I'm into old sentai and tokusatsu series right now.

A close friend of mine showed me a really good place to buy videos (you know, the pirate type where they sell dvds at 35 each). My brother and I really wanted to watch old sentai series and I asked my friend if there were any in there, and she was positive about it. So I went with her one time when she went there.

Lo and behold, I indeed saw the ones I was looking for!

There was a dvd copy of Bioman there, and remembering that my brother really wanted to watch it again, I bought it immediately. But the one I was really looking for was Kamen Rider BLACK.

Kamen Rider BLACK (Masked Rider BLACK), for me, is the best tokusatsu series in its time. Lead character Minami Kotaro (Robert Akizuki in the Filipino dub) doesn't just look good, he really kicks Gorgom ass. Sugoi!

And after looking for it store after store, I finally found it! Yay for me! 

Just watching the opening credits roll and the song play the moment I put it in the dvd player sent waves of nostalgia, not only at me, but also at my brother. How we love this series! We instantly remember how we used to imitate Kamen Rider BLACK's transformation sequence when we were kids. Hehe...

Those were indeed fun times...

Anyway, anyway, that's it. Gotta watch them all now! ...Final words? Why not a loud shout of...

HENSHIN! (begins transformation...) 

Kasama ko ang mga fellow Koolasas na nakasama ko rin sa dating dorm namin: sina Krista, Ahlee, at si mommy Camille.

Yay!

Pero medyo malungkot din, kasi may mga iiwan din kaming ibang friends dun sa dorm. Medyo nagtatampo nga yung roommate ko sa akin eh. Haaay...

Nga pala, eto na itsura ko ngayon.

Oks ba? Hehe...

...wala lang.

Pati nga yung parlorista nagulat nung tinuro ko yung gusto kong hairstyle. "Ang ikli naman!" sabi niya sa akin.

E sa gusto kong magbago ng hairstyle eh.

Actually, hindi pala bago tong hairstyle na to. Dati na pala akong may maikling buhok. Ngayong college ko nga lang pala sinubukang magpahaba ng buhok, yung tipong lagpas balikat, abot dibdib na.

Pero ewan, nagsawa rin siguro ako. After 2 years, balik sa dati.

Dahil doon, pinalitan ko rin yung itsura ng avatar ko sa Yahoo! Maikli na rin buhok nya. Hehe.

Nga pala, belated happy birthday kay Watanuki Kimihiro ng xxxHOLiC. Saka kay Kinomoto Sakura na rin ng CCS.

Hindi na rin pala applicable 'tong isa kong usericon na mahaba pa buhok ko. Papalitan ko na rin yan. 

Yun na lang muna, sige...

Hehe.

It's March, and my brother is always bugging me to download songs (AC/DC, The Sex Pistols, etc.), since I always access the net whenever I'm home. I just bought my first pair of the legendary Converse Chuck Taylor! HEE-HEE!

The real reason for me adding an entry today is to greet one anime character having his birthday today, and it's Shizuka Doumeki from xxxHOLiC! Happy birthday to you!

(Doumeki: Aho.)

What?! Calling me an idiot when I greet you and everything! Grrrr...

...Anyway, anyway, that's Doumeki for you!

And yes, it's so amazing!

Naruto's showing his true potential here, and maybe he's near to becoming a Hokage. His new jutsu is awesome! I think it's the 'Rasengan Shuriken', a rasengan with spikes, just like a shuriken, hence the name. He started with something small at first, like the normal size of a shuriken, but when he was about to fight Kakuzu with it, it looked like the windmill shuriken one! It was HUGE! Even Kakuzu was afraid of being hit by it! HAHA!

He even used his bunshin to simulate a fight with Kakuzu at the start, just to gain some experiance and to determine how to match him. He's becoming really capable! A true ninja indeed!

And yeah, before that, I assumed Hidan already died. I mean, Shikamaru blew him to pieces, and while Hidan's head was still talking shit, our fave chuunin placed another explosive on his face and let it boom! Go Shikamaru! At last you have avenged Asuma-sensei's death!

Naruto wa sugoi dattebayo!

Since my 4 - 7 lab class didn't meet that time, I grabbed the chance to eat dinner early and then surf the web. I decided to eat at a local fastfood chain store then. When I arrived, there were still enough seats available, so I didn't opt to put my umbrella atop one of the tables and straightly ordered food.

After doing so, upon turning my back, all the seats were occupied! Sure, there were still seats not yet occupied, but they were already reserved (meaning someone put something theirs on top of the table beside the chair). The second floor was still closed, but then do you expect me to just eat while standing? Of course, I asked other people if I could just seat with them, but they said no, we have others with us.

Okay.

Next option? I asked one of the workers there if I can eat upstairs.

He said there were still chairs in the current floor, and that upstairs was still closed. I reasoned out, "But those empty chairs you see are already reserved for someone else, and others have companions with them." After looking around for some time more, he then agreed. And when I was about to go up, he said, "Special Dinner," to one of his co-workers.

It was a bit creepy upstairs, being alone. It was hot because the airconditioning unit hadn't been opened yet. There were another two who went up, high school students, but they then left. Myabe they couldn't stand the heat. But what could I do? I had already ordered. I was going to eat there, no matter what.

When the same guy who let me upstairs gave me the additional food I ordered, he kindly opened the aircon for me and told me to sit near it. He then told me to enjoy my meal. And of course, I said thanks.

Ah, the life.

It was nice being served like that.

And the second floor, all mine!

It was only kind of sad, because I was the only one there.

But what the heck? I felt rich and important! Indeed a special dinner!

Maybe next time again? Hehe...

As they waited for their order to arrive, Larry asked his question once more. “So then, why are you here, Jane Cruz?”

“Quit the formalities,” Jane replied, and then took a sip of the coffee served to them, “We’re not in the hospital right now. ‘Jane’ is fine.”

Larry reasoned out. “I call you Jane Cruz most of the time. Starting from high school. Now tell me what happened. What happened to Jerry and…Lei?”

Jane traced the edge of the cup with her finger, looking at it and not at Larry, while she spoke, “You honestly want to know? You might not like what I’m about to say. It’s really not nice, after all.” She gave a glance at Larry, and saw his serious face. “Well then, I’ll tell you. Just don’t try to kill me afterwards.”

“‘Just don’t try to kill me afterwards’? How serious is this?”

“Listen, and you will know.”

And Jane Cruz told her story.

—0—

“If my memory’s not failing me, it started more than seven years ago. Remember the time you left?” Larry nodded. Jane then continued. “You ended your relationship with Lei then. She looked really okay when we went with you to the airport to send you off. But afterwards, she changed. Her usual genki⁽¹⁾ self suddenly disappeared. An air of seriousness and sadness surrounded her. She was more reserved, relaxed. She wasn’t Lei.

“At first I thought, this would pass. She would move on. I somehow had to make her happy, but then I didn’t know how. Until I received a letter, anyway.”

“A letter?” said Larry.

Jane nodded. “Yes. A letter from the Dean of Harvard’s College of Medicine. I took the college entrance exams for said university, and somehow, I passed. Which was really crazy at that time for me, since I didn’t even make it past the exams of Ateneo, or even UP.”

“Wait, you took Harvard’s entrance exam? Why? How were you able to?”

“Connections, Larry. Online, and help from relatives here in America. It was timely, too; we were sent a petition to migrate here in the States by our relatives. My dad always wanted us to come here, and here was his chance. My passing in Harvard made things even more favorable for him. So we all gave him an OK. We would leave as soon as possible. I had to defer my registration for a year, to make way for our preparations.

“I was really excited to tell Jerry and Lei of my fortune. I was very happy. Then it dawned on me, they wouldn’t be. Lei was already feeling down with you gone, and if I told Jerry about it, he might—would—feel happy for me, but would also feel sad with the thought of me leaving. I would be an addition to their despair, I thought. So I hid it from them until I think it was the right time for them to know.

“We were going on as usual, us three together. It just bothered me to leave them as they are. I thought of every possible scenario that might happen once I disappear from their lives. And as I stared at the both of them while they were talking, I then realized another situation that might occur.”

Larry took a sip from his cup. “And that is?”

Jane eyed Larry seriously, and averted her gaze to her cup once more. “They might end up together.”

As Larry heard this, he almost burst into laughter. “What? Jerry and Lei? No way! That’s--”

Jane finished Larry’s sentence. “--Impossible? I don’t think so. I mean, when you were about to leave, I had Jerry promise me to also look after Lei. And being at the same campus helped them a lot, too. From the looks of things then, they seemed to know each other better. But during that time, Lei’s thoughts were still full of you, and Jerry was as faithful to me as ever.

“It did look impossible then, but what if you also remove me from the scene? The two of them would be left behind. Both Lei and Jerry weren’t very adept socially, well, none of us were, and who was there to count on but each other. And you, Larry, should know this, but no matter how Lei might look, she was a romantic. She believed that two wounded hearts heal faster together; she told me so one time.

“Lei’s heart was wounded, all because you left. That was one. I held on to her belief this time. Now the only matter left is to find the other wounded heart, or create one, one close to her, one that might call to her in desperate times.”

Larry must have caught on, for his eyes widened. “You mean--!”

“Jerry, yes. I wanted them to get closer together. I tried to distance myself from them more often. They did mind, and whenever we saw each other they would ask just that. I said I just had more things to deal with, considering the course I took. Partly true, being a medicine student was really hard. And partly not, for you know the reason.

“Then the time of departure came. I was still wondering if I would tell them. But considering what I wanted to happen, I decided not to. If I did, then they would be accepting things with much more ease. Jerry would still know what to do, and that was to continue on loving me. Lei would be supportive in some way, for this would help me reach my dream, and she wanted me to do so for sure.

“So I left. Not a single word to them. Not even a single hint to Jerry. He might have been devastated then, and Lei much lonelier. But that was still according to plan, after all.

“I wanted them to end up together. That way even if I leave them wounded, if what Lei said ever came true, they would call on to each other, help each other heal themselves, and eventually…” Jane looked back at Larry. The latter was still wide-eyed with everything Jane told him.

“That is all I can say. End of story.” Jane finished.

Larry was clenching his fists under the table. His face was etched with a mixture of emotions such as confusion, surprise, and… anger. And as Jane finished her tale, he said, a bit of anger along with the words, “You did all of those? You actually thought of those things? ‘According to plan’, you say?!”

Jane had anticipated this reaction. She was dealing with Larry Keng, wasn’t she?

The man then slammed his fist on the table. Doing so made what was on the table wobble; the cups almost fell. “You did everything just because of your stupid dream?!”

“Making my dreams come true is something that I would never let go. Isn’t that true for every person here on earth?”

“But as far as to hurt your best friend? Leave your love behind? Tell me, were they anything important to you? Did you really even love Jerry? Who are you? What are you?”

Jane looked at Larry squarely in those flaming eyes of his. “I am human. That is why I did all of these. And yes, I loved Jerry. I still love him. But I just can’t let the opportunity given to me pass by.

“I still feel guilty of what I did to them. The only thing I can think of right now to atone is to not show myself to them ever again. If I did, it would just stir up old memories that should have been forgotten. What if they’re together now? What if they’ve already forgotten about me? About you, as well? What if they’re already happy, just like I wanted them to be before I left? Wouldn’t it ruin everything if I came back?

“They will pressure me for reasons. Question me everything they needed an answer to. And definitely, they will show the same reaction you showed me today.

“I’ve also taught myself to forget. I can live now without Jerry. I have been doing so, for more than seven years. And I’ll continue to do so. But you,” she again looked at Larry, but this time much softer, “you still haven’t learned to let go of Lei, have you?”

Larry flinched. She was right. Hearing this, he seemed to calm down, tension from his shoulders disappearing. He took his gaze away from Jane. “You really saw right through me, didn’t you? Yes, that is true. I still love Lei.

“I thought I got over it when I started living here. Heck, I even had another girlfriend. And we managed to stay together for four years, longer than Lei and I had. But those four years together with Melanie were easier to forget than the two short years with Lei. I don’t know if it’s because our time together was shorter that it became more memorable, or if it was really Lei that made it that way.

“Only one thing is clear to me now: I am a fool for leaving like that. Unlike you, I have too much regret. I want to go back and make her love me again. But…

…if it is true, this thing you just said, then I have no more right to interfere. If indeed they learned to love each other, I should not be in any way against them.”

Looking back at Jane once more, he continued, “This doesn’t mean I forgive you for hurting the two of them to make them closer. If you weren’t a woman, I could have grabbed you and punched you here and now.”

“I know,” replied Jane. “You don’t need to tell me that.”

Larry sighed. “Don’t worry, everything will go on normally while at the hospital. Part of being professional. And you had to choose this as your working place, of all.”

Jane chuckled a little. “It’s one of the best. I would definitely choose this. I never knew your family owned it. I just know it belonged to Orville Group of Companies. I never imagined you to be Larry Orville. And yeah, sorry for asking, but why change your surname?”

“That? Location, most of it. ‘Keng’ sounds too lame here. And ‘Orville’ is my great-grandfather’s surname. It is somewhat appropriate, you know.”

“So, even your father uses that name now?”

“We threw the name ‘Keng’ away already. It no longer exists. And maybe that is a reason why I held back my urge to return to the Philippines. Larry Keng no longer exists.”

Jane nodded. “So it seems.”

After that, their order arrived, they ate and drank, both silent for the whole course of the meal. There weren’t anything left to say for that moment. Afterwards, they returned to the hospital to start work.

—0—

Was it really impossible for these four to meet once again? Will time permit that to happen? As the seasons changed, so did people’s feelings. And so did their decisions. And, along with time, fate might change its mind after all, erasing any previous arrangements with new, more interesting ones, or so it would seem.

Will fate do so for the four of them?

Only time, the change of the seasons, would tell.

—0—

(end chapter 3)

“I can’t believe you did this to me!” a blonde woman at her early twenties shouted, hazel eyes blazing with anger as she did, “You seem to regard me as trash! What, you pick me up and then play with me, then discard me when you don’t like me anymore?”

The man she was referring to, answered back calmly but with a strong hint of anger, “I do not ‘seem’ to regard you as trash. You are one.”

The woman got more furious when she heard him say that. She went up to him and slapped him the hardest way she could. “You—you coldhearted bastard! What’s wrong with you? What have I done wrong?” She was already crying.

The man eyed her coldly and replied, “You cease to please me. You bore me.”

Hearing this, the woman cried even more and slid on the floor. Between sobs she said, “What about the three years we spent together? Were they meaningless now?”

“No. They were good. It’s the ‘now’ that I have problems with. I have to go.” With that said, he left the woman, who was aghast and on the floor crying her heart out. She mumbled as he left, “You…you are a cruel man, Larry Orville…”

—0—

Larry strode down the streets of New York in his car, hoping to find an open bar and have a drink there. His own bar in the house would not suffice tonight. He needed strangers around him to remind him he was not alone.

He adopted a new name when he came to the United States, and now he lived as Larry Orville, the surname being his great-grandfather’s. That being the case, no one ever called him by his real surname.

He thought of his breakup with his girlfriend for three years, Melanie Nickerson, who he met during his college days at Hunter. They began living together after graduation in a house that he bought for her and had it put in her name. He then worked at a hospital in central Manhattan that their family owned, as a manager and representative. She worked as a writer in a local newspaper.

He thought he could finally settle down and live with Melanie to see if things would really work out between them. But then, things changed so drastically.

Out of the blue, he found her boring. He found her weak. He found her to be no match for him. She couldn’t keep up with the changes he wanted, he noted. She just continued on obliging to everything he asked her of. No objections. No buts. Heck, he felt that if he asked her to strip and please herself in front of him, she would do so. 

He didn’t want that kind of woman. He wanted someone who was strong and brave enough to scold him, to smack some sense into him. Melanie wasn’t that woman. She was pathetic. Her slap a while ago was pathetic as well. If someone were to slap him, it better be hard to make him quiver. He knew he was headstrong, and he realized just now that he wanted someone as headstrong as he was.

Or rather, he already had someone like that before. But then he was about to leave her for the States, and both of them decided to end their relationship before he left. Now he regretted doing that.

He felt it was really her that his heart was after.

Lei, and even Jerry and Jane, how are they? I hope I can see even just one of them. It has been seven years, after all.

He sped up and finally found his ideal place. He went there, still musing on his thoughts and the events moments ago.

Little did he know that one of his wishes would soon come true.

—0—

Rrring! Rrrring!

Larry woke up when he heard the phone ringing. His eyes adjusted to the darkness of his room as he sat and grabbed the phone. “Yes?”

“Mr. Orville?”

“Yes. Who is this?” he asked as he looked at the clock. 5:00 AM.

“It’s Jenn, your secretary. Sorry to disturb you early this morning sir, but you have an appointment at 7:30 AM. And after that you’ll have a briefing with new hired nurses and doctors.”