Not demanded. Not manipulated.
Allowed.
And then Connor had shown up and turned allowance into a question.
I typed:I saw Connor.
Three dots appeared instantly.
Amaya:Of course, you did.
Me:We kissed.
The dots stopped. Then resumed.
Amaya:Where are you?
I hesitated, then typed my address. Before I could second-guess, another message came through.
Amaya:I’m coming. Do not spiral alone.
Amaya showed up twenty minutes later with a bottle of wine and the expression of a woman ready to perform emergency surgery on my emotional state.
She stepped into my apartment, took one look at me standing too still in the middle of the room, and shook her head.
“Ah,” she said. “You are vibrating.”
“I am not.”
She lifted her eyebrows.
I exhaled. “Fine. Maybe a little.”
She kicked her shoes off, moved like she belonged here, and opened the wine without asking. That was Amaya—direct, intimate, unbothered by the boundaries Americans pretended made them safe.
She handed me a glass. “Tell me.”
So, I did.
I told her about the orgy—how daylight had made me brave, how the absence of shame had felt like stepping into a world where my body wasn’t something to manage. I told her about Connor appearing like a pressure change, about the way he’d checked if I was okay like my comfort mattered more than his curiosity.
I told her about the kiss.
Amaya listened without interrupting, her eyes sharp, her posture relaxed. When I finished, she took a slow sip of wine and said, “You liked that he stopped.”
My throat tightened. “Yes.”
She nodded as if she’d expected it. “You’re not responding to aggression. You’re responding to control.”
“I don’t want to be controlled,” I said quickly, defensive.
Amaya leaned forward. “I didn’t say controlled. I said control.”
She held my gaze until my defensiveness softened into confusion.
“There is power over you,” she said, “and there is power someone has and chooses not to use.”
The words landed so cleanly it made my chest ache.
