Strings of Fate

The alarm buzzed too early, like it always did these days, but waking up was still the hardest part. Geneva’s sky was a thick slate gray, the kind of morning that made you want to pull the blanket back over your head and forget the world existed outside your window. Pero hindi pwedeng ganun. Not anymore. Not when you had a schedule to keep and dreams that demanded time.

The bus stop was quiet, with only a few other students bundled in scarves and wool coats, clutching coffee cups or textbooks. The cold air bit at my cheeks, a sharp reminder na hindi na ako nasa Manila na mainit at maingay, kung saan kahit pawis ay parang hugot ng buhay. Here, everything was clean, ordered, and somehow distant.

My planner was tucked under my arm—my lifeline. It looked like a war zone, covered in colorful sticky notes, scribbled reminders in both French and English, and hastily written French vocab I kept repeating to myself.

"Rappelle-toi, Eli, tu dois terminer le rapport avant vendredi."
(Remember, Eli, you have to finish the report before Friday.)

Some days, I couldn’t tell if my brain was more tired from Pediatrics lectures or from trying to memorize French verbs. But the feeling of holding on to that planner made me feel like I had some kind of control, even if my schedule felt like a complicated puzzle with missing pieces.

Lectures started at eight in the morning sharp, the halls of the University of Geneva buzzing with quiet energy and students hustling between classes. I sat between strangers, but their faces weren’t unfamiliar anymore. Mateo was usually a few seats ahead or behind me, his head always buried in his engineering notes, scribbling formulas like it was another language I was still trying to learn.

"Tu as fait tes devoirs de maths, Eli?" (Did you do your math homework, Eli?) Mateo asked once, flashing a rare smile during a break.

"Pas encore... Mais je vais essayer ce soir." (Not yet... But I’ll try tonight.)

His support was quiet but steady, like the gentle push I needed when my energy flagged.

Julien was my lifeline after school. His coffee shop smelled like roasted beans and fresh croissants, a warm refuge where the clatter of cups and the hiss of the espresso machine drowned out the stress of the day. I still wasn’t perfect at the French orders.

"Tu t’en sors bien, Eli." (You’re doing well, Eli.) Julien said one afternoon, wiping the counter with a smile that felt like an unspoken promise that I wasn’t alone.

The rhythm of balancing classwork and shifts was exhausting, but I clung to it. Each patient lecture in Pediatrics—about infants, vaccines, and diagnosis—reminded me why I was here. Why all this struggle mattered.

Some days, my eyes burned with tiredness, and my fingers ached from writing notes and serving coffee. But every time I glanced down at my wrist, the red string bracelet Rhyler gave me was still there. It was faded now, the color soft and worn, but it never left me. Not even when I wanted to forget.

I caught myself sometimes tracing it with my thumb when the pressure was too much—a quiet reminder that even if things changed, some parts of me were still holding on. The bracelet was a silent witness to all my fears and hopes tangled together.

The cold Geneva mornings, the warm buzz of the café, the endless French vocabulary I was learning by heart, the textbooks stacked in my small apartment—all pieces of this strange new life I was slowly making mine. It was chaos, yes, but it was also a kind of order I was beginning to understand.

Bawat araw na lumilipas, kahit gaano pa kahirap, I survived. Somehow. Still. That was enough for now.

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