Getting to No

by Eleanor Goodman

"I talked to Dan today." He spoke into her hair, which smelled musky like tropical flowers, the kind that open their petals in vulgar red profusions when the sun hits them the right way. Rebecca always smelled like that after sex.

"Oh? You called him?"

"He called me."

Rebecca yawned and turned on her side, resting her cheek against the scratchy spiraled hairs on his chest. Derek liked to joke that he had enough chest hair to make the other apes jealous, and at times she was tempted to agree. But she kept her mouth shut because she knew it would hurt his feelings. For an ape, he was remarkably sensitive.

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