Page 78 of All About You


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With each classic song that comes up our voices rise higher and higher, and soon my throat is feeling parched. It’s when we finish a round of Total Eclipse of the Heart at a red light that Marlon bursts into laughter.

“The dude from the car next to us was looking at us the whole time,” Marlon says in between chuckles.

My face, already hot from working my lungs overtime, doesn’t have the capacity to blush from embarrassment.

Instead, I shrug, and when Take On Me comes on, I sing the opening line from my chest, even rolling down the window to make a point. Marlon decides to one-up me, rolling down his own window and raising the pitch, his voice so loud that pedestrians from the footpath glance over at us, their faces contorted in concern. We both guffaw, and I tell Marlon to keep his eyes on the road.

“God, you’re a weirdo,” Marlon comments as we pull into the parking lot.

“Is that in a good way?” I ask, my tone challenging but playful.

“I mean, you’ve always been a weirdo since we were kids, but you were always an uptightmeanweirdo around me, so this is definitely in a good way.”

I roll my eyes.

“Um, I was mean and uptight around you because you were the annoying one, breaking all my things…”

“Sorry, who’s the one who stole my figurines and got me in trouble everytime?”

“As I wassaying, Mr-tore-my-sandcastle down, you were so set on being this annoying pain in my ass back then.”

“Were? Is that past tense I detect Garcia? Does this mean you don’t find me annoying anymore?”

I definitely walked into that one.

“I can easily relapse into thinking you’re the devil.”

Marlon laughs, “Maybe I’m still the devil, but you’re finally liking it.”

I can’t find it in me to disagree.

The Filipino cafe - Lolos and Titas - has a bit of a line, likely due to it still being new, but Marlon and I are at the front in no time. The exterior exerts a quaint, rustic cottage feel, with panels surrounding the window.

As we step through the cafe, I’m greeted with the scent of various freshly baked sweets, accompanied by an old-fashioned, cosy aesthetic, with beams stretching up to the ceiling, and biblical passages taped against faded beige wallpaper.

Through the display glass shelf, my eyes take in the array of Filipino delights - pandesal, ensaymada, buko pie, puto….

I shiver as a piece of fabric presses against the corner of my lip. I lurch back from Marlon fingers, and the tissue he was holding against my mouth.

“Um?”

“You were drooling, Garcia,” he chuckles.

He reaches forward again, brushing it gently over the same spot, and I resist the urge to shiver. Then, as if nothing had happened, he scrunches the tissue, and trains his eyes on the display menu.

“What do you feel like having? I didn’t realise it wouldn’t have any savoury, sorry,” he says, and I blink out of the trance, focusing instead on the baked delights before me.

“I’ll - um - I’ll probably get an ube and red velvet pandesal,” I say.

“Hmm,” Marlon hums, thoughtfully, “I’ll probably get a slice of that buko pie. Maybe a slice of the yema cake too. Ugh, why do they all look so good?”

It’s true - there were too many things to eat before us, and so little space in our stomachs. I step forward toward the counter.

“If you’re still deciding, I’ll get mine now so I don’t leak from my lips again.”

That’s when his fingers close around my arm. Marlon gently tugs me back, shaking his head.

“Let me cover this for today. Repayment for coming to my basketball game last week and all.”