Camila Asked Me to Do It Just for Her

My name is Bruno, and this is the first time I’ve told this out loud, even if it’s only in writing. For years I kept it as a memory that belonged to me alone, something I’d pull out of a drawer when I was by myself and no one could see the stupid grin it put on my face. Today I decided to write it down. If someone reads it and it helps them have a good time, even better.

I grew up in a rural area, one of those places where nothing happens and where, at the same time, everything does. With no decent internet and not much information, what we knew about sex we learned in fits and starts: an old magazine someone managed to get hold of in secret, conversations among friends full of lies, and a lot of imagination working at night when the lights went out. I used to fall asleep fantasizing about things I barely understood, and wake up with my body full of an urgency I didn’t know where to put.

The summer I turned nineteen was different. We were no longer the clumsy kids we’d been before: we had all grown up, and all of a sudden the girls we’d always known had become women I found hard to look at without losing track of what they were saying. Among them all, the one who kept me up at night was Camila. She had a face of innocence that clashed with a body that was anything but innocent, and the worst part was that she didn’t seem aware of the effect she had. That made her even more impossible.

One afternoon in January, a group of us went down to the lake behind the fields. It was hot enough to split stones. The girls arrived almost at the same time as we did, and they got into the water with their clothes on, laughing, splashing, not thinking too hard about it. I couldn’t stop looking at Camila. The wet T-shirt clung to her body and outlined every curve with a clarity that left me breathless. I remember the shame of not being able to get out of the water, of standing there pretending to be cold while inside I was burning.

On the way home I walked with my friend Tomás along a dirt path. We were talking about the girls, about the wet T-shirts, about Camila above all, and at some point the conversation turned into something else. Tomás laughed, glanced sideways at me, and told me he was just as horny as I was. Half-joking, half-serious, he suggested a bet: who could hold out longer without finishing. I didn’t say anything, but my silence was a yes. We stepped off the path, each of us on our own, and got started.

It felt incredible. I was so wrapped up in what I was doing, with Camila’s image burned into my head, that I took a while to notice something had changed. When I looked up, she was there. Standing a few meters away, at the edge of the path, her shirt still damp and her eyes fixed on us. She didn’t move. She didn’t say anything. She just watched.

I should have stopped. Anyone would have stopped. I couldn’t. The shock, far from breaking me out of it, pushed me right to the edge, and I ended up finishing right there, in front of her, unable to hold back and not wanting to. Camila never looked away. It was the first time I felt what it was like to come while being watched, and it was, to this day, one of the most intense things I’ve ever experienced.

***

The next day I expected the worst. That she’d tell everyone, that I’d become the laughingstock of the town, that her father, who was the police chief, would show up at my house. None of that happened. We ran into each other a couple of times and she acted as if nothing had happened. We never talked about it. I buried it, or so I thought.

The years went by. Camila was dating a friend from the group, and to my eyes she was still the prettiest of them all: the unattainable one, the one you looked at from far away. I, meanwhile, had gathered some experience, nothing special, nothing that could compare with the electricity of that afternoon by the lake.

One summer night there was a party at one of the guys’ houses. We all drank too much. At some point in the early hours of the morning I fell asleep on a couch near the pool, and voices close by woke me up. It was Camila and her boyfriend. They were a few steps from me, in the half-light, kissing hungrily. He was kissing her neck, sliding the straps of her dress down, pressing her hips against his. I stayed perfectly still, holding my breath, not daring to move a single millimeter.

At one point he stood up and said he was going to get something to drink. When he walked away, Camila slowly turned her head and looked straight into my eyes. My heart almost stopped. I thought she hadn’t seen me, that I was asleep, but her low voice cleared up the doubt.

—Why so shy? —she said, with a half-smile—. I saw you once already. Or do you think I forgot?

I didn’t answer. I had no voice. He came back, too drunk to notice anything, and they went on with what they were doing. I stayed there, trapped between torture and desire, looking at something I shouldn’t have been looking at and couldn’t stop looking at.

***

A few days later we started chatting. At first it was nonsense, random messages, and little by little things got hotter. One night she confessed that thinking about that afternoon at the lake turned her on like few other things. That if she didn’t have a boyfriend, she might give herself the chance for something to happen between us, but she couldn’t. What she did confess was something else: that she loved watching a man touch himself. That she’d asked her boyfriend to do it and he’d never agreed.

The chats became routine and kept getting more intense. She asked me for details. What it felt like when I did it, what I thought about, whether I still used those old magazines. I answered everything, imagining her on the other side of the screen, biting her lip as she read. Until one night, I don’t know where I found the courage, I made her the offer.

—Come to my place —I wrote her—. I’ll do it for you. You don’t touch me, I don’t touch you. You’re not cheating on anyone. You just watch.

She took a while to answer. So long that I thought I’d blown it. But the reply came: “Saturday afternoon.”

***

Honestly, I didn’t think she’d come. Even so, I got ready, showered, tidied my room like an idiot, checked the clock a hundred times. When the doorbell rang, my blood ran cold. I looked out the window and it was her. For a second my vision blurred. One thing was writing it, playing with words from the safety of a screen; something very different was having her on the other side of the door.

I opened it. We were both flushed, not really knowing how to greet each other. We went to my room and sat on the edge of the bed, at a proper distance, like two teenagers on their first date.

—I’m a little embarrassed —I said, because it was true—. It’s not exactly what you’d call normal.

—I admit it’s pretty strange —she replied, and we both laughed. The laughter loosened the knot in my chest.

—You look gorgeous today —I blurted out, trying to break the ice.

She dodged the compliment with a question.

—Will you show me the magazines you use?

I took one out of the drawer, the one I looked at the most. She opened it, leafed through it slowly, and smiled sideways, as if confirming something about me.

I gathered my courage and told her the only honest thing I had to say.

—If you want me to do it, you’re going to have to give me something. Like this, on my own, I won’t be able to concentrate.

—And what would you like to see? —she asked, lowering her voice.

—That afternoon, at the lake, there was no magazine. It was just you in your wet T-shirt. That was enough for me. More than enough, even today.

She stayed quiet for a moment, looking at me.

—Only if you promise to do exactly what I tell you —she said—. Nothing else.

I nodded. I would have promised anything as long as she stayed.

Camila unbuttoned her shirt with a slowness that seemed eternal to me. Button by button, until the fabric opened and those breasts I’d spent years imagining appeared. They were exactly as I remembered from that afternoon, or better. I was left speechless.

—Now it’s your turn —she murmured, leaning back a little against the wall, her eyes shining—. Start.

I pulled down my pants and let her see everything. Her face showed surprise and something else, something she didn’t bother to hide. I started slowly, looking at her, letting her gaze do half the work. Every time her eyes dropped, I felt a jolt. She bit her lip, breathed deeper, and it drove me crazy.

—I think I’m going to help you a little —she said, almost in a whisper.

She brought her hands to her breasts and started rubbing her nipples, slowly, never taking her eyes off me. It was too much. I held out as long as I could, which wasn’t long, and finished with the same intensity as that first time at the edge of the lake. She didn’t look away for a single second, and on her face there was a mix of satisfaction and desire that stayed with me many nights afterward.

We stayed silent for a while, breathing hard, not knowing what to say. Then she straightened her shirt, kissed me on the cheek, and left, true to the rules she herself had set. We never touched. I never cheated on anyone. And yet it was one of the most intimate things I’ve ever experienced.

This is the first of many afternoons that Camila and I spent together. But I’ll tell those little by little, another day.