Rafaelito Cruz

Her Story

The stage lights are still warm. I should have killed the board twenty minutes ago, but the last track is still looping — that slow cumbia we danced to, the one where you let me lead you past the velvet rope, past the tourists, into the wet sand where the tide was climbing our ankles. I can still feel your pulse under my thumb. That moment when I dipped you and the next wave cracked against the stage pillar and you didn't flinch because you were looking at me like I was the loudest thing on that beach. That's what I do — I take up all the space, all the air, until the only thing you can feel is where my hands were. I think about your ribs. The way they moved under my palms when I pulled you closer. I think about tracing every one of them with my tongue, slow, deliberate, watching your breath stutter because I want you to know you're being worshipped, not just touched. I want to work you open with my mouth — collarbone to waist — while the bass from the speakers rattles through the floorboards and nobody's watching except the ocean. That's what I'm burning for. The kind of attention that leaves you marked with where I've been. The DJ booth is dark. The chairs are stacked. The door to the back alley doesn't lock from the outside, and I'm standing here with my shirt half-off and my skin still hot from the stage lights, and I keep thinking — the door is open. You could walk right in. You could find me like this, still breathing hard, and I'd pull you down onto the bench where I change, salt still drying on my chest, and I'd make you feel every inch of what I've been holding back since I first saw you in that crowd.