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Show "But that's a kid's disease." She laughed harder. "The mumps.'" "I always intended to write her and tell her thanks for everything." She was still laughing, her skin glowing happily. "The mumps. Oh god, really the mumps?" It wasn't that funny but we were in a giddy mood and not for a while did she remember. "What's mumps got to do with me using a diaphragm?" "Because they went down on me." "That sounds obscene." "It was." I told her about it. "But it made me safe. Sterile. If I was a blue-ribbon stallion, I wouldn't be worth a dime." I told her about the tests, everything I knew. I even told her I had feared a little that I was more than sterile, even i unable. "You?" she said, kindly surprised. "Ho, ho. But are you sure about the other?" "Sure I'm sure. I wouldn't kid about that." She looked at me with great concern. "Does that mean you can't ever have children? But, Chess, that's terrible.'" "So far it hasn't been so bad." Later while she was in the bathroom bending over the sink brushing her teeth I came up behind her and through her pajamas easily found her breasts. "Hey,"' she said, thinking she was going to resist, but I prodded her like a good stallion should, right on into the bedroom and out of our clothes in the fine summer air, those breasts swinging and alive. It was joy to feel at home in her room, to feel I belonged. We lay letting ourselves cool off. "It's nice not needing any gadgets," she said. I was so inexperienced I didn't know how nice. I even thought something extraordinary had just happened, not understanding yet how ordinary it is, how ancient and common^ Yet vaguely I knew that something^important, more than elafc-sex, had taken place, though I couldn't name i t. |