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Elias had lost track of time ever since he started rowing the boat earlier. Judging by the color of the deep blue sky, he makes a guess that it was already around 4 o’clock in the morning; the time of when the sun barely woke up from its slumber. His eyes dart towards the basking glow of the moon, slowly cascading down onto the scenery until his dark brown orbs stare directly at the man sitting in front of him, his nose buried deep in a booklet.
The boatman does not realize he’s befallen in a daze until the young man he’s staring at looks up at him back, a small grin on the corner of his lip. “Enjoying the view there?” Crisostomo quips. The breakage of silence causes Elias to shake away from his stupor, flustered eyes looking back at his rugged hands holding the wooden oar. “My apologies, Señor. I did not realize I was staring.” He bashedly says. He moves his arms once more to stir the boat forward, steadily moving further into the lush greenery surrounding the water body.
“Oh, you and your formalities. You know I’ve repeatedly told you that you can call me by my first name, Elias.” Crisostomo reassures him with a soft smile, a smile that so captures Elias’ heart. The smile that made him fall for the Ilustrado in the first place.
“I just haven’t gotten used to it, Señor Crisostomo.” Elias replies with another stroke of the oar. Again, he does not realize what comes out of his lips until Crisostomo giggles at it, which leads the boatman to tilt his head in confusion. “Hey, you just said it yourself. You know you got it.” Crisostomo smiles again, a snicker accompanying it even. Elias drops his head again, a tinge of red coloring his tan skin.
A sigh comes out of the bangkero’s lips, continuously ignoring how loudly his heart is thumping in his chest. ‘Focus, Elias. You might accidentally tip the boat.’ He thinks to himself, his head looking warily around his surroundings. “You’re really concentrated there.” Crisostomo comments again, voice laced with a playful tone. Elias’ eyes shift back to the young man, and only now, he can see how beautifully the moon lights up Crisostomo’s pretty face.
Elias sees how the moon’s glow rests itself on Crisostomo’s fair skin, blending with its moreno tone. His eyes shift to the young man’s light brown ones, it being filled with a sense of altruism and kindness. How Elias seems to see the galaxy’s stars swirling in them.
‘A child of the moon, sitting in front of me. And I, of the sun.’, a thought that keeps repeating itself in the bangkero’s mind. Thinking about their differences, how the two seemed so opposite yet similar at the same time; It makes his calloused fingers gripping the wooden oars to ever so slightly shiver in ecstasy, and his heart swells up in joy.
Elias lets out a deep exhale; a futile attempt to calm himself down, really, and he rests the oar down on the boat, with his sun kissed hands relaxing on a wooden platform built into the said boat. Crisostomo’s fingers, that were once holding the worn booklet, now danced itself to lightly touch his own. A sense of longing fills his mind, and he enacts it by resting his larger hand atop the ilustrado’s smaller one.
Elias knew his time with Crisostomo was going to be limited, but he would cherish every second of it, every moment with Ibarra was going to be one he would remember for the rest of his life time. Crisostomo looks upon the bangkero’s hand, his mouth forming a small smile at the gesture. “Momentary bliss is a bitter thing, isn’t it?” The Ilustrado tries to say it sweetly, but it ends up sounding sour. Elias chuckles at it.
“It’s like looking at the sight of a fleeting bird flying in the sky amidst a ground of bloodshed…” Crisostomo trails off, eyebrows stitched together in worry. Elias looks at him with concern, his grip on the young man’s hand getting a bit tighter. Crisostomo looks at him again. “But, in spite of everything, we will prevail through it, will we not?” He asks with a small smile, and Elias nods in response. “We have each other after all, Señor.”
Crisostomo laughs, a faint shade of pink dusting his fair skin. “You are too romantic. Has my attitude rubbed off of you?” He jests, his spare hand coming up to his mouth to let out a snicker. Elias relishes in the sound of laughter and the warm touch Crisostomo gave him, absentmindedly gliding his thumb across the back of the young man’s hand.
However he thinks back to Crisostomo’s statement of momentary bliss, and thoughts of inevitable war, grief, and destruction swirled in the bangkero’s mind. A pang mercilessly strikes his heart as he thinks, ‘This will probably be the last time you get to hold him like this.’
Elias could only smile in response to the young man’s quip. “Maybe you have, Señor.” He replies with a sweet tone, using it to mask the sorrow welling up inside him.