The Stranger from the Beach Who Came Up to My Apartment
The first time I saw her, she was sitting on a white towel, with her back to me, staring at the sea as if she expected it to answer her something. Her legs were drawn up and her arms crossed over her knees, and her hair was tied up in a loose bun with a few strands slipping free. I had gone down to that cove early, before the rest of the people, and had settled in behind the dunes, where the sand mixes with the dry scrub and nobody pays you any mind.
From there I could see the line of her back, the way the early light gilded her. A drop of sweat slid slowly down her spine and disappeared beneath the elastic of her swimsuit. I don’t know at what point I stopped looking at the sea and started looking only at her.
Her name was Mariana, though I found that out later. That first day she was nothing more than a stranger spreading oil over her legs with a calm I found obscene because it was so tranquil. She rubbed it into her thighs, her stomach, her shoulders, and each movement of her hands tied me a little tighter to the spot. If only they were mine, I thought, and the idea left my mouth dry and my cock hard against the fabric of my swim trunks.
I went back the next day. And the day after. I became a creature of habit, always crouched in the same hollow between the dunes, waiting for her ritual of gazing at the horizon and smearing oil over her body. Every afternoon I promised myself that this would be the time I’d stand up and go over to talk to her. That I’d ask her the time, any excuse. And every afternoon I stayed still, watching her, with my hand inside my trunks and my shaft swollen between my fingers, until she gathered up her towel and left without knowing I existed.
***
It took me almost two weeks to work up the courage. It was a windy morning, with rough seas, when there was almost nobody around. I found her packing up her things and, before thinking too much about it, I said something stupid about the waves. She laughed, with a frank laugh I hadn’t expected, and suddenly the words stopped being so hard.
It turned out we lived three streets apart. We walked back to the village together, talking about nothing in particular, and I discovered it was easy being at her side, much easier than watching her in secret. At the corner where our ways split, we said goodbye, and I kept on toward the supermarket convinced that was the end of it.
But the village was small and chance was capricious. Twenty minutes later I found her sitting on the step outside her building, looking annoyed, her phone in her hand. She had lost her house keys. It was Saturday; the locksmith only did emergency callouts and had told her it would be at least a couple of hours before he could show up.
—And me with all the salt of the sea stuck to my body —she complained, rubbing her forearm with a grimace—. I’m itchy all over.
I said it without thinking, just as I had with the waves.
—I live right here. If you want, come up and take a shower while you wait. I don’t have any women’s clothes, but I can lend you a dry T-shirt and a pair of shorts.
Mariana looked at me a second longer than necessary, weighing it up, and the grimace turned into a broad smile.
—Do you realize you’re saving my afternoon?
***
We went up the two flights of stairs and I opened the door to my flat. It’s small, tidy by dint of living alone, with a narrow balcony from which the sound of the seagulls drifts in. I took a clean towel from the cupboard, handed it to her, and showed her the bathroom.
—It’s not much, but the water runs hot —I said—. One warning: the door doesn’t close properly. The humidity made the paint swell and the latch won’t catch. But I’ll be in the living room, don’t worry.
—Thank you, really —she answered, and I could tell she meant it.
I nudged the door until it was barely shut and went to the living room. I sat on the sofa, rubbed my hands for no reason, stood up, sat down again. So many days watching her from far away, inventing her voice, her scent, the feel of her skin, and now I had her a few meters away, undressing behind a door that didn’t even close.
I heard the water run. And then I came up with the idea I’d been avoiding ever since I invited her up.
I recognize myself as a coward about almost everything, but curiosity got the better of me. I got up from the sofa slowly, careful not to make the floorboards creak, and walked down the hall to the bathroom door. It was ajar, no more than five centimeters, a vertical slit of light and steam. Through it I could see inside. I told myself I’d only take a peek. I lied to myself, of course.
Mariana had already taken off her beach clothes and was standing in front of the mirror, letting down her bun. Her arms were raised, undoing the knot in her hair, and in that position I could see her whole body: her breasts lifted by the gesture, the dark, hard nipples sharpened by the breeze coming in through the window, the curve of her waist, the triangle of trimmed hair between her thighs, the back I’d followed with my eyes so many afternoons from behind the dunes, now just three meters from me. So close it made me afraid to breathe.
She bent to kick off her sandals and, without meaning to, I got a full view of her round, firm ass and her cunt peeking out between her legs, the lips shining with the steam. She straightened up and, with a motion of her hand, finished undressing. I followed every gesture through the crack, my heart hammering against my ribs, my cock already swollen and pressing against the zipper, with the certainty that I was doing something I shouldn’t. That, far from stopping me, made everything more intense.
She turned on the tap and stepped under the spray. The water began running down her hair, her shoulders, between her tits, sliding over her stomach until it disappeared into the bush of pubic hair, tracing paths I had imagined a thousand times lying behind a dune. My throat went dry. My clothes started to feel unbearable, the heat rose up my neck, and I leaned against the hallway wall while I undid the button on my trousers so my cock would stop hurting from being squeezed.
I watched her soap herself slowly, unhurriedly, as if the hot water were giving her body back to her after a day in the salt. She worked the foam over her shoulders, over her arms, grabbed one breast with her soapy hand and kneaded it, sliding her thumb over the nipple until it stood up hard as a stone. Then she moved to the other one and repeated the gesture with the same calm. That’s how I’d do it, I thought, but with my mouth, sucking each nipple until she let out a moan.
She ran her soapy hand down her stomach. I held my breath. I saw her slip her fingers between her legs, part the lips of her cunt with her index and middle finger, rub slowly, with a care that seemed innocent but wasn’t, because almost at once she arched her neck back, rested her nape against the tiles, and let the air out through her open mouth. She was touching herself. She was touching her cunt with her hand full of foam, knowing or not knowing that I was watching, and I pulled my cock out of my trousers without thinking, grabbed it with my right hand, and started jerking off in time with her fingers, biting my lip so I wouldn’t moan.
She rubbed her clit in slow circles, then faster, and every now and then she shoved two fingers in and buried them to the hilt, her mouth still open and her tits rising and falling under the hot water. I was wanking my cock hard, the tip already wet, watching how her stomach tightened, how she spread her legs wider to give herself better access, how she braced herself against the wall so she wouldn’t fall. The foam slid down her thighs, mixed with what was coming out of her, and all of it ran down her long legs until it disappeared down the drain.
I sped my hand up at the same time as she did. I saw her start panting louder, her fingers moving frantically between her legs, how she clutched one breast with her other hand and twisted the nipple between her index finger and thumb. A muffled “fuck” slipped out of her, her hips trembled, and her whole body shuddered in a long spasm, her knees half-bent, held up by the tiles as if they were the only thing keeping her standing. I came at the same time, biting my fist so I wouldn’t let out a groan, cum streaming down my fingers and dripping onto the hallway floorboards, unable to tear my eyes away from her.
She turned off the tap abruptly. The sudden silence slammed me back into reality like a slap. For an instant I froze, convinced she’d discovered me, that she was going to open the door and find me there, cock still out and my hand stained, pressed up against the crack like a pathetic little bastard.
But she only reached for the towel. I watched her wrap herself in it, squeeze the water out of her hair, and then I reacted. I wiped my hand with a tissue from my pocket, tucked away my cock, still hard and still throbbing, rubbed the floor with my foot and went back to the living room with the stealth of a thief. I dropped onto the sofa and lit a cigarette with clumsy fingers, trying to get my face back together before she came out.
***
She appeared a few minutes later, wearing my gray T-shirt and my shorts, her wet hair combed back and her skin still pink from the hot water. Her nipples showed through the T-shirt, two dark, obvious circles in the pale fabric, and she wasn’t wearing underwear under the shorts because hers were hanging to dry in the bathroom. She was gorgeous in a different way than at the beach, more real, closer, and it cost me to hold her gaze without thinking about what I had just done.
—Those shorts look a thousand times better on you than on me —I said, trying to recover control of my voice.
—Nonsense —she laughed, and sat down at the other end of the sofa, legs tucked under her ass—. Thanks for the shower. I really needed it. You saved me from spending two hours feeling like a crab in the entryway.
—My pleasure —I replied, and felt the double edge of the phrase in my mouth.
We talked for a while about unimportant things, about the village, the sea, how badly locksmiths work on weekends. I nodded, answered, but part of me was still behind that half-open door, watching her sink her fingers all the way into her cunt, and I wondered whether she noticed, whether there was something in the way I looked at her that gave me away.
Her phone rang. It was the locksmith: he was five minutes from her building. Mariana got up, left the towel folded over the arm of the sofa, and headed for the door.
—I’ll give you the clothes back another day —she said—. Then I’ll have to see you again.
—Anytime —I answered, and for once it didn’t cost me to say it.
I walked her to the landing. She gave me a quick, warm kiss on the cheek that left me smelling my own soap on her skin, and started down the stairs. Turn around, I thought, watching her go down. Turn around, please.
When she reached the bottom of the flight, just before disappearing through the entrance, she stopped. She turned her head, found me with her eyes, and smiled in a way I couldn’t fully decipher, a smile with something of a question and something of an answer in it.
—Next time —she said, slowly, without taking her eyes off me— you should fix that bathroom latch. Or leave it as it is. Your choice.
And before I could answer anything, she went down the last step and disappeared into the street with a “ciao” that left me nailed to the landing, my cock hard again against my trousers, not knowing whether I had just been found out or invited to fuck her next time against the tiles of that very same bathroom.
