The Stranger on the App Took Me to a Motel

What single woman doesn’t end up, sooner or later, downloading one of those dating apps? I resisted for a long time, but boredom always wins. And that’s where, among photos and half-filled-out profiles, I ran into her.

Her photo stopped my finger dead. Big honey-colored eyes, a small upturned nose, thick lips that looked as if they’d been drawn on purpose to distract you. In the picture you could only see her face, but there was something in her gaze that promised the rest. When we finally met, I confirmed she hadn’t exaggerated: medium height, bordering on tall, good curves, fair skin without being pale. She wasn’t a magazine model, but she could stop traffic.

It’s worth clarifying what I’m like, because this whole story depends on a detail it took me a while to understand. I’m calm. Slow, some would say. I don’t have a prototype of woman I’m looking for or a list of requirements; I just let myself be carried by what I feel. I was never into casual sex. Those things, I thought, weren’t for me.

I’d gone two years without touching anyone. Two dry years, which sound quick but weigh like a slab of stone. And it wasn’t for lack of opportunities, but because of a wound that took time to heal. My last relationship had lasted three years and I was happy, or thought I was, until one afternoon a woman I didn’t know called me.

—Homewrecker —she blurted out as soon as I answered, without even greeting me.

I didn’t understand a thing. I asked her to explain, and between broken sentences she told me she’d been with Romina—my then partner—for two years and had seen a message from me on her phone. I told her the homewrecker was her, because I’d been with Romina for three years. It took us a while to piece together the puzzle, but when we did, it was clear: Romina had been lying to both of us, and who knows how many others, swearing fidelity to each one separately.

From that call on, I shut myself off. I distrusted all women, as if every smile hid another betrayal. And that distrust kept me from even getting close to anyone.

But loneliness gets tiring. The body demands, the spirit goes dim, and one morning I decided I’d had enough of punishing myself for someone else’s mistakes. I signed up on several apps. I was about to give up, because the norm was to write and get no answer—I never understood why someone joins if they have no intention of replying—when she wrote to me.

Her name was Lucía, and she was direct from the very first line.

—Hi. When are we meeting?

I suggested we talk a little by chat before seeing each other. She said no, she liked meeting people in person, and I should choose the place. My first impulse was to distrust her again: surely she was drowning in candidates and I was just one more in the queue. But something pushed me to agree. I suggested we go to the theater and then grab a beer. She liked that.

***

We agreed to meet at a quarter to seven in front of the theater. Seven, nothing. Seven-fifteen, nothing. At seven-twenty she showed up, unhurried, with a smile that didn’t apologize. Much later I found out she’d been late on purpose, so the theater doors would have closed and our only option would be to go straight to the bar. She had planned everything.

In person she was even better than in the photo. As soon as we sat down she started with the compliments, one after another, looking at me as if she already knew me. It didn’t take much insight to understand what she wanted. On the third beer she dropped the question.

—What do you like most when you have sex?

—That’s very personal —I said, squirming in my seat—. Why do you want to know?

—Pure curiosity. Are you embarrassed to talk about that?

—I’m pretty shy.

—And what does shyness have to do with it? We’re not doing anything. Tell me.

I sighed and let my guard down a little.

—What I like most is being touched all over, slowly. And you?

—Me? When they kiss me down there —she said without blinking—. I’m very sensitive. Where are you most sensitive?

—My nipples.

—Me too, but more between the legs. How do you like them sucked? I love little bites.

—I like them left wet.

—And your neck? Do you like being kissed there? That drives me completely wild.

—That makes me crazy —I admitted, feeling my cheeks burn.

We went on like that for a good while. She kept steering the conversation back to the same territory, drawing confessions out of me that I never told anyone. And while she talked, she started touching me: her hand over mine, her fingers in my hair, the palm resting on my thigh. She said things that made me laugh, and between the laughter, the beers, and her hands, without realizing it I started getting turned on.

—Do you like me? —she asked suddenly.

—I think you’re very pretty.

—Would you sleep with me?

—I don’t know. Why do you want to know? —I said, shy again.

—Because you’ve got me hot. I’d love to be with you right now.

She said it while holding my hands, looking straight at me. I stayed quiet, turning the proposal over in my head. I’d been aroused for a while, she was gorgeous, and two years of drought weighed more than all my principles. Lucía took advantage of the silence.

—Don’t think about it so much. I know you want to too. Let’s go to a motel. I promise I’ll make you come.

—But we barely know each other —I objected, without much conviction.

—That doesn’t matter. Stop denying what you feel.

And I let desire make the decisions, not my head. I said yes. The moment I did, she kissed me and squeezed my thighs with both hands.

***

In the room she grabbed the back of my neck and pulled me into her mouth. We kissed long, unhurriedly, and I liked that she wanted to start there, with the lips, before anything else. When she pulled away, she went straight to my neck, licking and sucking it while she stroked my back under my shirt.

She had heard every word I’d let slip in the bar and she was using it against me, to the letter. She traced my skin with the tips of her fingers, slowly, exactly as I’d told her I liked. I searched for her neck too and ran my wet tongue along it.

She took off my shirt, turned me around with my back to her, and kissed my shoulders, the nape of my neck, my spine. She unclipped my bra and, without stopping the kissing, took my breasts in her hands and started caressing them. Then she pushed me and I fell onto the bed, just as I had confessed I liked it. She climbed on top of me and went down to my nipples, sucking them, barely biting. I stretched out my hands, took off her shirt and bra, but she pushed me back down onto the mattress and returned to my neck.

—Do you like being here with me? —she murmured—. Do you like me running my tongue over you?

—A lot —I gasped—. I love your lips on my skin.

—You’re so hot I get turned on just looking at you. You can’t imagine what I feel when I touch you.

Everything she did made me hotter. She was focused on giving me pleasure, and every time I tried to sit up to wrap myself around her body, she overpowered me and put me back on the bed. And I let her, because that—being dominated like that—has always turned me on. She unbuttoned my pants and took them off, leaving me only in my underwear. She let saliva drip onto my nipples and sucked them while pressing with her fingers through the fabric. Saliva, sucking, pressure, bites, her hand on my neck, her mouth on mine. With every gesture she reminded me who was in control.

I took advantage of a moment when she sat up to unbutton her pants and pull them down. I pressed her against me and sucked her breasts; her nipples were swollen, taut, and that told me more than any words: she was as turned on as I was. I heard her moan while I slid my hand between her legs.

—Now you’re going to find out what it means to come —she warned me.

She took off my last garment and threw me back onto the bed. She kissed me with her hand between my legs, moved to my neck without stopping touching me, went back to my breasts, and from there started working her way down with her tongue. She spread my legs and began sucking my thighs, coming close and pulling away, pretending she was going to reach me and never quite doing it. I was dying for it, and she knew it, and dragged it out on purpose.

At that moment a thought flashed through me, the kind that passes in the blink of an eye: how much pleasure a complete stranger was giving me, how surrendered and dominated I was, opening my legs for someone I’d known for only a few hours. Far from embarrassing me, that idea turned me on even more.

And then, at last, her mouth reached where I wanted it. A soft kiss first, then her tongue running over me completely. She was right about her promise: I was coming like I couldn’t remember ever coming. After two years, I felt almost virgin again, and there was that stranger, breaking me in all over again, while I moaned out of control. Her fingers traced my belly and my breasts, always with the pads of her fingertips, without stopping sucking me. She took me to the edge and, from the edge, to orgasm, with her mouth pressed against me.

***

I pulled her by the head until I found her lips and kissed her. Now it was my turn to take the lead: I had an uncontrollable urge to explore her body and give everything back. I moved her aside, climbed on top of her, and started with her mouth, the way everything should begin. I caressed her breasts, sucked her neck—my God, how she moaned—and, just as she had made me wait, I decided to make her wait more. I went down to her feet, sucked her toes, the soles, and slowly made my way up her legs, over her thighs, until I got where I wanted.

I left not a single corner untouched by my tongue. She wouldn’t stop moaning and I was as turned on as before; now I had a stranger trembling under my mouth. Then I fingered her, slowly at first and then in rhythm, while I sucked her clit, sucking and releasing. My fingers going in and out, her body arching, her moans rising in pitch until she came with a cry that filled the room.

—Now get on top —she ordered, catching her breath—. Sit on my mouth.

I obeyed. She grabbed my hips and started rocking me over her tongue, setting the pace herself, sometimes stopping me with a squeeze so she could suck deeper and then pushing me again. Now the one who couldn’t stop moaning was me. What a way to make me come. And like that, rocking over her mouth, I came for the second time on top of her.

As if none of that had been enough, we pressed our bodies together. She ended up on top and started moving against me, hard and fast, nonstop, grabbing my head to kiss me while she ground herself. We were both moaning at once, lost, and after a good while we finished together, wrapped around each other, breathless.

—Did you like it? —she asked when we came back to earth.

—Do you doubt it, after hearing me moan like that?

—I don’t doubt it. I just want to hear you say it.

—In that case, I want you to know you took me to the clouds —I confessed.

That was when she told me the truth: that she had arrived late on purpose so we wouldn’t make it to the theater and would end up at the bar, because the moment she saw my photo she’d been dying to have me. I, who swore I wasn’t into casual sex, laughed against her shoulder. Sometimes the heart—or whatever runs the show on a night like that—knows more than the head.