**CW: body horror, gore, pandemic references**
It was mid-October of 2022 and the sun was setting, but the crowded towers of downtown Toronto still radiated with the day's heat. The air was as close and humid as August. Out on the streets, people were going around in shorts and t-shirts, dresses and sandals, trying to enjoy one last gasp of summer before the cold permanently settled in.
Inside one of the many towering hotels, Hunter Jackson poked a sneaky finger under the bottom edge of his mask, trying to let a little air in. Was it just him, or was the actual fucking heat running? Did they turn the furnace on at the start of October and just let it go, no matter what the weather was outside? His face was sweating under the mask and it was making his beard itch. He tried to turn his attention back to the presenter at the front of the room, but of course the one speaker he'd wanted to see on this panel was a no-show, so now he was stuck listening to the other two random papers that had been crammed into a mixed-bag session at the ass-end of the conference. What was the presenter saying? Something about precarity? Something about isolation? We've heard it already, buddy, and you're over 20 minutes. Just wrap it up so we can hit the bar already.
Hunter was not normally a cynical person, but he was hot, tired, and more than a little fed up with this conference, despite all the work he'd put in to get here.
As his thoughts drifted again, Hunter let his eyes wander around the room. Backs of heads and shoulders, mostly men. One woman was answering work emails on her laptop while taking notes on the presentation in another window and tapping at the phone on her lap, which lit up with notifications every two minutes. At the back of the room, another woman was standing by the door. Something about the way she leaned casually against the doorframe caught his eye. She didn't seem to be paying any attention to the presentation. She was scanning the room, just like him.
Once his eye was hooked on her, Hunter noticed something even stranger. The top button of her white blouse was open under her trim grey suit jacket, and there was something metallic-looking just visible where it dipped below her collarbones. She was looking away across the room, so he took the chance to peer closer. It looked like she had a zipper embedded right into her skin just below the hollow of her throat. It was definitely not on her blouse collar or her suit. Jewelry? But there was no chain. Could it be a piercing? He shuddered, thinking how much it would hurt to get a piercing made out of a zipper pull right there. And why show it off here, of all places? She looked completely professional otherwise, with her dark hair cut short and sharp and her suit custom-tailored to her curves. The more he thought about it, the more curious he became. Here was someone with a story. He decided to try and catch up with her on the way out.
At the front of the room, the panel moderator finally managed to stop the last speaker's headlong rant by waving a Sharpie-scrawled sign that read: "7 minutes over. Please conclude now."
"Ah, thank you so much to all the panelists. We're almost out of time here, but we do have a few minutes for discussion, if anyone has questions...?"
After a long, awkward pause, one hand went up.
"Ahem, yes, thank you all. Great work here. Fascinating. I have more of a comment than a question, really. In an article I recently published on labour conditions in the Southern Ontario manufacturing sector during the 1918 pandemic, I argued that..."
Hunter rolled his eyes and glanced back toward the door in desperation. The woman with the odd zipper was looking at him directly now. She jerked her head twice toward the door and pointed to her watch. A wave of relief washed over him. As he stood and collected his things, he let his body language say: 'Sorry, folks, got an important meeting. Look, I'm being called away. Already late, must hurry out.' He even nodded to the woman and smiled when he reached her as if he knew her, just to sell the scene. Hunter liked acting a part, especially when that part called for him to leave with an attractive woman.
Walking out of the conference room and into the empty, spacious lobby was a breath of fresh air, literally, since the air conditioning was working there. Hunter turned to the woman who had rescued him from the jaws of ultimate boredom.
"Thank God! I mean, thank you. That last speaker just--" He checked himself before badmouthing the presenter. You never knew who knew who. But she laughed and finished for him:
"--just wouldn't shut up! Honestly, does anyone stick to the time limit any more? Or are tenured profs too good for that?"
Hunter laughed again and bantered back,
"I wouldn't know, I am but a lowly adjunct. So naturally, my presentation was 19 minutes and 59 seconds long."
"You presented too? What day was that?"
"First day, first panel. The dreaded 9am slot. Don't worry, you didn't miss much. How about you?"
"I didn't speak. I'm here to watch and learn."
"You a grad student?"
"Post-doc. But sociology isn't my area. I'm in...well, it's interdisciplinary. Hard to explain."
She shrugged. The shape at her open collar caught his eye again.
"Hey, if you don't mind me saying, that's an impressive piercing. Uh, is it a piercing?"
Her hand went to her throat and fluttered there. Something twisted deep in Hunter's gut at the way she stroked herself.
"Oh, no, it's actually a tattoo."
She pulled open her blouse a little further. Looking more closely, Hunter could see the inked zipper tracks running down the front of her breastbone. He caught just a hint of dark cleavage below, into which the tracks disappeared invitingly. He wrenched his eyes back up to the zipper pull, and then to her amused-looking face.
"That is uncanny. From across the room it looked totally real. The 3D shading and the metallic highlights, I mean, that's top-notch work. It's like those M.C. Escher illusion tattoos you see online. Have you posted it on Reddit or anything?"
She ducked her head shyly.
"No, I didn't do it to get attention on the internet, if that's what you're asking. It's just for me. Because I like it."
Her fingers stroked her throat. There it was again: that darkly sensual feeling. That inexplicable erotic twist. Hunter couldn't say why, but the heat between them when she did that was as palpable as it had been in the streets at sunset. Something humid and lush, blossoming out of season.
Hunter realized they were standing much closer than two meters apart. He was near enough to see the faint sheen of sweat on her skin. For a second it was like he could feel her breath on his face, which was insane because she also had a mask on. He stepped back and adjusted his mask nervously.
'Get a grip, man,' he told himself mentally. 'I know it's been almost two years, but you can't jump the first girl you meet at a conference straight off.'
Then again, why couldn't he? She had to be fully vaccinated to get into the conference, and they all took rapid antigen tests every day. She was clean. He was clean. He had to get back in the saddle someday. Why not now?
When he looked up at her again, her eyes were smiling at him. He would even go so far as to say "sparkling." And her hand was still at her throat, toying with the tattooed zipper pull.
"Hey, do you want--"
"Would you like to--"
