A Dozen Pairs of Shoes by Luis Gatmaitan

My father was a shoemaker. Shoes made by him were really famous in town. A lot of people would come to us to have their shoes made. From what we heard, my father’s shoes were so much better than the shoes made in Marikina. They were durable, the workmanship was really excellent, and their designs, truly creative!

“Where on earth do you get your ideas for those styles? They’re sooo pretty!”
“Looks like the muse of shoes and soles comes and visits you…”
“You must have magic in your hands!”
With all these praises, my Tatay would only half smile. He was a quiet man. He rarely ever spoke.

I grew up amidst all the many shoes my father made. My friends and classmates often wished they were in my shoes. They said I was lucky to have a shoemaker for a father. Why, I always had a new pair for every occasion – school opening, Christmas, my birthday, or when I was awarded class honors in school! My Tatay even made me extra pairs of shoes from left-over leather and fabric. “I wish I were you, Karina. You always have new shoes. Me? I get hand-me-downs from my ate. I only wear the shoes that don’t fit her anymore,” complained one of my classmates.

I was in the second grade when my mother became pregnant again. We’d waited so long to have another baby in the family. My lola said that their prayers – for me to have a kid brother or sister – had been answered.
“Oh, pretty soon I will have someone to share my shoes with. But that’s okay, I know my father will always do enough shoes for both of us.”
When the baby was still in my mother’s tummy, I heard my mother and my father talking.
“I just had my check-up. My doctor said our baby is going to be a girl!”
“That’s great! If she’s a girl, we’ll have her take up ballet lessons. I’d really like to have a ballet dancer in the family! From now on, I am going to start learning how to make ballet shoes,” Tatay said.

But not all of my fathers’ dreams could come true. When we saw my baby sister for the first time, we were all so shocked. She had no feet! It was as though her feet had been cut off!
The rumors began to spread. Because my sister was sort of deformed, people were saying a lot of nasty things. Some said maybe my mother tried to get rid of her that’s why her body parts were incomplete. Or my mother might have taken some harmful pills and those pills melted my sister’s feet. Or the shoe spirits cursed my father because he raised the prices for his shoes. Or maybe my mother had an unusual liking for a doll while pregnant.

“Nanay, why doesn’t Susie have feet?”
“I had this infection, anak…I caught German measles while your sister was growing in my tummy. And well…the effect was that…” my mother narrated sadly.

My sister will never be a ballet dancer then. Tatay will be very disappointed. I had this thought every day, every time I’d see Susie without her feet. That’s why I decided to persuade Nanay to enroll me in a ballet school even if I didn’t really like ballet. But…
“Ma’am, why don’t you have Karina take up piano instead, or maybe painting, or enroll her in a banduria class?” my ballet teachers suggested to my mother.
I really felt very let down. Not for myself but for my Tatay and Susie, and for all the elusive dreams that could never come true.

I felt and saw how my father and mother loved Susie. They were always ready to keep her from harm. Once while we were on a picnic at the park, there was this guy who saw Susie.
Pointing at Susie, he said, “Hey, look! That kid will make a good freak show at the carnival!”
My father turned red. He clenched his fist. That was the first time I ever saw his eyebrows meet. He almost hit the guy.
“What’s your problem?”
A good thing my mother stopped him just in time.
While in bed one night, I heard Tatay talking to Susie.
“Anak, feet or no feet, your Nanay and I love you very much. You are special in the eyes of God. What’s important to us is that you grow up to be a good person, believing in yourself.” He kissed her warmly.

Father never stopped making shoes for me. But I could tell that each time he measured my feet, his eyes drifted towards my sister’s crib.
“Too bad bunso, you have never known how it feels like to wear the beautiful shoes our Tatay makes…” I whispered to her.

Susie and I were really close as we grew up. It never mattered to me that she had no feet. That never stopped us from playing together. We found a lot of games that didn’t need the use of feet, anyway. She always beat me in sungka, jackstone, scrabble and pitik-bulag. I took it upon myself to be her defender from all teasers. Her wheelchair pusher. Her ate assistant!
That was when I realized my sister and I were alike in so many ways. We were both better with our hands than with our feet. I was good in painting. And she was good in writing stories. And oh, our Tatay was also good with his hands!

Susie once woke me up to tell me about her dream: About a most unusual pair of shoes that looked so good on her feet.
She has fee in her dream? I wondered to myself.
“Believe me, Ate, I dreamed of a beautiful pair of shoes. It’s made of yellow patent leather adorned with sunflower up front!”
That was when she was about to celebrate her birthday. What I noticed was, whenever her birthday was drawing near, she would always dream of shoes.

“Ate, I dreamed of another pair of shoes. It’s made of red velvet with a big side buckle!”
She also told me about the open-toed blue shoes with her own toes peeping through. The white shoes with tiny heels and red bow. The denim shoes embroidered with the moon and stars. The sandals that looked like a fishnet. The purple shoes with a round crystal attached near the toe.
It never ceased to amaze me at how she could remember even the tiniest detail of the shoes in her dreams – the flowers, ribbons, buttons, sequins, beads, or buckles. And she thought of these shoes like they were her very own.

“Ate, when I grow up, I am going to write a story about all the shoes in my dreams. And you’ll draw them for me, okay?”

After a few years, my father retired from making shoes, except for the orders from the suki he simply couldn’t refuse. When he celebrated his birthday, my gift to him was one of my paintings – a pair of heavily veined hands making shoes. Susie gave him a small music box with a ballerina.
“You made your father very happy,” Nanay said.

Shortly after that. Tatay became sickly. Susie was twelve when finally he left us all for good.

One day, I happened to wander to the bodega, looking for old shoes that could donate to the orphanage. While searching, I found a box that looked as though it hadn’t been touched for sometime. Opening it, I found several small shoe boxes neatly piled on top of each other!
Who owns these shoes? Are they undelivered orders? I asked myself.
But when I looked closely at all the shoes, I was startled. They were my father’s best creations in wonderful designs. And they came in different sizes. There was a pair of baby shoes. Baptismal shoes. Leisure shoes. School shoes. Church shoes, Party shoes.
I was even more startled when I read the dedication written on a small tag.

For my dearest Susie,
On her first birthday

I peered inside the boxes one at a time. Every single pair of shoes was for Susie. My father had been making shoes for Susie all this time!

For Susie, joy of my life,
As she celebrates her seventh birthday

Year after year, my father never missed making a pair of shoes for Susie on her birthday. One dozen shoes all in all!

Specially for my dearest bunso,
On the occasion of her twelfth birthday.

I burst our crying when I saw the shoes. I hadn’t realized till then how deep Tatay’s love was. I brought the twelve pairs of shoes to my mother and Susie.

“I had no idea that your father had been making shoes for you, Susie,” tears formed in my mother’s eyes. “He kept it a secret from me…”
“A-Ate, these are the shoes I dreamed about…” Susie couldn’t believe her eyes as she caressed each shoe.
“Oh?!”
Suddenly, I remembered all the shoes that Susie had described to me in the past.
Yellow patent leather shoes with sunflower up front. Red velvet shoes with a big side buckle. Blue open-toed shoes with her own toes peeping through. White shoes with tiny heels and a red bow. Denim shoes embroidered with the moon and stars. Sandals that looked like a fish net. Purple shoes with a round crystal near the toe.
In my mind I thought, did my father’s love cross over, reaching out to Susie’s dreams so she could wear the shoes he made for her?
I am not sure.
What I am sure about is that, life isn’t perfect. Just look at the way my sister was created. But there are perfect moments. Like the moments when my father created the most beautiful shoes for Susie.