The wind won the battle against his exhalations, sending cigarette ash directly into his eye. The balcony, three floors up and barely big enough to pace several steps, had a clear view of the pool below and he watched the noiseless skinny dippers in silence. Had they cared (or been paying attention), the trail of dissipating smoke from the edifice above would’ve made them titter and giggle at the fact that someone knew. Instead, they swam birth-naked and free, unconcerned and simply assumed they were being watched. Had it been a year earlier, he might’ve joined them, but he was content to return to his new wife. Her gently distended belly had caught them by surprise, forcing the wedding to come earlier so she could still fit in her dress.

Other than the starlight cascading through the window, the room was dark. She had asked him to leave the lights off as he ventured outside and he had obliged, stumbling over his dress shoes and tuxedo pants in post-coital exhaustion. The cheap sheets were warm against her toes and she could see him squatting on the balcony, naked in the sweltering midnight air. The new ring felt tight around her finger, but she refused to remove it the way he refused to remove his. Each ring kissed the other’s bare palm as lips explored lips and legs became entangled, slippery with sex-sweat. She rubbed her belly absent-mindedly and smiled as he came back in, lifting the sheets and coiling himself up within her again before crashing into a wall of subconscious thoughts and snoring.

The two couples floated through the warm blue liquid, a fetal feeling of weightlessness and nude surrounding them as the moon played voyeur. The lights at the bottom of the pool had been turned off for hours, emanating a seductive appeal as they arrived home from the bar. They hadn’t bothered to stop by their rooms to change, just a hop across the fence and the quick release of belts and quiet unzips were muffled by the suppressed giggles. They all agreed to slide into the water, letting it swallow them slowly so as not to make any noise. A chance like this was rare and should be stretched out into forever whenever possible.

The brunette girl had noticed the smoke from the balcony above somehow. Whoever was watching was on a high floor and had she blinked, the exhalation would’ve been missed. She decided to give the smoker a show by climbing out of the pool, pulling her hair back and exposing her bare chest to the moon’s waning glow as it caressed her in ways her boyfriend would never figure out. She sneaked a glance back up to the balcony, but the smoke had disappeared and she couldn’t even be sure it was the right one anyway. No smoke, no show. ‘Sad, really,’ she thought. A captive audience was nice every once in awhile.

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