A love letter to Gigi Reyes

 

Gigi my darling,

I reach out because I sense that this is the forked road you had desperately tried to avoid. The albatross you dreaded most. Indeed what caused you to lose beauty sleep and furrowed that comely brow in the past. The recurring nightmare.

When frivolity and creature comfort fail to distract you from a chilling contemplation, you wonder, is karmic law for real? Are we ever held accountable for our misdeeds? Can karma catch up in our earthly life?

On good days you manage to convince yourself that karma is nothing but folklore. After all, you’ve seen living testimony that some “get away with murder” and live on and on unscathed. Or so it seemed.

You have been trained to stay cool and inscrutable when life throws a curved ball. Whenever scandal and crisis threaten to inundate you, it is water off a duck’s back. You are the mistress of illusion and misdirection. You were the best student of the Master.

Power is intoxicating and wealth is like a magnet that muddles the moral compass. Like Scarlet O’Hara, you reject disturbing portents, defiantly exclaiming, “Tomorrow is another day.”

Alas, today is that tomorrow. Love is drawn in all quarters, strained in manifold dimensions. Will you stand by him “for better, for worse, for richer, for poorer, in sickness and in health, till death do you part” – even if it was someone else who uttered those vows? Having lived more than half a century on earth, does it matter that your legacy is one that your progeny might rather not have?

Does loyalty and dedication prevail over motherhood, self-love and the instinct for survival?

You were terribly missed in the last 8 months since you disappeared last August. Where were you? Amidst a fog of questions, I imagined that you were healing broken wings, if not a broken heart. I prayed that those days were spent in deep introspection, in a quest for clarity.

Did you seek out old friends, anyone who could remind you of who you were before you got swept into this maelstrom? Did you try to remember past dreams and desires when life was purer and simpler?

You must have been wracked with the niggling uncertainty that you might be betrayed and sacrificed. There were whispers that the anxiety was not totally unfounded.

It must have hurt to hear that you were just one of 38 known dalliances with other women. The list could rival Janet Napoles’ roster of those involved in the PDAF scam.

Or maybe it puffed out your chest being acknowledged as the longest conquest, 15 years and counting. Did you blush at the revelations of the spurned wife who was refused an exit from a loveless union? Did you ever wonder why he didn’t want to release her at all costs? Why didn’t he take you in her place, when you were unencumbered?  

How did you pacify the surge of discontent that engulfs every woman now and then?  Can a mansion in Forbes shield you from self-doubt and disgruntlement? Does it matter that he could have made an honest woman of you, but didn’t? How many nights did you toss and turn asking yourself over and over.

Is it worth it?

You chose the day before Resurrection to return. Like others, I thought that signified your own rebirth, atonement for whatever turpitude had been committed.

It was your chance to come clean, a fresh lease on a new life less fraught with bitterness and intrigue. The possibility of a clean slate is yours to seize, if not for yourself, for your children. You could have pulled off the ultimate makeover.

Instead, you threw down the gauntlet and pointed an accusing finger at your hapless aide. The drama is unfolding and a script is being followed to the letter. Unlike the tragic Lady Macbeth, I hope any spot on your hand will still wash off. Your story can still have a happy ending.

Am I not more deserving of your love?

I have waited a long time for any sign of affection. I have yearned for your change of heart. I have wished for reason to dilute your passion long enough for you to consider my plea.

Choose me, dear Gigi. I will never take you for granted. You will feel less tainted, deceived, unloved or unheeded.  

By loving me more, you can still revise your history, reassess your priorities and rewrite your legacy to one that your children can be proud of.

You can take back what you have lost these past 25 years: your innocence, your self-respect and most of all, yourself.

Sing to me dearest Gigi. And I will listen to every lyric you croon.

Or you can write me a love letter and finally end years of unrequited devotion.

I await your verdict.

Yours always,

Juan

(de la Cruz)