Desire

I opened the curtains half asleep and didn’t realize he was on the other side of the glass, watching me. And something in that look made me want to let him keep going.

She got into my car in a loose dress and with the calm of someone who’s no longer in a hurry. I never imagined that two days later she’d ask me to detour to her door.

I decided the night before, while he slept: the next morning I would begin, alone, a routine I had imagined for years but never dared to maintain.

I let him in thinking he just wanted a glass of water. Ten minutes later I was on my knees in front of the sofa and didn’t want it to stop.

I boarded the last car expecting a quiet trip. I never imagined the woman in the green dress would invite me to watch what her partner was about to do to her.

When Sofía whispered in my ear that we wouldn’t be alone that night, I felt a shiver I couldn’t tell was fear or desire. The stranger was already on his way up the stairs.

She was nearly twice my age and had a smile that promised trouble. She told me she’d see whether I was truly hungry or just bored, and I was already lost.

I invited him for a coffee knowing it wasn’t coffee I wanted. At fifty, Raquel discovered guilt had never been stronger than her desire.

I watched him train every morning and pretended not to look. Until one day I went over, and that decision led me to the most intense night of my life.

The passenger seat was uncomfortable for him, so I offered to share the bed. I had no idea what would happen when he thought I was already asleep.

A week after that first night, my feet carried me back to the cabaret. Verónica was waiting with a velvet box and a sentence.

I turned off the TV, waited for my aunt to start snoring, and lifted my leg over his hip. I felt how hard he was and knew there was no turning back.

We were always the last ones to turn off the lights. That night I walked in without warning, and what I saw changed every shift after that.

I hid on the stair landing just to hear his deep voice talking about my body. I knew it was wrong. I also knew I couldn’t stop listening.

That night, after publishing, I opened my email and found a message from him. I didn’t know a stranger could move me so much with words alone.

She stood there among the trees, red with embarrassment, her hands clasped behind her back. “Just let me watch,” she whispered. “I’ve never seen a man do it.”

I couldn’t say whether I liked everything about that creature or nothing; I only know that, in the heat before the mirror, a new self began to emerge.

I’d spent the whole day not feeling like doing anything. Until, when I switched on the boiler, I saw the woman in the building across from mine walking nearly naked through her kitchen, oblivious to my gaze.

I caught him watching me in the hotel gym and knew that older married man wouldn’t stop until he had me. What I didn’t expect was how much I wanted him to succeed.

I could have held it, but I didn’t want to. I got out, left the door ajar, and waited for the headlights to find me squatting by the road.