• we’re crawling into your bed
• skating together and holding hands
• had not originated from her
• the Rorschach inkblot
• Don’t be mealy-mouthed about it.

Tune in next time part 131                             Click Here for Earlier Installments

“My husband is the president of the United States,” Tallulah breathed in my ear. “Not some Contrarian janitor.” She looked over her shoulder at our dapperly uniformed audience. “Although now that you mention it…”

“Wait,” I said. “You’re married to Thor? Since when?”

Tallulah threw her head back and laughed. “Don’t be mealy-mouthed about it. Your family has such hangups!” Her unusual blue-black eyes met mine. “You’re blushing like the Rorschach inkblots they used to show me, back at the academy.” She began her relentless gyrations upon me again, and I was helpless to resist.

A clearing of the throat broke my trance and I looked at Tallulah, but the sound had not originated from her. The janitor said, “You two look really happy, skating together and holding hands, or whatever it is you call that, but I need you to move. There’s a big clog in the ladies’ room.”

Tallulah used my joystick to steer me away from the door and into one of the stalls. “The minute we’re done here we’re leaving this place and we’re crawling into your bed, and we’re not leaving it for a week.”

My eyes crossed at the thought, but I managed to stammer, “But Thor’s in trouble. His blimp was hijacked by the Vegan Separatists.”

“Don’t you think I know that?” She increased the speed and intensity of her movements into an erotic frenzy. “I hired them! Working together, you and I will topple the governments of both the US and Contraria! Just like we talked about back in kindergarten!”

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• mixes my metaphors like a martini
• ritualistic signature
• People are disgusting.
• recovered his shiny silk hat
• removed the latex gloves

Tune in next time part 130                             Click Here for Earlier Installments

I waddled to the bathroom door, with Tallulah ecstatically aboard for the ride. Sure enough, no lock. I managed to jam one of my discarded shoes underneath, and then leaned back on the door to use our combined weight as a further impediment to unannounced entrances.

I wanted to ask her why she thought her husband might barge in on us. I wanted to ask her why she tracked me down in Contraria, why all the disguises. I had more questions than a one-armed paper-hanger on a frozen pond. Having sex with Tallulah always mixes my metaphors like a martini on roller skates. So, none of my questions were likely to get asked, much less answered, for a little while.

No longer constrained by hiding within my oversized clothing, she had room to execute her ritualistic signature finishing move. I was glad the door was sturdy, and the floor not too slippery, and that Tallulah toned down her usual yodeling crescendo.

I was on the verge of my own crescendo when one of the stalls swung open. The janitor had been cleaning that toilet the entire time. He tutted, then said, “People are disgusting.” The job in there had evidently been strenuous. He mopped his forehead, then recovered his shiny silk hat and long red cape from the hook on the back of the stall door.

Looking in our direction, he slowly removed the latex gloves. He sneered.

“Um,” I said as Tallulah purred against my neck and writhed against the rest of me. “Is your husband by any chance a janitor?”

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• light on the android-cyborg banter
• wiped clean with a tissue
• Farming, basically.
• I fantasize about the hospital
• very well-defined chin

Tune in next time part 126                             Click Here for Earlier Installments

Fortunately the arms merchants I was suddenly dining with didn’t expect a lot of conversation from me, and had the decorum to at least pretend not to notice the tantric pulsations of my tuxedo jacket. The man with the blueprints began a meticulous explanation of the weird machine depicted in them, then apologized for forgetting to go light on the android-cyborg banter. “For what it’s worth,” he summed up, “this thing’s a little of both and a little something extra.”

Tallulah squealed and shuddered. I thumped my chest, which was actually her back, and said, “Excuse me.” She ground against my lap, and I could hear her panting. I faked a coughing fit to cover both her noises and my own climactic moment. When I regained my composure I felt myself being wiped clean with a tissue. It was consideration I wouldn’t have expected from Tallulah.

The man to my right said, “That’s a nasty case of Contrary Lung you’re working on. God, I hate this country. There’s nothing to do. Everybody spends all their time on subsistence. Farming, basically. It’s depressing!”

As the next blueprint is discussed, I fantasize about the hospital where all of these jerks would end up when their battle-monkeys turn against them. Then dessert arrived, served by a waiter with a very well-defined chin. He gave me a puzzling look, a knowing kind of stare, careful not to let the weapons dealers notice. I felt like I should recognize him, but I was sure I’d never seen him before in my life.

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• except his penis
• you know that’s not allowed
• applying his left thumb
• four-limbed, ape-inspired robot
• blue-gray eyes suddenly keen

Tune in next time part 125                             Click Here for Earlier Installments

You know how a guy is supposed to think about baseball to distract himself? I was like that guy, except his penis (my penis, if we’re being honest) didn’t cooperate. Tallulah didn’t seem to mind. In fact, as I crossed the last few yards to our table, she wriggled almost imperceptibly in time with my waddling stride and suddenly I was engulfed.

I whispered down into my jacket, “You know that’s not allowed!”

Tallulah’s only reply was a tightening of her grip. Her arms clenched my shoulders, her legs squeezed my waist, her… well, you get the picture.

I took both a steadying breath and my seat at the table, hoping Tallulah wouldn’t be too much of a distraction.

The man to my left said, “Your mother sent us.” He pulled a roll of blueprints from his briefcase and spread them out on the table, applying his left thumb to the corner to hold it down.

As Tallulah clenched and unclenched, I tried to make sense of what I was looking at. It seemed to be plans for some sort of crazy four-limbed, ape-inspired robot. And then I remembered Mother and Fleur’s father plotting at my wedding. They wanted to build an army of killbots, all designed to look like the deities of Contraria’s ancient enemies.

I caught my reflection upside-down inside a spoon, my blue-gray eyes suddenly keen. I was surrounded by arms dealers, and, thanks to Tallulah, in a very awkward position.

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• I’m not going to go to the bathroom
• “But where are the huts?”
• forbidden within city limits
• haven’t spoken Romanian in decades
• People are disgusting.

Tune in next time part 96                             Click Here for Earlier Installments

John laughed at the expression of fury on my wife’s face. “I think you have better things to worry about than Tessa, buddy.”

I swallowed, but my throat was dry.

Fleur tied the laces of John’s roller skates together and hung them around his neck. She unzipped the door at the front of our buoyant boudoir, grabbed John, and in one quick motion hooked the zip-line to his skating harness and shoved him out into open air. He fell only a few feet before his tether stopped his descent with a jolt. Fleur pointed at the zeppelin ahead of us. “Haul yourself back and beg my father’s forgiveness for both your ineptitude at aerial roller derby and for interrupting my fertility ceremony.”

As John pulled himself along with shaking hands I heard him repeating, “I’m not going to go to the bathroom in my shorts,” over and over again.

Fleur rezipped the door and said to me, “Tessa is the least of your concerns right now. We are already in Contrarian air space. In a mere 24 hours we will land in the capital. I better be pregnant by then.”

I wanted to remind her that conception wasn’t an instantaneous process, that it might take several days, but I was distracted by the view out the window.

“But where are the huts?”

“The entire populace of Contraria awaits us in the capital. They took their huts along to camp in the streets. Usually that is forbidden within city limits, but this is the Year of the Monkey, so special rules apply.”

And then she told me to shut up again, and the next 24 hours passed in a sweaty blur.

When the airship arrived at the Contrarian capital, it went into a holding pattern. Fleur and I were reeled in and given the opportunity to clean up before all the pomp and circumstance. I was assigned a manservant named Nicolae. I haven’t spoken Romanian in decades, but we were able to communicate well enough to get the job done.

When I exited the spa, refreshed and clad in Contrarian ethnic garb, I passed by a laundress who was carrying the linens from the bed Fleur and I had just spent the better part of a week befouling.

I heard her mutter as she passed, “People are disgusting.”

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