Common denominator

THERE must be something wrong with a week’s movie schedule if the only movie worth watching is “The Nun II.”

A downtown mall’s cinema was already prepping the Instagrammable decor for “The Nun II” on a Tuesday, the day before its showing in Cagayan de Oro’s cinemas. I took a peek and it looked scary. Brrrrr. I was at the cinema for “Past Lives,” a movie about childhood sweethearts who—spoiler alert—didn’t end up marrying each other.

Talk of past lives, once upon a time, a friend had this relationship that lasted for a month when she was in her 20s. But when the guy got engaged, the gossip was this: that they were childhood sweethearts, that the relationship lasted for eight years, that kawawa naman si girl because he decided to marry someone else, and so on and so forth, blah blah blah.

A friend eventually told her about the fake story that was going around. Because she was unaware of what was going on. She was then busy with her career and had no time for gossip as usual.

So, a month-long relationship where all they had was a kiss, morphed into a fake story about an eight-year relationship. Wow. This is how gossipers stretch their lies to infinity and beyond.

Decades later, she learned that someone had been gossiping about her again. All lies as usual. And then, she had a eureka moment: Aha! This gossiper must be the same person who spreads lies about that relationship! Because she’s the common denominator in both.

The gossiper’s justification for making people believe her lies about my friend was—that people should believe her stories because they’re close friends. Oh my gosh. People listening to her should have had this Realization 101 then: If you’re close friends, why are you gossiping about her?

People laugh about the gossiper now, because she has continued gossiping. Recently, I was shocked while listening to people talking about a person they don’t even know. For a while there, I wondered who told them the story. And then, I also had a eureka moment: Oh, it’s the same gossiper again. She hasn’t stopped. She still gossips. But this time, her topics are other people. She couldn’t claim to know about the life of my friend anymore because they hadn’t talked with each other for eight years.

The gossiper usually doesn’t have time for herself because she’s always busy looking at other people and creating lies about them, hoping to make herself look good. She’s the type who would tell anyone who cares to listen to these observations: Di na puede iyang gahimuon, sayop na. With her head shaking from side to side as evidence of her most emphatic no. As if she’s the most perfect person in the whole wide world.

She’s the type who would roll out the red carpet for the famous and the wealthy and the powerful. But if you were once on the same level, and you’ve been promoted at work, she will start spreading lies about you, so people won’t notice that she has remained on that same level forevermore.

She should watch movies like “The Nun II” and “Insidious: The Red Door” to help her realize that the world doesn’t revolve around her lies.