Bennett smiled. “Did you know that in ancient Rome, same-sex relationships between men were perfectly acceptable?”

“Wait. What?”

“It’s true. As long as they took a dominant role over their partners and their companions had a lesser social status, such as…um…slaves or prostitutes, the men were free to enjoy themselves. The same goes for ancient Greece, including gods like Achilles, Zeus, Apollo, Hermes, plus a few others. I’d never heard about same-sex relationships until Max and I were discussing Greek mythology. He touched on homosexuality briefly, but it wasn’t until it came up again in our talks about ancient Rome when I dared to broach the subject. I couldn’t understand the concept because, as far as I knew, sex was necessary only to make children, so why men would want to be with men was beyond me. So, being the inquisitive student that I was, it had become impossible for me not to ask questions, and Max, God bless his heart, fumbled through the answers with the help of a brandy or three.”

“He was embarrassed?”

“Not so much embarrassed, just awkward. It would be equivalent to a parent discussing sex with their child for the first time. You don’t want to be too descriptive, yet in a way, you must. And, in my case, I wasn’t twelve. I was twenty-eight, and since I’d never found sex to be enjoyable, he had to…um…he had to assure me it could be with the right person.”

“And for you, the right person was, without question, a woman.”

“Precisely, except there was hardly any mention of same-sex relationships between women in Roman history. The Romans, it seems, did their best to sweep us under the rug.”

“Why?”

“Actually, Max had a theory about that,” Bennett said, readjusting her position. “He believed the Romans’ skins were much thinner than the Greeks, and they couldn’t handle the competition.”

“Huh?”

“Like in Greece, the men in Rome were the rulers, whether it was a kingdom or in a home, and they deemed women subservient. The men held places in the military, the senate, and the courts. They saw themselves as virile and irresistible because of their strength and supposed intellect, so any insinuation that a woman would prefer being with another woman instead of a man would—”

“Bruise their little egos?”