by Jules P.F. | Featured in Issue 02 - A Council of Stars
Lazy, jealous, and insufferable. Luxuriating at home, brushing my long black hair endlessly while my hardworking, loving, visionary husband, Tungkung Langit, created the world out of shapeless forms. One fateful day, so unable to contain my paranoia and jealousy, I sent the wind god to spy on him. Tungkung found out. Heartbroken by my betrayal of his trust, he came home and banished me (then cried for eternity because I never came back home to him). In his wretched state, he formed the seas, the mountains, and the forests out of heartache and loneliness. He took the jewels I had left behind and fashioned the stars from my necklace, the moon from my comb, and the sun from my crown. Forever in the sky, yet lost to him.
“That is how they describe me in the creation myths. Unfortunately, if I may, that is a load of horseshit.”
“I see that you feel anger, Alunsina. It is absolutely fine to vocalize it. This is a safe space.” The wind god looked down at their notes. “Can you tell me more about why you feel like this is—er—as you put it, horseshit?”
Alunsina took a deep breath and gathered her hair to one side. “Fine. If we were the only two beings in the universe, who could I possibly be jealous of?” She turned to the figure hunched nearby. “Your narrative is not even logical. It’s just hateful. How could you let them say this about me, Tung?” Alunsina was crying softly, purple tears streaming in rivers down her skin.
Tung said nothing. Alunsina continued, turning back to the wind god. “Yes, I stayed at home while he went out worldshaping. Tung never bothered to tell me when he would be coming back. He never spoke to me about his inner world while he was building his outer one. I would be brimming with ideas for world design—creatures of the deep, wild plants, nourishment for the humans—a whole system.” She turned to Tung, eyes flashing. “Remember that time you arrived home after three sun-cycles in the sea realm? I jumped into your arms, full of ideas for the next design phase, and you just nodded vaguely and left the room. After three cycles!” She looked at the wind god. “I know that he loves my designs, it’s not that. But the time to check in, to connect. It just never happens. Unless he needs the designs before going back out. I design the world, and he builds it. All fine. And how am I portrayed in the high stories? Lounging around? Combing my hair? Absolutely vile. And what’s more—”
“Alunsina, Let's give Tungkung space to respond.” The wind god slowly turned to the worldbuilder.
Tungkung took a deep breath. “Okay. I can see that the myth is biased—”
“Oh, just biased!” Alunsina’s eyes widened in disbelief. “You have got to be kidding me. That’s the word you are actually choosing to use right now—”
“Alunsina, please,” the wind god said softly.
Tung continued. “Okay, fine. It’s really unfair. It also erases your role as world designer. But you just don’t see me. You just see yourself, and me in relation to you. You don’t get it, do you? I use your designs for everything I build because it is for you. It is for us. It is for our life! When I get home, I am tired and I need space. I just don’t feel like talking, and you make me feel like I just cannot get anything right, even after I just spent the day crafting a goddamn mountain range from nothing. I can’t be what you want me to be. Your expectations of me are just as high as your expectations of world design. I just shut down, okay?”
Alunsina thought of her words carefully, not wanting to go down the same path of fighting and pain. “Tung, I know that this is for us. But I am here. I want to know everything about you. Still. After all this time. But you literally do not speak to me for hours on end after a formation day. I want to share my inner world with you, not just to worldbuild. I have told you this countless times. I feel that you cannot just take a step towards communicating in the way that you know I need. Not out of necessity or obligation, but of care. Of love. I am withering inside. I am lonely in this, in us. You’re not cruel. But I am dying. Dying by a thousand cuts.”
“After that fight, Tung, it’s also not true that I never came back,” she went on slowly. Gesturing to the wind god, she breathed, “I sent them to be a third space so we could talk, and you went off the wall. So much aggression, so much coldness, so much anger! I didn’t even recognize you. I swear, what masc-gods will do to avoid therapy—”
“Alunsina, I am here now! To the gods! Maybe if you went out with me to worldbuild sometimes, then things would look different! Maybe if you could just see me.”
“I do see you! All I do is see you! I am the one unseen, written out, erased! How could you do this to me?”
“Alu, I am sorry, okay? I was wrong. But you are the one that left. You left us. You left me.”
They were both crying now. The wind god looked at both of them and then looked at their time piece. “It looks like we are out of time. I am going to assign some homework on attachment styles, Tung—you can read up on ‘avoidant attachment,’ and Alunsina, I am giving you a pamphlet on ‘anxious attachment.’ All couples have forever fights. Yours just happens to literally be forever.”
The wind god moved towards the portal, signaling that the session was done.
“You both did great today, I think we are making real progress here.”
Dr. Julia Palmiano Federer (Jules P.F.) is a Filipina-Canadian-Swiss academic and writer. Her academic research interests include critical, feminist, and decolonial approaches to inclusive peace processes and unofficial dialogues. Her creative writing uses fiction and creative nonfiction to explore mythweaving Filipino folklore and futures as a form of cultural reclamation. She was born in Manila, Philippines, and raised on the unceded territories of the xʷməθkʷəy̓əm (Musqueam), Sḵwx̱wú7mesh (Squamish), and səlilwətaɬ (Tsleil-Waututh) Nations (Vancouver). https://juliapalmianofederer.com/
