How Nancy is mending her broken heart

Everything about her, from her eyes to her dark, somber clothes says it. Nancy Castiglione is grieving. Gone is the bubbly person who can light up a room with her smile.

What you see instead is a shadow of the old Nancy. Her smile is forced, her words as measured as the mechanical tick-tock of a grandfather’s clock. You know they will come. But, unlike the exciting, syncopated rhythm, say of a lively samba beat, the words lack color and fire.

Love has turned its back on Nancy again. Her latest boyfriend, Bullet Jalosjos, has, in her own words, dumped her three weeks ago.

And she feels empty and lost.

She sacrificed so much in the almost two years they were sweethearts that Nancy has, as she herself admits it, lost her identity.

"After Paolo (Contis) and I broke up, I felt that I was too selfish. So when Bullet came along, it became the other way around. I gave too much," she muses.

Too much, Nancy feels like an empty shell the ocean waves can toss and turn about any which way.

She doesn’t like it. But she has to deal with it.

Bullet wanted her to stop working and stay with him in Dakak, where he runs a business. But Nancy loved her career more. She was not ready to trade her job in Manila for a more laidback life in Dakak, where the Jalosjos family owns a resort. The relationship died a natural death.

"I have done some soul-searching," Nancy sighs.

The hopeless romantic has exchanged her rose-tinted glasses for a grey-colored one. And it takes some getting used to.

For the first time in so many years, Nancy is loveless this Valetine’s Day. Instead of spending Feb. 14 with a boyfriend as is her wont, she will just stay home with her parents, who are visiting her from Canada.

The visit from her folks is a big relief for Nancy, who lives by her lonesome in a Valle Verde townhouse. Mom and Dad help her lick her wounds and ease her heartbreak. They may live an ocean apart. But they know all about Bullet, and everything else that happens to Nancy.

Since her parents and older sibling live far away from her, Nancy says she treats her boyfriend like family. She never yearned for a barkada since she arrived in the Philippines from Canada to start a showbiz career because of this. Her boyfriend was enough.

But Nancy has changed her mind. Now, she is bent on looking for friendship first, love second. This way, she won’t grieve the next time she falls in love.

"I’m not ready for another relationship. It will take time for the wound to heal," Nancy explains.

That’s why she’s wondering why people think sparks are flying between her and fellow ALV talent John Prats.

"We enjoy each other’s company, and he invites me to go malling. But he knows I’m not ready to jump into a new relationship," relates Nancy.

The subject of the conversation, Nancy’s partner in ABS-CBN’s new romantic drama anthology, Your Song (premieres today, 3 p.m.), was not around to comment, though. John is cooped up in the Big Brother House, where he is one of the housemates of PBB’s celebrity edition.

Nancy and John star in Para Sa ‘Yo, inspired by Manny Pacquiao’s song during the recently-concluded championship fight with Erik Morales.

Nancy swears her thoughts are miles away from romance when she’s with John. She just wants to take her mind off her heartache, that’s all. And John understands. So he takes her out for a stroll at The Podium or at Eastwood.

Work is what she plans to concentrate on for the time being.

"I love my work," says Nancy. And if it means paying the price in terms of a lost love and the pain that goes with it, so be it.

For all we know, this could even turn into a blessing. Nancy may emerge a better actress because of it. When that happens, what seemed to be a curse may just turn out to be Nancy’s saving grace. That old fire in Nancy’s eyes will flicker once more and her smile will light up the room again.