What I Saw in My Father-in-Law’s Shower Is Keeping Me Awake

My name is Mariana and I’m the mother of a four-year-old boy. I work all day, pick him up from nursery, share an apartment with my mom, and, in theory, my life doesn’t have a single free gap. But there’s something that got into my head a couple of weeks ago and lives there rent-free. Something I shouldn’t be thinking about. Something that has to do with Mr. Aguirre, my boyfriend’s father.

It started one afternoon by pure accident. The bathroom door was ajar and I was walking by absentmindedly, phone in hand, not imagining he was inside. Steam was billowing out through the crack. And there he was, under the shower, with water running over his shoulders and chest.

I froze in place. It wasn’t a one-second glance, like I’d like to be able to say. It was longer. Long enough for the whole image to brand itself into me: his big body, his broad hands, and between his legs a heavy hanging weight, even there, at rest. I closed the door slowly and went out to the patio with my heart racing, praying he hadn’t heard me.

Since that afternoon, I can’t get him out of my head.

***

Today at the office was torture. I had a stack of forms to finish before noon and I couldn’t make sense of a single line. My head was somewhere else. I kept imagining Mr. Aguirre coming up behind me in the kitchen of his house, lifting my skirt without saying a word, one of those huge hands gripping my hip to keep me still.

This is wrong. This is very wrong.

And still I couldn’t stop. I kept thinking about his low voice whispering in my ear not to make a sound, that his son was in the living room, that I had to hold still. By lunchtime my underwear was ruined and my legs were clamped tightly together under the desk, as if that could hide what was happening inside me. Every time a coworker came over to ask me something, I smiled and nodded without hearing a word.

I could have texted my boyfriend. He has a nice body, he knows what I like, usually he’s enough and more than enough. But not today. Today even he wasn’t doing it for me. What had gotten into my head was something else, something heavier, rougher, something the size of what I saw that afternoon through the steam.

On the way home, driving, I fantasized about pulling over on some side street and finishing what I’d started right there, my forehead pressed to the steering wheel. I didn’t do it. But I did stop at the market.

***

I bought a cucumber. A big one, I chose it on purpose: long, firm, thick at the base, with that rough green skin. While the cashier weighed it, a flush rose to my face I couldn’t explain. As if she knew. As if everyone could read my intention on my face.

I know it’s ridiculous. Nobody knew anything. But doing something forbidden fills me with a guilt that, on top of that, turns me on even more. I paid quickly, tucked the bag in the bottom of my purse and drove the last few blocks with my pulse pounding in my wrists.

I got home, said hello to my mom, cuddled my son. The usual routine: dinner, conversation, my boy telling me every detail of his day at nursery with that seriousness that melts me. I nodded and stroked his hair, but inside I was somewhere else, counting the minutes until both of them fell asleep.

When the house finally went quiet, I locked myself in my room.

***

I stripped off my clothes in a hurry, leaving everything scattered on the floor. The blouse, the pants, the bra. The cool air in the room raised goosebumps on my skin and my nipples hardened almost instantly. I lay back, spread my legs and grabbed the cucumber. I looked at it for a while, turning it over in my hand, imagining it was him. That it was the weight I had seen that afternoon under the water.

Mr. Aguirre, why did you leave me like this?

I ran my tongue over the tip, slowly, while I went back to the shower scene the way I go back every night. Him from behind, water sliding down his spine. That image alone had kept me alive these last two weeks, every time I was alone and slipped my hand between my legs. I took it into my mouth a little more, wetting it with my own saliva, never taking my eyes off the ceiling as if I could see him standing beside the bed.

I lowered my other hand. I was already wet, much more than I expected. I touched myself first on top, in slow circles, feeling how every stroke tore a sigh from me that I had to swallow so I wouldn’t make a sound. Then I slid two fingers inside, slowly, opening myself, preparing myself. I brought them to my mouth to taste myself and, at the same time, imagine I was swallowing something else.

—Stay still —I told myself, pretending it was his rough voice ordering me—. Don’t move.

I shivered. The heat climbed from my belly to my chest.

***

I set the tip of the cucumber at my entrance and pushed just a little. So thick it was hard, pressing against me, forcing me to breathe deeply to loosen up. I pushed slowly, feeling myself being opened centimeter by centimeter, the cold of the vegetable clashing with how hot I was inside.

—Oh, slowly… —I murmured into the pillow, biting my lip so I wouldn’t raise my voice.

It hurt and I liked it at the same time, that strange mix I wouldn’t know how to explain to anyone. I closed my eyes and imagined it was him pushing, all his weight on top of me, those big hands holding my thighs open so I couldn’t get away.

Take it. Take it all. I’m not letting you go until you ask me crying.

I pushed it deeper, slowly, patiently, letting my body get used to every millimeter. By halfway in I could already feel the burn, that sting at the entrance, but deeper down everything was throbbing for more. I started moving it, pulling it almost all the way out and driving it back in, finding a slow rhythm that made my back arch against the mattress.

I imagined the whole scene. Him standing there, looking down at me from above, a barely visible smile while he watched me do it. The guilt of fantasizing about him, the father of the man I sleep with, turned me on like nothing else. That was the worst and best part of it all: how forbidden it was.

—You’re terrible —I told myself in his invented voice—. Look at you, getting like this over your father-in-law.

***

I didn’t stop. I sped up, thrusting all the way in, feeling every ridge of the cucumber’s skin brushing against me inside, touching a spot that made me clench my teeth so I wouldn’t cry out. The room was silent except for my ragged breathing and a wet sound that made me even more embarrassed. My forehead and chest were covered in sweat, my hair stuck to my face.

I dug my nails into the sheet with my free hand. My legs started trembling on their own, a sign I know well. I was close. I chased it with every stroke, faster and faster, repeating his name silently inside my head like some backwards prayer.

Mr. Aguirre, don’t stop. Please, don’t stop now.

And then it hit. It came all at once, a wave that started in my belly and ran through my entire body, leaving me rigid for a second and trembling the next. I had to press my face into the pillow to muffle the cry. My body clamped around the cucumber, again and again, while my legs shook without me being able to control them.

I stayed like that for a long while, gasping, my whole body loose and my skin prickling with the last aftershocks. The sheet was wet beneath me, a total mess. I pulled the cucumber out slowly and set it aside, feeling ridiculous and satisfied in equal measure.

***

Now I’m here, lying on the bed, catching my breath, writing this on my phone to tell all of you, people who don’t know me and will never know me. It’s the only way I found to get some of what’s happening inside me out. To say it out loud without having to look anyone in the face.

Because tomorrow I’m going to see him again. On Sunday we all eat at my in-laws’ house, like always. I’m going to greet Mr. Aguirre with a kiss on the cheek, pass him the bread at the table, smile at him while my boyfriend holds my hand. And I’m going to have to pretend that every time he gets up to fetch something, I remember that afternoon in the shower and my mouth goes dry.

I know this shouldn’t be happening to me. That it’s wrong in every way. But desire doesn’t ask me whether it’s right before showing up. For now I make do with this, with my nights alone and my imagination working overtime. It’s the only thing I have to get by.

Does anyone else carry a fantasy they know they should never tell? Maybe reading yours will help me feel a little less alone with mine.