Seduction

When I went into the kitchen she already had the lasagna in the oven and two glasses poured. I pressed her against the marble before she could set the dish down.

The drawer was jammed by a handwritten notebook. Inside were the most intimate pages of a stranger and his eight-year lover.

When I knelt in the sand with the sun beating on my back, I never imagined someone was watching every move from the other side of the crag.

I ordered a piña colada at the beach bar, and the waiter brought it with a smile. By the second day, I knew his service went far beyond the bar.

The first client asked me for something that wasn’t in my contract. When I went back to the room, Salvador was breathing like he’d been awake for hours.

We started talking by messages. We ended up seeing each other naked under the same red moon, each in our own city, each with the other’s breath on the screen.

I stopped in the hallway with my hand in the air. The sighs coming from my sister’s room wouldn’t let me knock or turn back.

Her boyfriend played with his phone a meter away while she left the fitting-room curtain half open and, every time she undressed, checked that I was still there.

Four years ago, her mother walked in just in time to stop the sin. This time, with everyone gone and the band booming below, no one was opening that door.

When he turned around in that little town store, I thought he was a woman. He wore white jeans, painted nails, and a secret I wouldn’t discover until we were stranded on the road.

I opened the door expecting dinner and found a slight girl with red-painted nails and a smile that said much more than “good evening.”

Her white nightgown barely covered her thighs, and I knew that night I would unbutton it all, one button at a time, in silence.

I rarely send photos: it’s dangerous. But that boy made me feel safe, and between black stockings and midnight messages I became the star of his best fantasy.

I thought the bathroom would be empty. Carolina was standing at the mirror, and her gaze wasn’t surprised: it was the gaze of someone who knew exactly what I had just done.

I thought I’d put her in her place. That afternoon, as I came out of the bathroom, I heard a zipper coming down behind the half-open office door.

That night I put on the skirt, stockings, and heels I kept hidden in the wardrobe. I didn’t know that someone had been watching from across the landing.

Caro was six years older than me, had a life that looked perfect, and a secret she thought she’d take to the grave. That night she decided she couldn’t hide anymore.

Marina left the phone book open to the letter C. I was only going to talk about my bedroom problem, but that first appointment didn’t end as anyone would have imagined.

When I took off my bikini top in front of Carolina, her face changed. And then I knew I wasn’t leaving the beach that afternoon as just her friend.