Chapter Text
Sherwin found himself scrolling through social media more often. For someone who had bravely insisted that social media wasn’t really his thing, he was awfully present. To tell the absolute truth, he enjoyed it now. He enjoyed interacting with the Baby Winners and those who would edit him looking like a tomato – one of the finest moments in his political career, one could even say. He enjoyed seeing the creativity of the community that rallied around in support of Risa, and him, and the work they do in the Senate.
It is one of those nights when the Macallan sits untouched by the bedside table like an afterthought. Win was a man of routine, most of his nights would look like this.
He had opened Facebook because the committee hearing had finally adjourned after almost ten hours, and somewhere between education reports, unread emails, and messages from his chief of staff, the algorithm decided it knew him better than he knew himself.
WON’T LAST A DAY WITHOUT YOU.
The notes of the song starts before his attention was lent elsewhere. The video starts with a picture of a young Risa, and an equally young him. Those years felt distant, but compilations like this lend the privilege of going through memories that are fond and kept tucked inside an area of his heart that he dares not open often. The video progresses and he sees with so much certainty and clarity the years that had stretched between them – ten years together, that’s a lifetime.
He should have scrolled – the five minutes that he spent watching could’ve been spent elsewhere. A Senate President’s time is valuable. Instead, he watched. Lips curling slightly into a fond smile.
The editor had done their homework. Not the obvious clips. Not the ones where reporters shoved microphones between them or where cameras caught them arriving at the same event. They focused on the small ones:
Time where they would hang around the plenary hall with just the two of them.
The both of them sitting together in a hearing that they preside moving in complete synchronicity.
Pictures of when they visited POGO sites.
And his favorite, a clip of them in 2017 where Risa hit his arm with a folder. No one knows the story behind it, they could only speculate, but it was during a time where she had challenged a veteran Senator in a debate and he said: “Nakakatakot ka siguro maging asawa, no?” She laughed, her eyes crinkling and that melodic laughter carried through the wind and straight to his stomach – sending butterflies furious. He laughed because she laughed.
The comments were amusing.
PERFECT TANDEM!
NAKAKAKILIG! BAGAY SILA!
SINGLE NAMAN SILA PAREHO DI BA? SILA NALANG?
Sherwin smiled. If only it were that simple. His thumb taps the screen twice, and a like appears.
He types out a comment, more heartfelt than intended: By far, ito na ang pinaka magandang video na ginawa ninyo. Thank you for the effort.
Sherwin smiles to himself, private and endearing… if it wasn’t so devastating. He takes the glass from his bedside table, and takes a sip of the dark whiskey gently swirling inside it. The bitterness sits in his mouth, and it is something that he is quite used to,but his mind drifts to memories deeper than the whiskey. There had been a time – before the edits, before WinRi, before people stitched meaning into ordinary moments. His mind drifts back to when those moments belonged only to them.
"Looks like we're trapped," Risa had sighed. They only finished a working session that stretched past working hours – they were both neophyte senators with much to prove, and burning eagerness for service going past work hours had become a norm for the both of them. One truth that they refuse to even acknowledge is simple: these long working hours allow both of them to enjoy each other’s company without outrightly craving it, much less ask for it.
It had rained so hard that the Senate basement flooded. Their drivers texted simultaneously that traffic had completely stopped.
So they waited outside the hallway where the windows overlooked Manila disappearing beneath gray sheets of rain.
"Ang bango," Risa says almost as a whisper, mostly to herself.
Sherwin looked away from the city.
"...Ha?"
"The rain." She smiled, still looking at the raindrops chasing each other though the glass pane. "Ang bango kapag unang buhos." Risa had a way of making things sound poetic. The way that she talked of service in the same breath as love, the way that she described pain as a reminder of hope, the way she talked to people as if every word they say is important.
He never answered because he wasn't looking at the rain anymore. He was looking at her, and she noticed – of course she did, Sherwin Gatchalian’s gaze held an intensity of a man so focused on details, but she would not dare look back. At least, here, looking at Manila painted in gray she wouldn’t have to know what that gaze held.
The committee meeting had gone particularly badly. A secretary had raised his voice, and someone had questioned Risa's competence simply because she was the only woman asking uncomfortable questions. Based on what he heard, he had the audacity of calling her “darling” and knowing Risa, that battle was already decided for the moment the crude secretary thought it was something he can get away with.
Afterward, she walked into his office – well, stomped was a more correct term. She didn't knock. Two years and the staff know by now that in Senator Win Gatchalian’s office, schedules and meetings are postponed and rearranged based on Senator Hontiveros’ pleasure.
Risa didn't speak – that look of annoyance still present on her face, eyebrows creased and jaw clenched. Sherwin had a pen on his hand, annotating the new bill in preparation for the period of amendments. Risa simply reached for the mug on his desk as if it was a habit she had formed.
"Uy." He reacts, eyes not yet parting from the paper.
"My tea." She replies simply and takes a seat on his couch.
"You have your own, gentle lady from Panay.” He looks at her now with that easy smile that won elections, pen down, and full attention on her.
"I like yours." She drank anyway – her gaze was fixed on him as she lifted the mug to her lips. He let her, still smiling while shaking his head.
“May pinaiyak ka nanamang Usec, no?” A smirk makes itself apparent in her features. She makes a feeble attempt to hide it behind the rim of the mug. Risa shrugs – feeling all too satisfied with herself.
“Di natin sure, but what I’m sure of is your tea is better than what I have in the office.”
“Naku, Hontiveros. Ipapabawas ko na to sa budget mo next year.”
Risa raises her eyebrows, bottom lip jutting outwards to a small pout. “Really? Gagawin mo sakin yun?” She pauses and waits for an answer. Gatchalian, a man who was been in politics for decades finds himself without an answer.
“Di ba, di mo kaya?” Triumphantly, Risa crosses her legs, and leans further into the couch, a warm mug of tea between her palms.
Sherwin only sighs, a smile still present in his lips as he shakes his head and goes back to the bill he is reviewing. He sighs not because he is annoyed that he is losing this tea battle, but out of fondness, and out of the fact that no one will ever know that he is not a big tea drinker, but he keeps stock of this particular kind only for her.
Moments pass and he looks up to check on her. Risa looks towards his windows watching the life outside pass by, nothing but comfortable silence wrapped the room. Sherwin, again, smiles to himself because despite the chaos and the battles she is set to fight in these very halls of the Senate. She has found solace in this little corner of his office.
Students of all ages visited the Senate from time to time. This building, after all, is more than a cluster of offices and public servants drinking more coffee than what is medically allowed, this is the People’s place– and hence, they are more than welcome. A class of Grade 5 students held a field trip, and unfortunately, hearings did not stop to indulge those who just wanted to chat with the kids. That did not stop Senators Hontiveros and Gatchalian though. They walked side by side in a pace that they both discovered. Risa stopped first, when a young girl approached her and just literally looked up at her.
“Hello, mahal,” Risa crouched down to the girl’s level; she reached out to fix the hair that had gone astray with a smile that showed nothing but kindness. “Thank you for visiting us.” The girl smiled– all gummy and excited and unprohibited. Slowly, she reaches to hug the female Senator and says just enough for a few to hear. “Can I be like you when I grow up?”
Risa’s smile can only grow bigger when she embraces the girl back. “Mahal, you can be whatever you like. We will make sure of that.”
Sherwin feels a lump at his throat, his polo wasn’t tight so it shouldn’t be an issue. Yet, in these moments where he sees someone who has grown to be quite important to him, he feels the weight of words unsaid and visions of a future he has not yet allowed himself to indulge in. As if that wasn’t enough, one of the boys folded a paper airplane and threw it into Risa's way. She picked it up and saw a child’s handwriting inside – a big thank you written in red crayon. Risa folded it carefully and slipped it into the pocket of her blazer.
One of the kids poked Sherwin’s leg once, then twice, and asked an alarmingly simple question: “Bakit mo siya tinitingnan? Crush mo yan?” Sherwin couldn’t help but laugh. He placed his index finger to his lips and made a shushing sound as he bribed the kid with the candy that was in his coat.
Back then they never called it anything other than friendship, a good working chemistry only because that felt comfortable. It was not courtship, and most certainly, they did not call it love.
It was just—coffee. It was only long drives after committee meetings that did not go the way that they wanted. It was texting until one in the morning about legislation before somehow ending up discussing books. Then it was sharing umbrellas, saving each other seats, backing each other up in hearings, Sherwin knowing her exact coffee order, and Risa keeping an extra blue ballpen in her purse just in case he needed it for annotations.
For years, they did not notice how comfortable they grew with one another, but people noticed. Of course they did.
Senator Sonny Angara had once grinned at him during recess. Approaching him in the Senate lounge as she watched Risa chat with Frank Drilon and Grace Poe.
"Pare,” he started with a tone that meant nothing but mischief.
"Hm?"
"Kay Sen. Risa ka na umuuwi no?" Sherwin laughed too quickly and took a sip of his water as calmly as he could. "Gago."
Sonny only smiled. "You didn't answer." Sherwin rolled his eyes and moved someplace else because how would he explain that in his closet, there’s a violet blazer too small for a man’s built, and in his bathroom, there was a travel sized facial wash from a brand that she can talk hours about.
Nothing dramatic ended it. There was no confession, hence no rejection. No betrayal. Life simply became… louder. They were in between family obligations, business, different initiatives that demanded their whole attention. There was endless committee work and calendars that filled itself before either of them realized they had stopped making time for each other.
Sherwin kept thinking to himself that after hearings, after her engagements in the province, after budget season, finally when things slow down …they never did.
He dated someone eventually.
She was nice. What they had was comfortable. He thought that dating someone who did not fully understand what it meant to be a sitting senator could be helpful.
It was comfortable until it wasn’t. Sherwin knew she deserved someone whose heart arrived completely, and he tried. God knew he tried even to the point that he was willing to close his eyes, take a deep breath, and just forgive. But, deep inside him, he knew that relationship quietly failed the same way. Not because he compared, that would’ve been unfair. There was guilt in his acceptance, because somewhere deep inside… he was still waiting for a conversation that never came.
By the time he reached home that evening, he was completely spent, exhaustion seeped in his bones. He reached for the chilled bottle of Macallan and dropped two ice cubes in the glass. He loosened his tie, and opened up his iPad for some minutes of mindless scrolling until her face came into view. An online interview dated just this morning. He pressed play if only to hear her voice, and reminisce how her laughter filled this silent space. She went through the interview and the questions with an eloquence he had always admired. However, her voice still sounded tired. Sherwin noted that in his mind: drop by Healthy Options to grab a box of the throat coat she liked.
The questions were standard – clarifications about the hearing, what is to be expected from it … until it wasn’t. They started talking about WinRi and the videos and the partnership; her partnership … with him.
"Pasensya ka na sa tanong na ito because the public may not know…"
Sherwin straightens up, and reaches for his glass which is held tighter than intended. He continued listening. He brought up the glass to his lips and there it was – her answer.
The whiskey never reached his lips.
She said partner. Not boyfriend. Not someone she was seeing. Partner.
The word sounded more certain for Sherwin’s liking.
Then—she smiled, with her hand flat to her chest. God. That smile. Sherwin knew every smile Risa Hontiveros possessed; the smile she gave reporters, the smile she wore during campaigns, the exhausted smile after fourteen-hour hearings, the smile when committee staff surprised her with cake, the sleepy smile he would find her wearing while buckled up in his passenger seat.
This one… he had never seen before. It was impossibly soft. Almost shy. The smile of someone thinking about the person waiting for her.
Sherwin closed his iPad.
Some hours later, his phone vibrated.
A notification from Instagram.
risahontiveros started following you.
"...Ngayon lang?" He laughed not knowing if he should be amused or offended because they shared ten years. Ten long years. Ten years of memories full of her. Thousands of committee hours. Hundreds of shared meals. Apparently she never followed him online. How perfectly ridiculous, and yet, he felt the pang of hurt that settled within his chest. Is he jealous? Yes, maybe, but what was his right to be?
He opened her profile. Advocacy. Her kids. The work she has done and continues to do, then one photograph of rain streaking across a window. He stared longer than he should have. Without meaning to, another memory surfaced.
"I think..." Risa had said once, watching rain drip down the Senate windows, "...if I ever retire, gusto ko nalang tumira somewhere quiet."
"Province?" She nodded. "With lots of trees and the sea just nearby. Sana meron ding local theatre groups.” He smiled. "And? Ano pang nasa wishlist ni madam?”
"A library."
"Maliit lang?" Sherwin asks, lists of contractors and architects already flashing in his mind.
"Hindi." She grinned. "Yung OA."
"And, ano pa?"
She laughed.
"And someone patient enough to listen to me talk about books."
Sherwin had wanted to say—I already do.
Instead—he says: "Madaldal ka nga. Ipag-pray mo yan."
She hit his arm.
His phone buzzed again.
Messages.
Her name: Ris.
He opened the thread almost instantly, almost as if it was a reflex.
Years compressed into blue and gray bubbles.
His thumb hovered above the keyboard.
Ris.
Delete.
I watched your interview.
Delete.
He started again.
Do you ever think about 2017?
Delete.
Again.
There was a time I thought...
Delete.
Again.
His breathing slowed.
His fingers finally wrote the only sentence he'd never allowed himself to finish.
I shouldn’t have allowed you to wait.
He stared at it.
His chest tightened.
He continued typing.
I should have been more courageous. As courageous as you are. I regret not being the one who stood firmly by your side. I thought we had time.
He imagined pressing send, then he imagined her reading it. He imagined the guilt that she will carry all because his heart and mind finally agreed now is the time to pour out years of longing and missing her. Risa would apologize – he knows she would because despite the image that she carried, Risa’s heart is defined by the gentleness of her love. She would somehow think she'd hurt him, but she hadn't. Not really, and that was the hardest thing to come to terms with – it wasn’t them who hurt each other; it was timing. It was fear. Sherwin selected the message and deleted it until only an empty text field stared back.
Some minutes passed, the ice in his whiskey has completely melted. It was past 1am when his phone vibrated
Ris:
- Win
- See you tomorrow at the hearing!
- Pahinga ka ha? Your staff said andami mong ginawa today.
Salamat today.
He smiled despite the weight that threatened to crack his chest. She still noticed everything. He set the phone face down and walked toward the balcony of his penthouse. Sherwin closed his eyes and let the numbing cold wind of midnight hit his skin. The strangest part was...he wasn't jealous of the man. Only of the life he gets to live by her side.
Paper airplanes. Rain against old Senate windows. Her favorite tea in his mug. All those tiny ordinary Tuesdays that might have become decades.
If only …
He smiled sadly. Life wasn't built from if onlys.
His phone lit up once more.
Ris: Oh, and I have pasalubong from Bicol!
Sherwin looked at the message for a long time. Then he reopened Facebook. The WinRi edit was still there. He watched it from the beginning this time. He watched two people who had once occupied the strange, unnamed space between friendship and love.
The comments called it chemistry. Soulmates. Fate.
They were wrong.
And yet—perhaps they weren't entirely wrong either.
Maybe somewhere, in a quieter world untouched by election cycles, committee reports, breaking news, and all the impossible timing that came with serving a nation, there really had been a small house lined with books. Maybe the rain still smelled the same there. Maybe paper airplanes still littered the floor after children visited. Maybe he still kept the tea cabinet full. Maybe she still hummed while making his coffee.Maybe they grew old arguing about books instead of bills.
Maybe they had found the courage to stop waiting.
Sherwin smiled. A quiet thing. The kind that comes only after accepting a grief no one else knows exists.
Then he finally replied.
Win: Good night, Ris. See you tomorrow.
Nothing more. Nothing less.
There are lives you get to live. There are lives you spend imagining.
Somewhere, perhaps, there existed a version of the world where he had spoken sooner, where committee meetings ended earlier, where courage arrived before timing slipped away. Somewhere there might have been weekends in bookstores, shared umbrellas, Paris, Sunday mornings, and children with her laugh.
But not here.
Here, she had found someone who was brave enough to arrive when she needed him.
Sherwin would spend the rest of his life grateful that she had found happiness, even if he had once dreamed of being the one to give it.
He picked up his glass of Macallan, looked out over the Manila skyline, and quietly wished that in another lifetime… they had simply met at the right time.