The Stowaway in the Rain

The rain began the moment our plane touched down in Tacloban, a thin, persistent drizzle that seemed to wash the color out of the world. I’d flown back for my grandmother’s wake, a duty I’d dreaded for months. As I shuffled into the cramped arrivals hall, my ears still popping from the descent, I had my first taste of it: a flicker in my peripheral vision, a dark shape that vanished the instant I turned my head. I chalked it up to exhaustion, to the sleepless night before the early flight.

My cousin, Marisol, was waiting outside in her rust-spotted pick-up truck. She gave me a wan smile and a hug that smelled of mothballs and rain. As I climbed into the passenger seat, I glanced at the dashboard, and there it was again: a form, tall and indistinct, seated right beside her, its head tilted as if observing me. It was there for a fraction of a second, then gone, leaving no trace but the cold prickle on my scalp. I blinked, and Marisol was just shaking her head at the downpour.

We drove west, away from the city, into the province of Leyte. The road wound through banana plantations and coconut groves that looked almost black under the weeping sky. My grandmother’s house sat on the edge of a rice field, a sprawling, dilapidated structure with a corrugated iron roof that thundered with the rain. Inside, relatives milled about, their whispers a low murmur beneath the storm. I was given a room at the end of a dark hallway, the walls covered in dusty photographs of people I barely recognized.

That night, I couldn’t sleep. The rain was a constant drum, and every gust of wind made the house groan. I got up to get a glass of water from the kitchen, padding barefoot down the cold, wooden floorboards. Halfway there, I felt it again: a presence behind me, so close I could feel a faint chill on the nape of my neck. I whirled around, the flashlight on my phone casting a trembling beam into the gloom. Nothing but the swaying shadows of the trees outside the window. My heart hammered against my ribs.

I went back to my room and locked the door. But the door had a small, square window in it, the kind you could open. I couldn’t help but peer through it into the hallway. The hallway was empty, but as I watched, the light from the living room at the far end seemed to dim, and I saw a tall shape pass across the threshold, moving with a strange, gliding gait. It was gone before I could even gasp.

The next morning, over a breakfast of cold rice and dried fish, I asked Marisol, half-joking, if the house was haunted. She looked at me with a serious face and said, ‘There are things in this province that follow the living. We call them ‘kabag,’ the dark ones. They come to those who are about to die.’ I laughed it off, but her words were like cold water down my spine. I tried to busy myself with the wake preparations, folding paper cranes and arranging flowers, but I kept glancing over my shoulder.

Later that day, I was in the bathroom, washing my hands, when I saw it in the mirror. It wasn’t just a flicker anymore. It was a tall, hooded figure standing right behind me, its face a void, its long arms hanging like wet branches. I froze, the soap slipping from my fingers. It didn’t move; it just stood there, watching me through the reflection. Then, in a blink, it was gone. I turned around, but the room was empty. I ran out, my breath ragged, and told my aunt, but she just crossed herself and said, ‘It’s the grief, child. Your lola’s spirit is unsettled.’ I didn’t believe her.

I decided to leave. I couldn’t stay in that house with that thing. I told Marisol I had a job interview and needed to go back to Manila. She looked at me with pity and said, ‘It’s not your lola, cousin. It’s been following you since you got here. It might be attached to you. Going back won’t help.’ But I was already packing my bag. I couldn’t stand another night in that place.

On the drive back to the airport, the rain was even heavier. Marisol’s truck splashed through puddles that were almost rivers. She was silent, her hands tight on the wheel. As we approached the airport’s outer gate, I saw it clearly for the first time: a tall, black silhouette standing by the roadside, its head turned toward us. It was as if it was waiting. The truck suddenly shuttered, and the engine died. Marisol cursed and tried to restart it, but it wouldn’t turn over.

The rain hammered on the roof. We were still a mile from the terminal. I looked at Marisol, and she was staring past me, out the passenger window, her face pale. I followed her gaze. The figure was standing right outside my window, so close I could see the rain falling through its form, as if it weren’t entirely solid. It raised one long arm and pointed at me, then at the airport, as if telling me something. I screamed and scrambled across the seat, but there was nowhere to go.

Marisol finally got the truck started. We sped through the gates, and I looked back. The figure was still there, watching us go, its arm still raised. I didn’t look back again until we’d cleared the parking lot. When I got out of the truck, I was shaking. I told Marisol I would be fine, that I’d call her. But as she drove away, I saw it again, standing in the middle of the parking lot, its form wavering like heat haze despite the cold rain.

Inside the terminal, I found a seat away from the windows. I tried to calm down, but every few minutes, I’d see it out of the corner of my eye, standing by the check-in counters, or near the departure gates, always watching. When my flight was called, I ran to the boarding gate, not daring to look back. But as I settled into my seat on the plane, I glanced out the window. The rain had turned to a thick mist, and through it, I could just barely make out a dark shape standing on the tarmac, its head tilted upward as if looking right at me.

I closed the window shade and didn’t open it again until we were safely in the air. For a moment, I thought I was free. But when I looked past my reflection in the window pane, I saw it. The shadow was sitting in the seat next to me, one armrest separating us, its presence as cold as the rain that had drenched me all day. I closed my eyes, and when I opened them, it was gone. But I knew, with a bone-deep certainty, that it would be back. It had followed me here, and it would follow me wherever I went, a perpetual stowaway in the rain, waiting for the moment when I would finally understand what it was trying to tell me.