Forbidden

When she adjusted his posture for the third time and he felt the pressure under his shorts, he decided that morning’s session was going to be very different from the others.

Andrés woke up naked in his greatest rival’s bed. With no memory of the night before, he only wanted to leave. But something kept holding him back.

For weeks I’d felt the way he lingered in his hugs and how he looked at me when he thought I wasn’t paying attention. That dawn I decided to stop pretending.

I got up at three in the morning because of moans I couldn’t ignore. My mother’s door was ajar, and I stood frozen in the hallway.

I entered that restricted area on purpose. Something about those uniformed men had attracted me from the moment we arrived, and I knew exactly what I was looking for.

The gym hadn’t opened yet when she grabbed his wrist and pulled him into the empty locker room. That class wasn’t on the app’s menu.

We’d been married for three days when Adrián whispered in my ear in a Roman café what was about to happen. I should have said no. I didn’t.

That morning I went into the prison with good news for my client. I came out with a wrinkled blouse, messy hair, and a secret I’d never tell.

She called from the bathroom with the tap running so no one would hear her. She heard “domination,” “submission,” “a year with no way out.” And she signed anyway.

Don Ernesto was twenty-seven years older than me, with rough laborer’s hands and a hungry gaze I pretended not to see. That night, I closed the curtains myself.

Rodrigo looked without hiding it by the hot springs. Sofía had her eyes closed and her long neck exposed to the sun. Claudia saw it and said nothing.

Ten years of widowhood and silence. Until one night I saw light under her door and went closer. What I found on the other side changed everything between us.

When I took her hands in the car, in front of the square, she already knew where I was taking her. I was still pretending I didn’t know.

When Roberto’s car disappeared around the bend, Sofía looked at Raquel. They had three hours, two men waiting, and a plan that seemed foolproof.

I walked into the living room and found him waiting with something hidden behind his back. His smile told me before he did that the night wouldn’t be normal.

The air lifted my dress and I did nothing to stop it. I wanted to be seen. I needed to be seen, even if I didn’t quite know why.

I had been fantasizing about her for weeks, but the snowstorm and that couples’ motel finally broke down the barriers between us.

He came to help me with my new television, with his defined arms and that gaze that avoided mine. He was twenty, and I already knew what was going to happen.

When I got into the truck with him that night, I knew something was going to happen. What I didn’t imagine was ending up on my knees in the dark looking at him like that.

When they walked into the apartment, there was no innocence left in their eyes. All that remained was deciding how we were going to end the night, and the deck stayed on the table.