And they really didn’t. By the time Mara was on her back in nothing but her slip dress, hips raised slightly by pillows and breathing through Jay watching her with hungry eyes, she didn’t want this to stop at all. She pulled down the front of her dress and undid the clasp of her bra in front. It really was easier. Jay helped her loop her arms under the straps, giving him the space to pull the bra away. She shivered when Jay pulled it away, her skin tingling where his fingertips touched her bare breast.
“Oh Mara,” he gasped, reverent and gentle as his cool fingertip lightly flicked at her slowly hardening nipples. “You are so beautiful.”
“Yes I am.” She had no plans of taking off the rest of the slip tonight, but it was comforting to know that she was in no hurry to do it. Because while this would be the first time, she was determined to not let it be the last. “Can I put the condom on you?”
And when Jay entered her, his cock warm and hard, slipping into spaces of her body that not even she was sure she’d ever touched, Mara knew this was definitely not going to be the last time they did it. It was such a new, but welcome feeling. But she loved the weight of his body against her, the way it fought against her but filled her so well. She loved the sounds their bodies made in their joining, her tension melting away as Jay canted his hips against hers, as her body shook and clenched to make him fill her deeper, deeper.
“God, Mara, you’re so tight,” Jay babbled as they slammed into each other, the bed making a creaking sound underneath them. “I knew it would feel good inside you, I knew it.”
She couldn’t say anything in response, luxuriating in the feeling that something inside of her was going to explode. Mara wanted to hold it in, to stop it, or contain the feeling. But it was impossible, so impossible.
“Are you going to come, love? Don’t hold back, let me hear you. God, I want to hear you.”
She had imagined what this would feel like. Oh, she knew it would be wonderful, but she had underestimated how deeply intimate it was, so be this close to a person. To have them know what you sounded like in your most vulnerable moments. In times like this it was impossible to hold on to control, and that freedom was what Mara had not expected to feel at all.
She came with a shout, her hand over her head as it grabbed Jay’s headboard for support, her leg wrapped around Jay’s hip. He followed her shortly after, slowly sliding out of her to properly dispose of the condom.
Mara blinked up at Jay as he walked back to her, a satisfied, smug grin on his face. The room had darkened, and several floors below, traffic built into gridlocks. People moved to and fro in their own places. All of them blissfully unaware that this magical thing would be inevitable—that Mara Jane Barretto was going to fall in love with Jay Montinola, and she was happy to keep falling for as long as she could.
Sexwascool. But knowing you got to do it again with someone you liked? Well, that was even better.
“You okay?” Jay asked, moving to the bed to lie beside Mara, helping her toss aside the extra pillows to his nearby floor chair (“It’s the chair I throw everything on. Best five thousand I’ve ever spent.”). He stretched his arms over his head, his toes forward and still naked. Then he bundled Mara into his arms, pulling the rest of her slip over her legs, her knees. “Let me grab your glasses.”
He reached over her and grabbed them, and her vision was restored. The world was a lot less blurry, but thank god it was mostly all very much the same. She did feel a little overwhelmed, curling into Jay’s chest and letting him smooth his hand up and down her back.
“Next time,” she said, looking up. Jay looked a little worried. Nervous. “We eataftersex.”
His face broke out into a happy, satisfied smile. He chuckled and pressed a kiss to her temple. “Next time,” he echoed.
And Mara’s heart settled into a peace she had never before understood. But there was peace in feeling so wanted, and so loved.
The room was quiet, but neither of them felt like getting up at the moment. It was in that quiet moment that Jay suddenly asked. “Can I order flowers from you?”
“To give back to me? Just give me money.”
“Wow.” Jay laughed. “It’s actually for this thing happening on Friday. Do you want to come?”
“Wait,” Mara said, frowning up at him. “What’s happening on Friday?”
Nige and Irene are finally getting married!
Civil ceremony to be held at Leo’s Deli at the Kontra
San Juan City
FIFTEEN
Nothing about Ate Irene’s love story had been conventional.
She had a one-night stand, got pregnant during the pandemic, reconnected with her best friend when things opened back up and decided to marry him after three years. They had opted for a civil ceremony—a church wedding could wait until Luna was in first grade and the Catholic school (if they chose it) made them do it.
Ate Irene had always been a fan of architecture, which was why she chose to get married at the Kontra. The building was housed in a corner lot that used to have an ancestral home turned restaurant, but now had become an incredibly chic, modern hub of cafés, restaurants and shops. The space was built with thin columns of steel painted white, which looked industrial but still tropical.
The bride and groom were married in the middle of all, on top of a set of steps, surrounded by fiddle leaf plants and underneath a gigantic ceiling fan.
“The bride wore a dress by no one.” Jay’s mother sighed beside him as they stood as her witness for the blessed event. Nige had an aunt who was a city judge, and she believed that a civil wedding ceremony was a quick wedding ceremony. “But then again, nothing about our family has been conventional.”
“No. But it’s better this way, I think,” Jay said, shaking his head and trying not to get distracted from Ate Irene looking into Nige’s eyes. “Have you talked to Dad?”
