Breathe through your nose, not your mouth.

It was perhaps the fiftieth time I had to remind myself of that piece of hiking advice a friend once told me, back when we were climbing a hill in Palaui Island, Cagayan. It seemed utterly trivial now compared to the torture I was putting myself through.

Fifteen minutes in and I was already sweating profusely, my shirt clinging to my skin, rivulets of sweat running down my back. There was no way I was going to ask that dreaded question to the five guides with us. Thankfully, someone else beat me to it.

“Are we near?” a Caucasian man asked jokingly. A few snickers followed the question that most of us were probably thinking.

“Near where we left off,” one of the Filipino guides replied with a grin.

With only the light from our headlamps and a smattering of stars overhead, we had no real sense of where we were. The wooden stairway we had passed earlier could have been miles away for all we knew.

This would have been child’s play for her. I could never match her athleticism, her willowy frame holding all the graceful endurance of someone born to move. And, loathe as I am to admit it, she was probably stronger than I would ever be. At least physically.

However strong she was, words still hurt her. From the vitriol of inconsiderate bosses to sarcastic one-liners from my lips, there was always something that would sting. Her lips would snap shut, forming an unconscious pout. She would mumble and I would ruffle her hair. She would lean almost but not quite onto my shoulder, and I would tell her without speaking that no matter how messed up the world was, especially to her, she would always have me. And she would believe me.

Perhaps the ease with which I gave her that assurance was why she found it so easy to toss everything aside. Or perhaps the ease itself unnerved her. How can you love someone so easily, so quickly?

Love. To this day, I still have no idea. And she would never believe me. Every day since that fateful night, she grew more distant until we were oceans apart. Talking to her was like an uphill climb…

“Akyat ka na, sir,” one of the guides called, bringing me back. They gestured to the second vertical climb we had to tackle. It was significantly higher than the last one, with no harness or safety gear, just the firm instructions of the guides.

Step on the rock to your right, then put your left foot into the shallow crevice just above your knee…

By some grace, I managed to get to the top. We were halfway to the cliff now. The group was quieter, more subdued than earlier. Still, every climb was met with tired but contented smiles.

As far as I knew, there was little similarity between us except for the drab Uniqlo wear that, to be fair, she wore effortlessly. I could never pinpoint the exact moment we started talking. Chatting at first, we hit it off well. She wasn’t my opposite but she was different. Politics bored and terrified her. She was more religious than I would ever be in a million timelines. Once, as a jest, she told me she would pray for me. I told her that didn’t sit well with me. We did not talk for a week.

Ironic that we patched things up, me mostly, at a religious event. I remember her closing her eyes, both free and pained at the same time, as she prayed with the crowd. While I stood there, transfixed. When the prayer ended, she smiled at me. The brightest smile. Right then and there, I knew I was in trouble.

Sorry na, I mouthed. She placed her right hand on my shoulder and gave a gentle squeeze. All is forgiven, she seemed to say.

It’s strange, the things you remember most. Not the view. Not the climb. Just the way her laughter would catch on her braces, how it made her smile flash brighter, like light bouncing off steel. The sound would linger, soft at first, then vanish too soon, leaving the air a little colder. I used to think that smile, hers, could carry us anywhere. Me anywhere. Up a mountain, across oceans, in-between wait times (often for me… sorry babe), even through silences. I was wrong. Some climbs end before you reach the top.

After the many pictures I would take of her (because I could never say no to those big brown eyes) she would probably spend the rest of our time at the peak staring at the ocean. She was fond of the sea, more so of its color. From sneakers to phone cases to printed socks, blue had always been her favorite. Only fitting, I suppose. She did have a habit of making me blue.

That little quip would fly over her head and she would glare, asking why writers were always like that. I would glare back and we would hold it until we broke into snickers, then laughter. She teased me for my elitist pretentiousness. I countered that my elitism was a good balance to her basic-ness.

And then, sometimes, we would just stop talking altogether. Not out of anger, but out of a quiet that felt almost natural. Almost. Until it wasn’t.