The Ironing Table

I was eleven when we moved to the outskirts of Cebu City, into a narrow lane called Sitio Lumad. Our house was a cramped two-story affair, but it was ours. My prized possession back then was a battered handheld console, the kind with a grayscale screen and a single built-in game that involved a pixelated hero navigating a maze of ghosts. I spent hours hunched over it, the plastic casing warm in my hands.

One sweltering afternoon, my neighbor, a boy named Marco, borrowed it. Marco lived at the far end of the alley, where the asphalt gave way to a dirt path that wound into a thicket of banana plants and acacia trees. His house was old, with peeling green paint and a rusted corrugated roof. I told him to return it before dusk, but as the sun dipped below the horizon, casting long shadows through the alley, I decided to fetch it myself.

The air grew still as I walked, the usual hum of crickets oddly absent. The front door of Marco’s house was ajar, not wide, but enough to see a sliver of the dim interior. I knocked, the sound echoing in the silence. ‘Marco?’ I called. The door creaked open further, and I saw him sitting on a frayed rattan couch near the entrance, his back to the wall, his face blank.

‘Hey, I came for my console,’ I said, stepping inside. It was cooler in there, and the smell of old wood and dust filled my nose. Marco didn’t answer. Instead, his gaze was fixed on something behind me. I turned.

On the dining table, which was cluttered with piles of folded clothes, an old woman stood. She was impossibly old, her skin like crumpled brown paper, her hair a thin white wisp. She was slowly, methodically smoothing out a piece of cloth, her hands moving with a mechanical rhythm. But it wasn’t the rhythm that frightened me—it was the sound. The cloth made no sound as it passed under her palms. No rustle, no whisper. And she wasn’t ironing; there was no iron. She was just pressing her hands over the fabric, repeating the motion, as if the gesture itself was enough.

I tried to speak, but my throat tightened. I looked back at Marco, hoping for some explanation, but his eyes were wide, unblinking. A thin line of drool ran from the corner of his mouth. He didn’t seem to recognize me.

‘Marco?’ I said again, my voice shaking. The old woman stopped moving. Slowly, she turned her head. Her eyes were milky, like a fish. She smiled, revealing toothless gums, and then she beckoned me closer with a gnarled finger. Her hand gestured to the table, to the clothes, and I understood—she wanted me to help.

I backed away, but my foot hit something. I looked down. It was my console, lying on the floor, its screen cracked, the battery compartment open. I snatched it up and ran. I didn’t look back until I was on my own doorstep, gasping for air.

The next day, I avoided Marco. But curiosity gnawed at me. I asked my mother about the old woman. She looked at me oddly and said, ‘There’s no old woman in this neighborhood. Only the Cruz family lives at the end of the lane, and Marco is an only child.’

I didn’t believe her. I went back. The house was quiet, the door now shut tight. I knocked. No answer. I peeked through a dusty window. The dining table was bare, the clothes gone. But on the table, neatly arranged, were dozens of pieces of cloth, each folded into a perfect square. In the center was a note, written in shaky handwriting: ‘Thank you for coming. I have been waiting. Come again.’

I never saw Marco again. His family moved away a week later, leaving behind only the house. But sometimes, at dusk, when I pass by the end of the alley, I see a flicker of movement through the window. A pale shape, seated at the table, pressing her hands over invisible cloth. And I swear, in the silence, I can hear a soft, rhythmic thumping—like a heart beating under the folds.