The Foreman Didn’t Know I Was Listening

A little over a year ago I finished my degree and became a licensed architect. My plan was to dedicate myself to interior design, to pretty houses and glossy magazine spreads. But the dream job never showed up anywhere, and I ended up where a lot of people end up: at a construction company, supervising job sites. It’s a technical trade, noisy, full of dust and men twice my age. It isn’t what I imagined at twenty-four. But it is what it is, and I learned to like it in my own way.

Before this, I had done a long internship restoring an old building, surrounded by old master builders who taught me more than any professor ever did. That left me with a strange, almost guilty taste for older men. For their confidence, their calm, for those hands covered in marks and history. I brought that taste with me to the job site without even inviting it.

The ones in charge on a construction site are usually over fifty. Sometimes, when one of them explains something to me, pointing at a blueprint with his thick finger, I find myself staring at those hands longer than I should. I remember other hands. I blush and turn my face toward the scaffolding. It’s a secret pulse I shut down at once, before it can give me away. Here I’m the professional, the one who signs off, the one who decides. Or so I thought.

At the site everyone eats lunch at noon, each crew in its own corner. I usually eat off to the side, with my packed lunch and my phone. The masonry foreman, a man of about fifty-eight whom everyone called Honorio, always ate with his men, far away.

One afternoon I needed to confirm a detail with him in the house we were finishing. Work had been paused because of a material delivery. I thought the place would be empty.

I heard him before I saw him. His deep voice was coming from one of the back rooms.

—...the new architect, yes, that one.

I froze against the hallway wall, the plans pressed tight to my chest.

—You watch her a lot, Honorio? —another man asked—. You like her?

There was a brief silence. Then his voice, blunt and direct.

—Of course I like her. My dick gets hard every time I see her walk by. I’d fuck her up against the first wall I could find.

—But she’s a girl, Honorio. And on top of that, she’s the boss —the other man said.

—I know. That’s why I keep my mouth shut. But nothing gets rid of the urge to shove it in her deep. I close my eyes at night and I see her with her legs open, begging for it.

I took a step back and my shoe scraped the concrete. The voices cut off at once. I backed away quickly, almost on tiptoe, my heart pounding in my throat.

Most women, hearing a man like that—older, talking about them that way—would be disgusted. Not me. I got hot. Immediately, without warning. It wasn’t Honorio himself, but what I heard. The naked rawness of his words. That lit me up all at once, as if someone had opened a valve.

Looking at him from a distance, I never saw him as attractive, or as a real possibility. But knowing I could wake that up in someone like him, a desire so basic, so unvarnished, made my blood boil. It was pure ego mixed with kink. A dangerous combination.

That night what had to happen happened. I got into the shower with my body taut from hours of tension. As soon as the hot water hit the back of my neck, I pressed my forehead to the tiles and let my hand drift down on its own. I was already soaked, and it wasn’t from the water. I spread my pussy with two fingers and found my clit swollen, throbbing as if it had a life of its own. I started rubbing it in slow circles, grinding my teeth, while I repeated every one of his phrases in my head. “I’d fuck her up against the first wall I could find.” “I see her with her legs open.” His rough voice scraped me from the inside.

I shoved the middle finger of my other hand into my mouth, sucked it well, and took it down, wet with saliva, to sink it into my cunt. Then the index finger too. I curved them, searching for that spot only I know how to find, while my other hand kept punishing my clit harder and harder. I imagined it was him, with those thick, rough mason’s fingers, shoving them into me carelessly, as if he had the right. I felt the walls of my pussy tighten on their own around my fingers, dripping. In two minutes I came standing up, biting my lip so I wouldn’t scream, my knees trembling and a warm stream running down the inside of my thigh. It was fast, intense, filthy. And I knew, while I caught my breath against the tiles, that I was going to want more.

***

A few days passed. But I needed to hear him again. I started looking for him without fully admitting it to myself. At every opportunity, when the crew was eating lunch, I found a reason to be nearby: checking a joint, measuring an opening, inspecting an installation just on the other side of the wall where they were eating.

Most of the time they didn’t say anything interesting. They talked about football, family, the heat. But when they talked about me, it was like holding a match to gasoline.

—Did you see the architect today? With those light-colored pants...

—Everything shows through her, even the line of her ass. When she bends over to measure, the fabric opens up and you can make out her panties. Give me a break.

—I’d lick her pussy for an hour without taking my tongue out.

Hidden on the other side, I’d blush and get wet at the same time. I held my breath, waiting for the other voice to drop in, the one that really mattered to me.

Sometimes Honorio cut them off.

—Don’t stare so much, boys. It’s disrespectful.

But other times, after a long silence, he was the one who let loose the comment that left me breathless.

—Those pants do her justice, all right. She’s got a perky ass, round, one of those you grab with both hands while you fuck her from behind. And those firm tits that bounce under her T-shirt when she walks. I’d eat her whole, starting with her pussy and ending inside her ass.

I listened and felt my skin burn. It was as if I were being stripped right there, in broad daylight, without a finger laid on me. And instead of making me angry, it made me want more. More listening, more stolen phrases.

I don’t know if that made me a voyeur, or something that doesn’t even have a name. But I was fascinated. Crouched behind an unplastered partition, pulse racing, hanging on every crude word. Every comment about how my clothes clung to me was a direct hit, precise, right to the center of my pussy.

And at night, in my bed, that was perfect fuel. I’d lie on my back, naked, legs open and knees fallen outward, and touch myself thinking of him. My nipples would harden on their own just from repeating “I’d eat her whole.” I’d pinch one with my left hand while my right worked my clit, first with the pad of a finger, then with two fingers spread in a V, pressing from the sides. I’d slide three fingers into my cunt and pull them out shining, then push them back in faster and faster, until the wet sound filled the room. I imagined his hard cock entering me without warning, the dick of a man who’s out of patience, who drives all the way in and makes me hurt a little. I came with my pillow in my teeth and the sheets soaked under my ass. It was a circle I didn’t want to leave. I was getting addicted, and I knew it.

***

The days kept going by without anything concrete happening between us. Until that Friday, at quitting time. The site looked empty, the staff cars were gone. I went back into one of the houses to get my laser level, which I had left behind on a shelf.

But I wasn’t alone. Voices could be heard downstairs. Two of them. I recognized Honorio’s deep one right away, and another younger one, an assistant’s.

I stopped on the stair landing, hidden by the shadow of the half-finished wall. I was about to announce myself, to cough so they’d know I was there. But then I heard my name.

—...Daniela, the architect, boss.

—What about her? —Honorio replied calmly.

—You know what. We all see it. You look at her too much, boss. It’s obvious you strip her with your eyes.

There was a thick, charged silence. Then Honorio spoke, and this time there was no restraint at all.

—I look at what needs looking at. A woman like that, right in the middle of this mess of concrete and iron, is a miracle. She’s got a fine body, the kind the clothes outline all over. Those pants paint a ass that’s begging to be grabbed with both hands and have a dick driven into it in one thrust.

I felt my legs weaken. I gripped the cold railing, not daring to breathe.

—And what would you do, boss, if you got the chance?

The answer came without a second’s hesitation, as if he’d been rehearsing it for months.

—First I’d grab her by the nape and shove my tongue down her throat so she knows who’s in charge. Then I’d put her against the wall, pull those pants and panties down in one yank, and kick her legs apart. I’d kneel behind her and bury my face in her cunt until my beard was dripping, lick her clit until she came screaming in my mouth. Only then would I pull my dick out, run it over her pussy lips, and shove it in all the way in one push, without warning. I’d fuck her against the cold wall, holding her by the hair, until neither one of us could speak. And when she couldn’t take any more, I’d turn her around, bend her over a plank and put my dick in her ass, slow at first and then rough as hell, to blow it wide open. And I’d come inside her, deep, jets of hot cum, so she’d carry my seed all weekend, leaking into her panties.

The silence that followed was total. I couldn’t swallow. A spasm of desire so brutal ran through me from head to toe that I had to clamp my thighs together with all my strength to keep from making a sound. I felt a rush of warm fluid running down between my legs, soaking my panties in seconds.

—Just a dream, that’s all —Honorio concluded with a sigh—. Come on, it’s late and we need to lock up.

I heard their footsteps cross the floor and leave. I stayed on the stairs, trembling, the echo of his words burning inside me. “I come inside her. Deep. Jets of hot cum.”

***

I couldn’t take it. Right there, in the empty, dark site. I sat on one of the freezing concrete steps and pulled my pants down to my knees. My panties were glued to my pussy, translucent with how wet they were. I shifted them aside with two fingers and felt the cold air hit my swollen, slick lips.

I didn’t think. I just acted. I shoved two fingers in at once, all the way to the knuckles. It was abrupt, almost violent, it hurt a little, but it was exactly what I needed. I pulled them out dripping and ran them over my clit, drawing quick, tight circles. Then I pushed them in again, three this time, opening myself wide. With my other hand I jerked my T-shirt and bra up in one pull, grabbed a breast and pinched the nipple until pain sparked through me.

I closed my eyes and he was there, in my head, with those rough hands gripping my waist, with that thick veined cock entering me without permission. I panted, imagining the hard rhythm he would have used, how he would have pushed my face against the concrete while he slammed into me to the hilt, how he would have called me “whore” in my ear while he came. I worked my fingers in and out to the beat of that imagined pounding, faster and faster, until the wet sound echoed off the empty walls of the house.

With the middle finger of my other hand I searched for the other hole. I wet it with my own fluid and started sinking it into my ass, slowly, while the other two stayed inside my cunt. I’d never done that to myself before, but I remembered the part where he bent me over the plank and I wanted to feel it. When the finger went all the way in, my legs trembled.

And in the middle of that fantasy, a thought flashed through me like lightning: I would have liked for him to come in and see me. To find me like that, with my pants down, my T-shirt up over my tits, three fingers in my cunt and one in my ass, dripping on the steps, lost in a pleasure he himself had provoked without knowing it. To grab me by the hair and finish fucking me himself, right there.

That thought, forbidden and electric, sped everything up. My movements turned frantic, my hand was slamming itself against my pubic bone, fingers going in and out with an obscene slosh. A muffled moan escaped between my teeth, then another, longer one, and the orgasm hit me, huge and solitary, in that corner of concrete. I felt my cunt closing in spasms around my fingers, strong, repeated contractions, while I bit my forearm so I wouldn’t scream his name in the empty house.

I was left gasping, forehead against the railing, fingers still inside, not daring to pull them out. Shame came later, but it arrived mixed with a new fantasy, even more dangerous: having been seen. In that instant I knew that listening in secret would no longer be enough. A part of me now wanted him to look.

***

The following week, on Monday, I noticed he was gone the moment I came through the gate. By Tuesday it was certain: Honorio wasn’t coming back. He’d been moved to another site on the other side of the city. Another foreman took his place, younger, quieter.

At first I kept listening to the others, waiting for the same punch to the chest. But it wasn’t the same. The voices were different, the comments flat, without that rough authority that set me on fire. The tension was gone. I stopped hiding behind the partitions.

Without that adrenaline, something inside me went looking for another way to feel the same thing. Almost without noticing, I started trying the other side. Small things, at first: a slightly lower neckline, bending a certain way right where I knew some man might catch a glimpse of the line between my breasts, letting a gaze linger on my ass a second too long. Feeling those eyes on my body, imagining what they were thinking of doing to me, became the perfect substitute.

Work went on, the days became alike. Little by little, Honorio’s absence stopped being a hole and became just something that happened, a strange season of my life. But the kink he awakened in me never left. It just changed shape. And every time I enter an empty job site, I still prick up my ears, just in case, waiting for a deep voice to tell me how he’d fuck me against the wall. A voice that isn’t coming back.