I wore black as a Dubai escort at The Bulgari Hotel

I wore black because it reminded me of everything I was not meant to touch and everything I already had inside me and as I stepped into the quiet marble lobby of The Bulgari Hotel I could see his silhouette before his voice reached me because I had memorised the sound of restraint in every man who tried to hide how badly they wanted to break their rules and he stood like that with a phone in one hand and a wedding ring that glittered more like guilt than gold and when his eyes found me I did not smile I only stood still as if my body was just a reflection of the invitation he had imagined for weeks but never said out loud and as we walked to the elevator the silence between us felt heavier than breath and I watched his fingers tremble not from fear but from something deeper than loneliness and when the elevator closed behind us he didn’t touch me he only looked at me like I was the last thing he would ever want to see in a world where wanting was not allowed.

In the suite the windows were open to the sea and the air smelled like Italian leather and questions never asked and I poured us two glasses of something red because I didn’t know what he liked and he didn’t know how to tell me without telling me too much and when I handed it to him his hand brushed mine and stayed there longer than it should have and I said nothing because some men don’t need words to ruin everything and when he finally sat beside me it was not lust that filled the air it was hesitation and it was the kind I had never seen in a man who had everything because I could feel he had nothing left inside and maybe he thought I was here to fix that or maybe he just wanted one moment where he could be held without being asked to explain and I let that happen I let my hand rest on his shoulder and I leaned in not like a lover but like someone who knew how hard it was to carry the weight of silence.

He spoke first and it wasn’t about me or the hotel or the weather it was about her and how he met her when he was too young to know the difference between forever and loyalty and I listened not because I cared about the story but because I cared about the way he told it and he said he hadn’t touched her in months and he didn’t know if it was punishment or protection and then he looked at me like I was the answer to a question he was too afraid to write down and when I leaned into him this time it was with all the softness of a memory I had never lived and still understood and when our lips met it wasn’t urgent it was slow and deliberate like two people trying to teach each other what it meant to breathe again and I let him take his time because I knew he needed to forget what rushing had done to his life and I let him explore every inch of me with eyes first then hands as if he was afraid he would be punished for remembering how to feel.

When morning came the sea was still and the curtains were half open and his shirt was on the floor like a question he didn’t want to pick up and I was already dressed because I didn’t need anything else from him not money not promises not even his name and he stood by the window with a cup of untouched coffee and said thank you in a voice that cracked even though nothing had broken yet and I walked to him and kissed his shoulder not his lips because I didn’t want him to fall in love with something he could never keep and I whispered something only he could hear something that told him it was okay to want something once and never again and as I left I looked back only once just enough to see him place his wedding ring back on with the kind of grace that only guilt could soften and when the elevator doors closed I smiled not because I had won something but because I had given something to a man who would never admit how badly he needed it.