I Touched Myself in the Theater Bathroom Thinking of Her

I saw you for the first time at a party a couple of summers ago. You were wearing a wig with black and silver strands that fell to your shoulders, and a short dress that clung to you in a way I struggled to hide. I kept staring at you longer than I should have. Your legs, your skin without a single mark, the curve of your neckline every time you laughed. I couldn’t stop imagining what was under that fabric, how warm you’d be if I got close.

I asked a mutual friend your name. Marina. I looked you up on social media afterward, followed you, and for a few days I checked your profile like a teenager. Until he appeared in your photos: a guy with an easy smile and his arm always around your waist. I stopped looking. I told myself it was nonsense, that we didn’t even know each other, and I tucked you away in that corner of my mind where one puts the things one would rather not want.

Or so I thought.

***

The day of the conference dawned clear. I’d taken it seriously for weeks beforehand: I got up early to go to the gym, did legs until they were shaking, I wanted to feel firm, confident, in my best shape. I went home, took a long shower, and let the hot water wake up every inch of my skin.

I got dressed without a bra. I decided that in front of the mirror, almost like a challenge to myself. I chose a thin blouse that hinted at my nipples every time I moved, and I put on barely any makeup, something natural, just enough to bring out my eyes. I liked what I saw. I left the house with that strange feeling of being armed, of carrying something hidden that no one else knew about.

The theater where the talks were held was old, with red seats and high ceilings. I went in, found my seat, and the first thing my eyes registered wasn’t the stage or the day’s program. It was the legs of the woman presenting the event. Long, crossed, in a dress that rode up a little every time she shifted her posture beside the lectern.

What a beautiful woman, I thought, and forced myself to look at my notes.

It did no good. The first lecture was interesting, truly it was, but I was only half there. The other half kept following the movement of those legs, the way the presenter leaned toward the microphone, the way her voice filled the room. I pressed my thighs together without realizing it. I felt the first warning of heat between them and took a deep breath.

***

As soon as the talk ended, I went out into the hallway to get some air. I needed to clear my head before things got out of hand. And then I ran into Lucía.

Lucía is a coworker at the agency. For a long time now we’ve been playing at that tension that never quite explodes: a hand that lingers a second too long on an arm, a look that lasts longer than it should. I’ve fantasized about her many times, alone in bed, imagining a threesome with another coworker who’s also dropped the idea more than once. But she’s married, and I’ve never had the courage to put into words what I think when I have her close.

—I wasn’t expecting to see you here —she said, and gave me two kisses that left her perfume stuck to my face.

—Neither was I —I answered, and noticed my voice came out lower than usual.

We sat together for the next talk. It was a bad idea and I knew it the moment her knee brushed mine and neither of us moved away. I could feel her warmth through her clothes, the brush of her arm every time she shifted in her seat. Out of the corner of my eye I looked at her stomach, defined beneath the half-open shirt, and my mouth went dry. I imagined her with nothing on, just in lingerie, lying somewhere waiting for me.

I’m not going to make it through the whole day like this.

The heat was no longer just an idea. It had taken up residence between my legs, throbbing, demanding. It was a physical urgency, almost unbearable, the kind that blots out everything else. I wanted sex right then and there, in that theater packed with people, surrounded by women I had neither the chance nor the permission to touch.

***

And just then my phone vibrated in my lap.

It was a message from you. From you, Marina. The girl with the wig, the one I had put aside so I wouldn’t want her. You had found my contact and you were writing me as if nothing were happening, chatting about a work topic, trying to be nice, testing out a conversation that at any other moment would have seemed charming to me.

But I was too turned on to pretend to be normal. I read your messages and I wasn’t thinking about the subject you were talking about. I was thinking about closing that distance, about confessing to you without filters what I was carrying inside: that I wanted to kiss your neck slowly and work my way down, that I wanted your mouth between my legs while I took care of yours, that I wanted to feel your fingers sinking into me while I bit your nipples.

I can’t take it anymore. I’m too turned on to keep sitting here.

My hands were trembling a little when I put the phone away. And then I remembered: in my bag I had my headphones, the big ones, the ones that cancel out all the surrounding noise. I almost laughed with relief. It was an out. A way to steal the five minutes I needed from the day so I wouldn’t lose my mind.

—I’ll be right back —I whispered to Lucía, and got up without waiting for an answer.

***

The bathroom was at the end of a side hallway, far from the bustle at the entrance. I pushed the door open and slipped into the last stall. Someone else was there, two doors down, speaking softly with another girl, but I didn’t care. At that moment, modesty was the last thing I had left.

I locked the bolt and leaned against the cold wall. I put on my headphones and the world shut off at once: neither the murmur in the hallway, nor footsteps, nor voices. Just my quickening breath and the pounding in my ears. I searched my phone for a video, something specific, fingers playing in a bathroom as anonymous as this one, and let the moans fill my head.

And I started touching myself.

I did it standing up, my back against the wall and my legs barely apart. I slid my hand under my skirt, moved the thin fabric aside, and found myself soaked, much more than I’d imagined. The first touch drew a sigh from me that I didn’t even try to hold back. I thought about the blonde with the long legs and the dark-haired man Lucía and I had imagined, the three of us tangled up somewhere with no clock and no witnesses.

With my other hand I pinched a nipple through my blouse, already hard, sensitive to every pressure. I thought about naked women’s bodies scattered all over the theater, about the presenter uncrossing her legs just for me, about Lucía waiting for me in lingerie with that half-smile of hers. I rubbed my clit in quick circles, without pause, letting myself be dragged along by the images and by the gasps sounding directly in my ears.

I thought of you, Marina. Of your mouth, of your wig, of everything I had forbidden myself to want for months. And that was what pushed me over the edge.

I came like that, standing up, biting my lip so I wouldn’t cry out, with a shudder that buckled my knees and left me trembling against the tiles. I came in my own hand, intense, long, silent on the outside and undone on the inside.

***

I stayed still for a moment, catching my breath, my forehead against the wall. When I lowered one headphone, I realized something: with the music locked in my head, I hadn’t heard my own sounds. But the bathroom hallway had. Anyone passing by would have heard perfectly the unmistakable rhythm of a woman rubbing herself until she finished, without bothering to hide it, right in the middle of the workday.

I felt a little embarrassed, and at the same time I didn’t. A part of me, the part that had gone without a bra and decided it in front of the mirror that morning, felt strangely proud.

I turned off my phone, carefully wiped my fingers clean, straightened my clothes, and breathed until my pulse returned to something close to normal. I opened the door and stepped out looking at the floor, avoiding the eyes of the two girls still standing by the sinks.

I washed my hands slowly, watching myself in the mirror. My cheeks were flushed and there was a new calm in my gaze, the kind that only comes after. I went back into the room, sat down again beside Lucía, and crossed my legs as if nothing had happened.

I took out my phone. Your message was still there, waiting for an answer, still talking about that work topic neither of us really cared about.

I’m going to confess it to you, Marina. One of these days I’m going to tell you exactly what I think when I look at you.

I started typing. This time not to talk about work.