Chapter 84

He spoke vocally, abruptly serious and conventional, but still holding her hand.

"You can invariably talk to me." You did not indeed give our fellowship any luck. Maybe I was too important in my haste to have you, and I allowed myself to escape the usual procedures of asking and being accepted. I allowed perhaps we would spring from being fuckmusketeers to real suckers."

He spoke the word "fuck musketeers" so fluently that she could have eaten her own hair in embarrassment had there been anyone else present to hear it. He was observing her face, and she dissembled to be gaping at something in the distance while her mind reused his words, and she began to verbalize.

"We had a taste of each other." I suppose it'd be stylish if we stayed exactly musketeers. Platonicfriends. no lacingsattached."

She spoke. She was still gaping ahead, but her mind was so attentive that she knew when he did something as importantas roll his eyes.

"I want the lacings, Martha.