“You’re still here?”

“But why not?”

“Alicia, I’m on my way to the beach.”

“Are you okay? Can’t I come with you?”

I didn’t like to make her run behind me, but I needed to wash myself. I knew she was still there because she was shouting out poems—not her own—as we went, to remind me of the good things.

I stripped off and ran into the sea. I swam and jogged on the beach until I was exhausted. I lay down next to her with the sun on me. Soon, I’d dozed off. When I opened my eyes, she was sitting there wearing just a cigarette, her arms hugging her knees. Unlike the other women at the Center, she never removed her clothes but always wore a long-sleeved top and ankle-length skirt.

“What is it?”

She said, “You slept with her.” Her hands shook as she drew on her cigarette. “Everyone in this hemisphere will have heard.”

“But you didn’t cover your ears.”

“I listened to your music. Every note.”

“What will you do with what you heard? Write about itor is it too human for you?”

“If that was all I was capable of, I’d hate myself!” She took my hand and placed it on her foot. “Will you look at me? We can’t have sex. You don’t want to. Perhaps you’ve had more than enough for today. I have never had an orgasm, and I am a virgin. Touch me, if you feel like it.” She lay back. “Would you?”

After my earlier experience, I couldn’t claim to be erotically absorbed. I did begin to rub her with the palms of my hands; then, when I began to stroke her with my fingers and her eyes closed, my mind began to wander.

“I need to borrow this.”

I took her notebook and pen, and began to make an inventory of what I found on her flesh. I did this, as they say on television, in no particular order. I went to what interested me.

The first thing I noticed was a light brown eyelash on her throat, one of her own. On her forehead there was one hard spot and one pus-filled, with several others under the skin. Her hair looked as though it had been dyed a while ago; parts of it had been bleached by the sun. It was hard to make out its original color. Her lips were a little ribbed and sore, the bottom more than the top.