Madly (New York 2)

“Ladies first,” he said.

Ngh.

“Ooohkay.” She wished, suddenly, for a drink in her hand—something to swing around as she worked herself up to being as brave as she wanted to be.

But fuck it. She was already brave enough to have made it here, to have said the things she’d said tonight, to have initiated the whole project.

“I want a thirty-second hug,” she said.

His pen hovered over the paper, but only for a moment. He wrote it down.

Thirty-second hug.

“I read this article online,” she explained, “that was all about how good for us it is to hug, but how we have to hold the hug for at least thirty seconds to release all this oxytocin in our systems. And you know, oxytocin is the same thing that gets released when you…you know.”

“I do.”

He was going to kill her with two-word sentences and dead-face seriousness that made her want to squirm in her chair, just to put some pressure where she needed it.

“Now you, mister.”

Winston set down his pen at the top of the pad and looked into the same blind window she had. He looked there for so long that she had plenty of time to imagine all the things he might be thinking of. She felt like she was sitting on a giant, pulsing…she didn’t even know. Horny. Whatever she was sitting on, it was horny.

He started writing without saying anything.

“What does that say?” What does it say, Jesus Christ.

“It says…neck.”

“Neck.”

“I…sometimes. Occasionally, you see, I’ve.”

“You’ve.”

“Shivers, you know. When.”

“When you’ve?”

“At the…salon. They…”

“My God, Winston. What kind of salon do you go to?”

“No, Jesus, Allie. Typical salon. In every way, ordinary salon…place.”

“You have to just get this out, man. These are only the first two things on our list. If one of us has to explain anal in any kind of detail we’ll burst into actual flames.”

“They razor one’s neckline, and then sometimes, after they’ve brushed the hair away, sometimes, they’ve, I’m sure unconsciously, well…blown away the…stray hairs. It’s just…it’s occurred to me that I may be rather sensitive there. On my neck.”

“You think?”

“I do, yes.”

“One. Hug. Two. Neck. Maybe we work our way down?” She tapped the paper near the bottom. “Just go ahead and write, ‘Ten. Anal.’ And get it over with.”

His eyes snapped to hers. “Are you serious?”

“First rule of the list—I never joke about the list. Write it.”