The Fire Escape

June had the bedroom light off and the window up.

Across the gap, the opposite flat was lit. Ray and Lila never closed the bedroom curtain all the way. June was forty. She had lived here two years. They had lived there one. Last week Lila had looked straight at the dark window while Ray fucked her and had not looked away. Tonight the curtain was wider.

June told herself she would watch for a minute.

Ray was thirty-three, shirt off, sitting on the edge of the bed. Lila, twenty-nine, stood between his knees in a T-shirt and nothing else. She glanced at the gap. June's stomach dropped. Lila smiled, small, and pulled the shirt off.

They knew.

June's hand was in her underwear before she decided to put it there. She rubbed herself slowly and watched Lila sink onto Ray's cock, facing the window, hands on his shoulders. The distance made the details worse. The bounce of Lila's tits. Ray's hands on her arse. Lila's mouth open. June matched the rhythm without meaning to.

She had watched three times before this and pretended the dark made her invisible. It had not. On Thursday Lila had mouthed something she could not hear. Tonight there was no pretending left.

Her phone lit.

Lila: Curtain's open on purpose. Stay there.

June typed with her wet hand: I'm here.

Lila: Good. Don't come yet.

Ray turned his head, found the dark square of June's window, and nodded once. Then he fucked up into Lila harder. Lila braced on him and let herself be loud enough that June heard it through two panes and the gap. June's fingers slipped. She stopped, obedient to a text, and hated how much she liked the stopping.

Another message.

Come to the fire escape. Door's on the latch. Watch from ours if you want it closer. Clothes optional. You can leave whenever.

June put a coat on over nothing and went. The metal was cold under her bare feet. Their door opened before she knocked. Lila was flushed, naked, shining between her legs. Ray stood behind her, cock wet.

"In or out," Lila said. "You can stay on the step and watch. That's a full option."

"In," June said. "I'll watch. I don't need to be touched unless you want it."

"We want you watching from the chair. Hands where we can see them. If you want a hand on you later, you ask. Not before."

They put her in the armchair by the bed. Close enough to smell them. Lila climbed back onto Ray, this time facing June, and sank down with a sound she did not bother to hide. June opened the coat. Her hand went back between her legs. Lila watched it.

"That's it. Show us. Slower."

Ray fucked her in steady thrusts. The bed was close enough that June could see the shine on his cock each time Lila lifted. She rubbed her clit and did not come, because Lila had not said. The restraint of that was its own heat. Ray looked at June's fingers and swore. Lila smiled without taking her eyes off them.

"You like being the audience," Lila said. "Say it."

"I like it."

"Louder."

"I like watching him fuck you. I like that you know."

"Now," Lila said. "Come while I do."

June did, shaking, two fingers buried, eyes on Lila's face. Lila followed, grinding down, and Ray held her there and came with a groan he aimed at the woman in the chair as much as the woman on his lap. June watched his cock pulse and felt a second, smaller shock go through her.

Nobody spoke for a moment. The fire escape ticked as it cooled.

"Same window tomorrow," Lila said. "Or the chair. You pick when you get home."

June pulled the coat shut. Her legs were not convinced.

"The chair," she said. "The window was the invitation. This was the point."

Ray laughed, breathless. "Leave the coat next time. We already know what's under it."

At home she did not turn the light on. She stood at her own window and watched them straighten the sheet. Lila looked up, found her, and lifted a hand. Not a wave. An acknowledgement. June put two fingers in her mouth, the same fingers, and Lila's smile went sharp even at that distance.

Her phone buzzed.

Lila: Tomorrow. Chair. Bring nothing.

June typed yes before she could make it clever.

June did not promise out loud. She also did not say no.

She slept badly and did not mind. At two she got up for water and saw their light still on. Ray was on his back. Lila was riding him again, slower, and when she turned her head she did not look surprised to find June at the glass. She lifted a hand off his chest and crooked it, a small come-here that June did not obey at two in the morning. She watched until Lila came, then went back to bed with her hand between her legs and the curtain in her own room left an inch open.