found myself wondering what his penis looked like—beautiful to be sure, in the way penises are beautiful, except of course when one notices that they’re completely ridiculous.
“Listen, Steve,” I heard myself say before I could change my mind, “I live way out in the valley and I’m a single mom. I don’t really think—much as I’d like to...”
“Just coffee,” he said.
“It sounds nice, really.” This was the truth . “But I have to get home to pick up my daughter and take her to ballet.” This was only partly true. I actually had hours before I needed to pick Lila up .
The fact was I was terrified—he was a lot younger than I was. Maybe Justine would be all right with that kind of age difference but I was nervous about his seeing my naked aging body. I’d need to work out every day for a month first. Yes, I realize he was only asking me for coffee and I’d already made the leap to the bedroom, but what was he thinking? He must have gotten the wrong impression, surely— that I was a repressed housewife from Sherman Oaks who spent her lonely days and nights reading erotica and therefore be easy pickin’s.
But, oh, those sleepy brown eyes! Did he want something, anything beyond the coffee? Did he imagine wild flights of sexual abandon? I recognize now this is exactly what I needed. I didn’t need any coffee. I needed to fuck this guy. And, after thinking about it, having a fling with Book Soup Steve might have kept me from ever going to Berggren’s dinner party. Steve and I might have been together that Saturday night having fantastic sex while Lila was safe at her dad’s or at a friend’s house. But of course, how could I have known that then, when I stood like an idiot in a bookstore holding a bunch of erotic books—mere surrogates for the real thing— talking to a gorgeous guy who I might have had a good time with if only I hadn’t been such an idiot.
But once again, I get ahead of myself.
Chapter 5
Deliciously Disturbed and Distracted turned out to be the novel I chose for the next gathering of the Cliterati. Both finalists under consideration were sexy and well written so, in the end, unable to decide for myself on the merits, I’d tossed a coin. Deliciously Disturbed beat out The Opposite of Dead ten tosses to nine.
As far as I could tell, Molly Wanamaker, Disturbed ’s author, had selected her tasty title as a reference to what was going on inside her protagonist, though her clandestine rendezvous over miscellaneous delectable ethnic meals seemed to carry a plot of their own. The title might also have been a reference to the swath this unnamed thirty-five-year-old married woman, whom I called “Lucky Girl,” cut across New York City as she flitted from one lover to the next with seemingly zero negative repercussions. All that said, Deliciously Disturbed was beginning to cause disturbances of its own although, in the big scheme of things, it probably wouldn’t have mattered what book we read. The ices were melting, the seed had been sown, the lava was leaping and that horse was already out of the barn.
I grew hornier with every page, more and more disturbed because I had no immediate way of satisfying the increasing lust I felt, generated by Lucky Girl and her paramours. I mean, duh, yes, there was always masturbation and I could have gone to a bar or a hotel lobby and scored with the first lonely traveling businessman I encountered but that wasn’t going to do it for me. Stupidly, I’d scuttled Book Soup Steve, who after the fact, in my head, I’d turned into a love-God rivaling Michelango’s David come to life.
One chapter into the book, after Lucky Girl had enjoyed unimaginably great sex with a swarthy Italian type she’d noticed noticing her on the lat machine at Club Equinox—someone she referred to as “the Hit Man”—I decided to take action. Returning to Book Soup on another slow Tuesday I hoped to find Steve who might, once again, be hanging around,
“Listen, Steve,” I heard myself say before I could change my mind, “I live way out in the valley and I’m a single mom. I don’t really think—much as I’d like to...”
“Just coffee,” he said.
“It sounds nice, really.” This was the truth . “But I have to get home to pick up my daughter and take her to ballet.” This was only partly true. I actually had hours before I needed to pick Lila up .
The fact was I was terrified—he was a lot younger than I was. Maybe Justine would be all right with that kind of age difference but I was nervous about his seeing my naked aging body. I’d need to work out every day for a month first. Yes, I realize he was only asking me for coffee and I’d already made the leap to the bedroom, but what was he thinking? He must have gotten the wrong impression, surely— that I was a repressed housewife from Sherman Oaks who spent her lonely days and nights reading erotica and therefore be easy pickin’s.
But, oh, those sleepy brown eyes! Did he want something, anything beyond the coffee? Did he imagine wild flights of sexual abandon? I recognize now this is exactly what I needed. I didn’t need any coffee. I needed to fuck this guy. And, after thinking about it, having a fling with Book Soup Steve might have kept me from ever going to Berggren’s dinner party. Steve and I might have been together that Saturday night having fantastic sex while Lila was safe at her dad’s or at a friend’s house. But of course, how could I have known that then, when I stood like an idiot in a bookstore holding a bunch of erotic books—mere surrogates for the real thing— talking to a gorgeous guy who I might have had a good time with if only I hadn’t been such an idiot.
But once again, I get ahead of myself.
Chapter 5
Deliciously Disturbed and Distracted turned out to be the novel I chose for the next gathering of the Cliterati. Both finalists under consideration were sexy and well written so, in the end, unable to decide for myself on the merits, I’d tossed a coin. Deliciously Disturbed beat out The Opposite of Dead ten tosses to nine.
As far as I could tell, Molly Wanamaker, Disturbed ’s author, had selected her tasty title as a reference to what was going on inside her protagonist, though her clandestine rendezvous over miscellaneous delectable ethnic meals seemed to carry a plot of their own. The title might also have been a reference to the swath this unnamed thirty-five-year-old married woman, whom I called “Lucky Girl,” cut across New York City as she flitted from one lover to the next with seemingly zero negative repercussions. All that said, Deliciously Disturbed was beginning to cause disturbances of its own although, in the big scheme of things, it probably wouldn’t have mattered what book we read. The ices were melting, the seed had been sown, the lava was leaping and that horse was already out of the barn.
I grew hornier with every page, more and more disturbed because I had no immediate way of satisfying the increasing lust I felt, generated by Lucky Girl and her paramours. I mean, duh, yes, there was always masturbation and I could have gone to a bar or a hotel lobby and scored with the first lonely traveling businessman I encountered but that wasn’t going to do it for me. Stupidly, I’d scuttled Book Soup Steve, who after the fact, in my head, I’d turned into a love-God rivaling Michelango’s David come to life.
One chapter into the book, after Lucky Girl had enjoyed unimaginably great sex with a swarthy Italian type she’d noticed noticing her on the lat machine at Club Equinox—someone she referred to as “the Hit Man”—I decided to take action. Returning to Book Soup on another slow Tuesday I hoped to find Steve who might, once again, be hanging around,
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