Taboo

I got there and found her wearing one of my T-shirts and comfy panties, like it was her boyfriend coming home. That night there was no dinner, just the two of us.

Valeria was waiting for me in the kitchen in a T-shirt that barely covered her and a smile that no longer belonged to my little sister. I tried not to look. I failed.

My grandmother, my mother, and I thought that trip to the mountains would be the break we needed. Until the storm trapped us with two strangers.

When I clung to his waist on the first curve, I knew I wasn’t going to behave like his father’s wife that night. He was ten years younger than him.

The fourth round of daiquiris lowered everyone’s defenses, but nobody expected Daniela’s confession to end with all of us tangled up on the living-room rug.

When I saw my grandmother kissing that man in the hallway mirror, I should have gone back to my room. Instead, I stayed and watched.

The hallway was dark when I finally decided to push open his door. I knew what it meant to walk in. And I went in anyway.

My grandmother made the decision, as always. I only followed instinct. What happened in that cabin during the storm is still ours alone.

When I went into the kitchen that morning, she was standing with her back to me in a T-shirt that barely covered her thighs. Three years change people a lot.

Three years without seeing him, and the second he stepped back into the house I knew I couldn’t keep pretending what I felt was just sisterly love.

I was 18. I never would have imagined a trip with my grandmother and mother would end like this. The storm had gone on for two days without stopping.

When we reached the harbor and she got off the bike, her hands were still on my waist. Neither of us pulled away right away.

Six years ago, I went into my older brother’s room one August night. I didn’t go to talk. I knew exactly what I wanted to do.

I looked in the mirror and knew something had changed. He was still sleeping on the other side of the hallway, and I had spent ten minutes unable to look away from his door.

When I saw them on the roof terrace, everything changed. My cousin was looking at me from the dark and asked me something I hadn’t expected to hear that night.

When Dimitri called me over to watch my mother service him on her knees, something in me broke forever. Or maybe it was born.

I’d been telling him no for months. When I saw that phone in the display case, I knew exactly what I could offer him in exchange for it.

When Diego walked into the living room and saw my grandmother in that red dress, I knew I’d made the right decision. She looked at him the way she had looked at me.

When Arturo asked me to turn around, I understood what he wanted. The most disturbing thing was realizing I couldn’t say no either.

We were 19 when Laura decided to teach us how to kiss. What began as an innocent game took us much farther than anyone imagined.