What Happened in the Massage Tent in Santa Marta

I’m Carolina, a thirty-two-year-old architect from Bogotá. I’d spent months locked up between blueprints, endless meetings, and projects that weren’t moving forward, so when I finally approved my vacation I didn’t think twice: suitcase, plane, and three days on the coast so I wouldn’t have to listen to anyone. I chose Santa Marta because it’s far from everything that wears me out.

That afternoon I was wearing a white bikini I’d bought the night before in a downtown shop. I’d already gone swimming in the sea, I’d already had two cold beers, and I was lying face down on my towel, letting the sun dry my back. The beach was starting to empty out. Families were gathering their things, children were fighting over the last ice cream, and only a few scattered tourists remained, counting bills in the sun.

That was when she came over.

—Would you be interested in trying a massage, pretty lady? Five-minute sample, no commitment —she said, stopping in front of my towel with a broad smile.

I looked up at her. She was an Afro-Caribbean woman, tall, with a generous body. I guessed she was around forty. She had full breasts, wide hips, and a soft belly that showed beneath the yellow T-shirt with the national team crest on it. She was wearing short jean shorts cut with scissors and smelled of salt, coconut, and the sweat of a whole day under the sun. She wasn’t conventionally pretty, but there was something about the way she looked at me—direct, without asking permission—that made me nod before I’d even thought about it.

—Okay, let’s go.

—Follow me, doctora. I’ve got a little tent farther over where nobody will bother you.

I didn’t correct her about not being a doctor. I liked the way it sounded.

We walked about fifty meters along the shore, to behind an old wooden shack where she’d set up a small tent with two poles and a cotton sheet. From the front you could see the sea; from the back, the shack’s windowless wall. No one passed by. It was very well chosen.

—My name’s Yamilet —she said while spreading a clean towel on the sand—. Lie face down, make yourself comfortable. I work with coconut oil I prepare myself.

I untied the bikini string around my neck so it wouldn’t bother me and lay down. The oil was warm. Her hands were big, firm, and knew what they were doing. She started with my shoulders, worked down my back with slow pressure, and found every knot I’d been carrying for months. I closed my eyes without even noticing.

—You have a beautiful body, doctora —she said at some point, without stopping.

—Thanks.

—Really. I see a lot of bodies in this line of work and yours is one you want to take care of.

I didn’t know what to say. Her hands kept moving down, over my waist, my hips. When she got to my ass, right over the bikini, she pressed with her thumbs in a way that drew a gasp from me. I felt embarrassed to have made it so audible, and she noticed. She said nothing; she just kept going a couple more minutes, kneading my butt over the fabric, sliding her fingers right into the crease where my bikini was digging in, before speaking.

—Doctora, do you want to turn over? The full massage includes the front. If you want, you can take off the top; it’ll fit better that way.

I opened my eyes. I’d gotten into this without thinking, and now I had to decide. The tent was empty. She waited without pressing, with that same half-smile. I thought about my life in Bogotá: the boyfriend I’d wanted to leave for a year, Sunday lunches with my mother, the architecture studio where nobody had touched me affectionately in God knows how long.

—Okay —I said, and sat up for a second to take off the top as well before lying back down.

***

Yamilet didn’t say anything. She just settled beside me and started with my neck, my collarbones, my shoulders again from the front. She worked down to my sternum. When her hands cupped my breasts, they did it with the same professional firmness they’d used on my back, but something had changed. My nipples hardened at the first touch, and we both saw it. She swallowed. I tried to breathe normally.

She ran both palms over my chest again and again, drawing circles. She pinched my nipples between thumb and forefinger, first gently, then harder, until a short moan slipped out of me. She moved to my stomach, leaving a shiny trail of oil. My hips moved on their own, a tiny arch that gave me away.

—Doctora, what a sensitive body —she murmured.

—Do you always do the massage like this?

—Like what, pretty lady?

—Like this.

She gave a soft laugh.

—No. Almost never.

She fell silent for a moment and then added, with her hand already sliding dangerously close to the edge of my bikini:

—Do you want me to stop?

—No.

I said it without thinking. And as I said it, I realized it was the most honest thing I’d done on the whole trip.

—Sit up —she asked—. I’m going to work your back from behind.

I sat up with my legs crossed. She settled behind me, her knees on either side of my hips, her chest almost pressed to my back. Her hands returned to my neck, my shoulders, but now they went down to my breasts in front and stayed there longer than necessary, squeezing them whole, weighing them in her hands, playing with my nipples until they were hard as stones. I felt her breath against my ear. I also felt, despite myself, her nipples through her T-shirt pressing against my back.

One of her hands slid downward. It passed over my stomach, over my hip, found the edge of my bikini. It stopped there, waiting.

I opened my legs on my own.

—Pretty lady, pretty lady —she whispered, almost surprised—. Look at what you’re making me do.

Her finger slipped under the fabric and went straight to my cunt. It found me already wet, soaked, with swollen lips and a slick slit. She slid her middle finger between the folds, up and down, getting to know me, until she found my clit and stayed there, drawing tight circles with her fingertip.

—Damn, doctora, you’re dripping —she murmured against my ear—. You’re wetter than the sea.

I let my head fall back against her shoulder and spread my legs wider. She pushed one finger in. Then two. She buried them deep and started moving them with the same slow rhythm she’d used on my shoulders, curling them upward, searching for that spot inside that made me clamp my thighs around her hand. With her other hand she kept kneading one breast, pinching my nipple every time I trembled.

She kissed my neck, my jaw, my ear. I turned my face and found her mouth. Her lips were thick, tasted like salt. I bit her lower lip while her fingers kept going in and out of me, making a wet, obscene sound that filled the whole tent.

—I’m not the kind to go around touching women, doctora —she said between kisses, without stopping with her fingers—. I swear to my mama. I don’t know what got into me with you.

—Don’t keep calling me doctora —I murmured, voice breaking—. Carolina.

—Carolina —she repeated, and drove her fingers deeper—. Look at how I’ve got you, Carolina.

***

I took off her yellow T-shirt myself. She wasn’t wearing a bra underneath. Her breasts were huge and soft, with very dark, almost black nipples, thick as grapes. I took them both in my hands, weighed them, filled my mouth with one and sucked her nipple while squeezing the other between my fingers. She moaned loudly, threw her head back, and finished pulling my bikini bottom down in one yank. Then she took off her shorts, without coquettishness, with the haste of someone who realizes she has little time and a lot of desire. She wasn’t wearing anything else underneath either. Her cunt was wide, with dark, thick lips, the patch of black hair glossy with sweat.

The tent was small; we had to arrange ourselves by touch. She lay on her back on the towel and I sat astride her thick thigh. My cunt pressed against her warm skin and I started moving, rubbing myself, leaving a shiny trail of how wet I was. She grabbed my hips with both hands, setting the rhythm, forcing me to grind harder against her leg, looking at me without blinking.

—That’s it, baby, that’s it. Ride my leg like a filly. Let me feel how you’re soaking me.

I obeyed. I rubbed against her thigh until my clit burned, until her skin was sticky with me. I bent down and sucked her breasts again, bit her nipples carelessly this time, ran my tongue through the hollow between them. She slipped a hand between my legs and caressed me from behind, spread my butt cheeks, ran a finger along my ass until it made me moan.

I moved down her stomach with kisses, leaving marks of saliva. I found the smell of coconut mixed with something more intimate, that smell of a hot woman that rises in your nose and won’t let you think. I spread her thick thighs with both hands and stared at her open cunt, shiny, pulsing. I’d never done that. I’d never eaten anyone out. I lowered my mouth and ran my whole tongue over her, from bottom to top, sucking up all her juice. She let out a cry she had to swallow by biting her fist.

—Oh, Carolina, oh, don’t stop, don’t stop.

I sucked her clit, nibbled it, stuck my tongue inside as deep as I could. I grabbed her breasts from underneath while I went down on her, and she squeezed my head between her thighs, squeezed my neck with both hands, fucked my face.

—Wait —she panted suddenly, pulling my hair up—. Let’s do something. Come here.

She settled in front of me, legs open and tangled with mine, one on top and one underneath, until our cunts were pressed together, one against the other. She pushed her hips until they touched completely, wet against wet, clit against clit. It only took one movement for both of us to gasp at once.

—Now this is good —she said, eyes closed and mouth open—. This is called scissors, baby. Move your hips. Like that. Fuck me with it.

We moved like that, slowly at first, finding the angle, and then with more hunger, more force, grinding our cunts against each other as if we were going to fuse. Sand stuck to our backs, the heat inside the tent was heavy, and it smelled of oil, of sea, of cunt, and of the two of us. Every push of her hips made her clit press against mine and a jolt ran up my spine. She gripped my knee and started thrusting faster, growling low under her breath, her huge breasts swaying with the rhythm.

—Look at how I’m fucking you, doctora. Look at how I’m giving it to you.

Yamilet slipped a hand between us and found with two fingers the exact point where our clits met, squeezed them together, rubbed them. I leaned back, supported on my elbows, and looked at her: she was beautiful like that, shining with sweat, mouth parted and eyes half-lidded, the black mass of hair stuck to her forehead, her breasts bouncing with every thrust.

—I’m going to come —I warned her, voice trembling—. Yami, I’m going to come.

—Come on me, baby. Come all over me.

I came first. It was long, sustained, much stronger than I’d expected from a first time with a woman. I felt the orgasm rising from inside and exploding in my clit, my thighs clamped around her leg, my whole back arching. I screamed into my own hand so as not to alert anyone outside. She didn’t stop moving; she kept thrusting against me, rubbing herself on me while I trembled, until a few seconds later she followed, gripping my knee with a force that left a mark for two days, her whole body shaking and a gush of warm liquid soaking my thighs.

We stayed like that for a while, still pressed together, catching our breath, not quite knowing what to say to each other. I felt the throbbing of her cunt against mine slowly ebb away. Outside, the sea kept hitting the shore as if nothing had happened.

***

—How many days are you staying in Santa Marta? —she asked me when we were already getting dressed, laughing like two teenagers, our thighs still sticky.

—Three.

—Give me your number. I don’t leave the beach, but we can find another place. There’s a little hotel two blocks away where they don’t ask questions.

I gave it to her. She gave me hers, written on a crumpled piece of paper she kept in the pocket of her shorts.

We saw each other again two nights later, in the bathroom of that little hotel that smelled of disinfectant and may flowers. She locked the door and made me put my hands on the sink, with my back to her, my dress hiked up to my waist and my panties around my ankles. She looked at my ass in the mirror for a second, licked her fingers, spread my butt cheeks with both hands and buried her face between them. She ran her tongue over everything, over my cunt, over my ass, without disgust, eating me whole while I gripped the sink so I wouldn’t fall. Then she stood up, slid two fingers into my cunt from behind and fucked me like that, against the marble, biting my shoulder to cover her own moans, while with the other hand she pinched my clit until she made me come a second time that night. When she finished, she put her soaked fingers in her mouth and sucked them while looking me in the eye in the mirror. This time there was no oil and no massage. Just two women who had discovered something together and wanted more.

When I returned to Bogotá, I thought that would stay a vacation anecdote. But we kept talking. We send each other messages almost every night, photos when we feel brave, the occasional video call when heat beats caution and I end up with my fingers inside my cunt in front of the screen, biting my lip so the boyfriend in the next room won’t hear me. Last week I bought her a ticket so she can come see me.

My boyfriend still hasn’t found out. I don’t know how much longer this is going to last. But that afternoon in the tent, under hands that weren’t expecting to find any of that, I discovered something about myself that had been waiting for thirty-two years.

And I’m not giving it back.