In Public

I sat in the center of the classroom pretending to be an unconscious patient. No one knew that, with every hand pinning me down, I was falling apart inside thinking of him.

I went out determined to let him see me with other men, but I ended up between two cars on an empty street, letting a stranger use me.

I left the gym in the same clothes as always, with every eye on me. That night I understood I no longer wanted to hide how much it excited me to be desired.

I know I should feel ashamed, but at that hour, pressed against bodies I don’t know, I stop pretending the touch is an accident.

I went back to school that afternoon under the excuse of studying in the library, but neither of us was going to open a single book. We were going for them.

It was six in the morning and he was looking at me in the rearview mirror as if he already knew what I was going to let happen. This really happened, and I regret nothing.

We always thought no one could see us. That lie we told ourselves was the beginning of everything that came after, night after night.

That Monday the gym was almost empty. I only wanted to shower in peace, but I walked through the wrong door… and he was already inside, watching me without saying a word.

Damián came every three days; Adrián showed up Friday on his motorbike. That week I found out just how far I could go when nobody was looking.

My friend promised me a wild costume night. I put on the sexiest outfit in the sex shop and headed out, not imagining what was waiting for me at that bar.

No one at the party suspected a thing: to everyone we were just friends. But that dawn Adrián took the road to the hillside estate, and I knew we were done pretending.

I always told myself my slip-ups were the alcohol’s fault. That morning, sober and in broad daylight, I knew I had been lying to myself.

I parked next to her car, not knowing that my free afternoon would end with her climbing into mine, in the darkest corner of the parking lot.

I swear this is a real story, one you don’t tell out loud. She appeared from the hedges almost naked, asked me for a light, and everything else just happened.

I’ve always hated public bathrooms, but that day I had no choice. What I never imagined was what I’d find when I ran back for the phone I’d left on top of the water tank.

It took me two weeks to admit I wanted it to happen again. And one dawn, instead of running away, I sat on that stair and waited for them.

That early morning I lost my money, my underwear, and the idea I had of myself. What happened afterward in that empty park I had never told anyone.

He slipped a scrap of paper into my hand as he cleared the plate. I read it in the room: it was his number. And I knew I wouldn’t be alone that night.

I hid on the locker-room mezzanine with Bruno pressed against my back. Below, my mother and her friend were undressing among the workers, and I couldn’t look away.

I’m naked while I write this. And I want you to know exactly what goes through my head when I shut the door and no one can hear me.