A 16-year-old bought a bike from our shop last Tuesday and never once sat on it.
He walked past every shiny bike to the plain black one in the corner. $180, second-hand. The price tag was soft as cloth, the number rewritten so often the paper had gone fuzzy.
We counted for almost an hour. $183.20.
My boss crossed out $180 one last time, counted $30 into the boy's hand and said, "Get her a helmet."
Yesterday the boy sent me a photo. His sister on the bike, helmet too big, laughing. He was half out of frame, one hand on the seat,
Under it, prices, each crossed out. $260. $240. $215. $195. $180.
"It kept getting cheaper," the boy said. "I thought bikes just did that."
I turned around. My boss pocketed the pen.
She starts secondary school next month," the boy said. "Two hours each way. She walks."
I was already working out how to tell my boss.
My boss stood at the counter, pen in hand. He looked away.
At the bottom was a notebook. Pencil. Every bundle written down, month by month. Car washes. Market crates. Three years.
The last page said: Her bike.
He didn't ask about gears. He asked, "How low can the seat go?"
He emptied his backpack on the floor. Coins. Crumpled notes, damp, smelling of soap.
A boy that age, a bag of dirty cash, a bike he'd picked in advance. One hand never left the strap.
Three hundred, I said. My boss had told him forty. Through the booth glass, he mouthed, please. I had rent due. I said it anyway. Monday the booth was mine. He never looked at me again. I still sit in his chair.
Every night at 11, a Rolls-Royce parked by the east gate. The man never got out. My boss always hid in the booth, and everyone said he owed that man money. Friday, the window came down. "How many cars use this gate?"
Stress, tiredness, or a wandering mind can shut everything down in seconds. Angle, pressure and timing change everything. And yes, it cleans itself and has strong opinions about scented soap.
You think it's a keyhole. It's a conversation, and she'll tell you when she's ready.
Real life is slower and far more interesting.
Every body looks different, and uneven labia are completely normal. Most women need 10 to 20 minutes to warm up, and only about 18% orgasm from penetration alone.
Most guys learn about a woman's body from a ten-minute video made by people who never asked her anything.
In porn she's wet in four seconds, finishes in thirty, and never needs a break, a towel, or a minute to breathe.
Two weeks before my wedding, my mother-in-law gave me the key to the gallery she'd kept locked for a year.
"My husband's will says you must value every painting," Cordelia said. "Do it properly."
I'm an appraiser. Nobody has ever questioned my signature .
Edward turned it
A woman in green silk. My face. The left earlobe, too big. Mine are small.
The plate read: Hannah, Lady Ashcombe.
A note: Every ancestor here is a lie. You don't have to be one. β R.
I hesitated. Then I signed all forty-two: "Authentic. Eighteenth century."