money I had gotten, but these were protracted, pierced by awkward silence as we struggled to fill the gaps left in her wake. It became painfully obvious that my parents preferred talking to Lina, because she had things to say.
            During one such call, just as my father was about to hand me off to my mother, I blurted, “I saw Lina talking with someone.”
            There was a pause. “Oh?” This was a different sound. On the other end, my mother said something, harsh and quick, and my father leaned away from the receiver to deliver the message in rapid-fire Tagalog.
             “So? Who is he?” he asked, a teasing tone in his voice.
            “It’s a girl.”
            Another pause. Then: “Ah?”
            “A girl. She was talking... I don’t really know, but it’s been a few times and...” I was getting flustered. I couldn’t figure out why. The humid summer air seemed to enter the little phonebooth and envelop me in a viscous, invisible fluid, and I suddenly felt like I couldn’t breathe. Darkness gathered at the corners of my vision.
            “A girl?” That was my mother’s voice, surprisingly loud even though she wasn’t on the receiver. “A girl, anak? Ah? What was she doing?”
            I sputtered out some vague and messy approximation of what I’d seen, or thought I’d seen. The receiver changed hands. My mother took a breath, but she did not release it. She held it somewhere tight in her throat, said, “Okay,” and then hung up.

            When Lina returned, she found me slumped over the side of the car. She revived me with a cold compress she kept in her purse, but when asked what had happened, all I said was, “Take me to Lola.” Perhaps the hoarseness in my voice convinced her, and all throughout the drive back, she did not ask me anything further. I sat with my head down, overwhelmed by confused guilt taking over my blood. I felt something twist in my chest, not quite with pain, but something close to it.
            When we reached Lola’s, I thought I felt better. Lina didn’t, though, and after telling Lola she thought it might have been heat exhaustion, she ordered me to take a cold bath, and refused to leave my side for the rest of the night. Only Lola could convince her to head to bed, though Lina did so reluctantly.
            Lola didn’t leave. She stared at me, her hands folded behind her, and I realized she was waiting. I sat up, and again felt that twisting sensation in my chest. Lola knelt. placing a liver- spotted hand on my chest. Her lips barely moved, but I could tell she was counting my heartbeat.

            “What’s wrong?” I asked. “Is it my heart?”
            “Yes. It beats—”
            “Wrong? I know, that’s what the doctors always said...” I struggled to remember, to sound smart, like Lina.
            She shook her head. “No. It beats wrong not because of that. It is because of guilt.”
            I looked at her, suddenly scared. “Can you fix it?”
            But she simply looked me, her dark eyes heavy and sad. She squeezed my hand. “It’s too late for that, Jemma.” It was the first and only time she’d said my name. I felt like crying.

​

​*     *     *

​

            I didn’t make the next phone call. Lina did, and even though I sat in the car, I could hear the cursing, the mix of English and Tagalog and something else. Each slur, each accusation of her being a godless slut, a dyke, a worthless cast-off, of bringing shame to the family, what was she thinking—all of this I heard, and felt, each remark raking hot coals across my skin.
            Lina didn’t react. She stood, a hand clasped delicately around the receiver like it was revealing a secret to her. She said barely a word throughout the tirade, and waited until the operator intoned that her limit was up before she replaced the receiver and walked back to the car. She’d left the AC on, but it didn’t matter; I was stuck to the seat, itching all over, and my chest continued to throb.
            “So they know about me and Ariana,” she said. “I guess someone must have told them,”
            I said nothing, finding refuge, or seeking to find it, in the faux-wood of the dashboard. Lina sighed, leaned over, and touched my shoulder. “They were going to find out eventually. I was going to tell them, before...”
            She un-parked the car and shifted into drive, and it was only when we were turning up the driveway to Lola’s house that I said, “Before what?”
            She didn’t answer.
            In our absence, Lola had tended to a client, and another lady walked out of the house looking like the sweltering heat hadn’t touched a hair on her. She smiled brightly at us before walking up the sidewalk. Lola stood on the porch and watched her go. There was a flock of seagulls also flying in that direction, and it seemed to me that both the birds and the woman were paced equally with one another. We went inside.

            “They know,” was the first thing Lola said. Somehow I was not surprised at her knowledge; her methods were unknown to me, but they were real. Lina stiffened at the declaration, before nodding. “What will you do?”
            “I’m not sure.” Lina was quiet, then said, “I should talk to Ariana.”
            “Go,” Lola said. Lina hesitated, looked at me, before turning and heading back to the car.
            Lola and I ate a silent dinner consisting of rice and chicken warmed up in the microwave. Afterward, I went into the living room and looked outside, waiting for the headlights of Lina’s car to bounce up the road. Lola busied herself for a time. I didn’t watch her. I watched the road and kept watching long after it’d fallen completely dark and the only lights on were the neighbors’ houses. Then Lola joined me there and waited, too. We waited all night, but I ended up growing sleepy. Lola picked me up and carried me to bed.
            “Lina used to do that,” I mumbled.
            “Do what?”
            “Carry me to bed. But she stopped a while ago.”
            Lola looked at me, and something in her face broke. But the shadows of night took it away from view.
            A few nights later, Lola said, “Your parents are flying back home this Sunday.” How she knew was anyone’s guess and mattered just as little.
            It was Friday, mid-August, and autumn loomed around the corner, yet no talk had been made regarding either the fourth grade or Lina’s college plans. Then again, that sort of topic didn’t come up when we were at Lola’s. Everything else tended to fall to the wayside.

            Lina took this news with a face made from stone. “Are they now?” she murmured. Lola looked at her, then made a particular gesture with a hand, and then Lina stood, trembling. “Okay,” she said, then, “Okay,” as though she hadn’t caught herself the first time.
            She looked at the clock, started forward, then turned and went upstairs to her room while I looked questioningly at Lola. I had the distinct impression that some rite of passage was being enacted. Lola’s face was the most expressive I’d seen, and more than that, it became too apparent her age; suddenly, I knew that she was old, and that like all old folks, her face hid a lifetime of memories, not all of them happy ones. Her brow furrowed, and her hands were wrung out in front of her, like she was performing chest compressions on an invisible patient.
            Lina returned with her traveling suitcase and a backpack. I hadn’t even realized she’d brought one with her to Lola’s that first time she’d dropped me off. She walked past me and didn’t stop to explain: there was a desperation, a nervousness, with every step. In her hand, I spotted a plane ticket, which she held a short distance from herself, like she was afraid of it.
            I followed her into the living room, shuffling rather than walking, my feet filled with cement. “Lina? What’s going on?”
            Lina turned and smiled at me. Her eyes were scrunched up. “I’m sorry, Jemma,” she whispered. “I have to go now.”
            I stared at her. She tried to explain something about she couldn’t afford to wait, that she’d be meeting Ariana, she’d send Lola and me postcards if she could, that she wished she didn’t have to leave me. I heard none of this. A surging wave of white-hot noise took her voice and vanquished it. Eventually, she must have realized it was pointless, for she stopped talking, her lips and eyes sharing the same frown.

            Lola appeared from nowhere. She had a white envelope that bulged with cash. Cash, no doubt, acquired from her services as a healer.
            “Lola, no.” Lina shook her head. “That’s yours, you shouldn’t—”
            “Take it.” She took my sister’s hand, unfurled it, and placed the envelope in the palm like she was planting a flower. “You have to.”
            Lina’s face crumpled. She put both the envelope and her plane ticket in her bag, then fell forward. Lola maneuvered the situation with a softness I’d never seen, and propped Lina up without any sense of difficulty. She patted her back, whispering in that foreign tongue.
            They had known this would happen, I found myself thinking. They’d planned for it. For how long? And why hadn’t I known? Who had my sister become, that she couldn’t tell me these things?
            Lina then tried to kneel and hug me, but I squirmed away. Her face crumpled, and, confused though I was, I felt satisfied that I’d finally found one thing I didn’t need to emulate her to do: breaking her heart. It was a terrible, guilty thought.
            She stood again, looking between me and Lola. Some resolution passed through her, and her face adopted that steely, desperate expression I’d seen in all of Lola’s clients. She nodded to us, picked up her bags, and went out the door. She got in her car and drove into the sweltering summer night and not once did she wave or honk goodbye.
            I watched until she turned right and passed forever out of my life.

​

​*     *     *

​

            Standing over the supine women, Lola begins to chant something monotonous and insect-like. The incense thickens into a smog, and the woman’s eyelids flutter. Lola sways back and forth, raising her hands and eyes to the ceiling, before leaning her thin body over the patient. I look away when I hear her nails digging into the woman’s flesh. Remembering that we had just finished dinner, I go into the kitchen and run the water, the woman’s muted gasps drowned out by the stream. I clutch the sponge with both hands, squeezing it, watching the soapy run-off run down my hands and into the sink. Is any heart just as malleable, I thought, or is it only women’s whose hearts soften under pressure?
            When I come back, the woman has dressed herself and is standing by the closed. Wurlitzer in the corner, looking at an arrangement of postcards and photographs. They’d been taken and sent over the last five years, always to this address, showcasing a journey west that could never be followed up on.
            I busy myself with cleaning the area. The woman turns to me, all smiles. “Excuse me,” she says, pointing to one of the photographs. “This young lady... She kind of looks like you.”
            I ignore the lump in my throat. Once it’d been the size of a golf ball; now it is an annoying pea. “She’s my sister.”
            “How lovely. Is she well?”
            Thankfully I never have to answer. Lola re-enters the room, having cleaned off her hands, and the woman turns to her, excited. “Salamat po,” she whispers. She opens her purse and puts money into Lola’s hands, before retrieving her boots and leaving through the front door.
            Lola gazes through the screen door. I join her there and watch until the woman turns westward and vanishes into the night. “Who was she?” I asked.
            Lola gives me the same answer she’d given when, after everything, I asked who my sister had become, for her to leave.
            “Unhappy.”
            She remains at the screen door long after I've gone to bed.

​

​

​