Chapter 4 The confession chair

At Luna Spa, the nail salon was a small temple to vanity... and secrets. It had cream-colored walls, a circular lamp that bathed everything in soft light, and a reclining chair with white leather upholstery where, without knowing why, the women talked about everything. Sometimes, more than they should have.

Aitana had already dubbed it: the confession chair.

That afternoon, the air smelled of mango cream, acetone, and a little bit of drama. As always.

"You don't know what happened to me this weekend!" exclaimed a blonde client with swollen lips and cracked nails, who asked for "something discreet but sparkly."

Aitana looked up from her little box of holographic glitter. She recognized the girl. She'd come in twice. Always with generous cleavage and the energy of someone who knows her way around. But this time there was an urgency in her eyes. A need to be heard.

"Tell me," Aitana said, as if she were a therapist instead of a manicurist.

"I went to a modeling agency party, you know which one? Glow, the one with Iker Valverde."

Aitana felt a small knot form in her stomach, but she kept her composure.

"Oh, yeah... he sounds familiar."

"God! That man is a fucking fantasy. But also an emotional wreck. We looked at each other three times, and I ended up leaving with him. Literally. In his black car, with Rauw Alejandro music blasting. Do you know what he told me? That he hated jealous women."

Aitana tried to keep her expression neutral while she disinfected the tools.

"And what happened next?"

"The usual. Hotel bed, dim lights, and then the classic: "I'm not ready for something serious." He kissed me on the forehead and left before breakfast.

"Hotel bed?" How many times has he said that? Aitana thought.

"But that's not the hardest part," the girl continued. "It's that, in his bathroom... I found a red string bracelet. One of those they say wards off bad energy. And it wasn't his. It was clearly feminine."

Aitana smiled, her lips barely curved. She was wearing one too. One that Iker had told her looked "mystical."

"Maybe it belonged to another guest," she said, trying to sound nonchalant.

"I thought so. But then I saw his phone. There was a pinned message from someone called "Naty Uñas Spa." I started stalking... and boom! Another gorgeous girl who posts photos with phrases like "When he kisses me, time stops." I'm sure she's referring to him!"

Aitana swallowed. The gel she was applying seemed to harden more slowly.

"So what did you do?"

"Nothing." Obviously I pretended I didn't care. But ever since that day, I've been following him on all his social media accounts with a fake account. And I don't know if I'm more in love or more obsessed. Do you think I'm crazy?

"No, not at all," Aitana said, although inside she felt tangled in a spider web. Iker had more women than shades of jelly polish.

The blonde sighed as she checked out her new designs: pale almond pink nails with liquid gold metallic tips.

"I love these. They're classy, ​​but they're also spicy," she said with a mischievous smile.

"Like you," Aitana replied, as she applied cuticle oil.

When the client left, Aitana was left alone in the booth. She turned on the UV lamp just to have something to look at while she sorted through her thoughts.

"Naty? Hotel bed? Red bracelets? How many of us are there, really?"

Her phone vibrated. It was a message from Iker:

"Lunch tomorrow? I want to pamper you a little, my nail artist."

Aitana read it without responding.

She leaned on the table and closed her eyes.

Flashback.

Three weeks earlier.

The same chair.

Another woman. Brunette. Caramel skin tone. Long, claw-like nails.

"I'm playing with Iker, you know? He thinks he's in control, but I'm the one in charge. The trick is not to fall in love."

So, at the time, she didn't understand. Now it was all starting to make sense. All those random phrases, details that seemed harmless. Pieces of a puzzle that was taking shape.

The door opened. It was Camila, the receptionist.

"You have half an hour free. Do you want a coffee?"

"Yes, with almond milk, please. And... could you tell the next client to come by a little later?"

"Sure. Is everything okay?"

Aitana just nodded.

When she was alone, she took out her design notebook, the one she'd hidden among the towels. She wasn't going to draw nails. This time, she wrote names.

Naty.

The one with the bracelet.

The brunette with claws.

The obsessive blonde.

And me?

She underlined the word "me" several times.

She didn't know if she was jealous, hurt, or just furious with herself for getting carried away. Iker was everything an ambitious girl could want... and everything an intelligent woman should avoid.

But the heart is not the head.

And Aitana, no matter how firm she wanted to be, was already hooked.

She turned on her phone. She went to Iker's profile. The latest stories showed models in a private pool, laughing and drinking. But one photo made her stop.

Hands resting on a sink. Satin lavender nails with a small white swirl detail. Its design.

Another one?

No, worse. That was her photo. Her design. The one she'd taken for a date with Iker, when they spent that night together in his apartment and he'd asked for an "artistic photo" of their hands together to keep as a souvenir. He'd uploaded it... without tagging her, without her face, as if she were anonymous. As if what they shared wasn't real.

The phone slipped from her hands. It hit the floor with a thud.

She looked back at the chair.

"The confession chair."

What she didn't know was that it could also break your soul a little.