Has this ever happened to you?
You’re in a hotel, an apartment complex, an Airbnb… and just on the other side of the paper thin wall your crush, or your best friend – or even the love of your fucking life – is moaning and panting and getting the ever living daylights railed out of them. It’s painful, isn’t it? Every moan, gag, and *SLAP* is a tortuous reminder that at least for tonight – but maybe forever – that person isn’t *yours*. It fills you with that potent mix of envy, and anger, and self-destructiveness. You hate every single second of it… yet your hand is shoved inside your panties, your fingers furiously and shamefully at work.
It’s more common than you might think.
Before the Delta surge, my employer organized a work retreat, our first in-person meeting since COVID struck and turned all of us into remote workers. In the days preceding the gathering, I felt like a teenager again. For months I had been nursing a crush on my co-worker, Dana, who I’d never actually met in person. She’s blonde and cute with an edgy, take-no-prisoners vibe that I’ve always been a sucker for. We text routinely about the lastest *New Yorker* articles and our favorite punk bands. Even though I already have a girlfriend – something about the prospect of being in a hotel with her in a far away city was absolutely titillating.