That Night I Gave Myself Over to My Fantasies

I’m going to tell this in the first person because I want you to get to know me a little, without filters. My name is Mariela and, if I had to confess something, I’d say I’ve tried almost everything. Men, women, encounters I’d rather not go into detail about. But there’s one thing I like more than anything else and have practiced since I was very young: giving myself pleasure, slowly, with no witnesses, without having to answer to anyone.

That particular night I didn’t feel like meeting anyone. It had been a long week, the kind that leaves your body tired but your mind restless. I got home with a strange tingling settled between my legs, an urge that didn’t feel like hunger or sleep. I knew it well. I knew exactly what I needed.

My phone buzzed a couple of times on the table. A couple of messages from people who, on another night, might have tempted me to go out. I glanced at them out of the corner of my eye and left them unanswered. I didn’t want conversation or drinks or the discomfort of figuring out a stranger. I wanted something simpler and more selfish, and for once I didn’t feel even a drop of guilt about seeking it.

I ate early and light, a plate of fruit and a little cheese, because I didn’t want to feel heavy afterward. I washed the two plates I’d dirtied and turned off the dining room lights. The house was left in half-darkness, and I in silence, hearing only the distant hum of the refrigerator.

I went into the bedroom and started the ritual. I lit three scented candles on the dresser, those vanilla ones that leave the air sweet and thick. I put on ambient music, something slow, with bass you felt more than heard. Then I opened the drawer where I keep my good underwear, the kind I save for myself and not for anyone else to see.

I chose a black lace set. A bra with light padding and a matching thong that fit exactly where I wanted it to squeeze. I put it on slowly, glancing at myself in the full-length mirror I have across from the bed. Tonight I’m for myself, I thought, and that thought alone already turned me on a little.

***

I lay on my back on the duvet, not getting under the sheets. I reached for my phone and put on one of those videos that lately turn me on more than any other: two women, unhurried, taking their time. I wasn’t interested in urgency. I was interested in detail, in the way one traced the other’s back with the tip of her fingers.

I turned the volume up just a little and let the scene carry me away. I didn’t imagine myself inside the video. I imagined me, alone, receiving that same calm, that same unhurried attention. There’s something about knowing I have the whole night ahead of me and no one to please that relaxes me and turns me on at the same time.

By the time I set the phone aside, I was already aroused. I started with my breasts, over the lace, without touching the skin yet. I drew slow circles around the nipples, feeling them harden against the fabric. My own breathing told me things were getting serious. The air was coming in deeper, slower.

I lowered my hand and slipped it under the bra. The contrast was immediate: the warm palm against my skin, the nipple already hard and asking for attention. I pinched it between two fingers, gently at first, then a little harder. I moistened my fingertips with saliva and ran them over it again, and that cool wetness tore a sigh from me I hadn’t expected.

My body started asking for more than I was giving it. I pulled one breast out of the bra and then the other, because having them half-covered was annoying. I kneaded them with open hands, squeezed them, let them go. I ran only my fingertips over the underside, where the skin is thinner and everything is felt twice as much. Every so often a moan escaped me, low, almost a purr, and I liked hearing myself.

I’ve got the mirror right in front of me, so I pushed myself up a little to look. I propped myself on my elbows and looked at the woman staring back at me: hair tousled, cheeks flushed, breasts bare and the black lace framing my hips. This is how I like to be, I thought. Seeing myself turned me on more than any video.

One of my hands drifted down on its own, without me telling it to. It passed over my belly, lingered a second at the edge of my thong, and kept going to where everything was already wet. I touched myself over the lace at first, feeling the heat coming through the fabric. Then I moved the thong aside and found my own dampness.

I started slowly, in circles, right over the clit. The other hand stayed busy on my breasts, alternating between one and the other. It was a double sensation that kept rising in waves: every time I squeezed a nipple, the fingers below responded on their own, faster. I bit my lip so I wouldn’t speed up too much. I wanted it to last.

***

When I felt I was on the edge and still didn’t want to come, I stretched my arm toward the nightstand. That’s where I keep my vibrator, the usual one, the one that knows my body better than any lover I’ve ever had. I took it out with fingers a little clumsy from wanting it and brought it first to my mouth.

I sucked it slowly, looking at myself in the mirror, playing at it being something else, as if there were someone else in the room to please. I slid it along my neck, between my breasts, leaving a wet trail over my torso. My skin was hot, almost feverish, and the contact of the toy, warm with my saliva, made every inch of me prickle as it passed.

I brought it down my belly and switched it on. The first vibration against my clit made my back arch hard. I held it there for a long time, moving it in small circles, adjusting the pressure with my hand. I was moaning without holding back now, because there was no one to hear me and because hearing myself was part of the pleasure.

I ran it over the whole area, unhurried, letting anticipation do its work. Then I started pushing it slowly inside me. It slid in easily, everything so wet. At first I moved it with my hand, feeling each vibration multiply deep inside. I touched my clit at the same time and the world shrank to those two points.

It wasn’t enough for me to stay still. I sat up fully, bent my knees, and rode the toy, setting the rhythm myself. I went up and down as I pleased, first slow and then at a gallop, while with my other hand I squeezed my tits, still hard as two stones. In the mirror I watched myself move, and that image pushed me even further.

The first orgasm hit me like that, riding my own hand, watching myself. It was a long one, the kind that starts in one point and spreads through your whole body all the way to your fingertips. I let out a hoarse moan and stayed trembling for a few seconds, but I didn’t stop. There’s more still, I told myself.

I eased the pace just enough to catch my breath and started again. The second came faster, more focused, almost angry. I was touching myself furiously, without the delicacy of the beginning, chasing pleasure with an urgency I could no longer hold back. I clamped my thighs around my hand and let it shake me through and through.

By the third I wasn’t measuring anything anymore. It was pure instinct, the body working on its own, my hips moving by themselves. When it came, it truly left me without strength. I collapsed onto my back on the duvet, gasping, my chest rising and falling as if I’d run for miles.

***

I carefully pulled the vibrator out and set it aside. My body was tired, satisfied, with that delicious heaviness that only comes when you give yourself over completely. I ran it one last time over my skin, now turned off, almost like a farewell caress, and left it on the nightstand.

The candles were still burning, casting soft shadows on the ceiling. The music was still playing, low, like a background I could barely hear anymore. I stayed like that for a while, half-naked among the rumpled lace, staring at the ceiling and smiling for no apparent reason.

I thought about how easy it is to look outside for what so often we already have inside. About how sometimes the best company is your own, without asking anyone’s permission, without waiting for them to guess what you need. That night I hadn’t had to explain to anyone what I liked or how. I knew it, and that was enough.

It’s not that I reject other people. I like other hands, mouths, the weight of another body on mine. But there is a freedom in being alone that no lover gives me: the freedom to go at my own pace, to stop when I want, to repeat what works without having to think about anyone else. That night I gave myself all of it, and I enjoyed it down to the last drop.

I stretched out my arm and blew out the candles one by one. The smell of vanilla mingled with my own skin, and the room was left in darkness. At last I settled in between the sheets, still wearing the lace because I was too lazy to take it off, and closed my eyes.

I fell asleep almost at once, with that strange, complete calm that I only know after a night surrendered to myself. And as sleep took me, the last thing I thought was that I wouldn’t wait too long to do it again.