The Older Man in the Bathroom Finished What Another Couldn’t

Months have passed since that afternoon by the pool and, although the pain in my body faded like a bad dream, the other thing still keeps circling inside my head. I’m thirty-four and I have a body that has never asked me permission for anything: dark wavy hair, wide hips, curves that attract looks that make me both uncomfortable and emboldened. I’ve tried to forget it, I really have, but there are nights when I wake with my skin burning and the sheet stuck to my thighs, and then he comes back. His rough hands, his hoarse voice telling me things in my ear, the brutal way he took me. It infuriates me that I desire him. My body, on the other hand, has no objections at all.

This weekend, Noelia and Sabrina practically dragged me out of the village. “You need some air, Carolina,” Noelia said with that unstoppable energy of hers, her dyed blonde mane falling over her shoulders. Sabrina, quieter, with brown skin and green eyes that seem to read you from the inside, only nodded: “The city will do you good.”

We rented a small apartment in the Gràcia neighborhood, in Barcelona. Flaking walls, the smell of burnt coffee and old tobacco trapped in the curtains, a place that smelled of long nights and people who don’t think about tomorrow. The train ride was pure scandal: laughter too loud, a bottle of cheap wine that stained our lips red, half-finished confessions amid the rattling. I told them softened versions of my stories, bragged about “some guy who drove me crazy” with invented details, but I kept to myself what really burns inside me.

***

On Saturday night the plan was a huge nightclub near the harbor, Eden. The taxi dropped us off at the entrance, beneath a flickering neon sign, and the bass could be felt from the sidewalk, thudding against the chest. The air inside was thick: sweet smoke, mixed perfumes, the sweat of hundreds of bodies searching for each other with their eyes. I’d put on a thin striped top that clung to me, an open beige jacket, and a short, frayed denim skirt. With every step I could feel the air brushing my skin and the fabric tightening where it shouldn’t.

Noelia wore a plunging top that barely contained her breasts; Sabrina, a tight jumpsuit that traced her gym-toned body. We toasted with tequila shots, the burn sliding down my throat and the lime stinging my lips, and the three of us threw ourselves onto the dance floor together, shoulder to shoulder, already sweating to the first songs.

I danced with my eyes closed, letting the rhythm sink into my blood. My skirt rode up with every turn, sweat glued the fabric to my back, and I could feel the gazes sliding over me: men with dilated pupils, women who judged or envied. It made me feel exposed and, at the same time, like I owned something. Noelia and Sabrina got lost in the crowd, flirting with a group of guys, and I let myself be carried away alone, my hips turning in slow circles.

Then I saw him. Tall, blond, with blue eyes shining under the spotlights, cutting through the crowd as if it parted for him. Nearly two meters tall, broad shoulders, a white shirt half open over a bronzed chest. His smile was the kind that belonged to someone used to getting his own way. He came closer slowly, and a citrus cologne scent mixed with the heat of the dance floor.

—Dancing alone? —he shouted over the music, his breath brushing my neck.

I smiled in my own way, leaning toward him.

—For now.

We moved together, his hands on my waist at once, big and firm, guiding me with a possessive touch I liked more than I expected. He pressed his body to mine and I felt his erection growing against my belly, though I noticed, with a certain strangeness, that it was small, a weird contrast with his size. Even so, his heat seeped through the jeans and was enough to make my heart race. He kissed my neck, nibbled my ear.

—Fuck, what a body you’ve got —he murmured—. You’re driving me crazy.

From far away, my friends winked at me. The alcohol hummed in my head and, for a while, the past fell silent. I wanted this: a stranger, no names, no future. Pleasure and nothing more.

—Come with me —he whispered—. To somewhere quieter.

He took my hand and led me toward the bathrooms, down a corridor lit in red, the floor sticky with spilled drinks, the air full of other people’s gasps. He pushed open the first door and we both froze.

***

Inside was a young girl, with short brown hair, bent against the wall with her leggings pulled down to her ankles. Behind her, a mature man of about sixty, weathered skin and sparse gray hair, was pounding into her with a fury that left me breathless. The wet sound of bodies colliding filled the tiny room like a drum, and she moaned with her hands against the tiles, her body arched, oblivious to the fact that we were watching.

The blond and I looked at each other for a second, desire lit in our eyes, and without saying a word we went into the adjoining bathroom, empty. He shut the door with a click. His hands flew up my shirt in a hurry, his fingers pinched my nipples, and he kissed me hungrily, tasting of tequila. He turned me against the cold wall, pulled my clothes down, spat in his hand, and entered me.

And then it came back, without asking permission, that afternoon at the pool. I couldn’t help comparing them. The blond was soft, almost shy, barely a touch that left me wanting more, like a breeze that dies before it reaches you. The mature man in my memory, on the other hand, had been a gale, had filled every empty space in me until he made me tremble. While this gorgeous guy moved inside me with barely any touch, my mind was somewhere else.

—You’re so hot —he gasped, kneading my hips—. I want to feel you shaking.

No one shook. He came quickly, with a muffled groan, and tugged his jeans back on with a satisfied smile that matched nothing I was feeling. He left and abandoned me there, frustrated, with my body half-lit and my head full of the other one, the real one, the one whose memory still burned me.

***

I should have left. Instead, I stayed, listening to the noises still coming from the neighboring bathroom. Curiosity pushed me up to the crack in the half-open door. The brown-haired girl was still against the wall, and the mature man was dominating her with a ferocity I had never seen up close, his huge hands marking her hips, his whole body surrendered to a brutal rhythm. I felt heat rising inside me again, this time for real, while I spied on them without daring to breathe.

Suddenly, she shuddered in a loud orgasm, her hands sliding on the tiles.

—I’m coming! —she shouted, her voice broken.

And as soon as it was over, she pulled away from him in a hurry, yanked her clothes up with clumsy fingers, and left almost running, without looking back, leaving him stranded in the middle of his desire. I stepped back too late. When I opened the door to escape, I collided with him head-on.

His dark eyes pinned me in place. He smelled of sweat and night, and there was something in the way he looked at me, unhurried, utterly certain, that reminded me of the other one in a way that made my legs weak.

—You —he said, in a deep voice that brooked no argument—. You’re going to finish what she left unfinished.

—I don’t know if I can —I murmured, and it was true: I had never done anything like this. Fear and filthy curiosity twisted together in my chest.

He didn’t give me time to think. He took my wrist firmly, not violently but without hesitation, and made me go in. He held my gaze for a moment, as if giving me one last chance to leave, and I didn’t take it. I knelt down on my own onto the cold floor, surprised by my own hunger.

What came after was unlike anything I had ever lived through. I took him clumsily at first, shamelessly afterward, letting instinct carry me, the salty taste, the way he growled and gripped my hair with one hand, setting a rhythm I followed without resisting. He wasn’t the pretty boy from the dance floor. He was someone who knew exactly what he wanted, and that certainty dragged me just as surely as the memory of the pool had.

—Good girl —he murmured, breathing hard.

And then what I hadn’t expected happened: I came, without anyone touching me, just from what I was doing and from everything it stirred inside me. Dirty, brutal pleasure went through me from top to bottom and left me trembling against the bathroom floor, dizzy, panting, my knees cold and my head spinning. He held on a moment longer and then pulled away, adjusting his clothes with a calm that made me feel small.

—Take care —was the only thing he said before leaving.

***

I got up unsteadily, cleaned myself up, looked at myself in the fogged mirror, and barely recognized myself. I left the bathroom with shaky legs and my head in a mess. When I got back to the dance floor, among the crowd and the lights, I ran into the brown-haired girl. She was talking to a guy who seemed to be her boyfriend, laughing, touching his arm as if nothing had happened, though she was walking with a slight limp and adjusting her clothes in a way only I would understand. I had the feeling she wasn’t going to tell anyone what had happened in the bathroom. The same went for me.

I found Noelia and Sabrina near the bar, euphoric, with no idea of anything. In the taxi back, while they shouted about the guys from the night, I sat in silence with my forehead against the cold glass, watching the streetlights pass by. Another softened version was waiting for me when they asked. But inside, the whole night was still beating, untouched, and with it the same question as always, the one I don’t know if I want to answer.

Was this healing me, or just another way of never stopping wanting him?