Pantera_71

I spent half an hour preparing provocations for a room full of women. What I hadn't prepared for was what they would do to me when I lost control.

Years ago, I wrote ten commandments to keep from hurting anyone. First: never intervene. Second: remain hidden. This is one of the nights I’ll never confess.

A gust of wind tore the towel away on the last step. She didn’t cover herself. She only looked at me, as if she’d been waiting weeks for me to come down at that hour.

She wore absolutely nothing beneath her long coat, and as soon as the doors closed, I sent the elevator to the top floor to have her all to myself.

It began in front of a webcam, in the dark and safe. But that afternoon, at the reservoir beach, there was no screen—only my body, the sun, and men who couldn’t look away.

The moment I caught his eyes across the glass, I knew I’d turn that afternoon into something neither of us would forget.

I arrived at her place an hour before dinner and found her naked in front of the mirror, torn between two dresses and about to change everything.

I went up to that flat for a haircut. She opened the door with the promise that she’d stay in a thong in front of a complete stranger.

She told her grandfather she was leaving, but she never even exited the building: Sonia was waiting at the end of the hall with five unwashed old men and a promise that made her tremble.

I’d never paid for anything like that before. We met on a Tuesday morning, she handed me the bag in a hurry, and I couldn’t stop thinking about what was waiting for me at home.

She ordered me to take off my clothes and let her hands tighten every wire against my skin. When I started getting wet, I knew there was no turning back.

Lying on the edge of the bed, black stockings climbing my legs, I warned him I wouldn’t use my hands that night: I’d undo him with my feet alone.

I had her against the wall when her phone rang. I ordered her to answer on video call: her friend was going to see just how far her obedience went.

She got out of the car with her jacket half open, and I knew that night I wouldn’t hold back. She’d said we shouldn’t; I’d already decided otherwise.

“If you stay, you stop being the perfect student,” he said without touching me yet. I looked at the locked door. My legs did not move.

She accepted the roof, the food, and the freedom to go out with whomever she pleased. What she didn’t read properly was the nine o’clock clause, when she stopped being free.

When she lowered her eyes to those white, sweaty sneakers, she knew she would obey anything that girl asked of her. And that was only the beginning.

I opened the curtain just enough to confirm my suspicion: he was outside, with his hand inside his pants, waiting to see something he shouldn’t have seen.

—Marina, you won’t believe this: I went in to clean the room and there was a couple in the bed. And I just stood there watching from the doorway, unable to move.