Midnyte Madness (Part One Chapter 4)
Merry + Barry = Happy Together?

BUT this salve did nothing to lessen my anxiety when the time came for me and my mother to travel. I felt light-headed throughout the trip from Angeles City to the airport in Manila. We were in a commuter van, not in a passenger bus.
If not for my mother’s stern warning not to vomit, I would have done so. In the process, I thought I would die from the discomfort I felt, feeling nauseous but trying heroically not to unleash the heaving from my stomach.
Barry, my mother’s fiancé — and my secret future husband when I turn eighteen — wanted to fetch us from the Philippines. He knew it would be our first overseas trip. He wanted to make sure we would get to New Zealand without a hitch at any point during our travel.
My mother declined.
I heard her say that she needed more money to buy new clothes and shoes, and pay the rest of our debt to our landlady. And would he, Mother said to Barry, send money instead of spending it for his airfare to fetch us?
They talked for several more minutes. More than once, my mother looked at me, frowning, while listening to Barry on the other line.
She also exclaimed a furious no! and then I watched that anger melt from her expression — all the while looking at me. I felt creeped out.
Were they also talking about me aside from money?
Barry obviously relented. He sent the money the next day via Western Union, and as far as I knew, Mother only spent a fraction of the amount.
As for the rest of the money, I was sure she gave it to my father on the eve of our departure. I saw her put a thick envelope containing money in her purse.
Then she went off to have an assignation with my father — I heard her talk to him on her cell phone — after she dropped me off at the clothes shop at 6:00 p.m.
That was the start of Thelma’s shift.
“I’ll pick Merry up after a couple of hours,” she said to Thelma.
A couple of hours turned to eight. Thelma was furious.
“If only she said she’d be out with your father all night. I could have closed the shop for an hour or so. I wanted to treat you to fries and ice cream. Or we could have gone to the movies as well.”
“It’s okay.”
“No, it’s not okay, Merry,” Thelma fumed. “This is your last night in the Philippines. Who knows if you’ll ever come back?”
Without meaning to, my facial muscles started to contort and my lips began to twitch. Thelma did not see my soundless crying. She was still ranting.
“I don’t like to say this but I will: I do hate your father very much. He could not be bothered to see you, even once, during all the time you’ve moved here in Angeles. But now that you’re going overseas, he should at least have the decency to want to see you. Even for the last time. You are his flesh and blood!”
What could I say to that? But I wasn’t sure if I wanted to see my father anyway. He had remained a drop of mist in my cobwebbed mind.
“And Anya, your mother, — she is utterly, utterly mad! Bah, spending the night with the man who treats her like dirt! I’ll be very happy for you, Merry when you’re finally in New Zealand. Once you’re there, there is no way for your father to further treat your mother badly and sponge money off her!”
I looked down on my feet: I did not want Thelma to see me cry my soundless cry.
If Thelma only knew what my mother had planned for me and Barry, and for her and my father in three years’ time…
MY mother made me take a couple of pills for travel sickness when we were at the boarding gate at the airport in Manila. She said she forgot she had some in her handbag. I took the pills while she exchanged text messages with Barry.
A few minutes before boarding, Barry called. Mother gave the phone to me. Barry wanted to speak to me.
He only said a few words: we will soon be merry together, Merry.
Then he laughed. It was not a happy laugh. It was kind of maniacal, like how villains in films laughed. I had never heard nor seen Barry laugh before, especially that way, when he was with us in Angeles. It was unnerving.
Six and a half hours on the plane from Manila to Sydney followed by a layover of four hours at Kingston Airport, we then boarded an Air New Zealand flight to Auckland. I felt woozy again as we got nearer our destination. Three and a half hours later, we were there.
BUT not quite, we were not yet there.
We landed at Auckland International safely. The crowd of people in the terminal, while not as huge as the crowd at the airport in Manila, added to my feeling of light-headedness.
I just followed my mother. She was not as disoriented as I was.
She read the signs which were all over the place for directions to passengers, like us, who had just disembarked. We got to the baggage carousel, took a baggage trolley. When she saw our luggage on the conveyor belt, she hefted our suitcases with a little help from me.
I held the sleeve of her travel suit. Tightly. I was too afraid that my mother would disappear, and I’d be left with all these people of all skin and hair colors. We got through customs smoothly.
We had nothing to declare.
Well, I wasn’t sure if the bottle of liquor and the carton of cigarettes she bought at the duty-free shop for Barry were supposed to be declared. I managed to quickly browse a little form called embarkation card which my mother filled up for us while we were still on the plane. It was there that I read something about declaring stuff at customs.
Through the wide glass doors separating the immigration area and the arrival lounge, I saw Barry waving at us. He was among the throng of people waiting for the newly arrived travelers. He was all smiles, eyes bright with glee.
I averted my gaze and looked at my flat black shoes. When the immigration officer stamped our passports and let us through the barrier, my mother nudged me. She finally spotted her fiancé.
“There’s Barry,” she said, not without excitement and a sigh of relief.
She hurried me off, not caring that I still felt not right. She had not even said anything when I told her I was cold. I had on a dark purple blazer over my light pink dress, but the blazer was not thick enough to keep me warm.
At the passenger arrival lounge, Barry gave my mother a light peck on the tip of her nose.
It was then that I felt the frosty breeze coming from the outside. It kissed my cheeks, wan from the anxiety of travel into the unknown. I felt colder but surprisingly better — only to feel anxious again when Barry hugged me and kissed me on both cheeks.
“Welcome to your new home, Merry,” he said.
I recoiled at the tightness of his hug but he just laughed it off. He seemed pleased that I was “shy”.
He led us outside the terminal.
A blast of cold draft hit us.
I shivered.
My mother pulled the front of her blazer tighter. Barry, wearing a scruffy black leather jacket, had no problem with the cold.
On a designated pick-up spot, he bid us to wait there on the curb while he got his vehicle from the parking lot.
His vehicle was not the usual-looking car that I was familiar with. It was, I would later learn, a sport utility vehicle. I was not impressed. Well, no, maybe I would have been impressed if he did not leave with me the feel of the touch of his clammy lips upon my cheeks and his whisky breath on my face.
It was gross. I have never been kissed before by anyone. It felt so creepy.
The creepy feeling, when I looked around, was instantly gone. The late morning sky was an incredible blue. It was almost a cloudless day although I felt as if I was inside a fridge.
It was the middle of July, the middle of winter in that part of the world.
The parking lot looked full but there were several vehicles already pulling out. There were also several people, newly arrived passengers, who were walking towards the parking lot instead of waiting at the curb for their ride.
I felt somehow normal and exhilarated with having achieved what Thelma said was “everybody’s dream”.

ON the way to Barry’s house in a place called Dargaville up north, my exhilaration remained. The trip took about three hours including a half-hour stop for lunch at McDonald’s at a mall in Manukau City.
I was thrilled to be inside a comforting familiar place even if I preferred a Jollibee burger and fries.
I was hungry so I stuffed my face with two large orders of fries. It did not feel as if I was away from Angeles City.
There were several Koreans and Japanese at McDonald’s, two families were positively Filipinos.
There were Caucasians and a sprinkling of what I would learn later as Polynesians, including the indigenous people of the country, the Maori.
Except for the presence of the Maoris and other Polynesians, I would think I was in a restaurant in Angeles. I felt as safe as I could be, being on familiar grounds.
That would be the first and last time I would feel safe in this country.
AS soon as we reached a place called Helensville, and still two hours away from Barry’s house in Dargaville, the temperature dropped as rain clouds massed overhead. I shivered so much that Barry had to turn up the car heater.
By the time we approached Wellsford, the rain was pouring in solid sheets. The beautiful scenery that I took in on full stomach of my favorite meal vanished. All I could see, as my teeth chattered and my feet and hands felt like ice, was a thick blanket of pouring liquid on a dark day.
When we arrived at Barry’s house, a solitary place in a sheep station without any neighbors, an unpleasant taste filled my mouth.
It was like a portent of some big change, a much bigger change than my mind could possibly conceive.
As soon as I got out of the SUV, the sick, oh-very-sick feeling that I held back for over 7,000 miles, exploded in a rush.
(to be continued)
Thank you for reading.

If you wish to check the Introduction and the preceding chapters, the links are provided below.
Introduction My Madness That Is Midnyte
Part One, Chapter 1 Midnyte Madness: A Tale of Two Terrors
Part One Chapter 2 Midnyte Madness — Merry Meets Midnyte
Part One Chapter 3 Midnyte Madness — Merry’s Tangerine Thoughts in Angeles City
This is what inspired me to create Midnyte in this non-fiction piece: Midnyte’s My Madness
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