I Came Home and Found Her Naked in the Bathtub

It’s eleven in the morning, and I still don’t dare wake you. I’ve been watching you sleep for almost an hour, following with my eyes the pattern of your freckles across your back and the curve of your hip beneath the sheet. Your hair is tousled. Your mouth is half-open. The sun slips through the curtains and draws golden lines across your skin, and over the dark stain of dried saliva left on your pillow from all your moaning last night.

I think about how many times I’ve fucked you over these seven months. How many mornings I’ve woken up like this, my pussy still throbbing, thirsty for you, feeling time slipping away from us no matter how hard we try to hold on to it. And yet, no night has ever been like last night.

***

I came home from work at seven in the evening with my back in pieces. I’d left the house convinced you’d be at the studio until late—you’d told me that very morning, while you tied your hair up in front of the hall mirror—and my mind had been on anything else: the dinner I planned to improvise, the paperwork I was carrying in my bag, the washing machine I’d left running since the night before.

The first thing I noticed when I opened the apartment door was the smell. Roses and jasmine mixed with something warmer that I recognized immediately: the big candles on the shelf, the ones we only light when there’s something to celebrate.

—Mariela? —I called, but there was no answer.

I crossed the hallway, leaving a clumsy trail of keys, scarf, and shoes behind me. The bathroom door was ajar. I pushed it open slowly, and my breath caught.

You were in the bathtub with the foam up to your neck, looking at me with that half-smile of yours that allows for no questions. A dozen little candles stood on the tiles. On the rim, two glasses and a bottle that was still unopened. And beside the tub, on the bath mat, a black lingerie set folded to perfection, like a gift that had yet to be given.

—I lied to you —you whispered—. I’ve been waiting for you since five. My pussy’s been wet ever since I turned on the tap.

I came closer, not knowing what to say. Your hand emerged from the water and beckoned me, wetting my cheek when I leaned in to kiss you. Your lips were cold and your skin was hot. That contradiction of yours that always drives me wild.

—Take your clothes off —you said—. Slowly. I want to see your tits before you get in.

And I, who in the office was still the efficient woman signing files with a blue pen, came undone in front of you as if the entire day had been a disguise. The jacket. The blouse, button by button, letting my breasts bounce free beneath my bra. My trousers falling onto the marble floor. My stockings, which I always insist on taking off carefully even though I know it makes no difference. Then the bra, and finally my panties, stuck to my pussy because they were so soaked just from looking at you. As I undressed, you barely blinked. You kept your eyes fixed on every inch of skin that appeared, and I felt you rewriting me with your gaze, already fucking me with those green eyes of yours before touching a single hair on my body.

When I got into the tub, the water was exactly the right temperature. You wrapped your arms around me from behind, I rested my back against your breasts, and I let your hands travel over my arms, my belly, my thighs, my nipples, which had already gone hard as rocks. We didn’t speak for a long while. There was no need. Your fingers played with my tits beneath the foam, pinching my nipples with that slowness of yours that makes me beg without opening my mouth.

***

—Want me to help you wash your hair? —you asked, burying your fingers in the nape of my neck, covered in foam.

I turned on your legs until I was kneeling in front of you, the two of us almost sitting, the water forming a warm ring around our waists. We began kissing as if it were the first time. Hurriedly, then slowly, then hurriedly again. Your tongue entered my mouth and searched for mine hungrily. Your hands slid down my back to grab my ass beneath the water, sinking your fingers into the flesh, pulling my cheeks apart. My fingers tangled in your wet nape. When one of your knees forced its way between mine, all the air in the room seemed to evaporate. I felt the bone of your thigh pressing against my open pussy and couldn’t stop myself from rubbing against it.

—Slowly —you murmured against my mouth—. We have all night.

I didn’t listen to you, and neither did you. You pushed me against the tile and slipped your fingers beneath the water until you found me. Two fingers. Straight in. No preamble. They sank into my pussy as if they knew the way by heart, because they did. You began to fuck me slowly, your thumb pressing my clitoris in small circles while you bit my lower lip until it hurt. I opened my legs wider, opened myself for you, gripped the edge of the tub with both hands, and let you move me however you pleased. You pushed your fingers in and out with a slow, filthy rhythm, curling them upward, searching for that spot only you find on the first try. Water splashed between us. My nipples had grown so hard they hurt.

—More —I begged—. Put in another.

You slipped in a third finger and sped up. I felt my pussy opening to make room for you, felt my mouth fall open without a sound. I came for the first time that night with my wet back against the wall, biting your shoulder to keep from screaming, spilling over your hand beneath the foam. I felt the contractions squeezing around your fingers, one after another, while you didn’t stop, while you drew it out until my knees were trembling and I had to push you away to make you stop.

Then I insisted on my turn. I lifted one of your legs and rested it on the edge of the tub, leaving you open and exposed like a split fruit. I knelt as best I could between your thighs, waist-deep in water, and lowered my mouth to your pussy. It was hot even with the water around it. It was swollen. It was asking for me. I licked your clitoris with the tip of my tongue, carefully at first, then harder, then with broad, hungry licks that made you let out a muffled cry and grab my hair. I slid in two fingers and curled them upward, matching your rhythm with my mouth, feeling your belly tighten and feeling you press my head against your pussy so I wouldn’t pull away.

—Keep going, don’t stop, fuck, don’t stop —you repeated in a voice I didn’t recognize—. I’m going to come in your mouth.

And you came. You came with your leg trembling on the edge of the tub, your hand clenched in my wet hair, your pussy throbbing against my tongue. With your mouth pressed to my ear afterward, while I kept drawing the remnants of your orgasm out with two slow fingers, discovering how much you’d been holding back throughout the entire wait.

It took us an hour and a half to get out of the tub, and by then the water was barely steaming. I helped you stand. I wrapped you in a white towel. I kissed your shoulder, your ear, your collarbone. I licked a drop of water running down between your breasts. I could feel my pulse beating in places where there shouldn’t have been a pulse: in my fingertips, in the soles of my feet, in my pussy again.

—Come on —you said, tugging at my hand—. The best part is still to come.

***

The living room smelled of firewood. You’d lit the fireplace and a few more candles, and dragged the white shag rug we were always fighting over into the middle of the room. The walls filled with women’s shadows: two elongated, shifting silhouettes that seemed to belong to another era.

We sat on the rug. I dried your hair with the towel, unhurriedly, pausing to kiss every inch of skin I uncovered. You let me. For the first time all afternoon you stayed still, watching, with a mixture of sweet exhaustion and curiosity. Tonight it’s your turn to receive. You’ve spent the afternoon pampering me. Now it’s my turn to give it back to you.

I stood and crossed the room to the dresser. From the bottom drawer I took out two black silk blindfolds. One longer, one shorter. I’d bought them a month earlier at that shop on Belgrano Street we’d left laughing like two teenagers, too afraid to try them out. I showed them to you in silence.

—Do you trust me? —I asked.

You nodded. You said it without opening your mouth, with that way of looking at me that no longer needs words.

I knelt behind you. I kissed the nape of your neck. I passed the silk over your breasts, letting the fabric barely brush your nipples before raising it to your eyes. I tied it without tightening, with a gesture I hoped you would understand: it isn’t a cage, it’s a promise. I felt your body bristle beneath my hands and the gooseflesh rise along your arms.

—Don’t move —I whispered—. Not tonight.

I laid you down on the white rug. I raised your arms above your head and, with the second blindfold, tied your wrists. I didn’t tighten it: just enough for you to feel the shape of the fabric. So you would understand that, for a while, you couldn’t intervene. You could only feel. I spread your legs with my knee and left you open, your pussy already shining again in the firelight.

—Are you okay? —I asked.

—Keep going —you said, your voice slightly broken—. Fuck me however you want.

And I did.

***

I started with your wrists. I ran my tongue along the insides of your arms, over your freshly shaved armpits, along the curve of your shoulder. Your skin prickled beneath every kiss. I heard you let out a first moan when I reached your neck, and another, longer one, when I caught your earlobe between my teeth.

—You can’t kiss me —I reminded you softly—. Tonight you’re mine. This pussy is mine. These tits are mine.

I lowered myself to your nipples. I took them into my mouth one at a time, sucking hard, tugging with my teeth until I tore a long moan from you. I left them wet for a moment, gleaming with saliva, hard as stone points, and stood up.

—Where are you going? —you asked, alarmed.

—Wait —I said—. I’ll be right back.

I went to the kitchen. I opened the freezer. I took out a couple of ice cubes and, from the fruit bowl, a handful of strawberries I’d bought at the greengrocer’s on Friday. I came back barefoot, leaving a trail of wet footprints, and found you exactly as I’d left you: lying on the white rug, your arms above your head, your breasts rising and falling with each breath, your legs slightly open and your swollen pussy pointing toward the ceiling. The fireplace cast your silhouette against the wall. I stopped for a second just to look at you.

—I’m here —I said—. Shhh. Don’t move. Feel me.

I knelt beside you and dropped a piece of ice onto your collarbone. I slid it slowly between your breasts. The cube melted, leaving a trail of cold water that evaporated a few seconds later in the heat of your skin and the fireplace. I lowered it to your belly. I drew a circle around your navel. Then I suddenly moved up and pressed it onto your left nipple without warning. Your whole body arched. I giggled and passed it over to your other nipple, holding it there until the cold turned it purple and you pressed your lips together to keep from screaming. Your thighs were trembling.

—Open your mouth —I said.

I passed you what remained of the ice from one kiss to the next, letting it melt between us. We tasted of water, salt, and something else.

***

I took a strawberry and bit into it. I painted your breasts with it. The curve of your neck. The line of your hip. I traveled over your body as if you were a notebook, drawing red strokes that I erased afterward with my tongue. I sucked the juice from your nipples, one at a time, nibbling them between my teeth. I went down your belly, licking every red line until the fruit disappeared. Your breathing quickened with every inch I covered. You began to move, tugging lightly at your tied wrists, lifting your hips in search of me, begging me with a voice that could barely emerge.

—Please —you whispered—. Get down. Get down now.

—Already? —I murmured with my mouth against your navel.

—Not yet —I answered with a smile, imitating you.

I went lower, but not all the way. I placed another strawberry between your thighs, against the soft flesh on the inside, and crushed it with the palm of my hand, leaving a sticky trail up to your groin. Then, just before touching you, I slid an ice cube over your clitoris.

The sound that escaped you wasn’t a scream: it was a breath of badly contained air. I felt your legs tense, felt you try to close them to keep me inside. I wouldn’t let you. I grabbed your thighs and forced them apart, leaving you exposed, your pussy red and shining, the ice melting over it. I pressed the warmth of my mouth where the cold had been and began to suck your clitoris completely. With my flat tongue, from bottom to top, as if I were drinking you. Then with the tip, in quick circles over your clitoris. Then I pushed my tongue deep inside, moving it in and out as if I were fucking you with it. I sucked your lips one at a time, leaving them swollen and gleaming. I slid in two fingers and curled them upward while sucking your clitoris between my lips.

—Look at me —I said, even though you couldn’t—. Listen to me suck you.

The strawberry was trapped between us, crushed, sweet, mixed with your juices, my saliva, and everything else. I kept eating you until you began repeating my name in a thread of sound, until I felt you were about to break apart again.

—Now —I said, pulling away for a moment.

I untied your wrists. Then I removed the blindfold from your eyes. The first thing I saw was your dilated, shining pupils, looking at me from somewhere I still hadn’t fully reached. I sucked the fingers that had just been inside you so you could see what you tasted like. I climbed onto your body. I straddled one of your thighs and, without stopping looking at you, began to move against you, rubbing my soaked pussy over your skin.

You imitated me. You raised your knee and pressed my clitoris with the bone. Your thigh rose to meet me. Mine lowered to meet you, crushing your pussy with every thrust. Our hips fell into sync without either of us having to decide it. I grabbed one of your tits and leaned down to suck the other without stopping my rubbing. You dug your nails into my ass and guided my rhythm, pushing me against you harder and harder. The white rug was stained with strawberry, saliva, and us, with two pussies dripping at the same time. We were both panting. We were both looking at each other. We both knew we were about to fall together.

—Come with me —I begged.

—With you —you said.

And we fell.

***

The orgasm tore through us almost at the same time. I felt my belly contract, my thighs tense, my pussy squeeze in spasms against yours, felt all the heat in the living room seem to concentrate for a few seconds in a single point and then spread over our skin like a receding tide. Your body did the same beneath mine. I heard you let out a long moan, almost a sigh, and felt you surrender, felt your orgasm spill in hot spurts over my thigh.

I let myself fall on top of you. I pressed my pussy against yours and stayed still there, feeling us both pulsing, stuck together, wet, our contractions answering one another like an echo. Me lying on top of you, your head turned toward the fireplace, both of us breathing slowly. The firewood crackled. The candles stayed lit. One of them went out on its own, without warning, and neither of us wanted to light it again.

—I love you —you said.

—I love you —I replied.

Nothing more. We said it as if it were the first time we were learning those two words together. As if somewhere between the bath, the ice, and the fireplace, we had discovered a new language only the two of us understood.

***

It’s eleven in the morning, and you open your eyes. You see me watching you. You smile with the slow smile of someone who still hasn’t finished returning from sleep.

—Good morning, my girl —you whisper.

—Good morning, my love —I reply.

And as I kiss your forehead, I think I have to write all this down somewhere before the day carries it away. That I have to remind myself, six months from now, two years from now, a whole lifetime from now, that this Saturday existed—the one when I came home thinking about an improvised dinner and found a woman waiting for me among candles, her pussy wet since five in the afternoon. That this way of loving you, of fucking you, of letting you fuck me, existed. That it exists.