Chapter Thirty-Eight
Jenna
I don't freeze because I'm surprised by what he says. I feel it too, emanating from his skin and mixing with the post-orgasmic oxytocin rush that washes over me as my insides stay moulded to him.
I freeze because I am instantaneously both proud that he was brave enough to say it first, and ashamed because I wasn’t.
I am the one who has studied love. I am the one who has written about it extensively. I am the one who champions love for all. I am love's greatest advocate and yet, I've been fighting it, ignoring it, holding it back in myself.
And so I stop fighting it.
My ears pull back as I smile wide. My eyes rest on his and I push up and touch my nose to his before lying back down on the pillow.
“I love you too, Marty,” I say softly.
When he dives his face down into my shoulder and starts covering my neck and collarbone with kisses, I know that he didn't expect that.
He was prepared for a rebuttal, for me to rebuke and challenge him.
He was prepared for me to dispute and dismiss his love, and him having that expectation is almost as heart-shattering as if I had actually done that.
“I love you so much, Jenna,” he says into my hair. “I can't believe this happened. I can't believe you happened.”
“I love you, Marty,” I say again. I slide my hand up his strong back and feel disproportionate disappointment when he slides out of me.
He pulls back and tells me he's going to deal with the condom, insisting I stay where I am, and I don't have the energy to argue even if I wanted to.
I don't know if it's the incredibly intense sex we just had, the declarations of love, or just the last four days catching up with me, but I am abruptly weighed down with exhaustion.
That’s why I’m in the same position as a naked Marty walks back to me. I start to smile but that quickly evolves into giggles when Marty picks up his pace and jumps over me, landing sideways next to my body with a loud “Bam!”
“What was that?” I chuckle.
“That is how I feel right now,” he says, and he pulls me closer to him. I reach for the duvet and that gets tangled up with us too. “I feel like I could jump as high as the moon! Like I want to shout out from the rooftops how fucking happy I am right now!”
“Oh, Marty,” I say before I erupt into laughter because he starts tickling me. This continues until I am trying to hit him through the duvet that wraps around me. “Stop!”
And he does stop the tickling, letting me roll onto my side away from the duvet.
His body lines up next to mine and before I know what’s happening his lips come down on mine, kissing me so hard I feel like he already wants to go another round.
When I feel his dick hardening against my thigh, I know I have to pull away.
“Okay, okay, enough! I need to pee and wash before that happens again,” I pant out, pushing his body away from mine but still keeping my hands on him. I always want my hands on him. “Do you still want to spend the day together?”
“Try and fucking stop me.” He starts to rut against me. “I'm not going anywhere.”
“Jesus, you're like a puppy that is yet to have the snip,” I say but I hold his face in my hands so he can see all the affection I have for this fact.
“That feels like a compliment,” he says, and thrusts harder.
“Stop, Marty! I also need coffee, and food, and I want to ask you something. Something important,” I say, and I do. I nearly asked earlier, but I was scared. Scared to break the perfect dream-like state I was in as we made love without words.
His movements halt and he looks across at me. “What is it?”
“After Ibiza,” I say slowly. “Did you get tested?”
“Like STIs?” he asks after a beat.
“Yes,” I say.
“Yeah, like twice. I went once by myself. Then my mum dragged me there herself because she didn't trust the results I showed her.”
“I'm sorry she did that,” I say.
“I'm sorry I gave her reason not to trust me.” He sighs. “You probably don't believe me, but I was actually quite careful in Ibiza. I did a lot of stupid things during that time, but messing with other people's health, and my own, wasn't one of them. At least not in that way.”
“I believe you.” I place a hand on his chest, playing with the sparse hair that's there, feeling the solidity of his muscles under smooth warm skin. “And no problems?”
“None, I've been celibate since then,” he says.
“I’m also in the clear, and until you, celibate since my divorce.”
“You got tested?”
“After my divorce, yes, I was quite keen to move on. Have sex with others, and so it seemed like the right thing to do, as well as continuing to take my pill. Honestly, I also considered it research. The whole process has changed quite a lot since my own youth. It's easier now.”
“Oh, yeah, it's quite a laugh really. The nurses love me,” he says.
“I bet they do.” I smile and shake my head.
“Why did you want to ask me about that, Jenna?” he asks, but his tone tells me he already knows why.
I pull in a breath. “Because, I want to feel you. All of you.”
His eyelids pull down, almost closed. “Fuck, yes,” he whispers, and he presses against me again, not thrusting this time. He bends to give me a kiss, which I take but don't deepen.
“Just not now,” I say against his lips.
“What?” He pulls back.
“I need coffee and breakfast, and to pee, and to shower and brush my teeth. I'm not sure what order I need those things to happen in, but I know I need them all.”
He bends down to flick his tongue over my nipple. “Really? That's what you need?”
I moan with pleasure but still move away.
“Do you trust me, Marty?” I say as I stand up and look down at him over my shoulder.
“I'm questioning it right now, but yes,” he says, stroking his cock now and that nearly undoes all the resolve I have. I'm going to make him do that for me at least once today, fist himself until he comes, preferably all over my breasts or my tongue.
I close my eyes, shutting off the temptation at the source.
“Then, let’s wait. You'll be amazed how good a little anticipation will feel.” I walk to the bathroom.
Minutes later, I find Marty in the kitchen, making us both coffees.
He’s wearing the other hotel robe and my smile is impossible to hide.
When he goes to sit outside at the table next to the pool, exactly where I was going to suggest we have breakfast, I feel giddy with the synchronicity even though it's not an impossible coincidence he would want to sit there too when the sun is still low in the hazy blue-pink sky and the air still has that clear, calm smell.
As I pick up the phone to order us breakfast, I glance at the clock and call my brother to request a favour, which he doesn't even hesitate to agree too.
“You don't even sound tired,” I say to him the breakfast order is also placed. “But you must be. Yesterday was a long day.”
“This job is just a series of long days. I am high on adrenaline and success right now,” he says with a yawn. “Can you thank Marty again for me? He really did save me.”
“I will. Do you need me to send him somewhere for lunch today? I think he’d love it.”
Jake yawns then, but there's a bounce in his voice. “No, thank you. I have stand-in staff coming today. Besides, aren't you spending the rest of the day shagging each other's brains out?”
“Something like that.” I sigh.
“I could always try and extend your stay,” he says with a leading tone. “I'd have to downgrade your accommodation now we're going to be booked up but I'm sure I can find something.”
“Yes, about that. Are the Bouras’ pleased with the new bookings?”
“Delighted! They even mentioned my favourite B-word?”
“Boner?” I guess.
“Okay, second favourite B-word. Bonus! I may actually get a bonus this season!” Jake’s delight makes me smile.
“You absolutely deserve it,” I say.
“And you deserve Marty. So why not bunk up with me in my off-site shack for a few more nights?”
“No,” I reply. I need to affirm out loud what I've been telling myself. “I think it's right I go. No matter when we say goodbye it's going to hurt.”
“But you will see each other again, won't you, Jen? That Irish rogue is infatuated with you, and I don't think I'm far off the mark when I say you feel the same.”
I look at Marty leaning back in a chair, gazing lazily at the horizon and hugging his coffee mug. “I feel the same. And he knows it.”
“Just promise me when you get married you come back and do it here? Hopefully, I'll still be the manager and it will be a successful business again and I can source the most epic marquee to blow Hospital Tent Gate completely out-”
“Jake. Nobody is getting married. Certainly not me. Now can I ask a very depressing question? Can you check my car is booked for tomorrow?”
“Already did. It will be here at 9:30. You need an alarm call?”
“No, thank you. I will have another reason to wake up early,” I say, my eyes still on Marty.
Jake groans. “You're testing my ability to stay at a healthy thirty per cent jealous of you both.”
“And you're wasting too much of your precious energy on this phone call. Thank you for breakfast plus extras. I'll message you later.”
“It's a pleasure. It should be with you in about thirty minutes,” Jake replies. “And Jenna, enjoy today. I am so happy you found him or rather, that my arse found him for you.”
“Me too, Jake.” I smile as I replace the phone's handset.
“Breakfast is on its way,” I say as I rejoin Marty, placing a kiss on his head, before moving to sit on the other side of the table.
“Grand,” Marty says. “So, what are you doing in July or August?”
I don't say anything, but he doesn’t seem to notice as he keeps talking.
“I should have enough money then for flights to London. I figure I can get the cheapest ones possible, hand-luggage only, and just take a backpack because it's not like I’ll need many clothes,” he says with a wink.
I hope I swallow my wince before I speak. “Marty, we don't have to talk about this now.”
“I want to talk about this now. I want to know when we'll be together again.”
Despite our declarations of love earlier, and what I felt in that moment - what I still so fervently feel - I keep freezing every time the concept of us 'together' after this holiday is presented to me or arises independently in my own mind.
I am doing my best to be curious about why I feel strangely ill at ease about making plans.
It's not because I don't want to see him again - having a date in the diary for when we could hold each other close again is possibly the one thing that would take the edge off the dread at saying goodbye tomorrow - but more because when I told him I loved him, I accepted that came with a certain set of responsibilities.
Because I love him, I want to do the right thing by Marty.
“What does it look like to you? Us being together?” I ask.
“It looks like us single-handedly propping up the London-Dublin airline routes. It looks like us having romantic weekends spending far too much money on fancy dinners in London, and cosy pub lunches in Dublin. It looks like us spending weekends in other places too.”
“Don't you work weekends?” I ask, the thought popping into my mind.
“Sometimes, but the restaurant can survive without me now and then,” he says with another Marty-wink.
I nod. I know I'm causing more problems than I'm solving by resisting him right now, but the truth is I can't dive into these waters with him, not yet. And I need to figure out why.
“Marty, I love you,” I say.
His fist pumps out above his head. “God, I will never get bored of hearing that.”
“Well, I do love you, so please don't forget that. But because I love you, I want to be honest with you.”
His smile drops. “Jenna, please don’t say what I think you're going to say.”
“What do you think I'm going to say?”
“That you don't want us to see each other again. That we'll just stay the most epic of holiday romances, so epic they will have memes, and GIFs, and a Wikipedia page about us. Don’t you dare say that that’s all this is.
No way. I want to drag this into the real world, Jenna.
I want us to try and make it work. So don't tell me I can't,” he says, and then he pauses, eyebrows heavy and pulled together, pleading. “Please.”
It's not just his words that puncture me. It's the way his hands grip the cup of coffee, paling his knuckles, and it's the way he stares at me like I hold his whole future in my hands, a burden I would be honoured to have but am also uneasy about being given.
“Marty, I will never tell you that you can't do anything.
You're one of the few people I've met in my life that I believe can do anything they want. But I am feeling very overwhelmed right now. Not in a bad way, but in a way where I worry these kinds of conversations will eat into the beauty of today.”
“You're scared?”
“Fuck, yes, I'm scared. But that only proves my love.
Love is scary. So I want to ask you to help me with this.
Give me today. We have almost exactly twenty-four hours until I leave.
That's more than enough time to figure out what happens next, but I don't want to spend the whole time doing that. I want today to be today. I want it to be ours. Not tomorrow's or the future’s.” I force my expression to become more jovial.
“I mean, don't we owe that to the Wikipedia page?”
He gives me a quick, gentle laugh but then his expression falls serious. “Just promise me this doesn't end when you leave tomorrow. I don't want that goodbye to be goodbye forever.”
“Marty...” I begin.
“Just promise me this doesn't end tomorrow,” he says again, eyes dark and fixed.
I nod as I consider my reply.
“I think I can promise you that,” I say, and I reach my hand over the table and sigh with something like relief when his fingers touch mine.