ALONE AND JACKETLESS in the desert night, I shivered. The line was getting longer. Still scrolling, I walked to the end of it and took my place behind a group of girls, two guys in tow. They all turned to look at me, then back to each other, and the silver dress, which at home in the small and streaky bathroom mirror had looked expensive, felt cheap the way I knew it was. I checked my phone for Jake again, saw nothing and thought of catfishers, scammers, stories of stupid girls, too eager to be wanted, too easily punished for it. But then, a buzzing. A blue bubble and in it, Jake’s name. “Don’t get in line,” he wrote and washed me in relief. I saw him appear at the door, saw him from beyond all those waiting bodies. He held a hand up high and waved me to where he was. I unfolded my arms, put my phone in my clutch, left the line, and went to him.

He wore a suit, the collar of his dress shirt unbuttoned, prayer beads on his wrists and laced loose around his throat. “You look hot,” he said and leaned in to kiss my cheeks. The feeling—his skin against mine—thrilled me, scared me, thrilled me again. I tried to see his face, but all I saw were flashes: fabric and skin. I had seen Jake’s account, though, the pictures of Jake’s face: chiseled cheekbones and his trademark tousled hair, worn most often in a bun atop his head. He was hot in a manufactured way. Soon I would be too. But always, I wanted to see him without a filter; for our entire time together, I would wonder what he looked like completely naked.