A Good Talk with a Stranger

“Mukha ba akong manloloko?”
A guy friend’s friend asked as I was staring blankly outside the window flicking a cigarette.
“Uhh, yes? But I’m not sure about it since I don’t know you,” I answered.


It was my college friend’s birthday celebration at his pad somewhere in Makati. He invited a few college friends and two high school best friends. We plunged into the pool, ate, filled ourselves with alcoholic beverages, puffed some cigarettes, sang our hearts out, played “games”, and some other stuffs.

I was totally pissed off that night because of some reasons that shouldn’t be put here, so I wanted my time alone. I sat by the window, puffed the cigarette that lasted only two to three minutes. A guy sat in front of me, my guy friend’s best friend. He’s face is familiar, I seldom see him at school since we’re attending the same university. Out of the blue, he asked me something which initiated a good conversation between the two of us.

He’s a psychology major, I suppose by the way how he read a person. We talked about a lot of things. He narrated about his miserable love experience that led to open up about mine. Life issues were brought up, family problems and the like. It's as if we were really close to each other to talk about personal stuffs. We tackled different topics that steered to another matter. We happen to have our own beliefs but we do respect each other’s views. We That was a good discussion, a sensible one.

But I was puzzled when he asked me if I put on a lip gloss. I answered no with a quizzical look. I only applied powder to my face, and I didn’t even comb my hair that night. Then, he said that I looked like I was wearing a lip gloss though I smoke. As we chat that night, he kept on making remarks about my lips which made me laugh.

He asked personal questions, but I didn’t answer it all since I’m not obliged to. He even dared me for a “truth-or-truth game” but I told him that he should convince the other people to join the game. The light crept in; it was about five or six in the morning. It was time to go home so we weren’t able to play “truth-or-truth”.

I went home thinking about all the things that we discussed about.

We did see each other inside the campus, but there are no hi's or smiles whenever we passed by each other. It's as if we don't know each other, like strangers.