Oral

My friends were strolling past the display windows laughing. I stopped in front of hers and, by the way she looked back at me, I knew that night wasn’t for them.

I climbed into a van full of foreign guys without thinking twice. My boyfriend would be back from the supermarket in ten minutes. I only needed one.

When the referee blew the final whistle, I knew there was no turning back: I’d have to pay up on the bet in front of my friend, right at the bar.

I climbed onto the chair in front of the mirror, legs in the air for the photos my girlfriend asked for. I didn’t expect him to walk in, or what came after.

I told the guys at the bar I liked men and, without meaning to, opened a door I couldn’t close. That same night, someone followed me into the bathroom.

We’d sworn the playroom would be oral sex only. We hadn’t counted on the man next to us watching—or on his wife’s hands on my back.

When she leaned in to say goodbye at the door, her mouth found mine and everything I’d buried for years came rushing back.

He’d asked that no one in the building see him. When she locked the door and pressed her back to the wood, she was already trembling in his hands.

When I put my hand on his chest and didn’t take it away, I knew that afternoon wasn’t going to end like the others. He was twice my age and smelled like cold beer.

I wanted people to watch her. To devour her with their eyes. What I didn’t expect was that one of the strangers in the back would dare to chase her into the showers.

Camila whispered in the elevator that she wasn’t wearing anything underneath. When Diego opened the door, I knew the afternoon was about to spiral out of control.

I thought nothing could be worse than letting him drive me home. Until he shut the apartment door and I put my bag on the couch.

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.

My mother had sent me to ask her for a couple of eggs. Doña Marisol opened the door in a robe, her hair still wet, and looked at me in a way I would never forget.

I ripped the dress, tossed a shoe, and rubbed my thighs until they were red. When I called him crying from the phone booth, I knew he’d come without thinking.

I went to the bathroom on a night with no electricity, convinced I was alone in the house. A phone light lit up the kitchen and I understood why the two of them had been acting so strange.

We happened to meet in the elevator by chance. She was carrying boxes and I had my hands free. I agreed to help her without knowing that storage room would close with both of us inside.

I got out of the taxi half a block from the hotel, as always. The receptionist no longer asked my name: she handed me the key to 304 without looking at me.

Our eyes met in the service-area café. I knew he’d follow me into the bathroom, and I knew I wasn’t coming out the same man who went in.