Scottish Marigold with Brown Sugar and Calamansi

Boil enough hot water for four people. (Ton) Make sure, at this juncture, that you will not drink this tea alone. Prepare colorful mugs. (Chet) If you must drink this alone, do so at dawn when the sky is aflame and there are people in the street below because, otherwise, what’s the point? (Sia)

It was called ixora, flame of the woods, but when she saw the flowers, she only thought of their strange color: half-way between red and orange, flaming but never burning out. They grew – in large, uncontainable bushes – at the base of the far wall bordering the backyard of their ancestral house in Rizal and Sia grew up plucking handfuls of tiny flowers – a brilliant bouquet in each babyish hand – to drain each flower of its nectar. The sweet, provincial soil regularly watered by rain, unrelenting sunshine, and turned by the loud, brash winds, nurtured a garden of weeds, brilliant grass, the sturdy and knotted branches of young trees. Everything grew upright and strong, each color magnified into a hundred different hues all with tinkling names. Sia’s childhood garden acquired the untamed irregularity – untrimmed trees with large spreading branches, bushes that refused to take recognizable shapes, flowers sprouted everywhere including from high upon the cracked cement walls – of the undomesticated adjacent lots and Sia enjoyed it with her bare feet. Nourished by unspoiled nectar of that garden, flowers were in her blood and their petals colored the blood in her veins so it was not surprising that Sia, who hid among the planets to breathe, pilfered her grandmother’s box of flower-tea recipes for herbal concoctions to lift her spirit.

Her grandmother’s recipe for ixora tea had been recorded by Great Uncle Ton whose family legacy, he maintained, was the swirling alphabet devised and refined throughout his career as a librarian. Curlicues embellished his letters: they swelled like the warm summer sea distressed by wind; they were fluid as salt water so that the words written in this hand floated in Sia’s memory, buoyed up in her memory by her Great Uncle’s calligraphic masterpiece.

The entire box of recipes had been penned in the same illustrious hand wielded by three different generations: Great Uncle Ton, Sia met as the large man speaking in whispers, his gurgled vociferations bubbled just below hearing so Sia sat next to him during reunions to listen to his stories; Kuya Chet, Sia’s Uncle, only a few years her elder, with large blinking eyes that glowed in the dark; and Sia, determined to bring the box of tea recipes to Manila. Although she couldn’t find half the flowers in the city – and she stole what she could from the neighbors – she found a ready supply of simple blossoms at her university and street children offered garlands of sampaguita.  

It was called ixora, flame of the woods, but when she saw the flowers, she only thought of their strange color: half-way between red and orange, flaming but never burning out. They grew – in large, uncontainable bushes – at the base of the far wall bordering the backyard of their ancestral house in Rizal and Sia grew up plucking handfuls of tiny flowers – a brilliant bouquet in each babyish hand – to drain each flower of its nectar. The sweet, provincial soil regularly watered by rain, unrelenting sunshine, and turned by the loud, brash winds, nurtured a garden of weeds, brilliant grass, the sturdy and knotted branches of young trees. Everything grew upright and strong, each color magnified into a hundred different hues all with tinkling names. Sia’s childhood garden acquired the untamed irregularity – untrimmed trees with large spreading branches, bushes that refused to take recognizable shapes, flowers sprouted everywhere including from high upon the cracked cement walls – of the undomesticated adjacent lots and Sia enjoyed it with her bare feet. Nourished by unspoiled nectar of that garden, flowers were in her blood and their petals colored the blood in her veins so it was not surprising that Sia, who hid among the planets to breathe, pilfered her grandmother’s box of flower-tea recipes for herbal concoctions to lift her spirit.

This is important: Choose a marigold bulb still on the vine but close to rotting, one filled with ants, those connoisseurs of sweetness who, like us, appreciate the taste of flaming petals. (Ton) Choose, if you find no bulb of that description, the brightest and reddest. (Sia)  

Sol held the mug by its rim, between thumb and forefinger, and the ice of the words on his tongue would not cool Sia’s honeyed-sampaguita tea. Every breath slowed his thoughts and soon he found it impossible to speak, open his eyes, or force words out of his throat. He felt the mug tip onto his lips, a steady stream crept, hissing, over his tongue and fell gracefully down his throat, burning all the way so that he felt his lungs collapse and drown, his own flesh steaming. Still he drank the sweet tea because, what else could he do?

That much he remembered. It tasted vaguely refreshing, like dew, and the heat was more than burning; it was a deep, rich rumbling kind of heat that swept away feeling and memory. In the brief six months – the highlight of their relationship – Sol never liked Sia’s provincial tea. Each cup she gave him he finished off as quickly as he could, in large gulps, the dregs from unrefined sugar sifted into his last mouthful, and he swallowed the choking as best he could. That much, he remembered and recognized as thought and insight before – here, yet more tea, more hot water, more of that sick flower smell that Sia wore on all her clothes and on her skin and in each kiss, it even tasted like her – and then Sol fought, struggled to raise his arms. He could have knocked the mug away, breathed the hot air out and lived enough to heal burnt lungs, half-drowned heart. Instead, he fell asleep, drugged, in the same way Sia, drowsy from the flowers she drained, collapsed on a bed of emerald grass to soak up the afternoon sun until she glowed pink.  

Sia: long-legged, bony, with an oriental face, round and plump cheeks the texture of ilang-ilang in full bloom and gumamela red when she blushed looking at Sol, and tiny eyes like beetles hiding beneath velvet leaves. But he did not see the florid arrangement, the bouquet of emotions cramped upon her face when she tipped the steaming cup down his throat: anger crumpled her features, crushed her beneath its heel so that she exhaled an aroma of ground cinnamon and bruised jasmine; afterwards, a long moment of recognition sweet and painful as the morning flowers fall, a shadow-moment fleeting and intense the way a rain-heavy cloud momentarily obscures the sun; and, finally, the devastating remorse like a garden besieged by storm and wind, her eyes grew into twin moons white and empty, and she could have howled.  

Sol slumped on the tile floor of her bleak room, his open mouth steaming like a hot kettle.

With your wrists and knuckles, crush the flowers, ruin the petals. Only with violence can we reach the sweetness. (Ton)

Sia’s room was a fragrant, moist place and she slept on a dew-sodden mattress and under every book she pressed flowers, not as mementos and bodies for her memories, but for tea. She hung discarded tarpaulins or cloth to shade the delicate potted plants shaking in the weak wind.

Half-empty, Sia’s bowl of honey – the color of worn wood, a dark burnished gold deeper and more malevolent than amber – lay forgotten as Sia shuffled the recipe cards. Here: rose grape, kapa-kapa, toasted over an open flame and reduced to ashes and then boiled, sweetened with moscovado. Another: kalachuchi – the frangipani – finely chopped along with three large leaves should produce a bitter tea perfect for an all-nighter. Its flavor obstinately stayed on her tongue and it came with restlessness so pervasive, she could not sit still until she resolved to ignore the tingling in her bones. Sia became a tolling bell, her bones tinkling an alarum that woke her spirit, propelling her into an insomnia from which she would not recover for three days. She read and studied until dawn.

Asusena or tuberose, which she encountered only twice, was the sweetest natural tea she had ever tasted. Coarsely chopped and stuffed in a bag, her grandmother let it steam in the boiling hot water for an hour. They drank a small pitcher of tuberose milk tea with a tin of biscuits and she felt lightheaded, giddy, for the rest of the day. What would she give for some of that witchcraft?

Abandoned in the heartless wild of the city, Sia confronted her poorly stocked cupboard with a somber grin. While she shook the honey pot, dusted the moldy shelves until her hands came away coated with salt, sugar, and dust, she resolved, finally, to visit the twenty-four hour convenience store to find some bread, sugar, and a mug.  But she would not return home to drink tea or prepare a midnight snack; Sia would not come home, at all.   

When kosmos, pot marigold, became her immediate favorite tea, Sia thought it was a sign from her grandmother – a divinity she trusted more than saints because her grandmother had been the recipient of her grandfather’s great love – that Sol would play an important part in her life. His home along a small street just off the highway was obscured from view by flourishing marigold bushes reaching outwards to the street, creating a canopy under which Sol stood a foot from her, raiding his pockets for keys while Sia, her shirt dripping wet from Sol’s spilled soda, breathed marigolds.

Mahilig ka rin sa tsaa? She smiled because, no matter how many times she asked, Sia divined the answer. No. No one drank tea the way her family did and she relished every opportunity to flaunt this achievement. I know how flowers taste, I know that dew tastes like the moon and it glows and it makes your face glow, too. Sol discarded cigarette ashes, held a case of cigarettes and a tiny lighter in his hands, a few lose coins, until finally the keys revealed themselves where they had been hidden in the fold of his pants pocket.

His house smelled of ash and soot and darkness because it was a hole of concrete and it was cold. Sol brought her a towel, pointed her towards the bathroom, and wrung his hands but Sia only smiled and repeated her question. Mahilig ka ba sa tsaa? His books tumbled to the tiled floor in the living room, books Sia recognized. Sol was a foot taller than her but nervous, body tilted away in an attitude meant to be read as standoffish if Sia did not notice how often he glanced at her expression and, no matter how well he pulled his emotions inward – as though they were in danger of flying away and reaching her – now and then, his expression swelled into the bright luminosity of hope, something young, ringing with adventure. He seemed to say, without meaning to: I did it, she’s here, now what?

Drown the petals in boiling water. Squeeze the juice of the smallest, most bitter calamansi. (Ton) Two calamansi. (Chet) Wait until the petals have ripened and risen to the surface, bloated with water and juice, and then strain the tea directly into mugs. Do not wait! (Sia)

Kiko was late.  Behind him: a highway jammed with screaming cars and pedestrians hiding beneath umbrellas, all obscured from view as a wall of water crept past. Finally stepping into the light – despite the storm, cafes and restaurants remained open and accommodating – Kiko shook the water from his hair and shoulders. He checked the bruise on his cheek – some tall yuppie rushed to reach shelter with a heavy laptop bag that swung wildly as Kiko stumbled out of the way and onto the street – and scanned the wide, low-ceilinged tea shop. He spotted Sol – back curved against the wall, a little smile, and his loose white shirt – and wedged past the tightly packed group of college students.

Kiko was naturally apologetic, his anecdotes and stories interspersed with contrite asides, but with Sol, at least, his tardiness had become a disappointing fact long accepted with infinite patience, like Sol’s white shirts, how he can’t concentrate after four hours, the way Kiko chewed pencil erasers,  or his sweaty palms. When Kiko sat down, Sol didn’t bother to look up, only allowed the smile to creep higher, empty hands clasped on his lap, his shadow obscured a half-inch thick stack of photocopied readings. Sol’s shoulders dropped an inch, his body sagged and his wrinkled shirt pooled around him although the smile, Kiko noted, seemed fixed. Kiko took a seat opposite the friend he hadn’t seen in four months, his backpack damp with rainwater. They found themselves – Kiko’s body ringing from movement and rushing through rain and wind his whole attitude and character muted and waiting; Sol languid on the couch alone at the back of the café and bent over – in the setting made familiar by their annual reunions, after their mutual friends have all decided to go home, and one bottle between them.  

“Pare. Glad you’re here. When you didn’t answer your phone, I thought you weren’t going to make it.” Sol inclined his head towards the shuddering white doors and shifted in his seat as a draft broke the calm: tinkling glasses, the door creaked loud as shattering glass, someone squeezed in among the tables muttering excuses as she went. Kiko refused to become a fixture in Sol’s life where, Kiko felt, their one-sided relationship wouldn’t survive. One day soon, Kiko felt, Sol needed to be punched.

 During the phone call Sol sneaked while Sia took a bathroom break on their Saturday night study date, Sol whispered a meeting place and time. Thanks, pare, he said, letting the static accumulate into a weight at the end of the line until Kiko hung up.

The café was the last in a chain of recently renovated shops lining the avenue. Outside, an alley led into a maze of side-streets. Kiko watched it turn sharply right and out of view. Sol had chosen this café, Kiko knew, only because the alley beside them led almost directly to their house and Sol frequented the sari-sari stores along the way. Kiko chose the seat near the windows, staring out into the shifting darkness, legs folded beneath him. He was Sol’s sounding board and Kiko knew to expect only trouble. He was acquainted more with Sol’s problems, not their complicated back stories, not what led Sol into the cafe, and certainly not Sol’s romance. So he waited, a little on edge, because he came tonight with a story of his own and he did not know if Sol was the person he wanted to hear it.

“Walang beer dito, e.” Kiko tried a joke to bait Sol out to meet him. Sol’s attitude hadn’t changed: he refused to look up and he was biting his lip. “Hoy, sige na. Nandito na’ko. Ano ba nangyari?” Sol closed his book, rested his hands flat on the table, and frowned, his long face made gaunt by shadows under his eyes. His face had lost all its natural curves – it was some geometrical shape, pointed and severe, all jutting angles and deep creases.

“Wala.” He had ordered and eaten a sandwich. A plate, a fork, the dull knife had been left on the table. Sol gripped a mobile in his left hand until it rang and he slipped it into his bag, a weather-spotted backpack. “Parang ang hirap lang niya pasayahin at napapagod na’ko.”

Kiko waved a waitress over and asked for two tall glasses of lukewarm water. “Mag-aaway kami kapag hindi ko siya nakakausap nang maayos, pero pag nag-uusap kami, puro away uli.”  

The water washed away the taste of the street, smog, the yellow-and-red lights. Kiko drained his glass until water ran down the side of his mouth. “Parang ayoko na.”

 Strain, stir, and set aside. Allow it to cool. (Ton) Do not add more calamansi or sugar. (Chet)  

From down the hall, Tyn heard breaking glass: a thud, the metallic ring, and her roommate’s tinkling voice cooing to soothe Sol’s aggravated baritone. Not again. Sia invited Sol to their room and Tyn fought off the urge to turn back towards the elevators. Not again. She wouldn’t allow herself to be turned out of her own room – not tonight, at least. January had been ushered in by a cruel, howling wind. In the morning, she pushed herself out of bed before the heat baked the sidewalks and she stayed in the office to wait out sporadic bursts of pounding rain. But all day, the wind pricked her eyes and made her blind, dried her lips and spun the grime of the city in her hair and clothes.

Their door unlocked, Tyn pushed her way into the apartment. Crammed into the space between her bed and Sia’s mattress, Sol crouched on the floor, shirtless, carefully gathering pieces of a broken mug. Her mug. Pushed to the wall, their fold-away table set with a canister of hot water, chips, a stack of paper plates, and one of Sia’s small bottles full of the dried flowers she drank as tea. Tyn inhaled jasmine, another faint fruity scent, and beneath all of this, the earthy smell of damp grass and new bark. She felt lightheaded and dizzy.

“Where’s Sia?” Tyn kept her voice level.

“I’m here!” Sia emerged from the bathroom, Sol’s wet shirt in her hands. “I’m sorry for the mess, Tyn, we’ll clean it up.” Behind her, Sol swayed on his bare feet, carrying shards to the trashcan. He nodded at her and ducked back down to finish his job. If it wasn’t for Sia, Tyn wouldn’t have seen Sol, would never have glanced at him. His was a forgettable face, something a stare would never pick out, all glances slid off of him.

“I’m tired, Sia.” Tyn picked her way to the bed and dumped her bag upon it. “Do you mind if I stay?” The question grated her pride but her sense of propriety held sway: if they wanted to be alone, Tyn had no choice but to leave – albeit she would take her dear sweet time to do so. Even her pillow had acquired the jasmine-breath of the room. Tyn opened the window above her head and from below, the wailing street issued siren song after song. Sol began whispering. He inclined his head towards the door and nodded at Tyn.

Tyn toyed with her mobile, trying to disappear because the limited space in their apartment and its blank white walls provided no distraction from the arguing couple. Sia’s body didn’t move. She froze in place, tense, so that when she finally turned to look at Tyn – smile hardened in place – her roommate heard a rattling anxiety and unease. Instead of flowers, now, the room stank of rot. Sol kissed Sia’s cheek, an approximation of their goodbye ritual. He stood a foot or two above her and waited for Sia to kiss him back. Something heavy fell somewhere, Tyn heard it echo in the hallway. It startled Sol who twitched where he stood. Sia thrust her lips towards him, a child. Tyn looked away, unconvinced.

Dip the petals in sugar. Pour lukewarm tea into mugs. Serve iced and with one petal in each glass. (Sia)

Sol shared his hospital room with two other men: one lay still, his left leg bandaged and a tube had been inserted down his throat; the other was an octogenarian whose wife dropped by once a week, he breathed through his mouth. He had been confined indefinitely, abandoned to old age.  A pump inflated his body while it hissed in the corner. Sol’s bed, wedged between them, enjoyed an uninterrupted view of the hospital parking lot seven floors below, and rooftops covered in graffiti. The room had been chosen for him because neither of its first occupants was capable of speech. Sol and his burnt mouth fit in.

It was Thursday, three in the afternoon. Sol’s last classes ended at noon. During his first week of confinement, his friends visited after school and ate the cakes his mother brought. Sol was fed through a slit in his stomach. His friends wanted no part in changing the heavy bag of his urine. They didn’t want to see the boils on his lips, or his shattered cheeks.

Fuck Punk. Green, blue, and the pink of gumamelas Sia brewed into herbal remedies. Graffiti on the walls he read to wake him up. Fuck Punk. The door to his room opened to reveal Sia carrying her school bag and a metal jug. Her arrival filled the room with static and made his mouth water and sting.

How are you, baby? There was no room for a table or a chair so she perched on the foot of his bed. The tongue in his mouth – cut into a stub by the emergency room surgeon – would never recover. That’s okay, I’m here. School was great. I copied down our lesson for you. I wrote out our homework, too. Don’t worry, I can pass all your tests and all your quizzes for you, too.

And since there was no way to respond, Sol closed his eyes. Fuck punk, he read in his mind.

He felt Sia shift closer until she leaned over him. He smelled gumamela, marigolds, sampaguita, flowers, and leaves. Somewhere, a hot sun toasted petals in its glare, bark hardened on trees. Sia pried his eyes open, an eyelid between each thumb and forefinger, her nails long and poised. What’s wrong? I came from school pa, and you won’t even listen?