Letters

It's Wednesday. My treat on Wednesdays is to have a coffee in front of the city council, at the cart that is placed in the central square. Walking down the main avenue, past the old jetty and away from the crowds, turning on my iZooma to interact with the stories and the news while sitting in front of the beach and drinking my coffee. It is a hidden place from tourists which in summer fill the beaches and the turquoise sea. I come here to watch the news of the day, drink my coffee and watch people sunbathe. The topless will never go out of style.

I like the coffee cart. It has that air, so I'm sure it was a great time from the beginning of the millennium. After my coffee, I go to the antique market. Sometimes exciting things are found, but now it is fashionable to make holograms inspired by iPods' music. They are those nice square-shaped or rectangle devices from the beginning of the century used to store songs. I always wonder what the original owners thought when saving those songs. Why keep them in an object? Although I suppose it was quite a ritual to sit, search, fill the item. Does my grandfather save his? Today I find something different. It is a novel from the beginning of the century. I was seduced by the cover. It is the painting of a woman with a naked back. I am one of the few who still likes to read on these paper objects. I want them for being old because they talk about places that are not like those I knew when I visited them. To my surprise, I find written letters between the pages and from the dates, I see that they are from more than 50 years ago.

Mon Chéri:

I call you "mon chéri" because it seems better to me than using your name. Also, with that opossum face that you have, it makes it fun. I tell you that I celebrated my birthday. I gathered some friends from the university and other friends from John's work. My friends are now mothers. I don't know when it happened. The plan was quiet, go to a bar, nothing extraordinary. I like the cliché of having your name put on a screen and the local drunks applauding at you. I know that I dress up as an older woman for the corporate world, but not tonight. I was wearing tight leather pants, a black top that left my shoulders completely bare, my coat and nothing else. Maybe that night, the fantasy of meeting someone at the bar was fulfilled. And it was close. I was at the bar ordering my beer when a guy approached me. Tall, with a broad back. My weakness. We started talking, or instead, I began to respond as best I could. He tried to make me talk, but I was paralyzed. I know I screwed up, but what do you want? Besides, you are worse slimy than me, mon chéri. He had to leave because he was working the next day, when he said goodbye, he took my face with his hands and kissed my cheek, just where the dimples are made. I stayed cold. I was still there, but my head was replaying what had happened, over and over again. No way, that's going to be the closest thing.

After so much beer, someone suggested that we had to do something more adventurous, and we went to a strippers place. You don't know how much fun I was. More than one of them was scandalized when I suggested the place as if they did not know my crazy head. They feel like respectable mothers and wives as if I hadn't seen them during our college years, parting a lot. But I needed a celebration like that. A night that broke the routine and took me out of the role of schools, homework, the house's routine, out of my head with accounts payable. What fucking life is that if, from time to time, these nights don't happen? I know what you are thinking, and I will leave you wondering.

I am sending you a photo on paper, yes, PAPER. You know, I like to see the faces of the hipster employees when the lady in the office costume comes to pick up her artistic photos.

Take care of yourself.

X.

Next to the letter, I found a picture of a woman. It accuses the passage of time. She is not in her twenties but still young. She wears a blue and red plaid shirt over her pale skin. I can't see her face or even her neck, but I can see the shape of her breasts. They look shapely, not big, but not small either. I would say they are cute. I think of the work involved in sending these things. Now it is hard to believe that someone is going to send a photo like that. Everything is in the iZooma. I'm still looking in the book, so I folded the iZooma and put it in my pocket.

Mon Chéri:

You won't believe it. This year is my year. The three of us enrolled in a gym, or both of us did, and poor Victor had no choice. You know, the ones that are like mushrooms all over the city, the ones that promise to babysit your kids in the afternoon so you can at least run in your band like a hamster. But hey, it's a break. The truth was I was only there to have a break and watch TV without anyone interrupting me, even if I have to be on a treadmill pretending to run. I hate running, but it's better than nothing. It also serves to exercise. There is no way I will look like my friends. I still love myself for my mental health.

Well, that does not matter. I was telling you, this is my year. I'm going to keep coming to the gym like never before and not because now I have a lot of love for exercise. I was on the treadmill with my headphones watching TV, one of those series based on superheroes. You're going to say it's crazy but do you remember I told you that I would have Captain America in front of me? Well, I'm close.

I minded my own business, ready to watch TV for a while and when a voice told me, "increase your speed." You would have seen my face; my panties almost fell off when I saw who was talking to me. He was the guy I met at the bar in a Captain America shirt. Ricardo, his name is. For me, He is Ricky. It turns out that Ricky is an instructor. He sold me a personalized program that I now attend religiously. Well, it's only been a couple of weeks. But the sensation of having Ricky behind me while I squat with the barbell is well worth the sacrifice. Under his clothes, I could see a tattoo on his forearm. If I could, I would kiss him and rip off his clothes to discover what is underneath. Now I do have the motivation that I lacked before.

I am sending you another postcard of the raw material available to Ricky. The face of the guy who gave me the photos was epic. The guy did not know if it was me or not the one in the picture. He only looked at me with a lusty face that he could not hide. My office khakis made him hesitate.

Take care of yourself.

X.

I look at the photo. Again, the face is not visible. Only the torso area is visible. The woman is lying on her stomach. It seems that she is raising her head, but I can not see her. I can barely see a lock of her hair. I look at the beginning of her breasts, which have a beautiful shape. There is a strap over her shoulder from the cloth that covers the rest of her breasts. I can see her hips and legs. The black of the lingerie contrasts with her pale skin. I wonder what originated this correspondence between these people. I wonder what that woman will think of me, now that, just as the people that worked on the printing site years ago, I am intrigued by who this person was. A lady taking these photos? It is strange to see these memories on paper, stuff from another time, now that everything is so ephemeral, that everything is so ethereal.

Mon Chéri:

The virus arrived here. I hope you are safe. I barely had time to say goodbye to one of my favourite places in this city. The one where I feel the rush when asking for my photos as if hiding my alter ego. That dark about us, we are ashamed, but at the same time, we care like a treasure.

I could not say goodbye to was Ricky, as soon as they gave the news I decided to stay with my husband and my son. I was so close, my dreams told me. Do you know that when you dream of someone, it is because they both connect? Once, a sorcerer told me, it seemed to be the best explanation for when you dream with someone, and after what I dreamed, it better be.

Now everything is chaos—the fear, not knowing what will happen or when it will return to normal. News arrives of what is happening in Milan, in Madrid. The dead, the loneliness of those who die in isolation, barely having time to say goodbye through a screen. What the fuck, goodbye is that? In that case, I think it is better not to say anything to Ricky, to keep the image of my ass approaching his body, of my head coming down to the level of his crotch while I move the bar with weights. I am left with the image of his forearm with the tattoo, feeling my body's closeness to his. I prefer that to be sent off by a screen, like a nightmare show. What shit of times, locked up and faced with the reality of each one. Now, we will know ourselves and ours. We will feel our moods at all times.

I almost forgot the dream. It made me wake up in a good mood. I don't know what happened in the intermission. I just remember that I was utterly naked, coming out of the shower, and Ricky was waiting for me at the bathroom door. I continued with my routine of fixing my hair while the drops of water running through my body, and he stood there watching me.

This photo is the last one that I could print. I'll have to upgrade and order printouts by mail, you know? This is sad. I won't be able to see the faces of those who give me the photos. Every time I pick up an order, they invite me to check them in the lightbox they have on the counter's side. They wish. They and I became orphans of that little rush that each one carries deep inside but denied, although we do not know why we hide it.

So if you stop receiving these letters, think that I say goodbye to you on paper, with these lines and photos. Do not expect that you will receive a video call from me. You fuck yourself.

X.

Again I find next to the letter a photograph in black and white. The woman is on her back. She is looking out fo a window while standing on the edge of a pool. She wears a ponytail, completely naked. I'm mesmerized with her body, her bareback, wonder with the roundness of her ass. I want to taste her, feel her skin that seems so soft. I look for information about the virus and see the holograms of a time that seems distant. I see people with masks. I think of the photo again, the freedom of nudity, the limitation of confinement, the need to cover the face, the farewell to places and customs—the likes. I think about how that changed us. Maybe that is the root of today's life, in which loneliness and no contact is the norm.

Mon Chéri

These are grey days. The exhaustion of confinement and the frustration of the accumulation of tasks. Work, home stuff, and now being a teacher. I adore Victor, but forcing him to concentrate for 6 hours in front of a screen seems crazy to me. That kills all inspiration. But that wasn't the most screwed up of these days. I had to say goodbye to a part of me.

Do you remember Ramiro? We had to put him to sleep for cancer. I wasn't going to let him suffer. Today I only write because I wanted to share my grief with someone else who was not in these four walls. When John and I met, we did not want to separate. I crossed the city to see him, three hours locked in the subway to visit him, and now his music, his noise sometimes exasperates me. And it's not him. I think it's the confinement, the sadness, the satiety and the fuck, he too.

But I miss Ramiro. It's good that he didn't speak or write, he would have sold more copies than E. L.James, and I'm sure he would have written something better with everything he saw. I think the bastard liked to watch. Do you remember I told you when he was a sweet puppy and everyone loved him? But not even he with his bright and playful eyes would have been able to help your Mon Chéri, your ugly face. He couldn't have helped you find someone who wanted to date you.

I leave your photo so that you remember us.

X.

I see a photo of a woman and a small dog. They both turn their backs to the camera, walk on the beach. The woman wears a ponytail. It seems that she only wears a turquoise tank top that barely covers her body. She is almost naked while walking with the dog.

I think about the letter and the photo, being confined and the image in the open air, at sea. I think about when was the last time I spent so much time with someone. I believe it has never happened to me. In any case, the iZooma allows you to anaesthetize yourself when there is nothing to do. You feel how your brain is slowly flooding with pleasant sensations. Today the confinement seems relatively easy. Dealing with another person for so long, not.

I keep going through the pages of the book, looking for more images, more letters. It amazes me how this object was transformed into a time capsule, like a guardian of multiple stories. It's own ones, those between the reader and the author and those that occur between the readers themselves.

Mon Cheri:

It's amazing how you adapt to things. I begin to like the confinement's routine, to the miniature universe built within my four walls. I think poor Victor is the one who suffers the most. Seeing his father and me all the time. If I were a teenager, I would surely see it as being in jail. John is mired in his routine of calls, videoconferences. But that has helped us to form other habits and times of coexistence that did not exist before. And despite the enjoyment, I have to say that I live in torment. I exercise by video, I guess, like everyone else. But you know my crazy head.

I imagine that it is only us. While I do the exercises, I am shedding my clothes, I am sweating. Ricky asks me for different practices to see other parts of my body.

Other times, I imagine that John and I do it. Ricky sees us through the camera and begins to stroke. I guess Ricky's body as if I had already seen it. I only know what he showed with his gym uniform, and his only particular feature is his tattoo. When Ricky asks me to try harder, I am in my fantasy, I blush as if he had read my mind, but in reality, he means that there are still more repetitions to be done. I go back to the living room to do sit-ups.

The surprise was receiving a package of doughnuts from Ricky. To cheer me up about Ramiro. Maybe he likes to see me exercising. Again my crazy head.

I leave you your photo Mon Cheri, to see if you finally dare to tell me something about the pictures. You never say anything.

X.

I hope to discover more about X. I think I already know her. It's funny how familiarity with strangers can be felt from their words, it's as if they become part of you, of your everyday life. I wonder if someone would take the time to dedicate a few lines to me or some photos. Nobody does these image jobs on paper anymore. Only museums. I see the picture. She is upside down. The image portrays her legs, from her hips to her ankles. In the background is her torso, but it is not the central figure. The central image is her curves, her shapely legs and her buttocks. A small ribbon surrounds her hips, but otherwise, she would appear to be naked. I'm hooked by her legs as if guessing the sensations of her skin. Who was the photographer? Perhaps if he had known what those legs felt like, what was their texture, would they be as soft as they look? What made the woman reveal the secret between those legs? At least he sure had the answer to the mystery of the woman's face.

Mon Cheri:

How complicated life is in these times, it's funny how you miss the little things that you can give yourself when you have just a little time, a little space, a little time for yourself. I miss the time for me. It sounds absurd, but there are things that I prefer to keep to myself, something that I refuse to share, even with John or Victor. We all lost something in this pandemic. Some have lost everything. Others are more fortunate and only lost those little pleasures that we always despise but are absent today.

I miss the freedom of escapades with John. To compensate for this pandemic, I allowed myself to experience something that I had always wanted, Mon Cheri. I will only say that it was deeply moving to look at myself in the mirror, to see my face, the expression on my face, John behind me. Feel the pain and go through it to get pleasure. It is curious to know that the man on your ass can hurt you but still take risks and feel how it goes inside you. The hardest thing was having to put up with the urge to scream while being penetrated. It is difficult to have to shut up and not express the emotion I feel but imagine what would happen if I started screaming. Poor Victor. 20 years from, having to pay a psychologist, explaining that his life is a disaster due to all the traumas caused by his screaming mother.

Pleasure and pain united. A metaphor for these times: life and death hand in hand, and in the end, life is stronger, life moves us, makes us scream.

I hope you can yell something, Mon Cheri.

X.

Again it is a photo from the back. She appears sitting on a table or a marble bar. The white contrasting with the black of her clothes. Nice little clothes. More than covering, it decorates and highlights. I can see X hair's movement, but the photo's strength is in her back and the roundness of her butt. It seems that she is sculpted in marble. Scream, when was the last time you felt the urge to scream with excitement? Go through pain to get pleasure? It's true; life is stronger. I return to the photo, to her roundness beautifully decorated by a small black line that runs through it and the black lace that starts it, like a curtain that opens to the spectators' delight.

Mon Cheri:

I dreamed that I knew life through another life. I mean, it was me, but it wasn't me. I dreamed that I was going to a bar for a beer and met someone—a completely ordinary stranger, rather ugly. Don't ask me why, but I kissed him, and that made me want to follow him to his apartment. The next scene I remember in my dream was being at his home, on a sofa in an apartment with wooden floors. I remember the colour of the sofa, one of those in small white ones. I remember we kissed. I remember wanting him to kiss my breasts. It was so real. I remember the feeling of my skin in contact with his. I would sit over him, on his lap, moving my body against his hard cock.

I liked the face of pleasure of the stranger at the movement of my hips, I could hear me scream, and I remember that I could scream. I could let out everything that I could not in this fucking quarantine.

The stranger whose face I do not remember placed his mouth between my legs, and I only felt his warm and soft mouth tasting me. I took his face, and to my surprise, I saw that it was a woman with green eyes, a small nose and tight skin. She told me her name: Mila. The surprise woke me up, or maybe it was John's snoring.

Mon Chéri, I think about my dream. I wonder how someone will experience my body. I want to see his face full of pleasure, about to reach orgasm and recognize me as the cause of his excitement. I want to hear my name in his moans as a testimony of my life. I need that stranger to see me naked, see my image reflected in the gaze of a stranger, as an opportunity to know the experience of being alive through another, that stranger; or he could be a window to another world where for a moment I am what saturates his senses. It is difficult not to give in to the desire to see the world through someone else, a way to enrich the experience. I know you understand me, Mon Cheri.

X.

By now, I have to hide the effect that this correspondence has on me. I am an intruder. I'm intrigued by X and her zest for life, her will to live during the pandemic of the century. It's a colour photo. I can see X's breasts almost completely. I guess their round shape while she's lying down, a robe covers the rest of her body, but her legs escape the fabric. I like her breasts, crowned with her nipples that seem small and pink. Can we really live in isolation without the gaze of the other? Isn't our reflection in another what also makes us recognize ourselves? Our life is seen through another window. I have become a voyeur of X's erotic life, which I find fascinating and a great experience. Reading as a way of living other lives, of knowing more about the experience of existing. I have more questions about X. Now I want to understand more about her.