Roberto Was Waiting Downstairs While Diego Worked

This happened three years ago, when Diego and I were a more or less happy couple who had moved to the other side of the continent looking for something better. My name is Paola; I was twenty-eight at the time and worked as a self-employed seamstress. Diego found a job at a logistics company. His uncle Roberto was the one who took us in.

Roberto had the downstairs apartment in a two-story house. He was a truck mechanic, had his own shop ten minutes away, and came home every afternoon carrying that mixture of oil and soap that never quite goes away, no matter how many times you wash your hands. He was about fifty-two, though his body didn't give it away: tall, dark-complexioned, with graying hair and a full beard. He wasn't the kind of man who filled silence with jokes or made conversation out of obligation. When he spoke, it was because he had something to say.

The first few months were peaceful. Diego left early, and I stayed home with my sewing machine and the week's orders. Roberto came upstairs now and then, brought me coffee, asked about Diego. Ten minutes and done. Nothing out of the ordinary.

But there was something in his pauses. Something in the way he listened to me without interrupting, as if he didn't want to miss a thing. And in the way he looked at me when he thought I wasn't noticing.

One Sunday afternoon I noticed it more clearly. I was on the terrace with the machine, getting ahead on my orders. I'd brought out the little table, with fabric everywhere, and I was wearing what I always wore when I was alone at home: long leggings and an old T-shirt. Roberto appeared from downstairs with two cups of coffee.

—I brought you one, if you want it —he said from the doorway.

—Sure, thanks —I answered without getting up.

He sat down across from me. We talked about the economy, how difficult everything was, my family, the shop. Sunday conversation. Normal. Until he asked how long Diego and I had been together.

—Three years —I told him.

—I thought it was less. —He took a sip and looked at me over the rim of the cup.— Is he working today?

—Double shift.

—Are you alone?

—As you can see —I said.

He smiled faintly. Then he asked whether I knew anything about computers. He needed to upload some documents for a bank loan and didn't really understand the form. I told him I'd help him as soon as I finished the hem. He nodded and left.

I stayed there for a moment before getting up. My leggings were pretty tight, and I wondered whether I should change. I decided not to: he was my boyfriend's uncle, not a stranger, and I wasn't going to make a spectacle of running upstairs to put on different clothes because of a bank form.

I went downstairs. I knocked on his door. I went in.

The room was untidy in the particular way of a man who lived alone: tools on the table, a jacket hanging from the chair, magazines piled up without any order. It smelled like the shop. Roberto was sitting in front of the computer and pointed to the chair beside him.

I sat down. I crossed my legs. I looked at the screen.

It was a bank form, nothing complicated. I explained the fields to him, asked him for the information, and filled everything out. At some point he told me his age: fifty-two.

—You don't look it —I said without thinking too much.

—I'm old, Paola.

—That's not what I said.

He looked at me. Only for a second, but I felt it at the nape of my neck.

I finished helping him and stood up. When I left the room, I was certain he followed me with his eyes all the way to the stairs. I didn't turn around to confirm it.

***

Something shifted that week, though I wouldn't have been able to explain exactly what. When Diego was there, Roberto's greetings were still the same as always. But when Diego wasn't there, the greeting was different. Slower. A kiss on the cheek that lasted a second too long, his beard brushing against my face.

One Friday at noon, he kissed me on the mouth.

It was quick, almost accidental: he was leaving, I was standing in the doorway, and when we crossed paths his lips brushed mine instead of my cheek. He left before I could react. I stood there with my hand braced against the doorframe.

It must have been accidental.

I told myself that several times that day. And every time I thought it, it sounded less convincing.

***

The following Saturday Diego got home early, and we suggested going out to eat somewhere nearby. When we went downstairs, Roberto was at the door of his apartment with a woman. Dark-haired, well dressed, laughing together. We exchanged greetings in passing and kept going.

—Looks like Uncle's got company —Diego said, somewhat humorously.

—Yeah —I said, and didn't add anything else.

That night I slept badly. I woke up after two in the morning to a noise downstairs, voices muffled by the ceiling. I went to the kitchen for water and, with the light off, heard from the floor below the unmistakable sounds of a woman being fucked hard: broken moans, the rhythmic thudding of the bed against the wall, and, in the background, Roberto's deep voice saying things I couldn't make out but that kept drawing one muffled cry after another from her. I stood in the darkness of the kitchen with the glass of water in my hand, listening to him dismantle her downstairs, and felt a heat between my legs that I didn't know what to do with. I went back upstairs to bed and tried not to keep thinking about it. I didn't entirely succeed. Diego was sleeping with his back to me, breathing evenly, and I lay there staring at the ceiling with my hand slipped beneath the sheet, squeezing my thighs together, imagining what Roberto must look like on top of that woman, how he would look at her, how he would hold her.

***

On Tuesday Diego left early. I stayed behind cleaning the apartment: broom, mop, the whole usual routine. I was wearing what I always wore to clean, which wasn't what I would put on if I knew someone was going to show up: short leggings, a T-shirt tied at the waist, sandals.

At eleven, I got a message from Roberto.

“Sorry to bother you. Could you come down for a moment? Something was left incomplete on the bank form.”

I replied that I was coming down now and looked at myself in the bathroom mirror for a second. I should change. But I didn't want to keep him waiting over a clothing issue. It was only a matter of checking a form.

I went downstairs like that.

Roberto opened the door and looked me up and down, quickly, before stepping aside to let me in. I caught his eyes pausing for a moment on my tits beneath the knotted T-shirt, braless, then traveling down the short leggings to my legs.

—You were cleaning —he said.

—I was going to finish anyway —I replied.

There was coffee already made. He poured me a cup without asking whether I wanted one. We sat in front of the computer, like the first time. The form did in fact have one field left blank, the shop's registration number. We filled it in within ten minutes.

I was about to get up when he spoke.

—I wanted to tell you something about the other day.

—The other day? —I asked, though I knew perfectly well what he meant.

—The kiss. —He paused.— It wasn't accidental.

I looked at him. He held my gaze without blinking.

—Roberto... —I began.

—I know I shouldn't be telling you this. —His voice dropped.— But you've been in this house for months, and there's something about you I can't stop noticing. This doesn't usually happen to me. I'm not the kind of man who does this sort of thing.

—You're Diego's uncle.

—I know that perfectly well. And even so, I've been spending weeks thinking about fucking you.

The air caught in my throat. No one had ever spoken to me like that, so directly, so plainly. And the worst part was that the word in his mouth didn't sound vulgar but inevitable, as if he were saying something we'd both known for some time and he had simply decided to name it.

There was a silence that lasted too long. I stared at the screen without seeing anything. I felt him beside me, the heat radiating from him, that smell of soap with something oily in it that had already become so familiar to me and shouldn't have been familiar to me in that way.

When he moved closer, he did it slowly. His lips brushed my neck, just below my ear, and I closed my eyes without meaning to.

—Stop —I said. And I didn't move.

—Tell me again and I'll stop —he murmured against my skin.

I didn't say it.

His mouth continued over my neck, slowly, without rushing. His beard barely scraped me, and that made everything more concrete, more real. He spoke to me in a low voice: that he hadn't been able to stop thinking about me since the first day, that he jerked off thinking about my ass every time he saw me climbing the stairs in front of him, that he knew it was a mistake, that if I wanted him to stop, I only had to say so once.

I felt his large, rough hand on my knee.

—Roberto... —I said his name again, but this time it came out differently. Softer. Without the intention of being a warning.

—Yes —he answered, as if whatever I said were a confirmation.

His hand moved slowly up my thigh. I didn't stop him. I tilted my head back slightly, and he took advantage of it to reach with his mouth that exact place where my neck joined my shoulder, where I was most vulnerable, and he found it as if he had known it before. With his other hand he untied the knot in my shirt, lifted it, and pulled it over my head in one movement. He stared at my tits for one long second without touching them, only looking, and that anticipation made my skin prickle more than any caress.

—Fuck, Paola —he said softly, almost to himself.

He took one breast in his whole hand, the rough palm from the shop covering it, his thumb searching for my nipple, already hard. He pinched it lightly, and I let out a moan I couldn't contain. He lowered his mouth and sucked it slowly, circling it with his tongue, tugging with his lips, while his other hand continued moving up beneath my leggings.

When his fingers reached the waistband of the leggings, I tensed. He didn't speed up. He kept the same patient rhythm, as if he had all the time in the world. He found the edge of the fabric and slid his fingers underneath. I felt them brush me and let out my breath sharply.

—If you want me to stop —he repeated.

But I didn't answer anymore.

His fingers slipped inside my panties and touched my pussy directly. He stopped for a second, barely brushing me, then gave a short, deep laugh.

—You're soaking wet —he said against my ear—. You're all wet for me. How long have you been like this?

I didn't answer him. I couldn't. He started touching me with a calmness that was almost maddening. No haste, none of the anxious urgency of other men. He knew where to go and went straight there, with his fingertips, finding my clitoris on the first try and working it in slow, steady circles. I bit my lip and looked at the ceiling. Then he lowered his fingers and slid them inside me, first one, then two, all the way in, very slowly, and curled them upward while his thumb continued on my clitoris.

—You're okay —he said. It wasn't a question.

—Too okay —I answered quietly, and he gave a short laugh.

His fingers went in and out at an even rhythm, and I began moving against his hand without being able to help it, seeking him, squeezing his fingers inside me. The wet sound was embarrassing and he heard it, and let me know he heard it, moving his fingers a little faster every time I moaned louder.

He pushed my chair back a little to turn me toward him. He kissed me on the mouth, finally for real, without the urgency of Friday's stolen kiss. It was long, measured. His beard against my face. His tongue entered my mouth in the same rhythm his fingers entered me below, and that synchronization made my whole body tremble. His hand never stopped moving while he kissed me.

When his lips moved down my neck and continued lower, I understood where he was going. He knelt in front of me on the tiled floor, grabbed me by the hips, and dragged me to the edge of the chair in a single pull. He pulled off my leggings and panties together, dragged them down my legs, and tossed them aside. He spread my thighs with both hands, without tenderness, and stayed there looking at me for a second, his mouth inches away, breathing over me.

—Look at you —he said—. Wide open for me.

And then his mouth was there, on that exact spot, with the same precision and calm with which he did everything else. His tongue flat and long, moving up from below to my clitoris, again and again, until I began moving my hips against his face without being able to control myself.

I closed my eyes and clutched the edge of the chair.

He sucked my clitoris between his lips and held it there, playing with the tip of his tongue, while two fingers went inside me again. His beard scraped the inner sides of my thighs, and that combination—the soft tongue, the rough beard, the firm fingers—was too much. I don't know how long he stayed like that. I know that at some point I began moving my hips without realizing it. That one of my hands ended up in his hair, pushing his head against me without shame. That I could no longer control the sounds I was making. That I begged him, “Like that, like that, don't stop,” in a voice that wasn't my own.

When he felt me nearing the edge, he noticed and eased his rhythm, taking me even more slowly, stretching out my orgasm before giving it to me, until my whole body contracted all at once and I came into his mouth, trembling in the chair, squeezing my thighs against his ears, having to bite my fist to keep from screaming and letting the neighbors hear.

He kept licking me with his tongue flat and soft until the contractions subsided, drawing out every last pulse. When he lifted his face, it was shining all the way up into his beard.

He stood up. He looked at me silently for a moment, wiping the back of his hand across his mouth.

—Come —he said, holding out his hand.

I followed him to the bed, naked from the waist down, my legs still trembling.

I sat on the edge. He took off his shirt. I saw him like that for the first time: broad torso, dark-complexioned, with gray hair on his chest, hands marked by years of manual labor, and that serenity in his movements that made everything heavier, more definitive. He unbuckled his belt without hurry, pulled down his pants and boxers in one motion.

When I saw him completely naked, I was speechless. Not because I hadn't seen men before, but because of the combination of everything: the size of his cock, thick and dark, already rock-hard and pointing upward, the contrast with his brown skin, the calm way he looked at me as he finished removing what little clothing I had left. Diego was average. Roberto was something else.

—Come here —he said, taking his cock in one hand.

I knelt on the bed, took it in my hand too, felt it hot and heavy. I brought it to my face and ran my tongue along its entire length, from his balls to the tip, and he let out a low growl. I put as much of it in my mouth as I could, barely half, and he grabbed my hair with one hand and set the pace, not brutally but firmly, all the way down each time, until my eyes filled with tears and I had to breathe through my nose.

—That's it, baby —he said, looking down at me—. Suck me like that.

Then he pulled it from my mouth, laid me on my back in the bed, and spread my legs with his knees.

—Slowly —I asked him.

—Always —he said.

He kept his promise. He placed the tip at my entrance, still soaked with saliva and the previous orgasm, and began pushing it in very slowly. Even so, I had to hold on to his shoulders when we started, digging my nails into him. I felt every inch enter, opening me, and it wasn't pain, but it was a pressure I'd never felt before, a fullness that forced me to arrange my whole body around it.

He spoke into my ear as he did it: telling me to breathe, to relax, that he knew how. And he was right. After the first few minutes, when everything was about adjusting, when I had to convince myself to loosen my muscles and stop fighting something inevitable, something changed. My body found the rhythm on its own. When I felt him enter all the way, until he struck something inside me, I let out a long, guttural moan I didn't recognize.

—All of me —he murmured against my ear—. You have all of me inside you now.

He began to move. Long withdrawals until the tip, slow entries all the way to the bottom, giving me time to feel every pass. I shifted position, raising my knees, and he felt it instantly and changed the angle slightly, and I let out a sound I didn't recognize as my own.

—That's it —he said softly—. Right there, huh?

—There, there, Roberto, don't stop.

—I won't stop.

He braced himself on his forearms and lowered his face to my neck, fucking me with a slow, deep rhythm, a long rocking motion that made me feel him from tip to base every time. I wrapped my legs around his waist, crossing my ankles, and pushed my hips up to meet him, seeking him deeper, entirely without shame now. The bed creaked beneath us in a slow, steady rhythm, the same rhythm I'd heard on Saturday night, and the thought—that now I was the one downstairs—made me squeeze him hard inside.

—Oh, like that —he panted—. Squeeze me like that.

At some point he straightened up, sat back on his heels, held me by the hips, and lifted my ass off the mattress. That angle was something else. He started going faster, with short, deep thrusts, bone knocking against bone, drawing sounds from me with every stroke. He looked into my eyes while he fucked me, and I couldn't hold his gaze; my eyes kept rolling back.

—Look at me —he said—. Look at me while I put all of it inside you.

I looked at him. And that word, spoken like that, in that low, firm voice, while I felt myself split in half, triggered my second orgasm without warning. My whole body contracted around his cock, squeezing him, milking him inside me, and he felt it and growled and kept fucking me harder through the spasms, stretching them out until I couldn't take any more and begged him to stop for a second so I could breathe.

He didn't stop. He turned me face down, raised my hips, and thrust back into me from behind in one motion. I buried my face in the pillow so I wouldn't scream. He grabbed my hair with one hand, not hard, just gathering the lock so he could pull it back and make me arch my back, while his other hand held my hip and he drove into me all the way, again and again.

—Hold on a little longer —he said, his voice already broken—. A little longer, Paola.

And I wasn't thinking about anything anymore: not Diego, not what I was doing, not the consequences that would come afterward. Only the weight of him on top of me, his beard against my shoulder when he lay over my back for the final stretch, the firm pressure of his hands, the cock entering and leaving me faster and faster, more and more desperately.

—Not inside —I managed to say.

—No —he panted—. Don't worry.

He pulled out just in time, climbed onto my ass, and came across my back with a long, hoarse growl, warm and thick, running over me from my shoulders to the small of my waist, while he held himself in his hand and milked out the last spurts there on top of me.

When he finished, he lay down beside me. The room fell silent, except for our labored breathing and the semen cooling on my back.

—Paola —he began.

—No. —I got up before he could continue.— Don't say anything now.

I looked for my clothes. I grabbed a towel from the back of the chair and cleaned my back as best I could. I dressed without looking at him, still feeling my sex pulsing, feeling what was left of him and me running down the inside of my thigh. I opened the door and hurried barefoot up the stairs without turning around.

I locked myself in the bathroom and turned on the shower, making the water as hot as possible. I stood beneath the stream for a long time, watching the steam fill the room, taking stock of what I had just done.

I did it.

With Diego's uncle.

In his bed, twenty meters from where we slept together.

The water took away the smell. That smell of the shop and soap and something else that had no exact name. But it didn't take away the sensation—the feeling of still being open inside, of feeling him throbbing where he had been—or the way he had said my name when we got up from the chair. That took much longer to fade.

If it ever went away completely.