This night at the dinner table my brother brought up the topic of him going on an overnight trip to Fontana in Subic with my cousins. They had been invited by Lance, a former classmate and a present schoolmate and friend of mine. Lance’s family has the privilege of being one of the rich stockholders in Fontana, and Lance had been nice enough to invite my cousins and my brothers at the said resort for the weekend.

Blast. My father shot that idea down quickly.

I can’t understand. Is this one last attempt to control their aging children? As a sign of power? To remind us that since we’re still living here under their roof, we still have to do each and everything that they say to us?

I don’t know.

It’s one thing to not allow me to go to the mall (the mall, people, the mall!) with my friends to watch Pirates of the Caribbean a few weeks back, but to not allow a grown man to get a night out with cousins (cousins!) is another.

Man, that must have sucked for my brother. I’m twenty, an undergraduate so I can understand that the parents still do have the controlling rights over my life and everything, but my brother’s already working. He must have earned the right to do it, right?

We’re good children. We really, really are. I mean, if we weren’t, we wouldn’t have bothered with the asking of permissions. We do our chores (when we have to) and we do nice stuff for each other. Do they not trust us?

This is my father’s point: nakakahiya naman sa pamilya ni Lance. Here’s the background on Papa: he lived the hard life and has experienced the life of living from house to house, none of which were his. He really has heard some nasty stuff from the people he’s lived with and I guess he just doesn’t want us to hear them too.

It is a good point, to be fair. But Lance wouldn’t have invited my brother and cousins if he really didn’t want them to come, right? I guess I could say that I kind of know Lance, and he’s the type who could come up with excuses if the need came up.

Man, oh man, oh man. And the night before the trip too. My cousins have been texting my brother non-stop for the past few days; I could tell from the non-stop ringing of his cell.

My brother’s pissed, that much I can tell. He actually walked out of the dinner table while my father was talking. And my brother’s not really the type who gets angry easily. I mean, he’s lived with me for…well, for the entirety of my whole life but I have yet to feel his wrath.

Gah. I wish I could do something for him. Arg.

I can hear my mother talking to him now. I wonder how that conversation turns out.