Nude Men

remove one earplug. She’s still banging.
    “I got fired!” I shout to her from my bath.
    The banging stops for a moment, but then it starts again.
    “I don’t have a job, and I’m not going back to work,” I scream, hoping that this information will make her less eager to hold on to me. “Did you hear me?” I shout.
    “Open the door,” she shouts back.
    “Did you hear I got fired? Did you hear?” I scream at the top of my lungs.
    “Yes, I heard, but you’ll get another job...”
    I squish the earplug back in my ear and close my eyes, content. She heard. That’s all that matters.
    I hear the phone ringing through my earplugs. I don’t answer it. In just three more days I’ll have peace from the phone, and maybe from my ex-girlfriend, and maybe from my cat, and even, if I’m lucky, from the strangers in the street, though I’m not getting my hopes up for that one.
     
    T he next morning I go to work carrying my resignation. I walk with my tail between my legs, my shoulders drooping. I’m a loser, a failure.
    No I’m not. They are. Their lives are so empty and dull that they entertain themselves by performing petty cruelties. I must walk in there like a king. I must be the disdainful one, for once, the contemptuous one, the condescending one.
    I march into the magazine, holding my head high, my nose stuck up in the air, and place my resignation on my boss’s desk. He’s out of his office. I certainly will not wait for him to return to say goodbye. As I walk toward the exit I pass Annie, sitting at her desk, and say, “Ciao, Annie. Happy filing.”
     
    I take Minou to the vet and have her spayed. Two days later, she’s lying on my desk, looking at me blankly. I pet her head, but she’s as unfriendly as an ice pick. I try to pick her up, but she growls and stiffens, so I let her go. She settles back down, and I notice something orange peeping out from under her.
    What is that? I ask.
    Fuck off, she says, covering the orange object more completely with her body.
    What is that thing? I repeat.
    She turns her head away.
    Don’t you dare scratch me, I say, sliding my hand under her.
    She turns around ferociously and bites my hand. It bleeds. I shout. I feel an irresistible urge to grab her and fling her across the room, but I control myself because she has just had surgery.
    You are a monster, I say.
    You only said not to scratch, not not to bite, she answers smugly.
    I pull the orange object out from under her. It’s the kitchen scissors.
    What is this? I ask.
    The kitchen scissors.
    Did you drag these all the way here?
    Yes.
    You shouldn’t drag heavy things after your operation. What are they for?
    To cut your balls off.
     
    S ince yesterday my mother hasn’t been able to call me because of my change in phone number. Charlotte is finally leaving me alone, Minou is getting nicer, but people are still coming up to me in the street and talking to me about little girls. I call my mother and ask her to stop sending her employees over. She refuses.
     
    I see more of Laura and less of Lady Henrietta, because recently things have changed. Sara is not as nice as before, and she has health problems. She gets severe headaches and often throws up. This makes her moody and spoiled and affects her mother. Lady Henrietta invites me very rarely these days, and when I do visit, she never seems pleased to see me. I feel concerned for Sara, but I guess she has a stubborn flu and needs to be left alone with her mother.
     
    * * *
     
    I am pleased to announce that Laura is officially my girlfriend and I’m her boyfriend. It’s been the case since the first night, in fact, but I’m mentioning it now in case it wasn’t clear. We are very good for each other. She makes me more normal, and I make her less normal. I’ve told her about sleeping with my elephant. She took it well.
    She also took it well when I “quit” my job. Although she works only for the respectability, not for the money, working is not something she requires of others. She’s extremely well balanced. People who are very well balanced don’t need ambition to be happy. They don’t need goals. They appreciate life. They live one day at a time and love each day. She evokes this same serenity in me.
    Laura is tallish, but not extremely tall for a woman, which is good because I’m not very tall for a man. She is perfectly proportioned, and she’s as beautiful as a magazine model, her body too. She has light-brown hair and warm brown