Stony was a little different. When none of his friends were around he smiled at her in a particular way, something in his expression conveying to her that he knew there was something else out there beyond his teen-age friends and chump-change family. And that, whatever it was, he wanted some. She knew that when he was back with his pals, he got into the "ol' Three-Finger Annette" number, but that didn't really bother her. Small thrills for small minds. She had watched him and his cocktease girlfriend who looked like that big-titted blonde in "All in the Family." She had her number from the git-go. The Jewish princess with the Crown Jewels between her legs. One of the true hookers of the world. When the grapevine had it that they split up, she waited two weeks until she figured Stony was climbing the walls with horniness, then called him up. He was over to her crib in ten minutes flat. Just to blow him out of his socks she gave him the Royal Harem treatment that night. She knew, by the expression of his face after twenty minutes in bed, that Cheri was nothing but a childhood memory. Annette had a nice time racking with him that night. He was a little too fast and sloppy and he had to learn a little about lying back, relaxing and appreciating things done to him instead of running through all the male performance numbers, but basically he had it in him to develop into a class A fuck.

As nice as the sex was, what really stuck in her head was the conversation. After fucking, they sat up in bed all night talking. She felt on her guard, so she didn't tell him anything of the scenes she had been into since ten, but he poured his heart out. He talked about his family, his brother, his uncle, the doctor that got him the gig in the hospital, what it felt like working with kids, how his own brother reminded him of the black kids he cared for every day, the new thoughts and connections he was making in his head about kids and parents. All these new ideas of his were things she could have told him when she was twelve. As she listened, she had the feeling he was telling her all this to get a specific reaction from her. He wanted to hear something. Finally, she said that he might as well slash his wrists if he quit the hospital and worked with his father and uncle. He was crazy even to consider becoming an electrician, and that the further he removed himself from that family the more of a human being he would become. That if he went into construction and became a full-blooded De Coco, whatever heart and feeling he had would shrivel up inside him faster than a hard-on in a room full of nuns. Stony freaked out and started running around the apartment, shouting at her that she was a dumb cunt and didn't know shit from Shinola about anything and basically saying that she just didn't understand. Annette just shrugged and felt O.K., I'm wrong, no sweat. But later that night, when she sat up because Stony was tossing and turning, moaning in his sleep, she knew she had hit it dead on the nose.