Window Dressing

I thought a lot before writing this. I'm thirty-eight and I am not proud of this, but when it began it was so out of character for me that it has taken me some time to come to terms with it; I'm not even sure I have.

Let me start at the beginning. I don't travel a lot as part of my work. So, when I get the chance, I tend to be excited even though on this particular occasion, I was only going to a two-day seminar in New Jersey. It was the middle of November but already unseasonably cold. My flight into Newark had been delayed and I was feeling quite chilled by the time I reached the hotel.

Having checked in to my second-floor room I decided to soak in a warm bath. When I got out, I walked back into the bedroom and continued to dry myself and to dry my hair. I was conscious of a movement or something and realized my curtains were open.

Wrapping the towel more firmly around me I went to the window to draw them and my attention was drawn to a lighted window on the third floor of the wing facing mine. As I started to look the light went out and I started to draw the curtains. I had only just started when I realized I could make out the shape of a figure in that room; someone staring intently at me.

For whatever reason I stopped drawing the curtains. This was what was so weird. I have never considered myself a voyeur still less an exhibitionist. But I found myself turning to one side as though unaware of this presence and let the towel fall from my naked body. I turned my back to the window and pulled my hairbrush from my suitcase, turned sideways, and began to brush out my still damp hair. Two distinct thought tracks were going through my mind. Who was this pervert, this peeping Tom? But also I felt intense excitement at my scandalous exhibitionism.

Getting hold of myself I moved to the window and shut the curtains fully, but not before revealing a full frontal to the presumably watching voyeur. I was even tempted to look out and see if he was still watching but I restrained myself. I got dressed in my PJs and a gown and ordered an over-priced burger and a glass of merlot from room service. Oh, the decadency of a rare expense account!

After the order came, I sat at the small table and read my book until I felt it was time for bed. I cleaned my teeth and took off my gown and PJs and put them beside my bed in case of emergencies. The room was quite hot, and both my husband and I usually sleep nude anyway. It wasn't until I was lying in bed that I thought again about my very strange behavior. I had no idea what sort of perv I had been exhibiting myself to, and yet the undeniable memory of my excitement returned.

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The clock in my room said 6:17 when I awoke the following morning. I turned on the bedside light and confirmed the time with my phone. I had set my alarm, which I now switched off, for 7:00 am. I turned on the light and opened the curtains and looked out: a thoroughly grey and miserable-looking day. As I stood there, I saw the curtains move in one of the rooms opposite. Not the same one as last night but the one next to it.

As I realized I was standing there stark naked, I could make out a man's face peering out at me. I looked at him and he pulled his curtains further apart so I could clearly see him standing there. He actually gave me a little wave. I pulled the curtains to and stood there gathering my thoughts. I'd never encountered anything like this before.

Did all men enjoy looking at naked females in hotel rooms? Did my husband do this? He travelled a lot more than I did. I realized I could hardly classify them as perverts when I was the one providing the free show. Of course, most hotels did not have this U-shaped configuration of opposing wings.

The problem was I rather enjoyed it; I liked being looked at. It reminded me of when I had visited nude beaches and attracted admiring glances. After all, I was in pretty good shape despite having had two children. I could hardly open the curtains again while I was still naked, as I knew he knew I had seen him watching. Instead I decided to go to the gym and make sure I stayed in good shape. I put on shorts, a sports bra and a tee shirt. I took my room key and took the lift to the pool level where the gym was.

Using my key I entered the gym, a large room full of exercise bikes, ellipticals, weights and benches. A television was turned to the local news channel. I chose a bike with a program for cross-country and set it to a medium level that I felt would give me a good work-out.

Twenty-four minutes later I was perspiring freely. I looked at the clock and realized it was 7:10, still plenty of time before breakfast. The seminar would begin at nine. I went into the change room to have a shower. I was stripping off by a vacant locker when I saw a door open to a steam room. Maybe before I had my shower, I should enjoy the steam room for a few minutes. I grabbed a couple of towels and went through the open door just as another woman was exiting.

Inside the steam was quite thick and I parked myself on one of the stone benches close to a young woman in a stylish one-piece swimsuit. I could feel the perspiration running down my body. I had adjusted one of the towels so I could sit on it and fold it over my lap. The other I had wrapped round my breasts as a measure of public modesty. I wiped the sweat from my eyes and looked around.

It was so steamy it was hard to see. There were probably only two or three other people in what was quite a large area. Over to my left on a higher level of benches against a back wall someone appeared to be napping. I looked again. If I was not mistaken, it was a man and as if to confirm this, the towel across his lap was slipping revealing his undoubted sex. Moreover, as I watched the towel slip further it seemed he was in possession of an almost complete erection; certainly quite straight and chubby.

I'm not a teenager. I know men can and do get erections while sleeping, but it seemed somewhat coincidental that he should get one in what I now perceived to be a mixed gender steam room. A door opposite me opened and what were clearly two young men in swim shorts entered. That must be a door from the men's changing room. I had never experienced anything like this in an American hotel before, although I had heard of such things in certain European countries.

In my surprise I realized the towel covering my own breasts was in danger of slipping. I wrapped it more tightly around me while continuing to watch the reclining figure. Another woman in a bikini entered from our side and stepped past me to move to the back benches. I heard an audible gasp and she quickly retreated past me and exited the steam room again.

I wondered if she would alert someone to our naked fellow steamer, but the minutes passed, and nothing happened. The woman in the one-piece on my right had either not noticed the situation or like me was prepared to live and let live. Meanwhile, he continued to lie back with the side of his towel towards us completely lying flat on the bench and his erection now full and fully on display. The other men in the room also appeared unawares but possibly the side of his towel towards them still hid him from their view.

Was this a truly innocent exposure or was he really, deliberately exposing himself to us? He gave a sort of snort and appeared to wake up. Holding the other side of the towel he stood up fully erect to our view and rewrapped the towel around himself as he made his way out. This made me suspect the whole thing was an intended act of exhibitionism.

It was time for me to leave too and I went back into the women's change room. I took a fresh towel and stepped into the shower. When I stepped out the rather stunning young woman in the one-piece was getting dressed and judging by the lenses in the glasses she had just put on I think our exhibitionist's actions had been wasted in what would have been at best a blur to her.

Ten minutes later redressed in my exercise gear, I left and returned to my room. I opened the curtains again and put on my business clothes ready for breakfast and the day ahead.

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The keynote speaker was quite provocative suggesting our profession needed to get its head out of the sand and make some serious changes to modernize our approach. We were no longer appealing to the kind of fresh young minds we needed to attract. We needed to create more senior leadership positions for women and minorities. Amen to that! Even though I was not seeking that level of involvement myself. In the meantime, we could do a better job of granting more rapid paths to accreditation to those immigrants who came to our country with commensurate qualifications from their lands of origin.

I totally agreed but knew there was still a strong element within our professional body who did not believe any but a few, easy to identify, countries could possibly provide such a qualification.

The day passed easily enough with some panel discussions and a workshop session, where we broke into small discussion groups in our own sections of the room. Between that and over lunch I got to meet some very agreeable people and also identify some I would be happy not to meet again. At the end of the day a small group of us went over to the nearby Marriott for dinner.

It was around nine-thirty when I got back to my room. I took out my computer to respond to some of the emails I had seen on my phone during the day. Nothing urgent. I thought about what I considered the brazen exhibitionism of the man in the steam room and I thought back to my own exhibitionism of the previous evening.

There was surely a vast difference between actively going to what was in effect a public space to show off and my own passive involvement as the target of voyeurism. Nevertheless, I felt a sense of guilty pleasure at the excitement I had experienced.

I finished my emails and looked out of my window. The curtains and blends were drawn on the original peeper's room, but there was a crack in the curtains of the room next door. I knew I shouldn't, but I began to undress in the middle of the room. Not close to the window, mind you, but in no way hidden from it. There probably wasn't anyone there anyway, I told myself and resisted any urge to look in that direction.

As I slid off my panties, I caught sight of myself fully nude in a floor-length mirror on the opposite wall. I thought I looked in good shape. That's when I realized in the upper corner of the mirror, I could see the curtains of the room above. The crack had clearly widened and I could see the waist and legs of a man standing up there looking at me. I spun around in a full circle without indicating I had seen anything. Just like last night I felt an excitement building in me. Looking in the mirror I did a few yoga moves and as I looked back from my 'downward dog' I could see his face and eyes following my moves intently.

Unfortunately, I can't do any of the more provocative yoga poses. And then although it was quite dark outside, I thought of the 'sun salutation' poses, a routine I could do with fluidity. I ended the sequence stretching up full frontal to almost face his window. I was facing just enough to one side to avoid it being obvious I saw him. I found myself facing a dark window three to the right of his, but a movement alerted me that there was most probably another person watching me now. Again, I turned away as if I had noticed nothing and picked my night gown off my pillow.

There was no denying the excitement I was experiencing as I went to my en-suite bathroom to remove my make-up, wash my face and clean my teeth. I must have been there a good ten minutes before I returned to my room wearing my night gown. I checked myself in the mirror and saw my watchers had been patiently waiting for my return. I went over to the bed and turned on the bedside light, then turned off the main light.

I took my book together with my reading glasses from the bedside table and lay down on the coverlet. The clock read ten past ten. I turned on to my side away from the window and could see in the mirror that at least one of my watchers was still there. As I had turned quite by chance the end of my gown had slipped off my hip no doubt revealing a naked buttock and leg. Although I could only see my watcher up to his waist, I felt sure I had his undivided attention.

I rolled back on to my back and piled the pillows against the headboard to support my neck while reading. I was only faintly aware that in doing this the tie on my gown had undone and my gown was now lying flat on the bed underneath me. How did that happen? I gave it a half-hearted tug but it was firmly under my butt so I left it enjoying the feeling of the air conditioning playing lightly over my naked body.

I was tempted to see what my watcher or watchers were doing but instead contented myself with letting my left hand play over my breast, I removed it turn the page of my book but let it return to continue strolling my breast lightly. After a couple more pages it apparently felt it had permission to play with my nipple. My nipples are very sensitive and within moments not only that one but its partner were standing fully erect. I rolled to the side again and checked the mirror. To my surprise there were now three watchers and at least one had got a grip on himself so to speak.

I knew it was time to stop. The clock now read ten twenty-eight. I rolled back on to my back and lay there with thoughts running through my head. What was I doing? It wasn't like I wanted sex. My husband and I have a very good sexual relationship. We both have very active libidos and I initiate our fun as often as he does. It's a joke between us. We had a good session before I left, and I'm sure we'll have another when I get back.

Would I tell him about any of this? Well I might tell him about the guy with the erection in the steam room and ask if he thought it was deliberate, as I did. Thinking about my husband I again wondered: would he stand in his room watching some unknown woman wantonly displaying herself.

As I tried to picture him standing at a room window looking down, I found one hand was now stroking my landing strip just above my sex. I was tugging gently on the short hairs down there, while my other hand had returned to playing with my nipple. I lay like that for a few moments and then my left hand stopped playing with the hair and began rubbing gently up and down my clit as my excitement mounted.

I couldn't stop now if I tried. My legs had bent out and opened to give me greater access as both hands now centered there. I felt the pleasure mounting as my hands moved faster and fingertips now slid in and out of my very wet vagina. Now I was cuming whether I liked it or not and growing waves of warm excitement built under my working fingers. And then my pelvic muscles contracted with spasms of pleasure.

I lay still, panting and enjoying the aftershocks rippling through me. It was a long time since I had pleasured myself in such a satisfying way. My husband often uses toys to ensure my satisfaction before mounting me to enjoy his own climax. I wondered again if he would ever watch someone from his hotel room and masturbate. Would I dare ask him if doing so meant admitting my own guilty pleasure? I rolled over to see in the mirror some of the curtains now pulled closed, but others still open, still watching. I could still feel my excitement. This behavior could become addictive.

I got up from the bed pulling my gown around me. Now I worried would someone complain? I looked at the coverlet realizing that I had been so wet some of my juices had left a wet spot there.

I turned off my bedside light. The clock now read ten forty-two: time to sleep. I took off my gown and tip-toed to the window to close the curtains. I could not resist looking up at the one window where the curtains were not yet drawn, and the cheeky bastard who stood there grinning at my dark naked shadow gave me a little bowing salute with a flourish of his right hand. I drew the curtains firmly and closed the blind. While I would be gone by tomorrow night, I wondered what tomorrow morning would bring.

THE END

Copyright: © Dawn Ramble 2020