Juna doesn’t knock.
I hear her on the stairs before I ses her, fast, light, two steps at a time. And when she reaches the landing, she is soaked in sweat, breathing hard, braid heavy, eyes fixed on me like the last forty-three minutes had only ever had one destination.
There is a package on my kitchen table.
There is a reason Juna came.
But first, there is the doorway.
And then the door closes.
This is the beginning of a longer Kaia Wouldn’t Dare story.
The first part is open for everyone.
After the paywall, the kitchen gets very quiet.
And the package has to wait.
At the end, tell me one thing:
Should I take them to the roof?
Forty-Three Minutes
The Kitchen
She doesn’t knock.
I hear her on the stairs before I see her, that rhythm, fast and light, two at a time and I’m already at the door when she hits the landing, chest still heaving, her black tights soaked dark from the waistband down, her braid drenched and heavy, sweat running in a clean line down her throat, her collarbone, disappearing into the neckline of her sports bra.
Three months.
Her skin is deep black in the morning light and she is breathing hard and she is looking at me the way she looks at a wall she has already decided to climb.
“Oh”, she says. “Hi.”
“Hi.”
She leans against the doorframe. Not casually, her legs need it. She ran here. Not past here. Here, specifically, which means somewhere around kilometer six she made a decision and kept running toward it for twenty minutes.
“The last twenty minutes”, she says, “my thighs were rubbing together with every step and I couldn’t stop thinking about your mouth on my pussy.”
The words land before I’ve processed them. Juna in my doorway, soaked and breathing and saying this like a fact.
“I thought about how wet you get”, she says. “How fast. How you feel when I push inside you and you try to be quiet and your whole body gives you away anyway.” She tilts her head. “Has it been three months for you too or just for me.”
It moves through me like something poured. From my throat downward. Fast and complete and not a decision.
“Three months”, I say.
“Did you open the package.”
“You said I couldn’t.”
Something shifts in her face. Not quite a smile. Something that knows it already won.
“Take your clothes off”, she says. Still in the doorway.
“Juna. What is happening right here.”
“Sssh.” She steps inside. The door closes behind her. “Ask me again in an hour.”
The door closes.
The package stays on the table.
And for the next forty-three minutes, the kitchen belongs to us.
