I've had an old man, a family friend, stalk me and threaten to kill himself "out of love" for me. Like, Lolo, what do you expect me to do? Mother your apos?
The funny thing is we reported him to our local DSWD bc he just won't stop the threats. And we (my dad and I) tried to file a blotter case against him, but some days after, I saw the old man's face again in our very own home. He was getting chummy with us again bc my father came to him in need of money.
All along, he'd give me this stuff and I thought he was just being a galante na tito but tada, there was more to it as it turned out.
I remember how tense I would get whenever I would walk home to and fro school and I would be forced to take the route close to where he lives. My friends would sometimes laugh at me already bc of how 'praning' I'd get, shrugging it off and telling me I'm safe. Well, the old man said he'd shoot himself with a gun in front of me, how am I supposed to react?
But I laugh about this now, comforted with the idea that I'll never have to see him again.
Was I mad at my father for risking my safety out of financial necessity? I don't know. Maybe. Surely, there were other means. Why would he have to resort to asking help from the people we wanted--no, needed to stay away from?
The tragedy was, the other means of financial resource that my dad saw was not very decent, but that's another story. They say you can't have it all. And I never did. But maybe at some point, I was lucky to have had enough and to remain alive and untouched by filthy hands as such.