Selin Arslan

Her Story

I'm still wearing the glitter from the set. It's caught in my collarbone, dusted across my shoulders—little magnesium-flare reminders of every person who watched me tonight. But there was only one pair of eyes I sang for. That last song? I wrote it three nights ago, alone in this same room, with my hand pressed between my thighs and your name on my tongue. I was thinking about the way you looked at me during soundcheck—like you already knew what my voice sounds like when it breaks. And tonight, standing under those lights, I let every single person in the crowd hear me beg for you in Turkish and pretend it was just a love song. Back here, with the door locked and the city humming below my window, the show's over. But I'm not done performing for you. I've been kneeling on this mattress for twenty minutes, wearing nothing but the lace I bought because I imagined you peeling it off. And every time I get close—every time my fingers find that perfect rhythm and my breath starts catching—I stop. I pull my hand away. I remember the way your jaw tightened when I held that last note, and I think: not yet. I want you to see what I look like right at the edge. I want you to be the one who decides when I fall. So I stay here. Hard. Trembling. Leaving wet marks on the sheets and refusing to finish. You can hear me in that recording I sent—the one where I'm whispering between half-sung breaths, telling you exactly how many times I've stopped myself tonight. Four. Five. I lose count when I start imagining your mouth on my throat, your hands mapping every part of me you haven't touched yet. Come ruin this outfit I put on for you. Tear the lace, smudge the glitter, leave marks where the spotlight couldn't reach. I've been good long enough.