Chapter 16: Southbound
The day she left felt heavier than I expected.
Not dramatic.80Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡVuKWDtvRsh
Not cinematic.
Just heavy.
She sent me a photo from the airport.
One suitcase.80Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ8Wm8wjaFMn
One backpack.80Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡJcL2eZESw0
Eyes that looked braver than she probably felt.
“Boarding soon,” she typed.
Davao.
Further south.80Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡyLbfMbmuqn
Further from Luzon.80Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡPRJndw1zSc
Further from everything familiar.
Further from me.
I tried to keep my voice steady when we called before takeoff.
“You’re going even farther now,” I said, half-joking.
But it wasn’t really a joke.
She smiled softly. “It’s still just distance.”
“It’ll be harder to visit you.”
She tilted her head. “Are you planning to? ”
One day, I wanted to say.
But my reality felt different.
Thesis expenses were piling up.80Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ8rhpOOaHCZ
Printing.80Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡGHy6HuzpzY
Revisions.80Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡySJ1u7xyRe
Transportation.80Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡFxZ26KIaf4
Deadlines stacking on top of each other.
Life wasn’t just emotional.
It was financial.
And I was scared.
Not of loving her.
But of not being able to keep up with everything.
“I’m afraid,” I admitted quietly.
She didn’t laugh.80Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡOv0YrBIme7
She didn’t brush it off.
“Why?”
“My thesis. The expenses. And now you’re even farther away.”
For the first time in weeks, she was the steady one.
“We’re not going to stop just because it’s farther,” she said gently. “Love isn’t measured in kilometers.”
She always had a way of making things sound simple.
As if love wasn’t as complicated as my overthinking.
When her plane took off, I watched the little airplane icon move across the tracking screen like it carried something fragile.
It did.
It carried her.
And a new chapter.
Her first call from Davao came hours later.
“I’m here,” she said.
I could hear the difference immediately.
The air sounded quieter somehow.
Less rushed.
Her grandmother’s voice echoed faintly in the background.
“How are you? ” I asked.
“Okay,” she said. Then softer, “It feels… different. But good.”
The first few days were all about adjusting.
Unpacking.80Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡznoLPhfPCc
Rearranging her old room.80Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡMzQ23WHN7n
Seeing childhood things still untouched.
“She really didn’t change anything,” she said one night, running her fingers over an old shelf. “It’s like she was waiting for me.”
There was comfort in that.
Davao didn’t feel like an escape.
It felt like shelter.
She started looking for schools almost immediately.
Requirements.80Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡXfVya26ANL
Transcripts.80Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡWW1WAuyT5j
Entrance processes.
Life didn’t pause for grief.
It simply redirected.
I watched her move through it with quiet determination.
Stronger than she realized.
Meanwhile, I was buried in my thesis.
Chapters to revise.80Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡSADF4KXBJK
Consultations to attend.80Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡxIjC4jPoAG
Expenses appearing out of nowhere.
Some nights, I felt the weight of both.
The pressure to finish.80Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡGehg8rSvTw
The fear of not being enough.80Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡO4x4S8tZSD
The reality was that she was now even farther south while I was stuck between deadlines and doubt.
There were small arguments.
Mostly about time.
“You’re busy again,” she would say.
“I have a consultation,” I’d reply, a little defensive.
“And what about me? ”
“You know you’re important.”
“I know. But sometimes it feels like I come second to your thesis.”
And maybe sometimes she did.
Not by choice.
But by necessity.
We learned something during those small arguments.
Love doesn’t remove stress.
It just teaches you how to navigate it together.
There were nights when we both apologized at the same time.
“Sorry.”
“Sorry too.”
And we’d laugh at how silly pride felt compared to losing each other.
When she finally found a school she liked, she called me immediately.
“I think this is the one.”
Her eyes were brighter.
Hope had returned in a quieter form.
Not the fragile hospital kind.80Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ4sbEHZ01D7
Not the desperate prayer kind.
But the rebuilding kind.
“I’m proud of you,” I told her.
And I meant it.
Because she didn’t just move cities.
She rebuilt her life in one.
Days in Davao slowly found a rhythm.
Morning routines with her grandmother.80Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ7uaaRhtoXE
Afternoon errands.80Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ8zGbutIJa6
Evening calls with me.
Sometimes she would show me the sunset outside her window.
Davao sunsets felt wider.
Calmer.
And I would sit in my small corner in Luzon, thesis drafts scattered around me, listening to her talk about jeepney routes and new classmates she’d met.
We were still us.
Still laughing.80Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ6jFtgrTix3
Still sharing random thoughts.80Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡH4kEreMkxB
Still arguing about small things like who ended the call first.
Distance didn’t erase that.
If anything, it made us more intentional.
“You’re farther away now,” I said one night again, softer this time.
“But I’m still here,” she replied.
And she was right.
Distance changed geography.
Not existence.
Life kept moving.
She adjusted.80Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡvb3G8Awbpl
I progressed slowly with my thesis.80Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡqUK6B23bxi
Expenses got managed one payment at a time.
It wasn’t glamorous.
It wasn’t easy.
But it was real.
And somehow
We were still happy.
Not the carefree kind.
But the earned kind.
The kind that survives funerals.80Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡPagwChXIas
Airports.80Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡkv9teFSasq
Financial stress.80Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡOrSDnu8Ofp
Cities change.
There were still small arguments.80Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡySN05WTAqI
Still moments of insecurity.80Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡCi3r1A9JWb
Still nights when I missed her more than I could explain.
But there were also kalimba songs.80Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡh3UpzVTgas
Late-night laughter.80Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡv0C2oGcP5R
Careful whispers about the future.
Davao became part of our story.
Not as distant.
But as proof.
Proof that love can stretch without breaking.
Proof that even when life pulls you south and responsibilities hold you north
You can still meet each other in the middle.
Through screens.80Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡcXtU3CiCtv
Through effort.80Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ7Rkl94RFD9
Through choosing each other again and again.
And as long as she kept saying,
“I’m here."
I believed that no matter how far the map stretched
We still were too.
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and then Add to home screen.