The Venezuelan Woman at the Imperial Chose Me in Broad Daylight

Madrid in May is treacherous. The midday sun falls on the back of your neck like a warm iron, and by afternoon the air suddenly turns cold when the breeze runs down the Castellana. I was walking without any real destination, with coffee still stuck to my tongue and my T-shirt damp from the long morning in Lavapiés.

I saw her come out of the Hotel Imperial as if the whole street slowed down for a second to let her pass. The beige linen dress clung to her in the places where the heat had already begun to dampen the fabric. She wore huge sunglasses and an expensive perfume, a thick blend of vanilla, jasmine, and something woody that spread around her like a cloud. When she stopped in front of the Loewe window, the sun lit up the shine of her collarbone.

She was nearing fifty, light brown skin, generous curves that no dress cut had any intention of hiding. She walked slowly, aware of every step, with that confidence only years can give you and having long since stopped needing to be liked by anyone. She was a woman who had nothing left to prove, and precisely because of that it was impossible to look away.

I went over. Her perfume hit me harder when I was a meter away.

“Sorry to speak to you so directly,” I said to her, in a low voice, just for her, “but it’s impossible to walk past you without forgetting even my own name.”

She turned slowly. She lowered her sunglasses a little. Her eyes were dark, with small wrinkles at the corners that deepened when she smiled. The laugh came out husky, with a hint of smoke and long afternoons.

“And are you one of those who just toss out the compliment and go home,” she asked, “or one of those who then invite you for a drink and tell you what they’d really do?”

I handed her my card. When she took it, her wine-colored nails brushed my fingers. Her skin was warm, slightly damp from the heat.

“Renata,” she said, holding out her hand. “And yes, I’m curious. Very. My daughter and her husband are going up to the mountains with the kid the day after tomorrow. I’ll be alone in the suite. If you want, come by Thursday night. But come hungry, okay? It’s been a long time since I satisfied this kind of appetite.”

She winked at me and walked away. The sway of her hips left a trail of perfume in the air and the faint crackle of linen against skin.

***

On Thursday, at seven thirty, the message arrived:

“Better not wait until night. Come now to Gran Vía. I want to start playing before we go up. Wear something that comes off fast. Meet me in front of the boutique on the corner.”

When I arrived, the air already smelled of the first hint of night: cigarette smoke, perfume from women heading out to dinner, the sticky sweetness of a churros stand. Renata was waiting in a tight black dress that clung to every curve. The neckline showed lace struggling against her warm flesh. When she came closer, her perfume mixed with a more intimate scent, more animal.

“Come here,” she whispered. Her breath smelled of mint and white wine. “Walk with me. And don’t stray.”

She grabbed my arm and we set off up Gran Vía, among the people going in and out of the cinemas and theaters. Every time we reached a darker stretch, behind a column or near a closed doorway, she stopped, pretended to look in a shop window, and pressed my hand against her waist with hers. I felt the heat of her body through the fabric, the slight tremor of her breathing when someone passed too close.

“Aren’t you ashamed?” I asked, half-seriously.

“I left shame in another decade,” she replied without looking at me, her eyes fixed on a mannequin in the window. “At your age, people worry about what others think. At mine, you learn that nobody is looking as much as they believe. And when they do look, even better: let them be left wanting to know.”

There was something magnetic about that calm of hers. It wasn’t the nervous shyness of a first date or the clumsy urgency of youth. It was a woman who knew exactly what each of her gestures was worth and managed them like someone dealing out marked cards. I, who thought I was experienced, suddenly felt like an amateur next to a professional of desire.

“This is what I like,” she said, laughing softly, her husky voice vibrating beside my ear. “Being seen without them knowing anything. You looking at me as if we were the only ones in the street.”

Near the Imperial entrance, she bent down as if to fasten her sandal. I moved up behind her for an instant, just enough to feel the heat radiating from her body. A group of tourists passed a meter away, laughing loudly, oblivious to everything. My heart was pounding in my ears.

“Fuck, Renata,” I muttered. “They’ll see us.”

“That’s the point, sweetheart,” she answered. “Come upstairs with me. I’m tired of the street.”

***

The suite smelled of clean sheets and her perfume. The city lights came in through the floor-to-ceiling window, orange, drawing long lines across the bed. She closed the door with her back and pushed me against the wall.

“Take off my dress,” she said. “I want you to see me whole before you touch me.”

I pulled the zipper down slowly. The dress fell to the floor with a whisper. I looked at her unhurriedly, tracing every curve with my eyes, and saw her breathing change under the weight of being watched. She had the body of a woman who has lived, generous, warm, made for touch and not for the camera.

“My husband,” she said softly, “touches me as if I were made of glass. As if he were going to break me. I don’t want to be treated like that.”

“And how do you want to be treated?” I asked.

“Hungrily.”

I kissed her. It wasn’t a soft kiss: it was one of those that make it clear what comes next. I held the back of her neck with one hand and with the other ran down her back to the low curve of her waist. She moaned into my mouth, a deep sound that vibrated in my chest, and dug her nails into my shoulders.

“Slowly,” she murmured, pulling back just enough, her lips still brushing mine. “The good stuff isn’t devoured. The good stuff is savored. Do I have to teach you that too?”

Teach me whatever she wants, I thought. I’d stay and learn until Sunday.

I took her to the edge of the bed and sat her down. I knelt in front of her, parted her knees, and kissed the inside of her thighs, slowly, working my way up. Her skin smelled of perfume and something deeper, salty and hot. When I got where I wanted to get, I felt her whole body tense and her breath slip out between her teeth.

“Like that,” she whispered, burying her fingers in my hair. “Don’t stop.”

I worked her with my tongue, slow at first, reading every tremor, every change in her breathing. She pushed her hips against my mouth, less and less discreetly each time, until she stopped pretending to control anything. She came trembling all over, with a husky moan she bit down against her own arm so it wouldn’t be heard on the other side of the hallway.

“Come here,” she said, panting, pulling me by the arm. “Now I want you.”

***

She knelt on the carpet and lowered my zipper with a calm that contrasted with the urgency from before. She wasn’t in a hurry. She was savoring the moment, the control, knowing exactly what she was doing. She looked up at me with that smile of a woman who has learned not to be ashamed of anything, and set about driving me crazy with deliberate patience.

“Don’t come yet,” she murmured, pulling away for a second. “I want you to hold out. I want the bed.”

I lifted her and laid her down. The mattress creaked under her weight. I opened her legs and sank into her in one go. Renata arched her back and let out a long moan, clinging to the sheets.

“Finally,” she gasped. “Finally someone who doesn’t treat me like a grandmother.”

I thrust hard, slowly at first, reading her rhythm, and then without mercy once she herself began asking for more. The sound of our bodies filled the suite, mixed with her ragged breathing and the broken words that escaped against my ear. Her nails were dug into my back and her legs were locked around my waist, as if she were afraid I might stop.

“Don’t stay still,” she ordered. “More. I want to feel it tomorrow.”

I turned her and put her on her knees, with her back to me, and took her like that, one firm hand on her hip and the other on her neck. She pushed back, searching for me, setting her own rhythm. Sweat ran down her back and glistened in the orange light from the window.

Then she climbed on top of me. The weight of her body on mine, her hands braced on my chest, her hips moving with a confidence only years can give. She looked me in the eyes while she rocked, not once looking away, as if she wanted to make sure I didn’t miss a thing.

“Look at me,” she said. “I want you to remember this face.”

She came again like that, on top of me, trembling, her head thrown back and a moan she no longer bothered to hide. I couldn’t hold out much longer. I came with her still moving, gripping her hips, and she collapsed onto my chest, sweaty, laughing softly against my neck.

***

We stayed wrapped around each other in the dimness, smelling of expensive perfume and sated desire, while the city kept sounding beyond the glass.

“Do you know the best thing about being my age?” she asked after a while, tracing circles on my chest with a fingernail.

“What?”

“That I don’t waste time anymore. I know what I want, I know how to ask for it, and I know when they give it to me properly.” She lifted her head and looked at me with that husky smile. “And you gave it to me properly.”

I laughed. She stretched out to reach the wine glass on the bedside table, took a sip, and handed it to me.

“My family comes back on Sunday,” she said. “You have until then to prove to me the street wasn’t the only thing you knew how to do.”

I drank, gave her back the glass, and pulled her toward me again. Outside, Madrid kept burning bright. Inside, Renata—fifty-something, newly discovering her own hunger—already had other plans, and I couldn’t think of a better place to spend the next three days.