Seduction

He came up behind my son with Bruno pressed against my back, holding my breath. I knew it was wrong, and that was exactly why I couldn’t stop.

When I opened the door to her at home, I knew that woman was going to ruin my night. I had no idea how far she’d take it—or where she’d end up on her knees in front of me.

The request came from a shy boy, my nephew’s friend. I took weeks to answer him and a month to admit I wanted him in my bed.

That Friday he got into the car with a suitcase and some boxes I didn’t understand. Inside wasn’t work: it was the gift that would finally let me be who I’d always been.

We weren’t planning anything that afternoon. But when he dropped his pants in front of me, I knew I was about to try something I’d never tried before.

She knew that every Thursday she hung the laundry at the same time. That morning I decided to step out wearing nothing at all, just to see her face. I didn’t expect her to smile like that.

When she told him she was “hanging in there,” Tino understood that word weighed the same as his own: years of cold sheets. And in the middle of the street, they decided to fix it.

I’d spent years swallowing her taunts and playing the patient friend. That August afternoon, on her balcony facing the sea, something inside me broke.

I never imagined that the elegant, serene woman who raised me was hiding, at two in the morning, another completely different woman on the living-room sofa.

The first time I walked into her apartment, I found a thong hanging in the shower, and I knew that food-for-hot-water deal was going to cost me far more than a few empanadas.

I went down to the living room half asleep and found her on the floor, in leggings, following a video. Then she turned her head, smiled, and asked if I wanted to join her.

He got two smiles out of me in one week, and I gave him my number. That afternoon, on the stairwell of his building, I showed him everything an experienced woman can do.

They thought they were paying a price for one night. Ariadna discovered something else: being in charge felt too good to ever go back.

I came thinking of Pilar, but it was her friend who slid the number across the table and told me, without beating around the bush, to call her as soon as I got home.

There were twenty photos and a video hidden in a folder with a single letter. I opened it expecting anything but what I was about to see.

When she handed me her card and told me to come hungry, I knew that woman wasn’t after conversation: she wanted someone who could keep up with her until dawn.

I knew it was dangerous to be alone with her in the boiler room, but when she tied my wrists to the wall and brushed my skin with her fangs, I didn’t want her to stop.

I invited him to teach me how to defend myself. By the time my father returned, my uncle would already have learned that one gesture from me was enough to put him on his knees.

I’ve always had a strange fixation. That afternoon I decided my best friend would be the first to obey me, on his knees and with nothing to hide.

She kept the card for weeks, telling herself she would never go. One Friday afternoon, for reasons she couldn’t explain, she put on her best dress and walked through that door.