The doorbell was ringing. We ran for the door. It was a tall uncomfortable man who looked as if he was full of secrets. I immediately took an intense dislike to him. He reminded me of my mother’s cousins in the Delta, bloodless, proper, scared.

“I’m Tom,” he said. “I’ve come for Gaye.”

She came down the stairs. She had changed into a pink wool suit. She was very elegant in white leather shoes and gloves. She was carrying a small suitcase in her hand and Malcolm ran up the stairs and took it from her. We made hasty embarrassed conversation for a minute. Then Tom and Aunt Gaye left the house and left us there. We closed the door. We went upstairs and lay down upon the bed and began to heave and sigh against each other. Time passed. Darkness fell.

“You’re supposed to do something about it,” he said at last. “You’re supposed to use some jelly or take a douche.”

“I don’t have any. I forgot to get it.”

“Look in the bathroom. Maybe Aunt Gaye has something.”

“I will. In a minute. I don’t want to get up yet. I don’t want to let go of you.”

“Okay. Come here. Get back on top of me. Like that. Oh, yes, just like that.”

Much, much later, around three or four in the morning, I got out of bed and went into the bathroom and found a douche bag still in its cardboard box and read the directions. Beside the box was a bottle of dark green liquid called Betadine. I filled the douche bag with water, added the liquid, and lay down in the bathtub and tried to stick the plastic nozzle up my vagina. I held the nozzle in with one hand and the bag above it with another. It was awkward, but I managed. When most of the water had run out into my body, I stepped out of the tub. The bottle of Betadine was sitting on the edge of the small washstand. I knocked it off and it fell to the floor and broke and the antiseptic spread everywhere, a deadly green lake on the white tile floor. I grabbed a towel and threw it down upon the mess. I grabbed all the towels in the room and began to mop it up. The smell was suffocating. I stepped gingerly around the pile of towels and pushed open the window. Then I knelt down and began to pick up the glass.

“What happened?” Malcolm said. He had come to stand in the door.