Nude Men

three
     
     
     
     
    H eat. What is heat? Every day, when I walk home from work, I wonder if there will be heat in my apartment. Today is no exception. As I walk down the street, I forget about Lady Henrietta, my naked body, everything except whether I will find symptoms of heat in my apartment. To tell you the truth, I don’t really know what to expect or to look for, because I don’t really know what heat is. I have lived twenty-nine years and never learned exactly what it was. I must admit I never bothered to look it up in the dictionary, but really, one would think that by now I would have picked up scraps of definition here and there. If the heat doesn’t come soon, I will take my cat to the vet. I tricked you.
    “God, that woman looks like she’s in heat,” is just about all I’ve ever heard about heat. I suspect heat has to do with vigorous energy, lust for life. The women referred to with those words seem more alive and happy than us poor folks who don’t have our heat. Their eyes twinkle and their hair whips the air. But I might be completely wrong; these characteristics may be purely coincidental.
    On my way home, there’s a pet store I always look into. I like to check if any of the kittens displayed in the window are more beautiful than my cat, Minou, a blue-cream Persian. None ever is. My cat has long gray fur with a cream throat, and a beautifully mushed-in face.
    Today the pet store window is filled exclusively with Himalayans, those vulgar cats who have the Persian’s long hair combined with the Siamese’s markings. They are so dull, always the same, like clones. Disappointed by the lack of competition, I don’t even bother to stop.
    I suddenly notice a woman running in my direction, so I start running toward her, because when a woman runs in your direction, there is one chance in a hundred (or a thousand, or a million) that she spotted you from afar, was stunned by your looks, decided then and there that you were the man of her life, and took it into her head to throw herself into your arms. Wouldn’t it be a shame not to reciprocate her enthusiasm from the very beginning? I think it would be a shame. So even though today has been a pretty good day, romancewise, and there is no reason for me to be that desperate, I am now running toward the woman out of habit, holding my arms slightly open so that if she is running to me, I will be running to her as well, and we will throw ourselves into each other’s arms, and it will all be extremely romantic. On the other hand, my arms are not open enough for it to necessarily mean anything or to embarrass me in case she happens to be running to someone behind me, or to no one in particular, which is usually the case. Rather, always the case.
     
    A t home, Minou is sitting in a corner of the apartment. That’s unusual for her; she usually runs to greet me at the door. I hang up my coat, drink some orange juice, go to the bathroom.
    How’s the weather outside? asks Minou from her corner.
    Fine. Why are you sitting in that corner? I ask.
    Cause I like it. Did you see any cats more beautiful than I in the pet store window?
    No. Only vulgar Himalayans. Are you feeling okay? I’ve never seen you sit in that corner before, I say, thinking that perhaps this is the first symptom of her heat.
    I’m feeling fine. What’s that spoon you’re holding?
    I look at my hand, startled. Before leaving the office, I had taken my spoon out of my pants pocket and held her in my hand all the way home, even while running with open arms toward the running woman, but I had forgotten to put her down when I drank my orange juice and went to the bathroom.
    Incidentally, you may be wondering why my cat is talking to me. Let me assure you that our conversation is probably not really taking place. I’m virtually certain that it’s only in my head that we’re talking, but sometimes I’m more certain than at other times. I realize it does not seem quite normal that I spend so much time conversing with my cat (and I confess that I do indeed spend a lot of time doing it), but I can’t help it.
    I am able to read all her expressions distinctly, unmistakably. Each of her gestures is translated by me into specific sentences whose subtlest intonation I can make out. Her words ooze out of her every strand of fur so unambiguously that even human beings cannot make themselves so well understood to me. What is most captivating and enslaving is that her language is specific. When