Kilohertz & Calamansi

Gael had their hand inside my skirt, two fingers moving against my clit, when the fundraiser automation died for the third time.

The production booth went dark except for the recorder’s red eye and the emergency strip’s blue blink. Rain struck the Quezon City windows in hard sheets. Beyond our door, a speaker coughed out half a donation appeal, then quit.

“You still green?” Gael said.

I had pulled their hand there myself. “Green. Don’t stop.”

“Tell me what you want.”

“Your mouth. Then I want you inside me.”

Their grin flashed. “Usable take.”

“Don’t be smug.”

“One good take. One reckless choice.”

They slid between my knees. I planted a heel on the vinyl couch while Gael kissed my thigh, then put their mouth on me. Their tongue moved slow at first, then firmer, finding the place that made my hips lift. I clutched the couch’s cracked edge and made no effort to stay quiet.

“More,” I said.

Gael gave me more. One hand steadied my hip while their mouth brought me right to the edge, held me there, then sent me over. I came with their name in my mouth, rain clapping at the glass like an audience that had paid nothing and demanded everything.

“Still green?”

“Greener.”

Gael reached for the harness beside the console. I caught their wrist.

“Condom.”

“Already planned.”

They rolled a fresh condom over the silicone cock, then held it at my entrance.

“Tell me when.”

“Now.”

They entered me with one careful push. I took a moment, shifting until the angle worked. Gael waited.

“Harder?” they said.

“Yes. Please.”

They moved with a rhythm like they were building a track from my body: slow beat, doubled beat, a pause for my answer, then more. I wrapped a hand around the back of their neck and pulled them down for a kiss.

“Good?” they said against my mouth.

“Very.”

“Specificity is useful.”

“Keep doing exactly that.”

They laughed, then did. I came again, clenching around the silicone while their hand worked between my legs. Gael stayed close until my calves stopped shaking.

“Score it,” they said.

“One reckless choice. Two good takes.”

“Only two?”

“You’re a musician. Count in bars.”

At eight, before the weather ate our schedule, Gael Mercado had arrived with a kulintang controller, a battered synth case, and an opinion about every song on my fundraiser playlist.

“No one donates after a six-minute synth intro,” I’d said.

“It’s forty seconds.”

“It feels six minutes long.”

“You programmed three ballads in a row.”

“They build trust.”

“They sedate people.”

Gael had taken a marker from my desk and written on an index card.

USABLE TAKES: 4 ARGUMENTS: 1 RECKLESS CHOICES: 0

“What earns one?” I’d asked.

“Kissing a producer who treats airtime like holy water.”

“I don’t treat anything that seriously.”

“You color-code wire labels.”

“And you keep time with a drum machine.”

“I keep time by watching your face whenever you object.”

The next clean takes had come fast. So had the kiss. When the rain knocked out automation, we locked ourselves in Booth B and let the scorecard follow us.

Afterward, Gael went down the hall for water. I sat up, found my phone under a stack of station IDs, and opened Voice Memos.

“Memo One,” I said. “Eleven forty-seven p.m. Production notes. Rain compromised automation. Gael Mercado’s fundraiser bed is usable. My judgment may not be.”

I stopped the recording, then started again.

“Correction. I did not make a mistake. I made a choice.”

At thirty-three, I had dated men. I had dated women. I had wanted people without sorting them into a story that made sense to anybody else. Every time, I called it a phase, a detour, a special case.

“I did not say the word I keep avoiding,” I said. “But wanting Gael doesn’t make me confused. It feels whole. That scares me more than the storm.”

I saved the memo before I could edit it into something tidier.

Gael came back with two cold bottles of calamansi soda.

“You record it?” they said.

“Yes.”

“Honest answer. One point.”

“That isn’t a category.”

“It is now.”

I took the marker and wrote HONEST ANSWERS: 1 beneath the others.

The next afternoon, I played Memo One five times before lunch and told myself I was checking levels.

By the fifth pass, I knew every rain strike behind my voice. I knew the click before I said choice. I knew the pause before whole. I closed the file when Gael came into Control A carrying a paper bag darkened by the weather.

“Grilled corn,” they said. “For the producer who skipped breakfast.”

“I had coffee.”

“Coffee is a threat, not a meal.”

They set the bag beside my console. Butter and calamansi cut through the hot-dust smell of old equipment. I kept both hands on the faders.

Gael looked at the index card taped beneath the monitor.

USABLE TAKES: 4 ARGUMENTS: 1 RECKLESS CHOICES: 1 HONEST ANSWERS: 1

“You replayed it,” they said.

“Twice.”

“My trackpad history says five.”

I looked at the screen. “Fine. Five.”

Gael picked up my marker and added a line.

HONEST ANSWERS: 2

“That is invasive.”

“That is arithmetic.”

“I was checking the edit.”

“You were checking whether you meant it.”

The corn had chili salt on it. I bit into the end because chewing gave me something to do besides answer them.

“It was a one-time mistake,” I said.

Gael rested their hip against the desk. “Was it one time?”

“Don’t make it grammar.”

“Was it a mistake?”

Rain tapped at the windows, gentler today. The station’s afternoon host laughed in the studio down the hall, bright and practiced.

“No,” I said.

Gael wrote again.

HONEST ANSWERS: 3

“Then don’t give it a name that punishes you.”

I hated how quickly my face warmed. “You make that sound simple.”

“It can be simple without being easy.”

“I have dated men. I have dated women. I have dated people who made every category feel useless.” I picked at a corn kernel with my thumbnail. “Every time anyone wanted an explanation, I made one up that sounded temporary.”

Gael waited. They were good at that. Not staring. Not filling the room with rescue lines.

“I don’t know what I’m supposed to call myself,” I said.

“You don’t owe me a word.”

“That sounds generous.”

“It’s basic respect.”

“But you have one.”

“Pansexual. Nonbinary.” They tapped the marker against their palm. “Those words helped me find people who understood parts of my life. They didn’t close any doors.”

“I worry they would.”

“Then we can leave the doors alone today.”

I looked at them. Their damp hair curled at the nape of their neck. Yesterday, I had known exactly what I wanted from them. Today, one harmless question made my stomach turn over.

“Do you want to see me again?” they said.

“Yes.”

HONEST ANSWERS: 4

“Properly,” Gael said. “Not because weather breaks the automation and we make reckless choices in Booth B.”

“That was a very good reckless choice.”

“It was.”

I reached across the console and touched their wrist. “Friday?”

“I rehearse until eight.”

“I finish the donor package at nine.”

“The food market behind Cubao closes to shoppers at ten. The corn guy stays later for crews.”

“A date at a closed market.”

“A proper date,” they said. “Food, conversation, no broken equipment.”

“And questions?”

“Many questions.”

“One point for every honest answer,” I said.

Gael’s grin came quick. “Your rule?”

“My rule.”

They added a fresh category under the others.

DATE QUESTIONS: 0

“Friday,” they said.

“Friday.”

After they left for rehearsal, I opened Voice Memos again.

“Memo Two,” I said. “Production note. I agreed to a date with Gael Mercado. This was not a mistake. I am still nervous about the words that might explain why.”

Friday, the rain had settled into a fine gray drizzle by the time I reached the food market behind Cubao. Most stalls had their shutters down. The last grill still worked beneath a patched awning, corn husks piled beside the coals like little green boats.

Gael stood there in a black rain jacket, counting coins into the vendor’s palm.

“You’re late,” they said.

“I am four minutes late.”

“Four minutes is enough time to burn corn.”

The vendor handed us two ears slick with butter, calamansi, and chili salt. Gael passed mine over with a paper napkin folded around the stick.

“You remembered the chili.”

“You put it on everything.”

“Not coffee.”

“Coward.”

We ate standing beneath the awning, rain ticking against the metal roof. Butter ran over my thumb. Gael caught the scorecard from their jacket pocket and flattened it against a crate.

USABLE TAKES: 4 ARGUMENTS: 1 RECKLESS CHOICES: 1 HONEST ANSWERS: 4 DATE QUESTIONS: 0

“You brought it on a date,” I said.

“You brought your work phone.”

“My work phone has boundaries.”

“Does it?”

I took the marker from them. “Date Question One. Why did you ask me out?”