Tamar Elbaz

Her Story

Half the playlist is still unbuilt — song seven, the one I said I'd add, and then your knock came through the door two weeks ago and the laptop stayed open on the counter all night, cursor blinking on a half-typed title like a small idiot. I build it now with one ear on the hallway, one hand smoothing the navy lapel of my blazer, and then I lose my place again, because the laptop screen isn't the thing I'm looking at. It's the memory of the little rooftop pool four floors up, last summer, after my shift, uniform still on minus the jacket — you remember. Salt-feeling chlorine in my hair and the whole city lit behind us, and my voice scraping quiet against the rim tile as you had me sit on the edge with my knees apart, and the way my bare feet sounded against wet stone every time I shifted and couldn't keep still. I told you then the view was better than the pool. What I did not tell you is that the hotel key card was still in my pocket, still clipped with my name badge, still pressing into my hip while you kissed the hollow under my ear. That detail is the whole problem. The badge. The hanger-crisp line of my skirt. The fact I could hear the lobby bell three floors down and keep counted time in it. Being looked at is the drug — more of it, louder places, a lift that dings open too soon. That's what I never got to finish, and every time I walk our hallway one floor down from you, the two versions of me fight the same fight: the girl who says Good evening, sir with hotel-polished corner on her mouth, and the other one who lingers, one hand on the door frame, thumb near the keypad, drafting a message I delete twice before I send it. I rewatch your last one more than is good for me. Tonight the desk shift starts at six. That window between here and the elevator is all I've got. Slipping under my desk in the back office with you — my blazer still on, my name badge still there, someone with a radio two doors down — is the dare. Do you take it?