Mature

Her white T-shirt soaked with sweat, her nipples pressing through the fabric, and the question thrown between two glasses of wine: is what they say about you and Lucía true?

I’d only been in the alley for a month when I was put in charge of the punch with house 207. I didn’t expect the woman who opened the door and her husband to change my idea of desire that very night.

I was her assistant. We worked twelve hours a day. That night, barefoot on her sofa, she looked at me like never before, and I knew something had changed forever.

I swear that when I got on that plane all I could think about was closing the deal. I never imagined that night would be the one where I lost myself and us.

I’d spent half my life with the same woman when that stranger in leopard print sat beside me and looked at me the way no one had in years.

I set the cup on the bedside table, knelt beside the bed, and understood that that morning nothing in this house would ever be the same again.

I was eighteen and had never been with anyone. My mother’s aunt ended up sleeping beside me that night, and everything I thought I knew about desire broke in silence.

Lucía never told that part. That Thursday she dressed the only way she knew how and made sure that virgin nephew wouldn’t leave without leaving something inside her.

When I went barefoot to the kitchen at three in the morning, my son was already there shirtless, looking at me like a man, not a boy, and I knew I’d give in that night.

Tomás watched her from the living room with a calm that was anything but innocent. Lorena knew it. And instead of ignoring him, she kept cooking without stepping away.

Sandra took the wine bottles, looked at me, and whispered: “It’s going to be needed, trust me.” Her smile was the kind that already knows how the night will end.

I arrived with my recorder and my questions ready. She welcomed me with a cup of coffee and a smile that was not exactly professional.

When she turned off the hallway lights and closed the door, I understood we weren’t going to talk about my record. Something had changed in the office.

The August heat crushed the block’s courtyard and Adrián couldn’t tear his eyes from the window across the way. Mrs. Valverde didn’t know she was being watched.

Rodrigo held her hips during their workouts and she pretended not to notice his erection. When she found her panties in his room, she could no longer ignore what was happening.

He’d been waiting for me for years and I didn’t know it until it was already too late. When he confessed at the end, I understood why everything had felt so different.

I was eighteen and had no experience. She had a husband, a daughter in my class, and the skill to keep me from sleeping since the first day.

I took the elevator in heels and a wig, praying I wouldn’t run into anyone. He opened the door in a robe and called me a slut before I even said hello.

When I went down the stairs naked, my sister-in-law still had no idea what kind of surprise my father-in-law had prepared for her that night.

When she told me she was into me, I didn’t believe her. Then came the message with the hotel name and the exact time. I knew it was real.