Wedding Night Stand: A Chic Manila short story

by Esguerra, Mina V.

  Wedding Night Stand

  A Chic Manila short story

  Mina V. Esguerra

  Wedding Night Stand

  How could it be midnight, already?

  Andrea wandered back, barefoot, into the wedding reception tent, or what was left of it. Of course her sister wasn’t going to be there anymore. The bride barely slept in the days leading up to this, her big day, and she deserved a break. The ceremony was in the early afternoon, and no one was going to have the stamina to stay this long unless they were paid to.

  Water. Andrea needed some water.

  “I thought you’d be heading back up to your room.”

  It figured that Daphne would still be there, with the catering staff and the guys who brought in the tent. Her sister’s maid of honor/wedding planner seemed to be plugged into a renewable energy source twenty-four/seven, and also had the power to be everywhere at once. Still, Andrea gasped, surprised, like she was caught stealing something.

  “No, I…I’m thirsty.”

  “Over here then.” Daphne nodded toward a disassembled table, and pulled from behind it a cooler. It looked heavy, and it made railroad tracks on the sand as she dragged it out. Andrea would have helped, if she had been in the right state of mind. Daphne lifted the lid, scanned the contents, and tossed her a bottle of water.

  “Shit.” It bounced onto the sand just off Andrea’s right foot.

  Daphne laughed. “What’s that about? And here I thought you and Damon were getting along so well.”

  “What are you talking about?”

  “You. Damon Esquibel, assigned to table five. Officemate of the groom.”

  “What exactly did you see?”

  She lifted the cooler lid again, and pulled out a beer. “I saw you having fun way over there.”

  “Shit.”

  Daphne laughed. “So do you want to tell me about it, and do you want to switch your drink to something harder?”

  ***

  Yes, Julie and Andrea had a talk when the older sister got engaged and started planning her wedding. She knew very well the younger sister’s position on the matter, and Julie happened to be a nice enough person, so Andrea was given the courtesy of not having to be the maid of honor, if she didn’t want to. She said she wouldn’t know what to do with the so-called honor, but would gladly help anyone Julie chose to bear the title.

  Andrea didn’t like weddings.

  Especially lately.

  This is making her sound like a horrible person. She still liked cats, and cotton candy. But it also seemed like yesterday that she developed feelings for someone (a dear friend, actually), only to be told that he would rather spend the rest of his life with someone else.

  Not in those words. More of, “Andrea, I think you’re great, but I’m ready to settle down with someone and I don’t think you’re on the same page as me on that. I’m not getting any younger.”

  He went and married a girl he had been dating for three months.

  Andrea knew, and cared for, that guy for ten years. Sure, they were never together together, but ten years. He really knew her.

  However painful and annoying that conversation was though, it was a wakeup call and reminded her of other things previous boyfriends had said:

  “You’re such a free spirit.”

  “I don’t want to tie you down.”

  “I can’t keep up with you.”

  Most of them were married now. To women they could “keep up with,” she guessed.

  She hated weddings. She was only in this one because she cared about the couple, and it was a free vacation right before she started at a new job next week.

  Bah, humbug.

  ***

  As luck would have it, she was also a sucker for guys who rocked a suit. So much that she watched hours and hours of crappy video on the internet of guys in formal wear, to desensitize and prepare her hormones for this day. She watched wedding videos, awards-night speeches, government press conferences. After that parade of unfit men, wearing ill-fitting outfits, sporting yucky facial hair, Andrea thought she would be ready for her sister’s beach wedding where a good percentage of the guests would be reasonably attractive, not related to her, and probably in that item of clothing.

  It helped. She got through the ceremony fine, without being attracted to anyone. (Maybe being in a church helped with that.) But then the reception at the beach happened, and he took the seat beside hers.

  Perfection! said her head, heart, and hormones. Her hormones especially. This was the longest stretch so far in her twenties that she’d been single, and the little buggers were pleading to be given something to do.

  So to speak.

  He had eyes that...she just needed to look at them. She had to find an odd angle so it wouldn’t seem like she was checking him out, but their eyes met anyway, and even more awkwardly.

  Perfection!

  “Excuse me?” he said.

  She coughed. “Sorry. I have a throat thing.” And then she looked away, toward the orchid and tulip centerpieces.

  Long lashes. Five o’clock shadow. Hair that was a day or two overdue for a haircut. Straight, broad shoulders, leading into what had to be toned arms, the way his suit draped respectfully on him like it was just happy to be there.

  Andrea had never seen him before, and had to clear something up, before this got any weirder.

  “Groom’s side?” she asked.

  “Anton’s officemate,” he answered, a beat late, and like he wasn’t completely there. And then as his backside slid across the chair and made itself comfortable, he said, "My name is Damon.”

  Of course it is. “Andrea,” she replied.

  His eyes fixed on her and tracked up to the band of small orchids atop her head, and then to her neck exposed by the ponytail that snaked down one shoulder, and further down still to the section of her lower back that peeked out from the criss-cross back straps of her lavender dress. She knew it, felt it all, even as her eyes swept back to the centerpiece.

  “You’re a bridesmaid,” she heard him say. His voice had a wonderful rumble to it, already calling up thoughts of being under soft linens. Or against hard surfaces.

  Maybe it’s not him. Maybe I just haven’t been properly had. In ages.

  When she braved another glance at him, he had turned somewhere else—Table 10, and that distracted look was on his face again.

  That was refreshing. Maybe it was safe to look at him after all. Maybe he wouldn’t notice how hungry her hormones were.

  “Yes I am. Sister of the bride.” There was a bit of movement over at that table, and someone stood up. Cute, regal-looking, gorgeous in navy blue. His eyes followed her too, almost intently.

  Huh. Well.

  “And she is?” Andrea said.

  He knew what she meant, and the smile that came to his face was an unexpected softening of all those sharp edges. “Geraldine. You don’t know her?”

  “Probably a friend of the groom. I don’t know the people on his side.”

  Damon leaned closer, his voice dropping to a whisper. It wasn’t necessary, really; there was music, and the white noise of two hundred people finding their seats. But it gave her the excuse to tilt slightly toward him and expose more of her neck.

  “She is someone I’ve been trying to ask out. For a while now,” he admitted.

  A small, light stab at her heart. That the rest of her ignored, because she was close enough to see his straight teeth and observe him lightly chew on the inside of his lip.

  “She’s straight?” Andrea asked.

  A smile, again. “Yes.”

  “So what’s wrong with you?”


  “What?”

  “Why won’t she bite? What’s wrong with you?”

  He laughed a little. “She just doesn’t know me that well.”

  Oh come on. She had eyes. And blood, and a working reproductive system. The way just being within arm’s length of Damon had woken up her ovaries, this Geraldine had to have a reason for not wanting a piece of that.

  Those eyes shot toward Geraldine’s direction, before coming back to Andrea.

  “I don’t know,” he said. “Maybe it’s something you can enlighten me about. Female perspective and all.”

  Damon didn’t know it, but he just wandered into her turf. She was the queen of the female perspective.

  ***

  He noticed her at the ceremony. She was the only bridesmaid whose grin wasn’t painfully stretching her face. She was beautiful but also restrained, and he spent too much time wondering why that was. Or maybe he was just staring because her dress showed off her lower back, her creamy skin. So there was the matter of suddenly wanting to touch it, wondering how soft she would be.

  Thinking about this in church, while a friend was getting married. Inappropriate.

  This was a problem as far as Damon was concerned. He did not usually get distracted. Not when he was so close. After repeatedly telling him she wasn’t interested, of dating other people and blatantly letting him know about it, out of nowhere Geraldine called him up and said, Are you going to Anton and Julie’s wedding? Are you staying over at the resort? Maybe I should stay with you and we drive back to Manila together.

  What else was he supposed to think?

  Only she ignored him throughout the ceremony, and when he sought her out before finding his seat under the tent at the seaside reception dinner, she avoided him pointedly. It wasn’t his imagination; she had looked him right in the face, smiled, and then pushed past him to start talking to another friend.

  He had an idea the kind of game Geraldine was playing. She was a “project” of his, ongoing and unconsummated for two years now, but that didn’t mean he didn’t allow himself other distractions. When the game was on, he was usually on.

  Regardless, the beautiful bridesmaid was beside him now, and a lock of her hair had strayed from her ponytail and crept inside the neckline of her dress. It was begging to be put back in place. Was he up to the job? Maybe with his fingertip, so he could have more control over it, and the “accidental” brush against her chest would be a lighter touch. Or a knuckle. Crude, but if he did it right, more casual.

  “When did you first meet her?” Andrea said. The way she shifted her shoulder knocked the lock of hair back into place, and he lost his chance.

  “Two years ago, when I first started hanging out with Anton.”

  “Let me guess,” said Andrea, turning toward Table 10. “Love at first sight?”

  Hardly. “I was instantly attracted to her, yes, but that’s not love.”

  “I meant I want to bone her at first sight then, of course.”

  “No chance to bone,” Damon admitted, and feeling fine with it. “But yes, I thought about it. There were several times that I thought she wanted it too, but maybe I’m misreading her.”

  “What signals did you get?”

  He shrugged. “Once in a while, we’d be alone together, and she’d actually become suggestive. No, more than that. She’d be different, more touchy. Sexual even.”

  “But not when you’re with other people?”

  He hadn’t thought of it that way, and a quick flashback of every single interaction confirmed it. “So what’s that about, she’s ashamed of me?”

  Andrea stretched her left arm, the one further from him, ever so slightly, in sync with how he leaned toward her. “Not enough facts. What do you do again? Finance, like Anton?”

  “Investment portfolio management,” Damon said, proudly. “And I’m good at it.”

  “Criminal records?”

  He shook his head.

  “Or not dumb enough to get caught,” she said, teeth revealed by her big grin. “Any shameful habits? Hobbies?”

  “Donuts.”

  Her smile became less of a mask on her face, and he congratulated himself on that answer.

  “Surely there’s something else,” she added.

  “Well yes, if you don’t like guns.”

  “Excuse me?”

  “I like guns.”

  He saw her perk up, and again shift closer. “You shoot?”

  “Competitively.”

  “Are you any good?”

  “The best in certain categories.”

  “Well.” She raised her arms in surrender. “That’s enough for me. And you smell good. Some girls are just not into that, I guess.”

  “Are you?”

  “What?”

  “Into that.”

  He didn’t have to do this, he knew. He didn’t have to flirt with the bride’s sister when someone else obviously had plans for him, if he played his cards right.

  But flirting was just talking, and he was surprisingly relieved to be able to talk to someone about this. What else was he going to do during dinner?

  “Don’t change the subject,” Andrea retorted, not taking the bait. “Tell me about your Geraldine. What’s the deal with her?”

  ***

  Throughout dinner, she learned that Geraldine was likely being smart, or just playing hard to get. Damon was what Andrea would call a serial pursuer, and he went “serial” on the same type of girl: elegant, pristine, mysterious…

  “Ice Princess,” she said, heels tapping the sand as they stood and waited for the buffet line to move.

  He had long since stopped checking if anyone from G’s table was around them, or listening. “You could say that.”

  “I am saying it. But it’s typical.”

  “Typical.” He seemed not to like the word, or how it had been used on him.

  “She’s a mannequin that’s come to life. It’s a fantasy. There was a movie about it. I guess what surprises me is that you’ve always gone for that type. Don’t guys feel that they have to level up to that?”

  “I never felt that.”

  Well, of course not. “Well you’re in good company anyway, because I’ve been the girl that guys practice with, before they land their Ice Princess.”

  She was joking. But maybe it was a little bitter on delivery, so she coughed and tried to fix it. “Are you friends with Anton?”

  Damon gently nudged her shoulder; she didn’t realize that a gap had appeared in the line. Andrea skipped ahead, and tried not to let the skin contact affect her.

  “Anton doesn’t have that many friends at work. But we’re okay,” he said.

  “That’s weird. Because he’s got friends everywhere.”

  “You know his reputation before, right?”

  He dated a lot, to put it mildly. His own best friend called him a “manslut,” but lovingly. “Before my sister? Yeah.”

  “Some people aren’t comfortable with it. So he doesn’t have that many work friends.”

  “Just you then,” she said.

  “Kind of.”

  Being friendly with Anton was how Damon met Geraldine, apparently. Not that it was helping him get anywhere with her.

  “And you,” he said, touching her shoulder again to move her forward, “you hate all of this why?”

  She pouted. “I resent it right now, that’s all. Not Julie and Anton, no, I love them—I just… I got burned. Someone...He got married recently. I've been in a funk since I found out about his engagement.”

  “He is an idiot.”

  “Thank you, but I’m sure he looked really happy on his day like everyone else.”

  “So what’s wrong with you?” Damon teased.

  “Me?” That started out as a fake gasp, but wait, she felt a tinge of something there. Actual defensiveness. “I seem to be all right with everyone, until I do something fun, and then guys are like I don’t want to clip your wings.”

  “What kind of fun things do you do?”<
br />
  She sang videoke at the top of her lungs. Jumped from beach cliffs. Rode horses beyond the trail. “I like trying new things all the time, that’s all.”

  “Hmm,” Damon said. “I happen to think wings are beautiful.”

  Maybe she was being set up to fail.

  That statement would have infuriated her sister, who would of course argue sensibly that the most expensive and elaborate day of Julie’s life did not involve messing in any way with Andrea’s. Really, Andrea. How self-centered.

  But come on. The two of them at the same table? Sure, he technically was the only person from Anton’s office and didn’t fit into the tables with Anton’s friends. And she asked on purpose to be seated as far away from the stage…

  Requiring guests to wear evening formal…

  Serving champagne while they lined up for the buffet…

  And then, at the buffet: grilled oysters.

  “How about me?” Damon said. “What’s wrong with me?”

  Not that he believed that for a second. It was a challenge, a game, and they were both half a champagne glass into this.

  “You probably haven’t proven to her that you actually like her, and not the mold she’s made out of,” she said. “But I don’t know you that well, so take that with a grain of salt.”

  “That’s fair though,” he said, doing the polite thing and serving her an oyster. And another. And another.

  “Maybe she’s just psycho.”

  He laughed. “Anything is possible.”

  “That’s enough,” she said, referring to the oysters. “I don’t want to—”

  “Don’t want to what?”

  “I don’t know. Lose my inhibitions.”

  He smiled and dropped three more onto her plate.

  ***

  Oh, dear Geraldine. After an hour or so of talking about her, Andrea almost, kind of wished she were her. Even though by the second time she and Damon lined up for more food, he had stopped obsessively looking in the direction of G’s table. Also, their conversation had gotten a bit more personal. Andrea hoped that her dad’s two elderly aunts, their table’s only other occupants, didn’t hear a thing.