Words by: Roem Krishane Bolongaita
The campus had always been a place of stories, where voices filled the open spaces between the old halls and laughter spilled onto the streets. Beneath the towering acacia trees, students gathered in quiet corners, lost in books or deep conversations, while the scent of freshly brewed coffee from nearby cafés mingled with the salty air. The waves whispered against the shore, carrying secrets only the wind could understand, and at night, the lamplights cast golden halos over the pathways, illuminating memories waiting to be made.
But inside the dorm room, there was no warmth, no welcome—only silence stretching between two strangers.
Jasmine knew from the moment she stepped into the dorm room that this was going to be a disaster. The air smelled of fresh paint and unfamiliarity, of two separate lives forced into the same four walls. Her side was already a mess of half-unzipped luggage, a Bluetooth speaker humming softly, perfume lingering in the air like a signature. The other side, in contrast, was untouched. A small plant rested by the window, books stacked with quiet precision, a notebook lying open as if waiting for something to be written.
And then, there she was.
Lourdes. Still, unreadable, her presence quiet but firm, like a pause that demanded to be noticed. She didn’t look up when Jasmine dropped her bags. Didn’t flinch when music filled the space between them. Not even the sharp zip of a suitcase caught her attention. Nothing.
Jasmine frowned, stepping closer. “Hey?” No reaction. She waved a hand slightly. Nothing.
Then, realization settled over her like an unexpected weight. No headphones. No earbuds. No recognition of sound.
Her new roommate was hard of hearing.
Jasmine exhaled sharply, rubbing her temples. She had spent her whole life in the pulsing heart of Cebu—the Queen City of the South—where everything was alive, where silence was drowned in car horns, karaoke music spilling from alleys, and the chatter of people who never seemed to sleep. But here she was, in a city slower, softer, edged by the sea and kissed by the wind. And across from her, Lourdes, from a small town in Negros, who sat so still it was as if silence was not an absence, but a presence of its own.
That first night, Jasmine typed out a note and left it awkwardly on Lourdes’ desk:
Hi. I’m Jasmine. Just let me know if you need anything.
Lourdes’ response came the next morning, scribbled neatly on a sticky note placed back on Jasmine’s desk:
Okay. Lourdes.
Jasmine brushed it off. She busied herself with her own routine—music in the background, makeup scattered on the table, phone calls with friends back home. She even tried waving hello a few more times, but the lack of reaction made her feel more and more invisible.
Lourdes, on the other hand, moved like a shadow—quiet, deliberate, precise. She folded her clothes with crisp corners. Brushed her hair exactly twenty strokes each night. Scribbled endlessly in that same notebook. Never smiled. Never spoke.
But it wasn’t that they hated each other—not yet. It was something more subtle. Like standing on either side of a closed door, unsure who should knock first.
Still, the tension began to build.
It started with the mornings—small moments that would chip away at the fragile peace they had, until they were both left on edge. Jasmine started waking up later and later, groaning when Lourdes opened the curtains early. The sunlight streamed through, and Jasmine squinted at the brightness, feeling her headache return. Lourdes, on the other hand, went about her morning ritual as if she were the only one in the room—brushing her teeth, combing her hair, packing her bag. Jasmine pulled the blanket over her head, trying to drown out the sounds, but then, Lourdes would speak or shift something, and it felt like an intrusion.
Jasmine had enough of it. One morning, as she yanked her headphones on to block out the world, she slammed her bedroom door shut—harder than necessary. The sound echoed through the room, sharp and forceful.
Lourdes didn’t flinch. Didn’t even glance her way.
It drove Jasmine crazy.
Then came the notes. At first, they were polite. Almost civil.
Please turn off the light when you leave. Please don’t use my mug.
Simple, harmless requests. But they had no effect. Lourdes continued with her routines, unbothered, almost too composed. Jasmine grew irritated by the lack of response. She wasn’t sure if it was the silence or the nagging feeling that Lourdes wasn’t taking her seriously.
Then the notes turned sharper.
Your music is too loud.
Jasmine froze when she saw it pinned to her mirror. Her heart pounded in her chest. You can’t even hear it, she wrote back.
Put your wet towel on your side, not mine.
The passive-aggressive nature of it all was too much. The notes felt like daggers—small, sharp moments of attack that only made things worse.
The next morning, as Jasmine was frantically trying to get ready, she threw her blanket off in frustration, stomped to the kitchen, and slung a half-filled mug of coffee onto the counter. As she was rinsing out her cup, she noticed Lourdes’ mug sitting innocently on the drying rack. It was all so… normal. Too normal. Too polite. It felt like something inside her was boiling over.
That night, the tension was unbearable. Jasmine watched Lourdes from the corner of her eye. She was reading, flipping through her notebook, like the world was fine, like everything was okay.
But it wasn’t. Jasmine could feel it.
Jasmine didn’t want to feel this way, but she was starting to lose it.
She grabbed a pen and furiously scrawled on a sticky note: Stop touching my stuff.
Then, to her surprise, Lourdes responded—not by shouting, not by throwing something at her, but by writing, her pen moving quickly, confidently: You don’t listen.
The words were simple, but they were enough to hit a nerve. Enough to break through the shield of frustration Jasmine had built around herself. She clenched her fists, her jaw tightening, before writing back with equal force: You don’t talk.
Lourdes didn’t flinch. She simply grabbed a clean piece of paper and jotted down: Silence speaks too, if you’d let it.
Jasmine froze. The words felt like they were written just for her, a harsh mirror held up to everything she hadn’t wanted to face. She wanted to tear the note into pieces, to hurl it across the room. But instead, she stood there, staring at it, her chest tightening with the weight of unspoken truth.
The silence between them wasn’t just the absence of sound. It was the absence of understanding, the absence of connection, and the absence of any attempt to fix the mess they’d created. It was heavy. It was suffocating.
And still, nothing changed. The chaos didn’t explode. It just… built.
That night, Jasmine stared at the ceiling, restless.
She reached for her phone, typed basic sign language into the search bar, then hesitated. It felt too personal. Too much.
She locked her screen.
But the next day, a small paperback book appeared on her desk:
Filipino Sign Language: A Beginner’s Guide.
No note. No explanation. Just placed there.
Jasmine picked it up slowly. Flipped through the pages.
She glanced at Lourdes, who didn’t look up—but Jasmine noticed the tiniest pause in her pen strokes.
That night, she sat with the book open and tried her first sign in front of the mirror. Her hands felt clumsy, too fast, too unsure. But she kept going.
She didn’t show Lourdes right away. She waited. Waited until it felt less like an obligation and more like a choice.
Jasmine walked into the dorm room one afternoon, the quiet between them weighing heavily, as it had for weeks. The tension had become a constant hum beneath the surface of their daily lives. She was tired of the constant back-and-forth, the notes, the silent wars waged over small things. She dropped her bag by the door and glanced at Lourdes, who was once again sitting at her desk, absorbed in her book.
There was something about Lourdes’ stillness, her quiet that made Jasmine feel like an intruder in a world she could never understand. For the first time, Jasmine realized that she hadn’t tried to understand it. Not really. Not beyond the surface. And that hurt more than she expected.
But then, she saw it—a small book on the edge of Lourdes’ desk, its cover plain, simple. No flashy colors, no attention-grabbing titles. Just a small sign language guide. Jasmine’s eyes lingered on it for a moment, and then she looked at Lourdes.
Lourdes’ gaze met hers, but she said nothing. Instead, she gave a small, almost imperceptible nod toward the book, her eyes speaking volumes.
Jasmine hesitated, her fingers curling around the edge of the chair, but she finally crossed the room. She sat down beside Lourdes, picked up the book, and flipped it open. The pages were filled with diagrams and symbols—each word, each gesture, something she had never really seen before. For the first time, Jasmine felt a strange mix of hope and nervousness stir inside her. Maybe this was how things could change. Maybe this was how she could learn to bridge the distance between them.
She started small. The first sign was simple: “hello.” She practiced in the mirror that night, moving her hands in the way the book suggested. The shapes felt foreign, awkward, and clumsy. Her fingers stumbled over the movements, and a sigh escaped her lips as she glanced at her reflection. It wasn’t graceful, it wasn’t fluid, but she kept at it. “Hello,” she whispered under her breath, her hands trembling as she tried again.
Days passed. Jasmine practiced in her room, her movements growing a little smoother, though still unsure. The mirror became her reluctant teacher, her eyes fixated on the way her fingers moved, trying to replicate the gestures she had seen in the book. Every night, she stumbled through the signs—“thank you,” “sorry,” “good morning.” But every time she messed up, every time the signs didn’t feel right, frustration bubbled up inside her. The shapes, the gestures—they felt wrong, incomplete, like she was speaking in a language that wasn’t hers to speak.
At times, she almost gave up, thinking, It’s just too much. But the memory of Lourdes’ quiet gaze—the way her eyes seemed to carry the weight of their unspoken words—kept Jasmine going. She couldn’t give up on this. She couldn’t let their silence stay like this, like a wall that couldn’t be crossed.
One afternoon, after several days of feeling utterly defeated, Jasmine finally gathered the courage to practice in front of Lourdes. She sat down beside her, the book open between them. “Hello,” Jasmine signed, her hands awkward, but she was determined.
Lourdes didn’t react immediately. She just watched, her expression unreadable, her hands resting on her lap. Jasmine felt her heart race. Was she doing it wrong? Was Lourdes disappointed in her? The silence between them was thick with Jasmine’s self-doubt. But then, slowly, Lourdes raised her hands and signed back, “Hello.”
Jasmine’s breath hitched in her chest. It wasn’t perfect—her hands were still clumsy, her movements uncertain—but Lourdes understood. It was a small victory, but a victory nonetheless. It was a bridge, fragile but real, beginning to form between them.
Jasmine’s practice sessions continued, and the signs started to come more naturally, though still with hesitation. She learned to form the letters, to move from one gesture to the next. But there were still days when the signs felt too foreign, when her hands didn’t move fast enough or correctly. There were moments when she wanted to throw the book aside and walk away from the frustration. She wasn’t getting it as quickly as she wanted. She wasn’t perfect.
But every time she looked at Lourdes, sitting silently but watching her, Jasmine couldn’t stop trying. She kept practicing, kept failing, kept trying again. “Thank you.” “Good night.” She practiced with the book, with the mirror, even on her own, repeating the movements until they became second nature. Her fingers were still stiff at times, but the clumsiness began to fade with each effort.
One evening, after a long day of practice, Jasmine set up a Bluetooth speaker between them. She turned the volume low, letting the soft vibrations travel through the floor, feeling the beat underneath their feet. She looked over at Lourdes, signing the word for “music”—her hands slow but sure.
Lourdes smiled, a slight tilt of her head as she closed her eyes, feeling the vibrations. She reached down, tapping the speaker lightly, her hands moving as if following the rhythm that Jasmine could hear, but not quite. “I feel it,” she signed back.
The days after that moment felt different. Jasmine began to learn more, slowly, bit by bit. Some days, the signs felt like they flowed effortlessly from her hands; on others, she had to stop and remind herself how to form a gesture. But the effort never stopped. The struggle to communicate was still there, but it no longer felt like failure—it felt like a journey, one she was willing to continue no matter how long it took.
One morning, Jasmine tapped Lourdes on the shoulder, her hand shaking just a little. When Lourdes turned to face her, Jasmine’s hands moved awkwardly, but she signed, “Good morning.”
Lourdes’ eyes softened, and she signed back with a quiet smile, “Good morning.”
The silence that had once separated them now felt different. It wasn’t a barrier anymore, but a space where understanding could grow. They didn’t need to speak the same language to hear each other. They were learning to listen in new ways, to understand not just with their ears, but with their hearts.
One evening, as they sat together, Jasmine signed slowly, her hands trembling a bit as she tried to express something she had been feeling for a while. “I’m sorry. I didn’t understand before.”
Lourdes paused, watching her with a steady gaze, before signing back, “You’re learning. That’s enough.”
Jasmine smiled, the weight of her guilt lifting slightly. She wasn’t perfect, but she was trying. And that was enough.
And then, after a moment, she signed, “Can you hear me now?”
Lourdes’ eyes softened, a gentle smile touching her lips as she responded, “I do now.”