It wasn't the alarm that woke me up, nor the bright summer sun touching my window, but Steph stirring by my side. Like my body still needed to make up for the long separation, that was enough of a trigger and I found myself squinting in the light that flooded our bedroom, my hand cupping that gorgeous buttocks of hers. It took me about two seconds to roll over and stick to her back. A muffled sigh escaped her lips against the pillow when my morning wood brushed her panties. Why did she have to sleep with her clothes on?

I bit her shoulder softly, my fingers pulling her panties down and out of the way. One of my legs covered hers, bringing my cock to brush her inner thighs. A delicious jerk made it wag, eager to dive into the warm gap that lay just inches away. I didn't need my hand to guide it. The first trace of moisture seemed to pull from my hips, that launched my cock to brush her groin and find its way in on its own.

Her flesh welcomed me and my breath grew heavier, pushing all the way in. She let out another muffled sigh as my hand sneaked under her sleeping top. I didn't care about style. I rocked my hips against her butt, lost to the awesome sensation of waking up like that, and moved my hand up under the tight cotton fabric of her top.

Steph arched slightly, making me moan. She'd just cleared my way to reach deeper in, and at the same time brought her breast to fill the palm of my hand. I grabbed it, my fingers pinching and teasing her hardening nipple. Gosh, it felt great. She felt great. I rocked and pushed, thrusting faster, until my whole crotch was on fire.

I humped harder, squeezing her breast in my hand and her buttocks against my hips. I felt her wriggle underneath me. I knew what that meant: she'd found the right way to rub her clit against the mattress and the bed sheets, matching my rocking. Oh, man, she was out of this world. I went for the last stretch, her muffled moaning like music to my ears, thrusting into her until my guts were twisting and my nuts ached and my hips couldn't push any further. We came together a moment later and I crumbled down on top of her back, sweaty and panting, my throbbing cock buried deep inside of her and refusing to retreat.

"I love you," I mumbled in her ear, not even knowing if she was listening and not caring either. I could never grow tired of this, of waking up to her, to her body.

Her awful alarm startled us, as she tried to extract her face from the pillow to murmur, "Me too." Because she did. She loved me. But the alarm had just left us out of time. She patted my leg and lifted her head an inch.

"C'mon," she managed to say, as agitated as I was.

I pulled out of her reluctantly and flopped myself flat on the mattress, my chest pumping for air. She turned her head to meet my eyes and smile. I would've kissed her, but she wouldn't let me until both of us had brushed our teeth. She was okay with my morning quickies, but overnight bad taste was a no-no with her.

"First for the shower," I muttered.

"First shower makes breakfast," she replied with a wink.

Her hand landed on my chest and slid down my sweaty skin. I would've jumped her bones again right then and there, but I was not a teen anymore. About to turn twenty-five, I needed some fifteen minutes to jump-start my junk. She knew, of course. That was why she teased me like that.

I bent an arm behind my head to watch her get up. She crossed the room in no hurry, taking her panties and her sleeping top off on the way to the bathroom and dropping them on the carpet, like a diva of old dropping a glove for some handsome gent to pick up. Well, maybe I could get a second round for breakfast, if I didn't take long in the shower.

However, it didn't matter that I showered in record time, because I found her already dressed and on the phone, moving all over the kitchen to make breakfast while she cleared her boss' early questions. We pretty much had breakfast with him, as they went over all the possible issues that could come up during the virtual hearing he was joining in an hour.

Before I could even touch her leg, it was ten to eight and my phone buzzed. My ride was two streets away. Steph asked her boss for a minute and walked me to the door like she did every morning. She kissed me goodbye, helped me wear my mask and sent me on my way, whishing me a good day.

If only I knew that would be our last ordinary morning.

The van was pulling over by the curb when I walked out of the building. It was an eighteen-seat shuttle, but social-distancing rules dictated it could only carry ten passengers. Good thing I lived far enough from work to be among the firsts to get on it, so I could always pick my seat.

I nodded hi at the others and sat on the third row by the window, as usual. The swab waited for me in a sealed bag on the empty seat by mine. I pulled my mask down to rub the inside of my mouth with it and dropped it back into the bag, right when the man in charge of the rapid tests came to pick it up. His portable device would have the results before we got to the campus, in order to be granted access to it.

My job as junior IT offered me the option of working from home, but I'd declined it. Steph worked from home ever since one of the senior attorneys of the firm had tested positive, and she was like a frigging twister, making calls while she cleaned the apartment and changing places every five minutes to type her countless documents. Too much of a distraction to have around. Not to mention that after the last three years, I took every chance I had to be out and about. I'd already had enough of being locked up.

All of us on the van had our vaccine up to date, like those in our family bubble, and followed safety rules strictly. So the results of our tests came all negative as usual. The van drove past the tall gates of the fence, that slid open to let us into the campus.

The old lumberyard had been turned into a piece of landscaping art, with the neat grass patches, fruit trees and flowerbeds, where the solar panels were just another part of the decoration. Pretty lanes wound about, connecting the Square with the smaller buildings of the campus, like the cafeteria, the doctor's office, the security den, the hardware storage. The cars of the graveyard shift workers were still in the parking lot, that our ride crossed to leave us right at the Square main gates, behind one of the vans waiting to take the night shift home.

It was another world in there, where the pandemic had no room and everybody followed the safety rules more out of excess of caution than real necessity. Which explained why there were so little positives among the company's staff. My group spread out at the lobby, each heading to their posts. All of us kept our masks on in the hallways and stairs, but we were free to get rid of them the moment we got to our stations, three feet apart from each other and enclosed by acrylic sheets.

I glided down the hall to the east side, where the IT department was. The other three sides of the ground floor were the main department of the company: Operations.

It'd been such a lucky strike, finding that job six months earlier, just arrived in the city. Steph had gotten there a few weeks before me, in time to find us a place to live and a job for herself.

She'd insisted I didn't need to work, because she would make enough money for both of us, but I'd refused to become a secluded househusband. I'd always been kind of a computer geek, and I'd did my best to keep up over my years away. So I had the skills to apply for the job, not to mention I really needed to do it. Maybe to prove myself I was back, and the last awful years were definitely behind.

So I'd submitted my CV to this logistics company, which had only a few years in the market but kept growing like a parasite spider plant. It'd already achieved the unicorn status, and rumor had it that Big Ellie, the founder and CEO, was raking Benjamins by the zillions ever since he'd started the company all alone, with his computer from his living room, connecting so many small transportation companies the pandemic had shut down with so many home businesses in need of cheap shipping for their goods.

And there I was, about to start another day of easy tasks. Regular and senior IT techs were regarded as first responders in the company, because any system glitch that could affect the smooth rolling of Operations needed to be fixed right away. While us, junior techs, spent our days doing vital stuff like replacing missing email passwords.

On the way to get a coffee while my systems loaded, I waved hi at Tom, my supervisor, in his fishbowl in the middle of the open office. He'd been at the helm since six am and he still looked like just out of bed. Back to my desk with a steamy mug, I took off my mask and logged in at nine sharp.