The mattress lay on a wood floor that was so polished, you had to be careful walking across it in your socks. She was waiting for me, naked, on her back, propped up on her elbows, legs parted. What a joy it was to be there, she seemed so grown-up now, without me in charge of her assignments.

I knelt before her, and then, without speaking, gently slid into her. The room was warm, and soon, we were sticky with sweat. I loomed over her, on my knees so I wouldn’t crush her. It was natural, the kind of sex that makes you forget hunger, thirst, and fatigue, a trance that swells and pulls you along, almost makes you want to say “I love you,” though you know doing so would break the spell, which itself has nothing to do with love. The blue eyeliner smeared around her eyes, her wet bangs crowning her forehead and the long hair spread beneath her, over the pillow: she stayed like this, her legs splayed, never shifting her position. Our smells merged, mine yogurt, hers ginger. Her thighs recognized me. I had never asked her to leave her fiancé for me—I never thought she could understand me through and through. Early on, when our affair still threatened to end our respective relationships, I told her: “Can’t you see—you can’t build a marriage on what we have—there’s too much passion!”

The long fall into twilight, cocooned in saliva and sweat.

Afterward, we lay on our backs. We felt around in the dark for our clothes. We cooled down, spraying ourselves with raisin-scented water. The smell of rain rose from flowerbeds outside through the open windows. We checked our phones; I texted Barbara.

After sex, we’d usually stay quiet until we got into the bathtub together, but now, Eleonora remained sprawled out on the bed, so I took my phone and walked to the bathroom alone, like I was protecting Barbara from Eleonora (whom she’d never seen). I threw away my condom, turned on the hot water, put in the stopper, and climbed into the tub. The tub was small, the window was open, and I could feel the warmth from the tub mixing with the cool from the rain, and I waited a bit to pour in the bubble bath, to preserve the smell of wet trees.

Still, she didn’t join me. When I came out, she was in bed, fidgeting with a dented plastic bottle on the floor, tipping it over, standing it upright. She was lying on her side, her back to me.

Then she turned, stretched her arm toward me, not quite reaching me; as she moved, her right breast rose, and two folds appeared at her hip. “Can you leave now?” she said. “I want to work alone.”