Women Seeking Women #111

She slipped through the doorway at 11:59, twelve minutes from midnight and the wrong kind of holy night. Two condoms in her bag felt heavier than hope. She ditched the coat on the first chair, peeled off stockings next to the bed that didn't even have sheets. Outside, somewhere, a goddamn radio kept bleeding Elvis into the silence of this cheap East Hollywood flop. He stood against the wall, already shirtless, whiskey smell sharp on his breath, and she let him push her backward onto stained carpet before she even spoke. His mouth found her collarbone, tasted salt and the tin recall of antique perfume. "Your wife's gonna kill us both," she said. His hand slid down her open fly and squeezed, hard enough to taste ownership. "She thinks I'm at the track." The bed frame started working; one leg rocked free beneath them and the floor absorbed every thrust she gave him back, every bruise she didn't plan. Later she'd feel the dry sheet ridge imprinting along her spine, smell the rubber-smell proof that fuck now meant nothing later. Tonight counted for sin alone. She came like a smashed mirror, scattered and slightly mean. When he rolled aside the cheap little rubber shriveled inside the trash like the oldest joke they'd ever repeated. Not tomorrow, though. Tomorrow was the confession both of them were late for.