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Annie had been up since dawn as she usually was, this time, she had been busy watering the plants that were close into withering away, sweeping the floor and dusting basically everything while her husband, Lito was in his room, humming the same tune repetitively since last night.

She came back home last week and this time, for good. She had been living with her daughter, Pam and her son for almost two years in the province where the girl works, giving her company, helping her in taking care of her two year old child. Annie’s husband, Lito was left alone in their home in the city, refusing to leave the meat shop they owned in the market nearby. Admittedly, it had been an easy deal for Annie, aside from her small worries for Lito, seeing him only every two months felt normal. It had always been that way for them for the last years anyway, looking after one another but stuck separately into their indidivual work and it was always for the kids.

But at the moment, she regretted even leaving in the first place. Lito was diagnosed just a week ago of severe dimentia. The signs were there even before, all of them subtle but she wished she hadn’t ignored: Lito breaking his routine of strictly waking up at four all of a sudden, calling Annie a liar when he would not believe the date, forgetting to go to work.

It was only until her recent visit that she knew something was off. He was laying in bed when she came back, noticeably thinner. It bothered her that he did not fixed himself and made her a coffee like he normally did on her regular visit and that he did not looked like his usual self, his silent energy and liveliness despite his old age was suddenly missing. Instead, he just smiled at her and told her that the song that was playing was a good one even though it was quiet. Then he started calling her Pam.

Lito and Annie were the same age. His parents were old friends of hers who were nice enough to offer her a home in the city. Annie was sixteen when they first met, frightened every minute but ambitious enough to leave home in the province to struggle alone in the city to support both herself and her family. 

It was not everything her family’s grand stories described, the ones that fueled her high expectations. There was no easy money and she did not had one of those grand jobs they mentioned, on her first job, she was a mannequin in a botique where she smiled majority of her days away while staring through the glass window without moving. However, she had Lito’s family — with their warmth and kindness — to thank for turning her fear into hope overtime. 

Majority of that gratitude, though she would not admit it at that time, goes to Lito. He was quiet and an obvious observant, always with his guitar whenever he was not helping his parents, skinny and tall with variation of haircuts and outfits she had judged which she immediately became guilty of because despite being very quiet, he was always respectful from the start; dutifully knocking her door every time dinner was served and every morning, he would offer her a ride to work in his motorcycle which she was too faint hearted to accept at first.

Annie could not recall how and when did she actually started looking for him or started waiting eagerly for his knock every evening or when did she started paying closer attention; finding meaning even in just the sound while he was playing his guitar and foolishly staring without reasons.

But like a first kiss, she would always perfectly remember when she started seeing some sense in what she had been feeling. She remembered being seated on the pavement outside alone, one of her nights of trying figure out what exactly she was doing. Lito sat beside her without saying a word and handed her a heavy box covered in an old newspaper. Surprised by the sudden gesture, she asked him what it was in a tone she right away wished was comprehensible. I’ve been wanting to give you something like that for a long time, it took me too long but I hope it would help you.

When she tore the newspaper open, it revealed a typewriter. The feeling of her heart filling with more than just gratefulness was a clear memory. You know that I write? She asked, aware that it cost him a lot of effort.

And even many years after, she believed that her image of the way his face split into a beautiful smile was forever untouchable. I noticed that your hands always have ink stains. 

They became closer since then. She was most at peace in their own simple things: hushed conversations, playful taunting, reading to him her own stories, Lito just playing his guitar while she sings. Maybe it took her long but a moment came when without another more of her complicated contemplation, she admitted into loving everything about him.

Then as everyone around them expected, they got married. A year later, Annie gave birth to their twins, Pam and Nilo.

She could not say that all that followed was wonderful but she could not remember better days than those with him. After all the tiredness and frustrations from either the long hours of work, raising the twins, or sometimes, at each other, being together made everything complete. Until now, it was something she knew and believed, even after their many decades of good and bad things, even after the time when everything seemed to be stuck as bad.

Annie recalled Lito’s gleeful tone, saying that he could not resist a friend’s invitation and he had been lucky, his gifts for the twins, a new expensive set of paper for her and the delicious meal at the table. She remembered her rising anger over him causally gambling his money away when they had many things that needed many days of work to afford and then being assuaged repeatedly. I just tried it, I wont do it again. Her frustration and worry must have disappeared completely because the night proceeded lively, a false picture and sign of what followed after.

He started going home late but most of the time, with empty pockets, there were rare times when he would win but there was always another variation of his apology. I don’t know what was happening to me. It felt wrong to miss the chance. I’m sorry. Many times, she talked him into stopping, screamed at him to stop, threw things because of her frustration. She witnessed his determination to stop then his failed attempts as conclusions.

He would give her small gifts, with or without win, his another attempt at an apology. One time, when she learned that he had pawned his motorcycle, she threw one of them across the wall without bothering to open it. She remembered receiving a CD of a song he had written and recorded himself when she told him her plans to leave him with the twins. He begged her not to go and swore to never go back to gambling again.

Everything did not went better after. Even if he would not admit that he still went on, the obvious defeat and regret on his voice when he would go back home sometimes and his missing watches gave him away. Annie was sure that she would also see his wedding ring go. Though Annie refused to acknowledge it, those time was when their distance from each other had started growing.

But she did not lectured him over it again, maybe it was trust or she was just tired of it. She turned to writing and kept herself busy, if she was not attending to their children, she was writing. It had remained that way since then, even after he had totally stopped gambling. Their whole focus was only on raising the kids together and their own work, nothing was more important. 

Everything was about the kids since then. Their school, achievements, graduations. When Pam asked them for help with her child and live with her, she did not hesitated even when Lito refused to go with them. 

She doubted she would ever be aware of what his absence truly meant for her if it weren’t for his recent diagnosis. She refused to think that they had lost their love or turned stale, she believed that it - the distance and space apart as they grew older - was only stronger partnership because in subtle ways, she still felt his love. Whether it was from one of their lighter nights with Annie’s playful singing while Lito plays the guitar, the coffee in her ink stained hands that he never fails to make every afternoon, his constant hushing of the kids so she could write in quiet, or even just in their usual routine of silence, occupied in their own separate matters but feeling comfort in each others’ presence. 

But right now, since he had failed to recognize her, she felt as if they had missed a lot and she caught herself thinking all night about what they could have done differently or closer.

For the thousand time since they had brought Lito home after he was diagnosed, Annie stared at their wedding photo, the center and the biggest of all the other photographs - mostly of Pam and Nilo – hanging on the wall of the living room. It was as if someone just pointed a camera at them randomly and they posed for it. They were in white which might be the only attempt to make it at least look formal, Annie’s head was leaned on Lito’s shoulder and his arm was around her as they both smiled. She wondered if lately, he even recognized that it was them whenever he would walk past it.

She turned then caught a glimpse of a bright red among the pile of old books neatly stacked inside the small opening below the coffee table. Already realizing what it was, she carefully pulled it out of the pile. 

It was the CD of Lito's self composed song that he had given to her. On the top left of the case, To my love was handwritten in cursive, Lito’s effort to keep it pretty and neat was obvious, a thing she remembered laughing at one time. She opened the case, revealing the CD that had stopped working a long time ago and a folded paper, its edges yellowing with age.

In his messy scrawl, it was written: I’m not good with words as you but I mean every words in this no matter how bad they may sound together. Thank you for staying with me and I’m sorry. You’re the most important to me, I love you.

He had written the lyrics below. The tune was a distant knowledge but the words were familiar. She jolted when she realized that they fit with the tune that Lito was humming over and over. She let it guide her as she scanned the lyrics quietly. She imagined that they were young again, it was just the two of them in the living room and he was singing to her while she writes, a familiar and old routine. Both of them could not stop smiling, hopeful for whatever future they might have together.

“In the end, I will not be afraid because I have you,” she sang the last line along with the melody of her husband’s humming in the background without bothering to stay quiet anymore. Annie neatly folded the paper and placed it on its case carefully, her heart heavy with multiple emotions. Without letting it go, she walked towards where Lito was, already humming the tune once more.

She wished that by a small miracle, he would recognize her again and if he still could not, she would introduce herself and maybe tell him everything from the beginning, it did not matter if he forgets it again. Annie just knew that she could not waste more time without him anymore.