Strangers

I took an empty shot glass with me when I left the dance floor. I didn’t even understand why, until we were alone in his car and I knew exactly what I was going to do with it.

I went into that hotel just to dry my clothes. I left hours later with weak knees and a secret I’ve been carrying ever since.

I wrote to half a dozen girls asking for the same thing. Only one replied, and that afternoon, in a shopping center bathroom, I discovered something I didn’t expect.

By day she had an ordinary name and practical steps. By night, under red lights, she chose a stranger and never missed.

That morning I only wanted a quiet shower. I had no idea someone would come in behind me, or that on the other side of the door there was a witness who wasn’t going anywhere.

I never thought I’d be capable of something like this, but the bank ultimatum was on the table and I could only think of one way out neither of us would forget.

She closed the door without locking it and stood looking at him, not yet knowing that this man was about to disprove everything she believed about casual sex.

I never saw her face. Only her brown back breathing hard while my hands went lower than a massage therapist should ever dare.

I’d been divorced for three weeks and thought I no longer knew how to want. That first night at sea, a stranger leaning on the bar proved me wrong.

The show was over, the drums had gone quiet, but the fire carnival had lit between her legs was only just beginning to burn.

I only wanted to make my ex jealous. I never imagined that night would end with me climbing a hidden staircase with the club bouncer.

I never told anyone what I did that afternoon. I went in alone, with no names, no rules, ready to let a stranger lead me into the dark.

I arrived trembling at the barn, on my knees in the straw, waiting for a man whose face I would never get to see. I did it for my boyfriend. Or so I told myself.

I signed up at the last minute for a countryside party where no one had a partner and one rule ruled everything: what happened that night stayed there. I had no idea how far it would go.

“Only the first three levels,” I promised him on the plane. Neither of us imagined where that challenge notebook would take us before we got home.

I’d never accepted an invitation from a man I’d just met. But something about his smile, and the way he looked at my cleavage, made me say yes.

When the power went out and we were trapped between two floors, I knew those dark hours were going to change everything. And I did nothing to stop it.

My friend stood me up that night, but the stranger at the bar had other plans for me. And I, even if I wouldn’t admit it out loud, did too.

His cold hand closed around my arm like a hold. I was ninety kilos of muscle, and still, in front of him, I felt small, examined, bought.

The motel terrace connected to his, and from the dimness a deep voice called me “pretty.” I should have gone inside and locked the door. I didn’t.