Chapter 1: El pasillo y el escote
The hallway smelled like cheap disinfectant and the ghosts of a thousand teenage anxieties. Fluorescent lights buzzed overhead, casting that sickly institutional pallor on everything they touched, and the lockers lining the walls were dented relics of a decade long past. The bell had rung five minutes ago, and the crowd was already thinning, leaving only clusters of stragglers and the echo of slamming doors.
I was about to head to my next class when I saw her. Marta. She was leaning against the lockers about twenty feet ahead, and even from here, I could tell she was waiting for someone. That someone being me, judging by the way her eyes lit up the second she caught my gaze.
I sighed internally. Not because I disliked her—I didn't. Not exactly. It was just that Marta was a lot. She was five-two of pure trouble packed into a frame that didn't look like it should be able to cause the kind of havoc she did. Her hair was dark and shoulder-length, falling in waves that she was constantly tucking behind her ears. Her face was unremarkable—pleasant enough, but you wouldn't look twice at her in a crowd. But her body was a different story entirely. I hated that I noticed it. I hated that I couldn't stop noticing it.
"Maaaartín," she called out, dragging my name into four syllables. "I was hoping I'd catch you."
I ran a hand through my hair and played it cool. "Yeah? Here I am."
The morning light from the windows at the far end of the hallway caught the fabric of her top—some kind of stretchy material in a muted gray that clung to her torso like it had been painted on. Not that I was looking. I was absolutely not looking.
Marta pushed off the lockers and stepped closer. She had a way of moving, a sort of lazy sway that made it seem like she wasn't trying to attract attention, even though she absolutely was. She stopped right in front of me, close enough that I could smell her perfume—something floral and sweet that didn't quite match the mischievous glint in her eyes.
Something dropped.
Her lips parted in a little gasp. "Oh, my pen."
She bent down.
I knew what was happening. I knew it like I knew the ceiling tiles above me were stained yellow, like I knew the janitor's mop bucket was always parked outside room 204. Marta was about to give me a show, and I was about to pretend not to watch.
The stretchy gray top dipped as she lowered herself. I caught a flash of lace—black, delicate, expensive-looking—and the smooth curve of skin where her breasts pressed together. She took her sweet time picking up that pen. Her fingers grazed the linoleum, fumbled, picked it up, dropped it again.
"Clumsy me," she murmured, loud enough for me to hear.
I shifted my weight. Looked at the ceiling. Looked at the lockers. Looked at the ceiling again. The fluorescent hum seemed louder than usual.
She straightened up slowly, the fabric of her top pulling against her chest as she rose, and for a moment, just a moment, I let myself look. Her breasts were round, firm, sitting high and proud in that lace bra. They hadn't always been that size—I'd noticed the change over the past few months. She'd gone from a modest handful to something considerably more substantial, and she'd been making sure everyone knew it.
Including me. Especially me.
"There," she said, holding the pen up triumphantly. "Crisis averted."
The way she said it, all breathless and pleased, made it sound like she'd just disarmed a bomb instead of retrieving a ten-cent piece of plastic. I knew better. She'd planned this. Every single second of it.
Marta tucked the pen behind her ear and then—this was classic her—reached up to adjust her bra. Her hands went inside the neckline of her top, tugging at the underwire, shifting the cups, making a production of it. She gave it a little pat at the end, the kind of motion that made her breasts bounce just enough to catch the light.
"God, these things," she said, sighing. "I swear, ever since I got back from vacation, they've been so obvious. Like, you can't not notice them, right?"
My mouth went dry. "I hadn't noticed."
The lie was so weak it practically evaporated in the air between us.
Marta laughed, low and throaty. "Martín. Martín, Martín, Martín." She closed the distance between us, walking with that same unhurried sway, until she was close enough that I could see the individual strands of mascara on her lashes. She reached out and placed her hand on my forearm. Her fingers were warm through my jacket sleeve, and she squeezed gently.
"You're a terrible liar," she said, "and I love that about you."
I tried to pull my arm away, but she held on. Playful, but firm. Her thumb traced a circle on my forearm, and I felt it go straight to my spine.
"I just don't understand how you can be so calm," she said, tilting her head up at me. "I mean, look at me. I'm practically spilling out of this top." She looked down at her chest and then back up at me, and there was something in her expression that I couldn't quite read—part mischief, part genuine curiosity. "Doesn't it bother you? Even a little?"
This was a game. Everything with Marta was a game, and I'd never been given the rules. I didn't know if I was supposed to say yes, no, or something in between. I just knew that in the ten seconds she'd been touching my arm, I'd imagined at least three different scenarios that I had no business imagining.
"I think you're looking for trouble," I said finally.
"I think you're right." She grinned and stepped back, letting her hand fall from my arm. For some reason, that small loss of contact felt like a bigger deal than it should have. "But you didn't answer my question."
"You didn't ask one."
"Oh, I did. The question was, 'doesn't it bother you?' And you deflected. Which, in my expert opinion, means it very much bothers you. Which is fine. I understand. I'm very bothersome."
She reached behind her back and adjusted her bra strap—another small, deliberate motion that made her chest push forward and the fabric of her top strain against her curves. I caught myself looking again. I hated myself for it. But I couldn't help it. Her breasts were round, prominent, perfect against the gray fabric, and she knew it. She was using me for validation. For the thrill of knowing that she was being watched.
"Anyway," she said, all casual now, as if she hadn't just spent an entire minute doing the most blatant verbal and visual seduction I'd ever witnessed, "I just wanted to say hi. I missed you yesterday. You weren't at lunch."
My throat was still dry. I swallowed. "Gym."
"Ohhh, right." She nodded sagely. "How were the weights? Did you lift them and put them down again?"
"Something like that."
"I bet you get all sweaty and gross. It sounds horrible. I bet you look so bad when you're working out. All red. All out of breath. Probably the worst thing ever." She was biting her lip as she said it, trying to hold back a smile.
The bell range again.
The fresh wave of students poured out of nearby classrooms, flooding the hallway with noise and motion. Marta swayed in the current of bodies, her dark hair bobbing over her shoulders, and for a moment, I caught a glimpse of her profile—the curve of her chest, the satisfied little smirk playing on her lips.
She looked back at me, mid-crowd, and lifted her hand in a lazy wave. "See you around, Martín. Don't let the weights win."
Then she was gone, swallowed up by the tide of students. I stood there for a long moment, rooted to the spot, my eyes tangled up in the spot where she'd disappeared. My arm still tingled where she'd touched me. My thoughts were a mess.
I told myself I didn't want anything from Marta. I told myself this was just a game she was playing, and I didn't want to be part of it. But as the crowd thinned and the hallways emptied, I realized that I'd been staring after her for a solid five minutes, and I could still picture exactly how the lace had looked against her skin.
I adjusted my backpack and headed in the opposite direction, telling myself the faster I walked, the less it mattered.