Beach

It started with a threat over a false rumor. It ended with her husband on his knees in the sand, begging me to fulfill the desire he never dared confess.

I opened the door expecting the smell of damp and abandonment. The house smelled of freshly brewed coffee and of a man. And there he was, pouring himself a cup as if he owned the place.

I’d spent years giving massages to strangers, but none had ever made me tremble like that on the table, waiting for him to beg first.

I opened the box in front of him because inside was the perfect excuse. What I didn’t expect was for the neighbor to dare that much — or for me to let him.

When he stayed to practice a few poses, I could feel him looking at me. I hadn’t had a partner in months, and my body had decided for me long before my head did.

I put on the shortest skirt I had, and when that college guy rested his hand on my thigh, I knew the trip was going to be a lot longer than the ticket said.

She ran her marriage, but that morning on the sand I found out how much she loved a stranger telling her who was in charge, with her husband watching.

“Only the first three levels,” I promised him on the plane. Neither of us imagined where that challenge notebook would take us before we got home.

She had a girlfriend and I was dragging along a relationship that was fading fast. We went to the coast as friends. What happened in that room with two beds was not in my plans.

For eons I knew only the silence of the void. Until I hooked a signal in a blue world and, without asking permission, slipped into the body of a woman on fire.

I only wanted to watch the sun go down and photograph the sea. Then I heard another bicycle approaching through the sand, and I knew that afternoon wouldn’t end like the others.

Iván was still asleep in my arms when a noise in the hallway pulled me out of bed. I had no idea the last day would be the hottest of all.

The first time I saw him without a shirt on the beach, I lost my breath. He was my mother’s man, but I could no longer look at him like a son looks at a father.

I offered the bus window seat to the old lady and she didn’t even look at me. I had no idea the real journey would begin in the hotel dining room, across from two strangers.

I pretended to be asleep so I could watch him. What I saw in the other bed that night completely changed the course of that trip.

I bet him that if I beat him on the field that afternoon, I’d collect my prize with him. He laughed. He had no idea I’d been waiting for that moment for years.

I couldn’t stop looking at Bruno’s body under the water, and when he turned around with his eyes closed I knew that afternoon we were going to cross a line we’d avoided for years.

We counted to three and took off our swimsuits in front of everyone. What I didn’t know was that she’d kept a key on her necklace for the rest of the day.

No one would imagine those giant, ridiculous sneakers were keeping my secrets. That night on the road, with everyone asleep, I finally dared to do what I’d been fantasizing about.

I chose the spot closest to the water, dropped my bikini, and before lying down, searched for the one who hadn’t been able to take his eyes off me.