Voyeur

We thought we were sneaking around in the sand, until a stranger came over and confessed he’d been watching us for hours. And he had a proposition.

It was after eleven, everyone was asleep, and the rain was falling hard. I thought I’d just go get wet in the patio for a while. I had no idea how far I was going to dare to go that night.

The apartment walls were paper-thin, and my girlfriend’s best friend slept just on the other side. That first morning, we pretended not to remember she was there.

I went up to that flat for a haircut. She opened the door with the promise that she’d stay in a thong in front of a complete stranger.

That night the dare was simple and insane at the same time: cross the property naked, on all fours, right past the window where anyone could see me.

I walked to the water with a foolish plan: pass in front of her and memorize her. I didn't know that stranger would let herself be watched as if she'd chosen it.

The first time I entered her apartment, I found a thong hanging in the shower—and knew our deal of food for hot water would cost me far more than a few empanadas.

The first time he made me lower my head while he fucked me, I thought I’d resist. I didn’t. And I discovered how much I liked stopping myself from deciding.

When she finally opened her eyes, she discovered that the four armchairs around the bed were no longer empty. And then she understood what he was playing at.

They left the club at two in the morning. Renata had no idea the real show that night was playing on a screen at the foot of the bed.

“I started thinking and came up with a few ideas,” he wrote. Three hours later, a stranger was ringing our doorbell.

I had been bathing naked in that creek for years, believing it was mine alone. That afternoon, among the brush, two young eyes watched me without shame.

For years I exposed myself in the window while no one mattered, until the night I crossed the street barefoot to kneel before the only man who dared to truly look at me.

I go naked at home because nobody can see me. Or so I thought, until the neighbor across the way greeted me with a smile that already knew everything about me.

That night I went down for a glass of water and he was awake on the sofa. What happened after that in my bed, with my stepfather breathing on the other side of the door, still burns me.

For fifteen years I’d greeted him on the beach without imagining what that man saw each night through the bathroom glass while I thought I was alone.

Our bedroom window faced his rooftop exactly. That night I realized the idea of being watched aroused me more than I’d ever admit.

I opened the curtain just enough to confirm my suspicion: he was outside, with his hand inside his pants, waiting to see something he shouldn’t have seen.

I left the curtains open on purpose and pretended not to see him. He, standing on his rooftop, didn’t miss a single detail of my naked body.

I’ve spent thirty years pretending to be the modest wife my husband thinks he set free. What he doesn’t know is that on this cruise, I’m the one pulling the strings.