of paper from the inside zipper pocket of her purse. She sat down on the side of the bed and wondered if it was too early to call. Slowly she picked up the receiver and punched in the numbers. After the third ring, a man answered.
“Handy Men, Inc,” he said.
“I’d like to make an appointment,” she said nervously. Her palms were beginning to sweat, and she rubbed her free hand along her thigh.
“What day of the week?” he asked.
“Uh, I didn’t…” she said. She realized she hadn’t thought this out very well.
“First time?” he asked.
“Yes.”
“This is what you do. You figure out what day or days of the week are best for you. Pick a time, preferably after five. Plan for an hour and a half. Secure a location, and call us back. By the way, the fee for the service is five hundred dollars. Call us back when you’re ready,” he said and hung up.
“Five hundred dollars,” she repeated aloud. “Five hundred dollars?” The man on the phone had been very pleasant. His voice was nice, but five hundred dollars was a lot of money. How could she justify spending so much money at one time in her own mind? She also didn’t think about where she would meet this man. Apparently it was up to her to secure a room, because she wasn’t stupid enough to have him come to her house. More money, she thought. She groaned as she got up from the bed. She would have to think about this some more.
6
It was lunchtime, and Marissa collected her lunch bag from under her desk and made her way to the employee cafeteria. After heating her Tupperware container of leftovers, she joined a few of her coworkers at one of the tables. The women were deeply engrossed in a sexual conversation. Margie and Thelma, two other phone reps, were discussing different positions and which they liked best. Marissa listened but did not want to get involved in this particular topic. She was surprised to learn these women actually seemed to like sex. Marissa didn’t care for it and couldn’t imagine going out of her way to get a man’s attention.
“Marissa, you haven’t said anything yet. We need a tiebreaker vote. What’s your favorite position—missionary or doggy style?” Margie asked suggestively. Thelma turned to Marissa to await her answer.
She kept her head bowed toward her plate. She didn’t care for Margie putting her on the spot that way. Now they were waiting for her to say something. Without looking up, she mumbled, “Sex is overrated.”
“Overrated?” Thelma asked, laughing. “Girl, what are you talking about?”
“I just don’t think it’s all you are making it out to be. It’s all about the man anyway,” she mumbled and shoved some food into her mouth so it gave her an excuse not to say any more.
Margie and Thelma exchanged quizzical looks. They knew Marissa was married, and she did seem like a timid creature, but this was the new millennium, and women were in control of their sexuality.
“Marissa, sex is not all about what a man wants anymore. Don’t you read books or magazines even? Women have been getting their groove on for years now,” Thelma said.
The panicked look on Marissa’s face caused Margie to interject quickly. “Look, nobody’s gonna tell your husband anything. This is a woman thing, girl. You get to have your needs satisfied, too. There are some men out there who don’t care about their woman’s satisfaction, but you have to tell him what pleases you and what you want.”
Marissa realized she’d opened Pandora’s box with her comments, and it was too late to pretend she hadn’t said them. Maybe these women could give her some advice on how to make sex better with Toby. He always complained she was boring in bed and she should be grateful he even had sex with her. If she were better at it, then maybe he would be nicer to her.
“My husband says as long as I please him and make him happy, then I should be happy. I am supposed to get my pleasure from his enjoyment,” she explained.
“No, no, and no,” Thelma said emphatically. “He tells you that so you won’t want to enjoy it. It’s a control thing. He probably isn’t all that good. And forgive me for saying so, but if you really got your world rocked, it would be all over for him. ’Cause obviously he can’t take you there.”
“Sex is a good thing, girl. It’s fun for the man and the woman,” Margie chimed in. “Have you ever looked at another man and thought what it might be like to climb on top of him and…” She shoved her hand in her mouth and pretended she was biting it as she twirled her head around and growled for effect.
Thelma reached over and nearly shoved Margie off her chair. “Stop it! You’ll end up scaring the kid. I’m going to bring you a magazine tomorrow, and I want you to read some of the stories in it. Then we can talk some more. I gotta get back to work. Tomorrow,” she said as she put her containers back inside her lunch bag and pointed at Marissa.
Marissa nodded her head in agreement. She was curious about the sexual pleasures these women spoke of. Her mother never spoke of sex with her, and she had been a virgin when she met Toby. All she knew she learned from Toby. He told her what pleased him but never asked what she wanted. She didn’t know he was supposed to.
The following day Thelma dropped a couple of magazines on Marissa’s desk. One was a magazine of romance stories, another was a magazine of erotic tales, and the third was a Playgirl magazine. Marissa quickly shoved them in the top drawer of her desk. Between calls she would peer inside the drawer but couldn’t see very much. She waited eagerly for her first break. Slipping the Playgirl into her purse, she headed for the seclusion of the ladies’ room. She breathed a deep sigh of relief to find the restroom empty. She walked quickly to the last stall and slipped inside. Stealthily, though no one could see her, she removed the magazine from her purse. Seated on the toilet she quietly flipped through the pages. She was afraid at first to look at the naked men in the pictures. Toby was the only man she’d ever seen naked. These men were handsome and boldly displaying their genitals. Her fingers lightly touched the images of their bodies on the page. As she continued to slowly peruse the pages, she began to feel an unfamiliar tingling between her thighs. Embarrassed and alarmed by the sensations, she closed the magazine firmly and put it back in her purse. She glanced at her watch. She was late.
It seemed an interminable amount of time between her first break and lunch. Finally the clock showed twelve thirty. She added the other two magazines to the one in her purse, collected her lunch, and headed for the cafeteria.
Thelma and Margie were waiting for her at the table. She greeted them both and sat down. “Well?” Margie asked. She couldn’t wait to hear what Marissa thought.
Marissa felt the heat rise in her cheeks. “I didn’t get to look at them all. I was busy this morning,” she explained as she pulled the magazines from her purse and put them on the table.
Thelma reached across the table and picked up the magazine of erotic tales. She flipped through a couple of pages to a particularly hot story and set it in front of Marissa. “Read this page,” she said.
Marissa put down her sandwich and began reading at the top of the page. It was a scene of a man and woman in a hot tub. The scene was very detailed and descriptive, from the moment their bathing suits came off in the hot tub to the moment the woman screamed in ecstasy at the end. Marissa squirmed in her seat. Why was her body reacting this way? Her mind wandered to the photos of naked men. She imagined them in this story. She
