Visions of St Lazarus Chapter 7

THE CREEP OF PALAWAN

I cannot cast the past into oblivion. It made me. It shaped my thinking, hardened and softened my mind in equal measure. It is the sum of who I became. And so I will not forget Palawan—nor the lepers, properly called Hansenites, whom I served there.

I will not forget the journey: the violent South China Sea, its waves battering our small boat, nearly hurling us against jagged rocks and sea caves carved by centuries of water and coral. I will not forget the impossible beauty beneath—schools of fish moving in perfect synchrony, their colors flashing like living mosaics, responding to the drums of wind and wave. Sea snakes striped like warnings. Birds mating midair. Crocodiles yawning along muddy banks, tears glistening in their ancient eyes. Swiftlet nests hidden in cave walls. Millions of bats erupting into the night sky like smoke.

I will not forget the roads—narrow, cliff-hugging, unforgiving—where our van crept forward, the jungle pressing close, breathing, alive with the music of insects and unseen creatures. I stooped to examine sea cucumbers and starfish; I lifted my eyes to watch monkeys torn apart by eagles. I remember my solitude, purple and heavy, beneath century-old trees, beside cold waterfalls and steaming hot springs.

I lived in an isolated sanitarium, deep in a forest, on an island stretched like an arm among the Philippines’ seven thousand islands. The water there was as blue as the sky—so bright it seemed unreal. At night, the stars hung low, multiplying themselves in the sea until the moon rose full and silver, communing with the water. Only at dawn did the sun intervene, separating sea from sky once more.

I lived there. I served there.

My work was to care for lepers in a small hospital and scattered cottages where medicine was scarce and supplies arrived by air drops—there were no runways. We lived far from the world.

The night that returns to me now was one of countless brownouts. Electricity failures were common then. I carried a candle as I assisted the Sisters of Mary in the morgue. They were preparing the body of Guillermo Makalusong, who had died on Christmas Eve.

With bare hands—our gloves long depleted—the Sisters washed his body using sulfur soap. Blood was swept toward the metal bed’s gutter, dripping steadily into a bucket below. Guillermo had stabbed himself in the neck five times. He was drunk when he killed himself.

“Hurry up, Sisters,” I said, impatient. “I still have exams to grade.”

I held two roles at the sanitarium: assistant to the nuns and clinical instructor to nursing students on affiliation from Manila. Our hands were always full. There were the living to tend to—and the dead to prepare and ship home.

We begged the world for help. Letters went everywhere. We taught patients vocational skills—making stuffed dolls, ceramic figurines, assembling hammers and mallets—anything we could sell. Still, money was always short.

Lepers, after all, were not machines. They needed food, shelter, clothing, water—beyond medicine. They fell in love. And being Catholic, they were denied contraception or abortion. Babies were born. More mouths to feed. More cribs to build. More caregivers to hire.

We took infants from their mothers for the first years of life. There was no sentimentality about it. Infants had no immunity. We could not risk them. We ignored the parents’ cries.

I also welcomed young nursing students—fresh from Manila, reluctant and resentful.

“We’re only here because it’s required,” they told me openly. “We hate it.”

I apologized for the conditions. I thanked them repeatedly for being there. I lectured anyway.

“Leprosy—Hansen’s disease—is found only in humans,” I began. “It is caused by Mycobacterium leprae. It is treatable with combination therapy: Rifampicin, Dapsone, and Clofazimine.”

While I spoke, one student filed her nails. Another reapplied lipstick. A third wrote a love letter.

After six months, I broke.

I was exhausted by their contempt—for the patients, for the work, for the dignity of care. I decided to teach them what nursing truly meant.

First, I informed their department heads that I was raising passing scores. Failures would repeat the course.

Second, clinical evaluations would include patient feedback.

Third, they would learn everything—how food was cooked and served, how autopsies were done, how supplies were inventoried, how skills were taught, how babies were cared for.

They called me names. Students with powerful parents withdrew using political pressure. Others were pulled out after threats to withdraw donations.

Those who remained—the powerless—called me The Creep of Palawan.

The administration wanted to fire me.

I told them plainly: in healthcare, you don’t choose your patients. Stroke, leprosy, AIDS—it doesn’t matter. If you avoid suffering because it’s inconvenient, you have no business in medicine.

What saved me was this: the remaining students studied harder. Patients began to voice satisfaction. The administration hesitated.

These thoughts followed me as I left the morgue, candle still burning. The nuns covered Guillermo’s body with a white sheet. In two days, he would be shipped home.

Home.

Where had I first met Guillermo?

Legazpi.

I remembered Mayon Volcano’s perfect cone rising behind a city still scarred by eruption—its Catholic belfry standing alone amid ruins.

We came for Guillermo at midnight. The safest hour. No neighbors watching.

He denied his identity. Tried to flee. Jumped from a window.

We caught him.

“Get away from me!” he screamed.

Dr. Montes was firm.
“Guillermo, it’s illegal to remain in the community with active leprosy. You’re endangering your family.”

His wife shook in a corner, clutching their children.

He cursed us.
“You sons of bitches!”

“It’s temporary,” Dr. Montes said calmly. “Treatment takes months. At most two years.”

I echoed him, eager to impress.
“You’ll be home soon.”

He wasn’t.

The disease worsened. Side effects ravaged him. His skin darkened. Lesions erupted. Steroids bloated his face. Nerves died. Fingers clawed. Feet numbed.

He was cured—but destroyed.

When he returned home, his children fled. His wife had moved on.

He came back to us drunk and broken.

He descended through the cottages—Acute. Sub-acute. Chronic.

Finally, Cottage D.

The Desperados.

Locked doors. Restraints.

I visited him.

“What more do you want, Guillermo?” I demanded.

“I want to go home.”

I stared at him.

Out of pity—or loneliness—I returned. I drank with them. Bought them music. Videos. Beer.

The nuns warned me.
“You’re crossing a line.”

The students left.

I insisted: they were still human.

Then came the autopsy.

Guillermo’s body lay on the table. The students watched, eager for spectacle.

The Y-incision was made.

And then—

The corpse moved.

Guillermo sat up.

Grinning.

Holding his organs.

“Home,” he whispered.

He collapsed.

Pandemonium erupted.

The students screamed. The Sisters ran. The monks prayed.

They blamed me.

They called me the Devil.

I did not defend myself.

I was expelled from Palawan.

The memoir ended there.

Reality returned as Lazaro’s foot struck the creaking stairs of the Dade Rest tunnel.

A door opened.

A man lay on a bed.

Lazaro sat beside him.

The man whispered,
“Hello. I’m Bill. I’m dying of AIDS.”

It was Guillermo Makalusong again.

The same soul.

A different face.
2026-01-21 14:13:09
visions

Visiobs of St Lazarus 6

CHAPTER 6: THE CONFLICT

“We are hard pressed on every side, but not crushed; perplexed, but not in despair; persecuted, but not abandoned; struck down, but not destroyed.”
—2 Corinthians 4:8–9

Lazaro pushed open the bar’s glass door and stepped into the balmy Miami night. Behind him, the thrum of synth-heavy pop faded beneath the hum of sodium lamps. The sidewalk outside was a gallery of the broken: vagrants muttering to invisible enemies, hustlers eyeing any movement with hollow hope, and drunks slumped like dislocated mannequins under neon signage that buzzed with the fatigue of its own glow.

An old man, wild-eyed and stooped, shuffled past him, mumbling into the shadows. He bent to the ground, snatched a half-smoked cigarette from a storm drain, and lit it with ritual care, inhaling like a monk anointing incense.

Lazaro walked on, dodging beer cans and crushed Styrofoam, caught in a breeze that carried the peculiar scent of the city—salt, alcohol, sweat, and a hint of bleach.

He didn’t know why he kept ending up here, night after night, wandering the edge of consciousness, tired but unable to sleep. The world’s straights were curled into beds beside loved ones, with dogs snoring at their feet, children dreaming of cartoons and cereal. But he—he was adrift, haunted by a restlessness that had no name.

He veered toward the beach.

As soon as his feet touched the sugar-white sand, he peeled off his shoes and socks. His pace quickened. His soles were tingling. The soft granules underfoot grounded him, stirred something primal.

And then—he ran.

He sprinted along the shoreline, letting the ocean wind slap his cheeks and pull the tension from his bones. After a mile or two, he slowed, panting. Sweat trickled down his back. Without hesitation, he pulled off his shirt, then his pants, his briefs—everything—and dove naked into the warm Atlantic.

He floated, suspended in the dark embrace of the sea.

Then a voice shattered the moment.

“Sir! Hey, sir!”

He turned. A flashlight beam danced across the waves. A cop stood at the shoreline, hands on hips, silhouette framed by moonlight.

“No swimming’s allowed this late,” the officer called out. “And definitely not nude.”

Lazaro trudged out of the surf, dripping and unashamed. But something about the cop struck him—those muscled thighs peeking out of regulation shorts, the sheen of sweat on his chest. The man was a walking advertisement for testosterone.

Their eyes locked. Lazaro’s body betrayed him—heat surged, breath quickened.

“I’m sorry,” the officer murmured, unsure, watching Lazaro approach, still bare.

“It’s alright,” Lazaro said softly.

The cop extended his hand. Lazaro took it. They didn’t let go.

There was no dialogue after that—just the shared language of breath. The kindling of Miami heat sparked fire between them. Lips found lips. Lazaro clawed at the man’s uniform. They tumbled into the sand as the voice of Gloria Estefan sang from somewhere in Lazaro’s mind.

But then—

“Ay, Dios por Santo!” Lazaro screamed.

He opened his eyes. Sitting nearby, as if teleported from another century, was St. Augustine, weeping.

The cop froze. He started laughing, a laugh that grew manic. He rolled off Lazaro and rose. His pupils glowed red. Horns curled from his scalp. His teeth grew sharp. His genitals elongated and twisted into a whip-like tail.

Lazaro blinked in disbelief. “I don’t fucking believe this.”

The Devil, now fully transformed, sneered. He kicked St. Augustine hard in the ribs.

“Hey!” Lazaro shouted, rushing to shield the Saint, who collapsed under the next blow.

“Don’t speak!” the Saint wailed. “Don’t protect me. He has the upper hand tonight.”

Another punch sent the Saint’s head jerking sideways.

“Fight back!” Lazaro pleaded.

But the Saint ignored him. Instead, he knelt, scooped up sand, and poured it over his own head.

“I have lost. You gave yourself to the Devil tonight. Every time you do, a Saint in heaven suffers. Did you know that, Lazaro?”

“But—”

“Don’t speak. And put your clothes on.”

The Devil was now sprouting wings. He turned, urinated through his tail like a garden hose, then shook it dry. “God, it feels good to piss again after a few centuries,” he boomed, then took flight, flapping off into the humid sky.

“This is unfair!” Lazaro cried. “I’m the one who failed. I’m the one who should be punished. Why are you two dragging me into this cosmic custody battle?”

The Saint collapsed.

Lazaro panicked. He checked for breath, pulse, heartbeat—nothing.

“Oh God,” he sobbed. “A Saint dies in my arms while the Devil’s out there flapping his junk around in the clouds.”

Suddenly, a sharp slap cracked across his face.

“Get off me, you drunken little sinner!” St. Augustine barked.

Lazaro stumbled back. “I thought you were dead!”

“I’ve been dead since the 5th century, idiot,” the Saint snapped, stretching his stiff spine. “I just passed out for a minute. It happens to the best of us.”

“You heard what I said?”

“I heard everything. What you said, didn’t say, wished you didn’t say.”

Lazaro sat beside him in the sand, naked except for a shirt. “Why can’t I just be left alone?”

“Left alone?” Augustine raised an eyebrow. “If you weren’t here right now, where would you be?”

Lazaro thought. “Probably asleep.”

“And tomorrow night?”

“Also asleep.”

The Saint sighed. “When I was your age, I became a monk. We were all loners, but never lonely. God gave you eyes, ears, hands, a mind—and what do you do? Hide in your apartment like a vampire, waiting for death to knock.”

“I just want peace! Why am I singled out among millions of gays around the world?”

“Because you dared to ask for God. And He heard you.”

The Saint rose, picked up his staff, and began walking away. His old body struggled, but he didn’t stop.

Lazaro scrambled after him. “Can’t I meet God without the horror movie plotline? Can’t He just... text?”

The Saint vanished mid-step.

Lazaro spun around. “Saint Augustine?! Saint?!”

He searched the beach, the dunes, the palms. Nothing. The city stirred in the distance.

He dropped to his knees, trembling.

A nearby beach custodian paused, stared at him.

“You okay, man?”

Lazaro was now in a shirt, barefoot, with only a pair of bunched-up pants. The custodian rolled his eyes. “Drunk. Get outta here.”

Lazaro yanked on his pants and jogged to his car. He needed sleep. Real sleep.

Back at the apartment, the clock read 6:03 a.m.

There was no way he could work. He called in sick, brewed a cappuccino, and collapsed on the couch.

“It was all a dream,” he muttered.

But the salt still lingered on his skin.

—

At 5:00 p.m., the phone rang.

“Please come to Dade Rest,” Jeff Kaploski’s voice crackled with urgency. “Something’s happened.”

—

Miami glowed under a full moon as Lazaro pulled into the Dade Rest driveway. Unlike its usual closed-door secrecy, the house was bustling. The sour scent of antibiotics was thick in the air. He stepped inside and was struck by the scene: residents, once hidden in corners, now lay on recliners, IVs in arms, sketching, knitting, chatting between bouts of vomiting.

Jeff stood at the railing, looking like a man pulled between two dimensions.

“It was probably the moon,” he said.

Lazaro tilted his head. “What?”

Jeff looked back at the chaos inside. “It started around 4 a.m. Right after... whatever happened to you. Everyone here got sick. Nausea, vomiting, diarrhea. We checked the food, the water, the tunnels... nothing made sense. It’s like the air itself turned on us.”

Lazaro’s stomach dropped. He hadn’t told Jeff anything.

Jeff leaned in. “You’re not here for these people. There’s someone else... downstairs.”

Lazaro nodded.

They descended into the tunnels, their shadows stretching long and anxious.

It reminded Lazaro of Palawan. The smell. The darkness. The descent into forgotten places—like walking back into a dream you never finished.

This time, though, the dream wasn’t letting go.
2025-07-24 00:37:00
visions