BARE AMBITIONS IN PUBLIC

The penthouse smelled like espresso and dry-erase marker. Aubrey had commandeered the dining table around eleven p.m., spreading legal documents across it like a surgeon prepping an operating table. Her laptop was open to a redlined version of Maya's divorce settlement, and she was marking clauses with a pen that probably cost more than most Will and Trust. Her sleeves were rolled to the elbows, her blonde hair pulled back in a knot, and she had the expression of someone who viewed other people's chaos as a personal challenge.

Maya sat across from her in an oversized NYU hoodie and nothing else, her bare legs crossed under the chair, a cold espresso martini sweating rings onto a coaster she kept forgetting to use. She was supposed to be reviewing the documents. Instead, she was watching Aubrey work and trying not to think about the rooftop. The rooftop had been forty-eight hours ago. The rooftop had been Riley's mouth on her pussy and the blue Manhattan skyline and the camera clicking and Topanga coming so hard the sound echoed off the HVAC units. The rooftop had been, objectively, one of their top five sexual experiences of Maya's life, and she was trying very hard to focus on their Assets and Donations instead of the way Riley's tongue had felt against her clit in the open air.

"Maya." Aubrey's voice cut through. "Are you reading paragraph seven or having a flashback?" "Both," Maya said. "Paragraph seven is very evocative." Aubrey's green eyes lifted from the document. "Paragraph seven is about the disposition of the Westchester property. It is not evocative." "Everything's evocative if you're in the right mood." Aubrey set down her pen. "You're in the wrong mood for legal review. You're in the mood for something that ends with a camera timer and someone on their knees. Which is fine. But we need to deal with this first." She tapped the document. "Specifically, we need to deal with the penthouse." Maya's stomach tightened. The penthouse. The floor-to-ceiling-windows, rooftop-access, three-bedroom fortress that she'd shared with Riley were finding the experience creatively frustrating. "What about it?" Maya said.

"I've drafted a clause that instantly recognizes Riley's equitable interest based on her being your wife and contributions and her role as a domestic partner. It gives her ownership too."
Actually the Trust owns the penthouse and you two are the Trustees. Maya stared at Aubrey. "You're terrifying." "I'm thorough," Aubrey said. "There's a difference. Terrifying is what happens if we don't do this." From down the hall, the sound of the master bathroom door clicking shut. Then the distinct sound of a lock turning. Maya looked up. "Did you just lock Topanga in the bathroom?"

Aubrey didn't blink. "Topanga is in the bathroom because Topanga had her third glass of wine and started crying about a case from 1997. She needs twenty minutes and a cold compress. The lock is to keep her from wandering out and trying to help, because when Topanga tries to help with legal documents, she makes them worse." "She's going to be furious." "She's going to be grateful when she's sober." Aubrey picked up her pen again. "Now. Back to paragraph seven."

They worked in silence for a while. The penthouse was quiet in the way that only an expensive penthouse could be. Thick walls, good insulation, the city reduced to a murmur twelve floors below. Maya read through the clauses, initialed where Aubrey told her to, asked questions that Aubrey answered with the patience of someone who had explained the concept of equitable distribution to a woman who kept getting distracted by her own memories of rooftop oral sex. It was somewhere around paragraph twelve that Maya heard the bare feet on the hardwood. She looked up. Riley was standing in the hallway entrance. Naked. Completely, unapologetically naked, her brown hair loose on her shoulders, her skin warm against the cool air of the penthouse, holding a glass of whiskey in one hand and wearing an expression that could only be described as deeply satisfied with herself.

"Is that my whiskey?" Maya said. "It was your whiskey," Riley said. "Now it's my whiskey. I'm drinking it in your penthouse. Which might not be your penthouse for much longer, according to the very loud conversation I just overheard through the wall." Aubrey's pen stopped moving. She looked at Riley. She looked at Riley's body. She looked at the whiskey. She looked back at her documents. "Riley. We're working." "You're working," Riley said. "Maya is staring at my tits." Maya was, in fact, staring at Riley's tits. They were full and bare and lit by the kitchen's under-cabinet lighting in a way that made them look like a Renaissance painting if Renaissance paintings had been painted by someone who really wanted to fuck the subject. "I was not staring," Maya said. "I was glancing. Strategically." Riley walked into the dining area.

She pulled out a chair next to Maya, sat down, and took a sip of whiskey. The glass left a faint mark on the table that Aubrey would absolutely notice and silently resent. "So. The penthouse." "The penthouse is being handled," Aubrey said. "The penthouse is my home," Riley said. "I live here. I sleep here. I eat breakfast here. I have very loud sex in the master bedroom here. I feel like I should have some input." "Your input is noted," Aubrey said. "Your legal standing is what I'm building." "And what's my legal standing?" Aubrey set down her pen and turned to face Riley. The gesture was deliberate, controlled, the same way Aubrey did everything—with the precision of someone who had measured the distance between intention and execution and found it acceptable. "Right now," Aubrey said, "your legal standing is that of Trustee of the newly formed Rilaya Trust. That gives you the language so that your interest is protected regardless of what anyone or any legal or otherwise claimant attempts." Riley blinked. "So you're protecting my home." "I'm protecting your interest in your home. There's a legal distinction."

"Is there a distinction between that and you being incredible?" Aubrey's mouth twitched. The closest thing she ever gave to a smile during working hours. "The distinction is that one of those things is billable and the other is a compliment." Riley leaned back in her chair. She was still naked. The whiskey was sweating in her hand. Her thighs were parted slightly, and Maya could see the dark hair between her legs, the same hair she'd had her hands in forty-eight hours ago on the rooftop, and the heat that had been simmering in her lower stomach since the rooftop was now becoming a problem that couldn't be solved by crossing her legs.

"You know," Riley said, "if we're going to protect my claim to this penthouse, we should probably document my relationship with it. Establish a pattern of use. Create evidence." Aubrey raised an eyebrow. "What kind of evidence?" Riley took another sip of whiskey. "We have a publication. We have cameras. We have a rooftop. We have the city. We have a holiday weekend with zero obligations until Tuesday." She set the glass down. "We do the dares. The public ones. The ones we've been planning for Tokyo but haven't tested here. We film them. We publish them. And somewhere in that footage is documented proof that I live here, I use this space, and this is my home."

Aubrey stared at her. "You want to use naked photography as evidence in a court. "I want to use naked photography as art that also happens to create a documentary record of my domestic life. The fact that it's legally useful is a bonus." Maya felt the martini warmth spreading through her chest, or maybe that was something else, something that had to do with Riley sitting naked three feet away and talking about home and belonging and art while her pussy was visible from where Maya was sitting. "That's insane," Maya said. "That's innovative," Riley corrected. "That's both," Aubrey said. She was quiet for a moment. Maya could see the gears turning, the legal mind processing the proposal and finding the seams where it could be stitched into something that would hold up in court.

"The dares would need to be documented carefully. Timestamps, location data, consistent identification of the penthouse as the point of origin. The AIT Gazette publication creates a public record. If we can establish that the dares originate from this address and that Riley is a consistent participant—" "You're already planning it," Maya said. "I'm already evaluating it," Aubrey said. "Planning would require Topanga's input, and Topanga is currently locked in a bathroom having a feelings crisis about a case from the Clinton administration." From inside the bathroom, faintly: "I can hear you, Aubrey." "Good," Aubrey called back. "Stay in there. We're working." Silence. Then, quieter: "Is Riley naked again?" "She is," Maya confirmed. "Of course she is," Topanga said, and the faucet turned on.

Riley grinned. She stood up, walked to the window, and looked out at the city the way she always did, like she was measuring it, deciding which part of it she wanted to take. Her body was silhouetted against the glass, the curve of her ass, the line of her back, the way her hair fell between her shoulder blades. Maya watched her and felt the thing she always felt when Riley stood naked against a backdrop of Manhattan lights, which was a combination of desire and pride and a fierce, possessive certainty that this woman was hers. "So where do we do it?" Maya said.

Riley turned. "We start close. The lobby. Two a.m., when the doorman is on his break. Then the elevator. Then the rooftop again, but this time we film from the roof of the adjacent building. Aubrey can set up the remote camera on the parapet across the gap. "Then we go out to the "Washington Square Park. The fountain. The arch. We do it fast, we do it quiet, we get the shots and we get out. Then we come back here and edit."

Aubrey had her laptop open again. "Washington Square Park after two a.m. is technically public, but enforcement is minimal. The risk is a summons, not arrest. If we keep the exposure under sixty seconds per location and have an exit strategy, the legal exposure is manageable." She paused. "I cannot believe I'm saying this." "You've said worse," Maya said. "I've said worse in court," Aubrey agreed. "But never about a plan that involves my client running naked through a public park at two in the morning." "Former client," Maya said. "Current friend and Trustee."

"Friends don't let friends get summonsed for public lewdness." "Friends help them get the shot first," Riley said. Aubrey closed her laptop. She stood up, walked to the bathroom door, and knocked twice. "Topanga. We're going out." The door opened. Topanga stood in the frame, her hair damp, her eyes slightly red, wearing one of Maya's bathrobes that was too short for her and barely covered her thighs. She looked at Aubrey. She looked at Riley, still naked by the window. She looked at Maya, still in the hoodie, still bare-legged, still holding a martini that had long since stopped being cold. "Where are we going?" Topanga said. "Washington Square Park," Aubrey said. "To commit misdemeanors."

Topanga considered this. "Should I change?" "Wear a coat," Riley said. "Just a coat." Topanga looked at Aubrey. Aubrey looked at Topanga. Something passed between them that Maya couldn't read but could feel the private language of two people who had been naked together in enough hotel rooms to communicate in shorthand. "Fine," Topanga said. "But I'm wearing shoes. I'm not stepping on broken glass in Washington Square Park barefoot." They prepared with the efficiency of a crew that had done this before. Maya changed into a trench coat and boots. Riley stayed naked but added a coat. Topanga put on a wool overcoat over the bathrobe, then dropped the bathrobe when Aubrey gave her a look. Aubrey wore her own coat, a structured, military-cut thing that made her look like she was about to invade a small country, and nothing else, which Maya confirmed when Aubrey's coat shifted as she loaded camera batteries into her bag and Maya saw the pale curve of her breast and the hard pink nipple before the fabric fell back.

"Camera," Maya said, handing Riley the GoPro. "Backup phone, fully charged. Remote trigger for the tripod if we use the rooftop first." "Rooftop first," Riley confirmed. "Then lobby, then park."
Aubrey pulled a small canister from her bag. Pepper spray. She clipped it to the inside of her coat pocket. "Safety," she said, catching Maya's look. "You're bringing pepper spray to a naked photo shoot." "I'm bringing pepper spray to a naked photo shoot in Washington Square Park at two in the morning. The pepper spray is the least reckless part of this evening." They took the service elevator down. The lobby was empty. The doorman's desk was vacant, his break apparently synchronized with whatever cosmic force had decided to give them a window. Maya set up the camera on the marble floor, angled it toward the elevator bank, and set the timer.

"Coats off on three," she said. Four coats hit the floor. The lobby air was climate-controlled and warm, a sharp contrast to the rooftop two nights ago. Maya's skin didn't prickle this time. It flushed. The heat came from inside, from the adrenaline and the absurdity and the way Riley was already looking at her with that expression that meant the photography was a pretext and the real agenda was something that involved fewer clothes and more skin. They stood in the lobby of their building, four naked women in front of a wall of elevators, the camera clicking. Maya felt the marble under her bare feet, cool and smooth, and the air on her body, and the weight of her own breasts, and the wetness that was already starting between her legs because the adrenaline always did this, always turned her body on before her mind could catch up. The camera clicked. And tThey grabbed their coats. They moved.

The park was emptier than Maya had expected. The fountain was off. The arch stood at the north end like a monument to every person who had ever done something stupid in this park and survived it. A few figures moved in the distance, students, drunks, the perpetual New York cast of people who existed in public spaces at hours when most people were asleep. Riley chose the fountain. She dropped her coat, climbed onto the edge, and stood there, naked, the arch behind her, the city behind the arch, the sky behind the city. Maya shot fast, three frames, four, five, her finger shaking on the trigger not from cold but from the way Riley looked standing there, unafraid, her body being offered to the night like a challenge. "Got it," Maya said.

Riley jumped down. A figure on a bench across the park looked up. Maya saw the silhouette of a man's head turning, and she grabbed Riley's hand and they ran, bare feet slapping the pavement, coats flapping, Aubrey and Topanga behind them, and they didn't stop until they were through the park gate and halfway down the block, four women in coats gasping and laughing and leaning against a brownstone railing. "That was sixty seconds," Aubrey said, checking her phone. "Maybe seventy." "Close enough," Riley said. She was breathing hard, her cheeks flushed, her coat open, her body still visible underneath. She looked at Maya. "Take me home."

They walked back. Fast, quiet, four coats and four sets of bare feet moving through the Manhattan streets at three in the morning. The doorman was still on break. The service elevator was still empty. They rode up to the twelfth floor in silence, the camera equipment in Maya's bag, the evidence of the night stored in digital files that would become art and legal documentation and something that was both and neither. The penthouse door closed behind them. Riley dropped her coat in the entryway. She walked to the kitchen, poured herself another whiskey, and turned to face the room.

"Topanga," Aubrey said, her voice low. "Bathroom." Topanga looked at her. "I'm done having feelings about 1997." "Good. Because I'm done reviewing documents." Aubrey took Topanga's hand and led her down the hallway. The master bathroom door closed behind them. This time, there was no lock. Maya and Riley stood in the living room. The city was outside the windows. The camera was on the counter. Riley's body was gold in the lamplight. "Come here," Riley said. Maya went. She dropped to her knees in front of Riley, pressed her face against Riley's stomach, and felt Riley's hand in her hair, gentle and firm at the same time. She kissed the skin below Riley's navel, tasting salt and adrenaline and the faint chemical trace of city air.

Riley's fingers tightened. "You're going to make me come, and then you're going to upload those photos, and then you're going to come to bed." "In that order?" "In that order." Maya's mouth moved lower. She could hear sounds from the bathroom—Aubrey's voice, low and commanding, and Topanga's response, breathless and willing. The walls were thick, but not that thick. She found Riley's clit with her tongue and Riley's hand pulled her closer and the city hummed outside the glass and somewhere in a legal document on the dining table, a Trust was waiting to protect the home where four women kept doing things that were either brilliant or catastrophically stupid, and the line between the two had never been thinner.