In Public

For months I’ve been replaying the same scene in my head on the ride home. Today, when the seat beside me was taken, I almost stopped breathing.

I rode out on my bike without underwear, my phone buzzing with messages I should never have opened. The road was empty, but I felt watched by everyone.

I closed my eyes for a second and, when I opened them, a huge shadow was blocking the sun. What happened next only existed in my imagination… until that afternoon.

You looked one way and then the other, certain you were alone, when you hiked up your dress in the middle of the garage. You didn’t see that, two spaces away, someone had been watching you for a while.

There’s a bathroom no one uses at the back of the garage. I’ve spent days imagining you there, against the mirror, while I whisper everything I want to do to you.

I sat between an older man and a guy who was to die for. Then the train slammed to a halt, the lights went out, and a hand found mine.

She wasn’t looking for love or company. She wanted to be watched, desired, imagined naked beneath her dress. That night she chose to be pure fire.

For weeks I’d been imagining a night like that, without names or promises. What I didn’t imagine was that he’d be watching me from the bar like he already knew everything.

I gave him two kisses in front of his mother and, without anyone noticing, decided to play along until neither of us thought we’d go that far that morning.

He was barely at my elbow when he took my hand. In six minutes, I discovered my body had no use for the rules I’d imposed on myself.

She arrives at ten-thirty, leans against the shelter, and crosses her legs. She doesn’t know it, but in my head we’ve already done everything we’d never dare.

I’d spent hours searching for a spark in other people’s eyes and found nothing. Until I decided to cross the room and put the whole game in his hands.

I used to hide everything. That night I went into the theater without underwear, in a short skirt and with the certainty that someone would look. And I wanted them to.

When the train left without me, I thought the night was lost. Then I saw him across the platform, motionless, looking at me as if he’d been waiting forever.

I left the house wearing a sweater that made everything see-through and nothing underneath. My boyfriend walked behind me, watching me, while strangers’ eyes ran over my body.

I went into the bathroom wearing my thong and came out with it tied in my hair. I had no idea the line for the theater would be the longest part of the night.

The steam erased faces and names. Only the heat remained, his fixed gaze on mine, and the certainty that neither of us was going to stop.

She stood up from the table, turned around, and looked at me in a way that left no room for doubt. I followed her without thinking, my heart pounding in my chest.

I placed my hands on the cold wall, took a deep breath, and understood that on the other side someone was waiting for the invisible permission to start touching me.

He told me to spread my legs and put my hands behind my head. What he thought was a routine pat-down was really the start of my game.