The Love You Crave

3.

I’m in Callie’s penthouse condo now. The lovely Gwen has changed her hair to platinum blond, and it’s working for her. She sees me and races toward me, as if she’s about to give me a big hug. But as she gets close, she stops short and wrinkles her nose.

“You smell,” she says.

“I know.” To Callie I say, “Can I shower in your guest bedroom?”

“Of course,” she says.

I enter the guest bedroom and pause to look at a group of items lined up on the dresser.

“What’s all this?” I call to Callie.

“Oops,” she says from the living room. Then adds, “When you called, Gwen and I were about to have a sex marathon. We set some things out we planned to use.”

“Really?” I say.

She and Gwen enter the room.

The three of us look at the items on the dresser. There’s a scarf, a vibrator, lipstick, a deck of cards, a condom, three bullets, and a bird cage.

Callie gives Gwen a look I can’t decipher.

Gwen shrugs.

I study the items another minute, then say. “It makes sense.”

Callie says, “It does?”

“Except for one item,” I say.

Callie laughs. “The birdcage?”

“Nope.”

She looks surprised. “No? Then what?”

“The condom.”

Callie frowns at Gwen, then says, “But you understand the birdcage.”

“I do.”

“And the bullets?” she says.

“What about them?”

“They make sense to you?”

“Of course.”

“But not the condom.”

“Not the condom.”

She shrugs, looks at Gwen again. Says, “He doesn’t understand the condom.”

Gwen says, “Go figure.”

I look at the items again.

“Ah!” I say.

“Ah?”

“The condom goes on the vibrator!”

They look at each other.

“Go take your shower,” Callie says.