“You are a good man,” she says. “You are beautiful.” She runs the back of her hand over the sparse fur of his chest. She lets a tiny crackle go, a prickle at his hair’s ends, glowing faintly. It feels good. Every line of his body is coming into focus as she touches him, as if he hadn’t really been there at all, before. He wants to be inside her; his body is already telling him what to do, how to move this thing forward, how to take her arms, how to bring her down on to the bed, how to consummate. But the body has contradictory impulses: fear is as significant as lust, physical pain as strong as desire. He holds himself there, wanting and not-wanting. He lets her set the pace. It takes a long while, and it is good. She shows him what to do, with his mouth and with his fingers. By the time she is riding him, sweating and calling out, the sun has risen on a new day in Riyadh. And when she loses control as she finishes she sends a jolt through his buttocks and across his pelvis and he barely feels the pain at all, so great is the delight. ~The Power, Naomi Alder

It is cold and dreary. I don't want to go out. I want to have gotten married at 25 and it worked out and I will have Sunday morning sex with him tomorrow early and ignore him this evening while he is puttering or out with his friends and it never crosses my mind to worry about trusting him while I read this borderline vampire porn with Jasper on my legs until I drift off. So that is exactly what I am doing. I am cuddled in with fuzzy pants on under a fuzzy blankie, drinking pms tea, chuckling at this girly Fight Club novel, listening to drizzle hit the window in a quiet house. It is exactly as it would be if I had lived happily ever after. Except the husband died or something. Saving a baby from a burning house (since I am making him up, why not?). And I am carrying on in a dignified fashion.