First Time

I had never touched myself. But that night, with the phone screen lighting my face, my fingers went down on their own and I didn’t want them to stop.

It took two days to arrive, and for those two days I could think of nothing else. When I finally opened the box, I knew that night I was going to know myself in a new way.

I locked the door, took a deep breath, and told myself that afternoon I was finally going to find out what my body could do when no one was watching.

When she shut the door, she told me I wasn’t enough of a man. I never imagined that same night I’d stop being one forever—and that it would be the best thing that ever happened to me.

I promised myself I’d never miss him again. So why is my hand between my legs and his name stuck in my throat tonight?

She had never been with someone fifteen years older. That night, in the hotel room, she discovered that intelligence can be seductive too.

When the scarf covered my eyes I thought it was an innocent game. It wasn’t. Mariela had other plans, and I didn’t want her to stop.

I warned her that if I didn’t like it, I’d drop her at the next corner. She smiled, reclined my seat, and asked me to close my eyes for a second.

When she sat on my couch with smeared mascara and a trembling voice, I knew a whiskey and a few comforting words wouldn’t be enough.

My roommate was asleep when he knocked with a bouquet of freesias. I opened the door in a sweater and barefoot. That night I promised never to let another man into my bed.

The first client asked me for something that wasn’t in my contract. When I went back to the room, Salvador was breathing like he’d been awake for hours.

What started as a silly afternoon on his sofa ended with me kneeling between his legs, learning that some favors can’t be undone.

We started talking by messages. We ended up seeing each other naked under the same red moon, each in our own city, each with the other’s breath on the screen.

I climbed into the car with my heart in my throat and told him I finally understood what a woman feels on her way to giving herself over.

When he turned around in that little town store, I thought he was a woman. He wore white jeans, painted nails, and a secret I wouldn’t discover until we were stranded on the road.

I was sixteen, the house was silent, and a word had sat in the margin of my notebook for months. That night, at last, I locked the door.

Her white nightgown barely covered her thighs, and I knew that night I would unbutton it all, one button at a time, in silence.

When he opened the bag, he found a burgundy bra and a note: “Get familiar with the sensations. Tomorrow we begin in earnest.” There was no turning back.

I never thought a game scene would ignite something between us, or that by that same afternoon I’d have his taste in my mouth and his name looping in my head.

Caro was six years older than me, had a life that looked perfect, and a secret she thought she’d take to the grave. That night she decided she couldn’t hide anymore.