Angela's Haircut

Gino, the eight year old cunning little rascal, took purple play dough and decided to prettify his sister’s locks one Sunday morning. His little sister, seven year old Angela, woke up in shock upon the sight of her sticky purple hair. She howled a terrifying shriek when her brother took a pair of scissors to “get rid of the mess”. He had snipped mounds of clay along with a year’s worth of hair growth. Surely, this wasn’t the first or last of his antics.


“Why so mean, big brother? What did I do to you?”

“Nothing. I just wanted to see what will happen.”

“You ruined my hair!”

“It’ll grow back, stupid. So grow up!”


Angela’s mom tried to remedy the hair problem by taking her to the barber that afternoon. The solution was a cute boy’s haircut—which was worse. Angela wouldn’t come out to play, much less talk to her big brother. She’d hide in her lola’s room and pretend to take naps in the summer afternoon. She’d get sick of watching boys and girls play langit lupa and agawan base from the window, but she still wouldn’t come out. Besides, she’s just a salimpusa. She thought the children won’t mind. They wouldn’t even notice she wasn’t around.

After a week, Gino tried to speak to her. Lola Zeny let him see his little sister only after promising not to pull off any more tricks. He had brought something for Angela.


“Will you ever come out?”

“No.”

“Here, I got you these”, Gino held a plastic bag.

“What?”

“Put them on. Come down and play.”


Gino was playing the third round of langit lupa with Jerome, Eric, Mico and Chris when Angela decided to come down. She was wearing her brother’s old shorts and red Iron Man shirt. When Gino saw her, he called out.

“Time first!”

“What’s wrong now, Gino? You have to stop the game when it’s your turn to be the taya,” said Chris.

“No, it’s not that. Someone came to join us.” Angela stepped to his brother’s side.

“Who’s that?”

“This is Angelo, my brother.”