System Set-up

I believe in systems.

People think that means I’m boring. It doesn’t. It means I know where everything goes, including my life.

In the beginning, everything is quiet. I’m standing in my new condo off Katipunan with the morning pulled wide open across the windows, sunlight laying down neat rectangles on the floor. The boxes are already stacked according to where they belong: Kitchen, Bedroom, Study, Bath, marker strokes straight, letters aligned by habit. The air smells faintly of new paint and citrus cleaner. It smells like a promise.

If my life is a program, then everything has already been debugged.

That’s the goal, at least.

I start where it’s easiest, the shoes. Five pairs, nothing excessive. Two heels, one white sneaker, one black loafer, one pair of running shoes. I line them up in the entry like punctuation marks. Toe to heel, heel to toe, straight. I step back. Adjust the left heel by two millimeters. There. Better.

The kitchen is next. I wipe the empty shelves and stack the glasses from tallest to shortest, then set the plates in precise nests, large to small, white to off-white. I cut the packing tape on the jar box, peel back paper, and set each jar onto the counter. The labels are already written in a tight hand, all caps: COFFEE, TEA, SUGAR, SALT, PASTA. I pour each ingredient like I’m measuring a life of no spills, no second guesses. I align the jars along the backsplash so the words face forward. I angle the coffee jar exactly perpendicular to the counter edge, a small defiance against the diagonal of sunlight.

In the bedroom, I fold my clothes the way my grandmother taught me and the internet affirmed. Whites together, blues together, blacks together. The drawers swallow the neat stacks and close with soft clicks. I hang the blouses by sleeve length. My blazer goes to the front. The cuffs lie flat, the lapels square. This is how you prepare to meet expectations, you meet your own first.

On the desk, I set the framed photo of my family. It isn’t candid, my family doesn’t do candid. It’s the kind of picture that belongs in a living room meant more for guests than for living, everyone in coordinated outfits, backs straight, smiles perfected through generations of practice. My father’s hand rests lightly on the arm of his chair like he’s presiding over more than just a photo. My mother’s smile is gentle but measured, as if she knows there’s only one acceptable way to be remembered. Even my own expression is a lesson in restraint. Polite, presentable, correct.

I open a new box, BOOKS. The spines are already a familiar chorus: programming references, systems design, database fundamentals, statistics made friendly and then made serious again. Management Information Systems isn’t glamorous, but it’s honest. It says, learn how things work and then make them work better. I shelve them alphabetically, then by height within letter. My planner sits on top, today’s date already pre-printed in blue: OrSem, MIS Block A.

I pause, cap the pen, and set it down exactly parallel to the notebook’s spine. Clean. Predictable. Mine.

College is supposed to be a clean slate. And I intend to keep it that way.

The fridge hums when I open it. Inside are essentials. Yogurt, cherry tomatoes, eggs, a loaf of bread, butter, a bag of grapes I will arrange into a bowl later because order is not only function, it’s also kindness. I brew coffee in a small silver moka pot, the hiss familiar, controlled. While it builds, I stand at the window and look out at Katipunan. Cars shouldering their way down the avenue, a mess of tricycles stitching the side streets, students in fresh ID lanyards walking in groups, laughing like the day belongs to them.

Noise. The word floats across my mind like a banner I refuse to carry. Noise distracts. Noise demands. Noise becomes habit.

I pour the coffee and taste it black. The bitterness sits cleanly on my tongue. I add nothing. I don’t need to.

On the dining table, I lay out my first-week schedule and block it the way I like. Classes in blue, study hours in graphite gray, meals in delicate green, travel time in a pencil-thin line. OrSem events sit politely on the margins. I will show up to what matters. I will not collect t-shirts or flyers I won’t use. I will not be pulled into groups simply because they are loud.

There is a knock at the door.

I don’t jump, but I do glance at the clock. People who know me don’t knock without prior arrangement. People who don’t know me don’t know this place yet.

“It’s open,” I say, and step to the side to remove a phantom smudge from the counter.

The door swings in and a streak of sunlight follows whoever enters. “A!” Diane’s voice arrives a split second before she does, smelling like perfume and last night’s laughter. She leans into the frame like the hallway is a runway. Big sunglasses, bigger grin. Her hair is perfect in the way that says it took time to pretend it didn’t.

“You’re early,” I say.

“I live one floor down from you hindi naman ako mata-traffic nun,” she says, pushing the glasses up into her hair and doing a slow spin. “Uy. Ang linis. Parang clinic.”

“Thank you.”

“That was not a compliment.”

“It should be.”

She pads in without asking, peeks into the bedroom, then the bathroom, then stops at the kitchen. “Oh my God, Aiah, you labeled the salt.”

“I labeled all the jars.”

“I can see that.” She plants her hands on her hips, surveying the place like she’s staging a scene. “This is so you. Like if personality could be a floor plan.”

“Exactly the point.”

Diane opens the fridge, huffs, and closes it with a small smack. “No cake? No sinigang? No leftover party? Wow. I feel poor.”

“Grapes,” I say, and push the bag toward the counter. “You can arrange them into a bowl if that makes you feel rich.”

She laughs. “You’re impossible.” Then she reaches for one, bites it, and leans back against the counter, chewing thoughtfully. “So. MIS Block A, huh? We’re officially blockmates. Lucky you. You get me.”

I write ‘bring student ID’ on the margin of my planner. “I did not require luck.”

“You will,” she says, sing-song, and pulls her phone out to snap a photo of the labeled jars. “I’m saving this so I have a reference and know you need help.”

“I do not need help.”

“Everyone needs help. Even the queen of neat.” She bumps my shoulder with hers, an affectionate nudge that makes me recalibrate the angle of the coffee jar just because I can. “Come on, OrSem’s starting. You don’t want to be late on day one.”

“I’m never late,” I say, and cap the pen again because she’s watching.

“Then let’s be early,” she says, flipping her hair like an exclamation point. “Block A’s meet-up is by the MVP steps. Sabi nila ‘wear something comfortable.’ But I wore something cute.”

“You always do.”

“And you always pretend not to notice.” She slants me a look, amused. “Anyway, I’ll introduce you to my new favorite person from the line at ID validation. Very funny. Very clumsy. Very… alive. You’ll hate her.”

I don’t look up quickly enough. “I don’t hate anyone.”

“Right, right. You ‘dislike variables.’” Diane mimes quotation marks. “Come on, A. Let’s go collect your first Ateneo memory.”

I check the door, the stove, the windows, the planner, the coffee jar, in that order. It takes less than a minute because preparedness is a discipline, not a superstition. I slip my student ID lanyard over my head. The plastic taps against my sternum with a small sound that feels like a new habit.

In the hallway, Diane loops her arm through mine and pulls me toward the elevator. She talks the entire way down, about a volunteer who flirted, about the block rumor that our programming prof never smiles, about which org booths will give away the best tote bags, as if silence is a room she refuses to enter alone.

Outside, the heat sits like a living thing on the pavement. Jeepneys rattle past, horns and bells and yell-smiles hanging off the back. The pedestrian crossing is a choreography of hesitation, but we move through it cleanly. The guard at the gate glances at our IDs and waves us in. Blue and white everywhere. Banners, shirts, streamers chasing the wind like it owes them attention.

Diane breathes it all in with a satisfied sigh. “See? Magic.”

“It’s loud,” I say, but not unkindly.

She tilts her head, studies me, and smiles like she hears a confession I didn’t make. “You’ll get used to it.”

I doubt it. But I say nothing.

We pass org booths stacked with posters and pretty faces. Volunteers chant in practiced rhythm. “Join! Join!” I take a flyer because it is offered directly into my hand and refusing would slow the flow of the walkway. Diane takes six, distributes three to strangers, keeps two for herself, and one for me that she will later sneak into my bag.

On the path up to the MVP steps, a line of freshmen snakes around a fountain, their voices layered into a hum that almost becomes music. I follow the edges of the crowd because edges are where you can observe without being claimed. Diane disappears and reappears by instinct, a magnet for greetings. “Hi, hello, omg ang cute ng lanyard mo, are you in Block A, we might be classmates, see you later, bye!”

I stand in the shade of a tree and check the time again out of habit. Five minutes to spare.

Noise is manageable when you can measure it. That’s all it is, sound you haven’t sorted yet. I take a breath, slow and deliberate, and let it out, counting to four.

Then the campus shifts, the way it does when the plot arrives, and I don’t know that yet. I only know the air thickens for a second, like something is stepping into frame. I look toward the main hallway just as someone breaks free of the crowd, moving at a speed that doesn’t believe in friction. Sneakers squeak. There’s a stumble, a sharp inhale, the clean thud of someone meeting tile, and a laugh that’s bright, unfiltered, shameless right after.

The laugh reaches where I am standing and lands like a coin on a table. It rings. People around her laugh too, easily, the way people do when the person who falls decides the floor is a joke, not a punishment.

I don’t move. I tell myself to look away because this is exactly what I avoid... unpredictable, uncurated, unquiet. But my eyes betray me the way eyes do when the body recognizes a variable before the mind approves it.

She’s sitting on the tiles, shoelaces undone, grinning like the ground has done her a favor.

I catalog details without meaning to. Hair half-escaped from its clip. Lanyard crooked. A bruise already forming on her knee, blooming purple against skin that doesn’t seem to care. She’s laughing at herself in a way that invites everyone else to join without making anyone a villain. People offer hands. She takes none. She pushes herself up, dusts her palms against her skirt, and keeps smiling like gravity is an old friend.

She looks up and her eyes catch mine.

It’s a small moment. It shouldn’t matter. But it does. There is a challenge in the look, yes, but also a question, Are you going to be the girl who stares and pretends she didn’t, or the one who admits she saw?

My face stays still. My pulse does not.

She wipes her hands on the back of her skirt, ties one lace in a knot that won’t last two hours, and jogs toward the shade where I’m pretending to study a bulletin board. When she reaches me, she tips her head and grins like we’ve been caught in a shared joke. Up close, she’s worse, worse for my control, worse for my calm. The kind of beautiful that doesn’t ask permission because it doesn’t know it needs any. Loud, careless, alive.

“Hi,” she says, breath still catching up. “You saw that, didn’t you?”

I could lie. That would be neat. Contained. “Yes.”

“Good.” She leaned on the bulletin board beside me, still catching her breath. “I got your attention. At least now, kilala mo na ako.”

“You tripped to get my attention? You’re crazy.”

“Exactly,” she said, smiling wider. “Hindi mo ako makakalimutan.”

I looked back at the board, hoping she’d get the hint. She didn’t.

“What’s your name? I'm Mikha,” she said, offering her hand. When I didn’t take it, she only laughed and shoved it into her pocket instead. “MIS. Block A. Professional faller.”

I hesitated. “Aiah,” I say, and the name feels like a disclosure I hadn’t planned to give. “MIS. Block A. I prefer not to fall.”

“That’s okay.” Her grin widens, almost conspiratorial. “I can fall for both of us.”

She leans closer, mischief in the set of her shoulders, then punches the next sentence out like a dare.

“Nice to meet you, Aiah. Don’t worry, I’ll make a better second impression.”

Then she winked at me.

My breath caught, so fast, so sharp I almost choked on it. Heat climbed up my neck, and I gripped the strap of my bag tighter just to ground myself. I forced my face blank, eyes fixed on the bulletin board like it was urgent, like her grin wasn’t burning itself into memory. I should have told her to leave. I should have cut the moment clean. But my pulse was hammering so loudly, I was terrified she could hear it. And somehow, she still smiled like she already knew.

I told myself it didn’t matter. That she’d forget me the second she walked away. But when her laugh carried down the hallway, I knew better. Maybe I’d been hers from the very start.

The OrSem volunteers call for our block to gather, their voices trained into cheerful authority. Students begin to drift toward the auditorium, folding into groups and routes like rivers finding beds.

“Aiah!”

I glance back and see Diane weaving through the crowd, hair already escaping its clip, grin too wide for someone who hasn’t even sat through a lecture yet. She slides into step beside me like it’s her birthright.

“There you are. Akala ko iniwan mo na ako.”

“I should have,” I say, dry.

She loops her arm through mine anyway, unbothered. “Too late. Block A tayo. You’re stuck with me, A. Masyadong nakakalito, parang Aiah na lang siguro itatawag ko sa’yo dito sa campus.”

Noise, I think, as the crowd swallows us. Diane chatters on, pointing at banners, waving at strangers like she knows them already. I check the time and count to four. The coffee I left in the sink will rinse cleanly. The jars will still face forward when I return. The shoes will stay in line. The system will hold.

I don’t plan for variables.

Variables plan for me.

And sometimes they arrive laughing.

The rest of OrSem blurs in the way noise always does when it is too loud to catalogue properly. Volunteers clap, org booths shout their slogans, the air smells of pancit and paper flyers. I let Diane chatter beside me, her words a current that pulls us through the day without my permission. By the time the block is dismissed for lunch, the campus feels swollen with heat, laughter, and the scraping of chairs being dragged across concrete.

I choose a corner table in the cafeteria. Corners are safe. From here, I can see exits, measure sound, and decide when to leave. My tray holds food portioned without indulgence, food and a glass of water. I set my notebook on the table, pen parallel, pages open as if the equations there might muffle the cafeteria’s chaos.

For a few minutes, it almost works. The hum of the crowd dims against the neatness of my handwriting. I stab a piece of tomato, underline a sentence. Control returns in increments.

Then the volume shifts again.

“Aiah!” Diane’s voice barrels across the cafeteria like it’s her personal stage. She drops her tray beside mine without permission, grinning wide, already mid-story. “Ay, perfect! Reserved seat ba ‘to para sa’kin?”

“Unfortunately, yes,” I reply, pushing my notebook half an inch inward so her plate doesn’t touch the margin.

She laughs, already chewing on bread like silence is a thing she intends to strangle. “You’re welcome, A. Wala ka nang excuse na maging loner.”

I almost roll my eyes, but then…

Movement.

Another tray slides into view. Sneakers scuff. And then I see her.

Mikha.

She stops dead when our eyes meet, surprise flickering before it melts into something else. A grin. A smirk. Like she’d been waiting for this.

She sets her tray down carefully, but her attention is all on me.

“We meet again, Aiah.”

The fork in my hand feels suddenly too heavy. I force my voice steady, my face blank. “Coincidences are bound to happen.”

“Sure ka?” Her grin widens, teeth flashing. “Eh bakit parang nakangiti ka?”

I smooth the edge of my notebook, hiding the fact that heat has already climbed my neck.

Diane gasps, delighted, completely oblivious to the storm in my chest. “Aba! You two know each other na pala?”

I do not answer. My system does not have code for this.

Mikha slides into the seat opposite me like it belongs to her. She unpacks her tray. Chicken, rice, an extra plate of fries she probably doesn’t need but clearly wants.

Diane leans forward, eyes sparkling. “So… paano kayo magkakilala?”

“She fell,” I say flatly.

“She stared,” Mikha counters, grinning at me, elbow braced against the table like this is our private game. “And then she admitted it.”

“I didn’t admit anything.”

“You did. You said yes.”

Diane claps like she’s hosting a talk show. “Oh my God. Meet-cute in the wild! Aiah, are you secretly in an AU story?”

I glare at her. “No.”

“Eh, mukhang oo,” she singsongs, stabbing her fork into her rice.

Mikha leans in, lowering her voice just enough for me to hear. “Don’t worry, Aiah. I’ll make sure it’s a good story.”

The way she says it makes my pulse trip. I look away first.

The noise of the cafeteria folds around us, but the table feels strangely isolated, like the air itself is listening.

Diane talks between mouthfuls, mixing conversations without care. “So, Block A tayo lahat, diba? MIS kids. Wala nang atrasan. At least magkakasama tayo in failing Stats.”

“I don’t fail,” I say automatically.

Mikha points at me with a fry. “Confidence. I like that.”

“I wasn’t asking for approval.”

“Good,” she shoots back, smirking. “Because I was giving admiration.”

Diane groans dramatically. “Ang corny mo, Mikha. Pero… kinikilig ako, grabe.”

Mikha shrugs, grinning wider. “At least one of you admits it.”

I grip my glass of water tighter than necessary.

“Serious ka ba lagi?” Mikha asks suddenly, leaning her chin on her hand like she’s been studying me this whole time.

“Yes.”

“Why?”

“Because it works.”

She laughs, head tipping back, the sound drawing glances from nearby tables. “That’s not an answer. That’s a slogan.”

“I don’t need to justify my systems to you.”

She leans closer again, eyes dancing. “That’s okay. I’ll figure them out myself.”

Something in my chest twists. Irritation, yes, but laced with something else I don’t want to name.

Diane slams her tray down like a gavel. “Okay, decision made. The three of us are officially stuck together. Study buddies, lunch buddies, life buddies. Walang atrasan.”

“I didn’t agree to that,” I say.

“Too late,” Mikha chimes in, already stealing one of Diane’s fries. “Consensus achieved.”

Diane beams, triumphant. “See? Block A’s Little Rascals. Perfect.”

I close my notebook slowly, the corner of my lips twitching against my will.

Noise, I think, watching Mikha laugh at Diane’s mock outrage. Chaos, disguised as fries and jokes.

And for the first time, I don’t want to walk away.

The cafeteria is still loud. Forks clinking, trays clattering, laughter bouncing off the walls like echoes nobody asked for. Diane talks through it all, mouth full, gesturing like her hands are in their own conversation.

“Aiah,” she says, stabbing her spoon at me. “Hanap na lang tayo ng papakasalan mo. Ang tahimik ng buhay mo, kailangan ng unting fun.”

I take a slow sip of water. “I don’t require marriage as a source of entertainment, D.”

Mikha grins across the table, fries in one hand, fork in the other. “Too late. I called dibs.”

My fork pauses halfway to my mouth. “Ridiculous.”

“See?” Diane bursts out laughing. “Even her ‘ridiculous’ sounds like she’s in a telenovela.”

“Only to people who dramatize everything,” I reply, turning a page in my notebook.

Mikha leans forward, resting her chin on her palm, eyes sparkling. “You sound like you’re about to deliver a monologue every time you talk. It’s…kind of hot, actually.”

I snap my notebook shut, the sound sharp. “You’re insufferable.”

“Thanks,” she says, utterly unbothered.

Diane nearly chokes on her rice. “Oh my God, Mikha, kalma lang! Kakakilala niyo lang!”

Mikha shrugs, smirking. “Eh ano ngayon? Life’s too short not to call dibs.”

I press my lips together, refusing to react. But my pulse betrays me, skipping once, then again, too obvious in my throat.

Lunch devolves into chaos after that. Diane launches into a story about how one OrSem volunteer tripped over a banner and still managed to shout “Welcome, freshies!” like a battle cry. Mikha keeps interrupting, adding ridiculous sound effects that make Diane laugh so hard rice nearly flies from her spoon.

I try to keep eating, notebook angled toward me, a silent barrier. But every few minutes, Mikha says something that hooks my attention whether I want it to or not.

“Block A’s supposed to be full of geniuses daw,” she says, pointing a fry at me like it’s a microphone. “So, Aiah, ikaw ba valedictorian?”

“Yes.”

Her eyes widen. “Seriously? No way.”

“Why is that surprising?”

“Because valedictorians don’t usually look like…” She waves her fry vaguely in my direction, then grins. “Like they’d murder you for misplacing a pen cap.”

Diane cackles. “She would though.”

I sigh, adjusting my pen so it lies perfectly parallel to my notebook. “You’re both exhausting.”

“Exhausting but charming,” Mikha shoots back.

I don’t answer. My silence is supposed to end conversations, but with Mikha, it feels like an invitation she refuses to decline.

Diane excuses herself to grab dessert, muttering about “choco mallows being currency.” For a moment, it’s just Mikha and me at the table.

“You don’t smile much,” she says softly, almost like a question.

“Smiling is not mandatory.”

“Should be.” Her eyes flicker across my face, lingering like she’s trying to memorize something. “You’d look good smiling.”

Heat threatens to crawl up my neck again. I flip my notebook open, pretending to read. “You’re noisy.”

“And you like it,” she says, not even trying to sound modest.

I inhale slowly, count to four, then exhale. “No. I tolerate it.”

“Sure.” She leans back, grinning like she’s already won.

Diane returns, balancing two packs of mallows, and immediately resumes her narration of cafeteria politics. The moment dissolves, but my pulse does not.

“Alright, rascals,” Diane declares after lunch, dusting crumbs from her skirt. “Campus tour time. Mandatory bonding activity.”

“I have notes to review,” I argue.

“Wala ka pang class! Notes agad?” She loops her arm through mine before I can protest further. “Come on, A. Live a little.”

Mikha pops up on my other side, balancing her tray in one hand, already walking backward like the hallway is her stage. “She’s right. You need chaos. Lucky for you, I come with a lifetime guarantee.”

I give her a flat look. “That’s not a selling point.”

“It is if you’re buying me,” she fires back.

Diane snorts, nearly spilling her Coke. “Grabe, Mikha! Pero sige na, Aiah, don’t fight it. Destiny daw sabi ng OrSem host kanina, diba? Look, destiny delivered us a trio.”

Against my better judgment, I let myself be dragged out into the sunlight, Diane on one side, Mikha orbiting too close on the other. The three of us moving together for the first time.

Noise. Chaos. Distraction. This wasn’t in my plan.

I told myself I was only keeping an eye on Diane. But the truth? I just couldn’t stop looking at Mikha.

As if she felt it, she glanced back over her shoulder. The smile she gave me wasn’t loud like her laughter had been, but smaller, sharper, like she’d caught me mid-thought. It landed in my chest with the precision of code written to bypass every safeguard.

For a second, I forgot to breathe.

I told myself it was nothing. Just a smile. Just noise. Something I could ignore, delete, archive.

But even then, deep down, I knew, this was not the kind of variable you erase from a system.

This was the kind that rewrites it.