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Carol is going to fucking kill someone.
Who? She hasn’t decided yet, but very likely it’s going to be the asshole who runs the “Airbnb” that turns out is just a foreign WhatsApp number and a photo stolen from a real listing, probably, if she can ever find him. But right now, standing here on the dark cobblestone street of wonderful, scenic Malcesine, Italy, at 9 p.m. with a heavy suitcase and no phone service, Carol will settle for anyone. She’ll settle for the ugly pigeon that just looked at her.
She had transferred all the money upfront, almost two thousand dollars, gone, into an account belonging to a thief. And here she is, in front of a green door by Piazza Cavour, knocking for several minutes, despite the creeping realization she’s been scammed. There is no lockbox as advertised.
A woman opens the door and Carol forgets what country she’s in. Instead she is acutely aware of the state of herself — sweaty, angry, red in the face as she stands face to face with some supermodel. Long legs. Bare feet. A white oversized men’s shirt. Probably nothing else.
“Can I help you?” the woman says, clearly irritated.
“Um,” Carol says, her voice coming out an octave higher than intended. She clears her throat. “Are you my Airbnb host?”
“Am I your— what, no. What?”
“It’s just… I have booked this house. On Airbnb.”
“I think you have the wrong house.”
“Isn’t this the house?” Carol says, putting her phone straight to the woman’s face.
“I can’t tell. You’d have to unlock your phone.”
Carol unlocks it with clammy, clumsy fingers. She shows her the door, the actual door, this fucking door, with the ivy and everything, house number matching down to the last digit and the woman just looks at it with distant amusement.
“Yeah, that’s my door,” she says. “This is my house.”
“You… live here.”
“I do, I live here.”
“But I paid— there’s a booking, there’s a— I have a confirmation number,” Carol says, like a confirmation number has ever meant something to God or man, and she thinks that this must be it, this must be rock bottom. Here, on the most idyllic street, with a stranger who looks at her with disdain.
“I think,” the woman says, “somebody has taken your money and doesn’t own this house.”
“No.”
“Yes.”
The most humiliating part is knowing the woman is right, is knowing she’s right because she had a fucking feeling and wouldn’t trust it, and it’s all her own fault.
“I don’t even have internet,” is all that comes out, pathetic. “I turned off the data because that’s a scam, twenty euros per day or whatever the fuck, and I’m not— I can’t even look up a new place now, I can’t call the bank… God, I need to call the fucking bank.”
“Okay.” The woman holds up a hand with long, slender fingers (probably, Carol doesn’t know because she doesn’t look closely, why would she). “Okay, stop. You’re having a… moment.”
“I’m not… having a moment…”
“You are, it’s a very loud moment right here on my street. People are looking.”
Carol opens her mouth to say something cutting, something that could restore some of her dignity, but all that comes out is: “I really need a bathroom too, if we’re doing full disclosure.”
The woman looks at her for a long second, then her face opens up and she barks out a laugh, actually even slapping her thighs. Carol has to bite the insides of her lips to hide a dumb, proud smile.
“Come in,” she says, stepping back. “Before you cry on my doorstep. I have Wi-Fi. And a toilet.”
“I wasn’t going to cry, but alright.” Carol hauls her annoyingly heavy suitcase into the house.
“Right. Come on in, Carol.”
Carol stops. “I didn’t tell you my name.”
“You’re wearing a name tag.” The woman points, and Carol looks down, horrified, at the little sticker from the transfer company that they all had to put on their clothes like fucking toddlers. HELLO MY NAME IS CAROL, it says, in a cheerful blue font. And then in black, more serious: GOING TO: MALCESINE. God.
“I can explain...”
The woman smiles. “I’m Zosia.”
—
The bathroom is tiny, beige and smells like chemicals. Carol sits there for an extra minute or two after peeing, with her head in her hands just to breathe. She’s fifty-three years old, she has survived Helen’s chemo, Helen’s body being put into the ground, she has survived conversion therapy camp and worst of all, she has survived celebrating Christmas with both Koumba and Manousos in the same house, and now she’s falling apart over a fake Airbnb and a hot stranger with an accent… Get it together, Carol, fucking get it together.
She kind of does.
Zosia is in the kitchen when Carol comes out, barefoot, putting two glasses of water down on the table. “Sit,” she says. “Wi-Fi is the Casa Bianchi, password is literally 1234. My landlord doesn’t believe in security.”
“Don’t you own this?”
“Yes.” A sly smile from Zosia.
Carol sits down and connects to the Wi-Fi with her phone. She writes Malcesine into the search bar on Airbnb’s website and begins to scroll. Zosia hovers over her immediately and even leans over her shoulder, close enough that Carol can smell her perfume, and says: “Not that one.”
“I haven’t even clicked on anything.”
“Right, but you were going to, I could see you were going to. It’s terrible, I know the address. It’s right above a bar. You would never sleep. Anything above a restaurant is a no, because you’ll need to have your window open at night so you don’t die from the heat, but in the morning they come and collect the glass bottles for recycling. It is loud.”
“Okay…” Carol keeps scrolling. She finds another, and Zosia makes a small noise through her nose.
“That one’s a scam also, probably. Look how cheap. It’s July. Or the toilet doesn’t work.”
“You’re not helping.”
“I’m helping very much, I’m saving you from more scams. You should be thanking me.” Zosia takes the phone from Carol’s hand without asking, and starts scrolling. Carol is too stunned to speak, and she’s going to pretend it’s from the sheer audacity of this woman, and not the almost physical contact they just had.
“Right. Thanks.”
Carol watches as Zosia scrolls the page herself, scanning, judgmental, magnificent. “Okay, this one is real. But it’s probably a forty minute walk from here. But you can’t walk that far tonight, you’ll die on the road and I will have to explain your body to the police in my terrible English.”
“Your English is literally fine.”
“My English is excellent, I was being humble.” She scrolls again and taps something. “This one. It’s real, not very far away. But um, it’s for tomorrow night. You’re not gonna find anything for tonight, I think.”
Carol stares at her. She reaches for her phone and looks at the listing. The world’s most okayest Airbnb stares back at her, ready tomorrow at 3 p.m. That’s not even the worst part, though, the worst part sits in her chest and it’s something she won’t name yet, thanks.
“So I have nowhere tonight.”
“You have nowhere tonight,” Zosia agrees. Why does she sound pleased.
“Great.” Carol puts her head into her hands. “Brilliant. I love that for me.”
“Do you want wine?”
The question sparks a whole flood of complicated emotions inside of Carol. She knows exactly what she’s like around wine, knows exactly how one glass tends to go, knows the specific lies she tells herself every time just to keep the evening going.
And right by the kitchen counter, with another button undone on her shirt, stands a very good reason to keep the evening going.
“Sure,” Carol says. “Why not.”
Zosia pours two glasses of red. She hands one over, but doesn’t sit down, just keeps leaning against the counter. Carol can see that she is, actually, wearing more than just the large men’s shirt. Criminally short jean shorts. Jesus.
“So,” Zosia says. “Tell me. What is a woman with such a large suitcase doing alone in Malcesine getting scammed by people on the internet.”
“There’s not really a story.” Carol takes a drink, more than a sip, and feels the warmth. “My um, my wife died. Two years ago. We were supposed to do this trip. Venice, Verona and then to here. Never actually did it, so I’m doing it now. Terribly, apparently.”
She waits for the face, the head tilt, the oh, I’m so sorry, and prepares something lighthearted in response, but it doesn’t come. Instead Zosia just says: “Venice is disgusting.”
Carol laughs, a real laugh that comes out of her in surprise. “You’re right. It absolutely was not a good time.”
“Everyone just pretends to love it. Once you get over the beauty, all it is is sweaty tourists and overpriced, stale cannolis.”
“Oh my god. I got one of those.” Carol shudders. “I had just taken the first bite — tasted like straight cardboard, by the way — and then a fucking seagull came flying and stole it?”
Zosia laughs. More, more, more, Carol thinks. “They didn’t warn you?”
“Nope. Let’s see this dumb American get her life ruined, it will be so funny, ha ha!” Zosia laughs again when Carol tries, and fails, to do an Italian accent.
“You should have come straight here,” Zosia says and refills Carol’s glass. She leans over in a way that could give Carol the opportunity to look right into her shirt, which Carol of course doesn’t, truly, at least not a lot, but she notices it. Files it away.
“I should have.”
“Skip it next time.”
“There’s not going to be a next time. I will stay home. I’m fifty-three, I’m too fucking old for this.”
“Fifty-three is not old, don’t be dramatic.” Zosia’s eyes do something then, a flick down and up, not shy. “You don’t look it, if that helps.”
“It… doesn’t not help.”
“Good.”
Carol is really feeling the warmth of the wine now. “So. What about you. Why are you home alone on a Tuesday looking like—” she gestures vaguely, at all of it, the shirt, the collarbones, the whole unfair situation — “that.”
“Like what?”
“You know like what.”
Zosia’s mouth curves. “I got dumped three weeks ago.”
“Christ. Who dumps you.” It comes out too sincere, and it’s because of the wine, but also because of the damn truth in it. “Whoever he is, he’s an idiot.”
“She.”
Something inside Carol sits up very fast and very interested. Bingo.
“Her loss, then,” Carol says. Playing it cool. “Genuinely. Enormous loss on her part.”
“You haven’t known me very long. How would you know.”
“I’m a fast judge of character.”
“I don’t know… You cried in my bathroom earlier.”
“I did not—” Carol starts, and Zosia is already laughing, a low laugh and not bothering to hide it, and she’s watching Carol over the rim of her wine glass.
“You’re flirting with me,” Zosia says, and it’s not a question, just flat.
“I’m being friendly,” Carol lies, and drinks to hide her reddened cheeks.
“You’re flirting kind of badly. It’s a little bit charming.”
“Excuse me.”
“It’s true. You keep looking at my mouth and then pretending you weren’t. Very smooth.”
“I hate you a little bit,” Carol murmurs.
“No, you don’t.” Zosia sets her glass down. “You want me, and you don’t know what to do about it.”
Carol’s pulse shoots right down between her legs.
“If I wanted you, I would definitely know what to do about it.” There isn’t as much confidence in her voice as she would like.
Zosia gets closer, stands by the table now. Carol wishes she was closer so she could smell the wine on her breath.
“You have nowhere to sleep tonight.”
“I have— technically I could find something, there’s probably a hotel—”
“There’s not, I checked while you were in the bathroom. Everything is full.” Zosia says this with no remorse whatsoever, she almost seems delighted by it. “If you behave,” she continues, voice now dropping by half a register, and bends down close to Carol’s face. “I have a couch.”
“A couch.”
“Mhm. A couch.”
“And if I don’t behave?”
Zosia looks at Carol for a long moment, and Carol can tell the moment she decides something, and it makes Carol’s body feel a pull she hasn’t felt in a long time, hasn’t wanted in a long time, even entertained the thought of. And now she thinks, she knows, she’s about to give in.
“I don’t want to talk about the couch,” Carol says.
“No?”
“No.”
Zosia reaches for the glass in Carol’s hand and sets it down on the table without breaking eye contact, and says: “Say it properly, then. I’m not going to guess.”
And Carol, all grown and successful and a life lived, sensible on a good day, who does not ever give in, gives in now. “I don’t want the couch.”
“Good answer.”
Zosia kisses her, still bent down over Carol, and it’s almost forceful. Carol holds back a moan when Zosia grabs her face and sits down on her knees beside Carol’s chair, and then Zosia deepens the kiss, making that moan fall out anyway. Zosia swallows it hungrily and Carol feels each lick of her tongue go straight to her clit.
When Zosia’s hand finds the hem of Carol’s tank top, Carol pulls back slightly.
“I should, um, shower,” she says against Zosia’s mouth. “Umph, Zosia, I’m disgusting, I’ve been on a bus for hours—”
“No,” Zosia says and grabs Carol’s hair, pulling her back in.
“I’m serious,” Carol tries to get out, “I’m sweaty—”
“I don’t care.” Zosia breathes heavily against her mouth. Carol stares at her, blown pupils, one bigger than the other, leaking into the iris. “I want you like this.” Any and all resolve she might have had is out the window.
So. Okay, then. Whatever is left of Carol’s brain files that away as possibly the hottest thing anyone has ever said to her, so instead of arguing she kisses Zosia back, hard. Zosia makes a startled noise into her mouth, and yes, that noise, Carol wants more.
Carol starts to stand up, grabbing Zosia’s face to make her follow. Needs to get closer, wants her closer right now, and Zosia stands up with her. Zosia tries to get her hands under Carol’s shirt, but Carol stops her, holding her wrists. She feels Zosia smile into the kiss at that, and so she decides to take, take what she’s been wanting since she saw this woman lean against the doorframe downstairs.
She lets her hand wander up Zosia’s stomach, feels her twitch and breathe in hard, and then she reaches a breast because of course there is no bra.
“Christ, where you just— walking around your house all night with no—”
“It’s my house. I can be naked under my shirt if I want.”
“That should be illegal.” Carol strokes her thumb over Zosia’s nipple.
“Fuck… You’re welcome,” Zosia says and Carol’s legs go weak. She wants to hear Zosia moan, she wants to hear Zosia beg, she wants it all, and she has both hands under Zosia’s shirt now, lets them squeeze and lets her nails scrape against Zosia’s back.
“Kitchen counter,” Zosia murmurs, already walking Carol backward.
“What?”
“There. Now. Fuck me on the kitchen counter.”
The absurdity of the whole situation almost makes Carol laugh. She’s so turned on she can’t form coherent sentences, and it’s because of some scammer on Airbnb that she now has the hottest woman she’s ever seen asking her to fuck her on her kitchen counter. Zosia smiles against her jaw where she’s bent down to kiss, as if she agrees, like the absurdity is half the fun, and then she bites down gently at the join of Carol’s neck and shoulder.
“Oh—” Carol hears herself moan.
“Mm.”
Carol’s hands wander lower, over Zosia’s ass, and she turns them and walks them back forcefully until Zosia’s back hits the kitchen counter and before Zosia can start to get herself up there, Carol lifts her, and Zosia groans straight into Carol’s mouth.
“Oh,” she says, looking at Carol. “Okay.”
“Okay?”
“I like this.”
“Good.”
Carol makes quick work of Zosia’s shirt, pushes it off her shoulders and just looks for a second, actually looks because God this woman is unreal, she’s sitting right here, so willing to let a stranger she’s just been mean to get her hands all over her — and then Carol stops thinking. She reaches up, kisses what she can of Zosia’s throat, her collarbone, and Zosia’s hand comes up into her hair again and grips, not gentle, and it sends another jolt down Carol’s spine. She’s getting hot, wet, swollen and needs to feel Zosia, needs to feel—
“You are a little bit annoying,” Zosia breathes out.
“What have I done now,” Carol murmurs.
“You take too long.”
“What.”
“I asked you to fuck me.” Zosia unbuttons her shorts and grabs Carol’s hand and pushes it down between her legs under her underwear as she surges forward to meet Carol’s lips. Carol groans against her when she feels how wet Zosia is, fingers coated immediately, and it strikes her how she has missed this. A part of her was worried — that maybe she’d be rusty, it’s been years, after all, but now… God. Her body responds, her body wants, her body knows what to do.
Carol moves her fingers, finds Zosia’s clit and circles it carefully, lightly, her hand in an awkward angle because of the shorts and underwear Zosia still has on, but it’s like a drug to hear Zosia’s breaths come out sharp. She keeps circling, dipping down, coming back up. She looks up at Zosia who has thrown her head back, leaning back on the kitchen counter pushing her hips forward, taking.
“Take these off,” Carol says and removes her fingers. Zosia whines, but lifts her hips up and Carol drags both shorts and underwear down and throws them over her shoulder somewhere. Then Zosia’s long legs are around her, heels digging into the back of her thighs, and Carol’s hand returns to between her legs in another awkward angle but it works, she can reach into Zosia now—
“Fuck, God,” Zosia says through gritted teeth. “Inside. Inside.”
Carol smiles. God, she could get high off this.
Still circling Zosia’s clit, she leans up again and whispers, right in her ear: “Not so smug now.” Her voice comes out lower than she expected, and Zosia’s hips jerk forward into her hand in response.
“Shut up. Fuck.”
“Bossy.”
“You started it.”
Carol shakes her head, but she’s only human, so she slides a finger into Zosia and feels her clench, and Carol has to close her eyes at the feeling, take a deep breath as she slides it out slowly and then in again. Zosia has grabbed her again, reaches for her face and their mouths clash together as Zosia moans against her, into her mouth, and Carol knows she will give Zosia anything and everything she wants.
Zosia’s hips keep chasing more. Carol feels it, knows what she wants, and gives it. Two fingers, and she kisses, bites, nips and takes Zosia’s nipple into her mouth as she starts to set a rhythm. Wet noises and moans fill the kitchen. Carol feels her own underwear stick to her, thinks for a second that she can get away with a hand down her own pants, but she decides against it.
She wants to make Zosia speechless. Wants to make her fall apart.
Using her own body as support behind her hand, Carol starts using her hips to thrust into Zosia, needs the strength of it, and it works immediately because Zosia lets out a long, desperate groan and says yes, oh my God, right there, and Carol thinks I know, and she keeps fucking her hard and fast. She feels sweat pool by her lower back and on her forehead, sees it on Zosia too, giving her chest a glimmer. Carol wants to lick it, and before she even finishes that thought has leaned forward and dragged her tongue up Zosia’s chest and up to her throat. She feels Zosia tighten around her fingers.
Carol drops to her knees on the kitchen tile without really deciding to, some animal part of her taking over completely, and Zosia’s breath catches audibly above her. A hand finds Carol’s hair again, gripping.
“Oh fuck, okay, yes—”
Carol doesn’t tease. She thinks about it for half a second — thinks about drawing it out, making Zosia beg, beg the way she knows Zosia likes to make other people beg, that mean little curl of her mouth all night, but that will have to wait. She wants Zosia falling apart, can feel how close she is. Fast, loud, now, and so she goes for it.
The noise Zosia makes when Carol wraps her lips around her clit is high, startled and Carol feels her whole body light up. There you are, there it is, she thinks, and she starts to suck.
“Oh my— Carol— fuck—”
Zosia’s accent is stronger now and Carol knows she will think about that for the rest of her life.
With her free hand, Carol grabs Zosia’s hip and doubles her efforts. She feels wetness run down her wrist, feels Zosia clenching, clenching, getting closer, hears her breaths go uneven, feels her own clit throb at it and wonders if she’s going to come from fucking Zosia without being touched—
“Oh fuck, don’t stop— oh my god, you’re— you’re gonna make me—”
Carol stops thinking. Keeps the pace. Jesus fucking Christ.
And then Zosia lets out a groan so loud Carol knows the whole town heard it, and pride swells in her chest, and Zosia arches— and comes, comes hard against Carol’s tongue and on her fingers, thighs clamping around Carol’s whole body so hard that Carol has to brace her free hand against the counter to keep herself upright. She fucks Zosia through every wave, feels it in her mouth, can’t hold back any moans but doesn’t care to. Not anymore.
“Oh… Oh Jesus— okay, okay stop, too much, God…”
Carol pulls back, wipes her mouth on the back of her only dry hand, and looks up to find Zosia staring down at her with an expression that has nothing left of smug in it. She’s flushed, wrecked, hair sticking to her face, chest heaving—
“There,” Carol says, standing, knees cracking in a deeply unsexy way that she chooses to ignore completely. “Not laughing now.”
“Oh my God. Quiet,” Zosia says, and grabs her by the back of the neck and kisses her hard, tasting herself on Carol’s mouth, licking into her and Carol swears she hears a little whine.
“I want you in the bedroom,” Zosia says against her mouth. “Now. I want to actually use my hands properly, this counter is a disaster for my back.”
“How charming.”
“I’m not trying to be charming.” Zosia hops down off the counter on legs that visibly aren’t fully steady yet, grabs Carol’s wrist, and hauls her down the hall with an urgency that makes Carol laugh again, delighted, tipsy from wine and adrenaline.
They don’t make it fully upright the entire way — there’s a moment against the hallway wall, Zosia’s mouth on Carol’s neck, Carol’s shirt and sports bra finally coming off over her head and getting flung somewhere she’ll have to search for tomorrow — and then the backs of Carol’s knees hit the edge of the bed and she goes down onto it. Zosia comes down over her, and for one second they just look at each other, both of them breathing hard, almost stunned.
Zosia smirks a little, and then she’s kissing down Carol’s stomach, unbuttoning her pants with quick and confident fingers, and Carol’s brain goes blessedly quiet for the first time in two years.
“Tell me,” Zosia says, dragging the rest of Carol’s clothes off her in one motion, settling between her legs on the floor with zero hesitation, “if you like this.”
“I’m going to like anything you—”
“Tell me anyway. I like hearing you.”
Fuck.
And God, Carol knows she’s loud, always has been, Helen used to laugh about it and say the whole cul-de-sac knew her business, and it feels so good to give into it now, to not try to hold it back the second Zosia’s mouth is on her. A long involuntarily “oh fuck, yes, right there—” comes out of her, and it has Zosia humming against her in what could be both approval and enjoyment, and Carol knows she won’t last.
Not her fault. It’s been a while.
“More,” she says, hips moving, and Zosia has to grab her and hold her down. Carol’s fingers find Zosia’s hair and hold her in place. Zosia’s tongue delves into her, deep, and Carol looks down at her, thinks good girl, but doesn’t dare to say it, doesn’t trust her voice or any part of herself anymore.
Zosia stops just long enough to say: “Talk, Carol.” And then she dives back in, and Carol arches off the mattress, and fuck it feels so good, she doesn’t have it in her to be ashamed, ashamed to not have showered or shaved or anything, because Zosia wants her and it feels so good—
“Don’t fucking stop,” Carol gasps. “God, right there, just— just let me use you, let me come in your mouth—”
Zosia moans loudly against her.
It builds fast, faster than she expects and faster than it has any right to— God, Zosia must know, must feel how Carol is contracting against her chin, she keeps going, tongue so filthy and so precise—
“Yes, yes, yes, yes, good girl, fuck—”
And it builds and builds, and she’s standing on the edge of it, chokes out “oh God—” and then Carol comes apart in Zosia’s mouth, both hands holding her head in place, pressing her in, whole body seizing and releasing in long, shuddering waves while she says — or screams? — something that isn’t even words anymore, just noise—
Zosia works her through it and Carol releases her head, and Zosia is gentle with it, and it keeps going as Zosia drags it out— might want to keep going—
“Okay, okay, God.” Carol pushes lightly on her forehead. “Give me a minute… fuck.”
“You’re the loud one who told me not to stop.” Carol looks down at her, head resting on her thigh, mouth glistening.
“I take it back. Whatever. Come here.”
Zosia comes up and collapses half against her, both of them breathing hard, sweaty.
“You’re still disgusting from your bus,” Zosia says into her shoulder, but Carol hears a softness in it now.
“You said you didn’t care.”
“I don’t.” She pauses, trails her hand lazily up and down Carol’s stomach. “I have a lot of time before 3 p.m. tomorrow, though.”
Carol grins at the ceiling, feels something in her chest that hasn’t been there for years, it’s loose and reckless and gloriously stupid.
“Good. I’m not done with you.”