A study like that really makes you think about the cost of things, doesn’t it? It ought to. It also ought to make you consider what the real costs of dating in traditional relationships happen to be. Because if you’re throwing money down the black hole of traditional dating and relationships, you’re not just wasting money. You’re also willfully participating in a process that is abusing you and treating you badly. The old fashioned way of dating is rigged. It’s a system designed to take advantage of you, and to pull your money out of your wallet in order to give it to women. Worse than wasting your money, though, is wasting your time. Every hour you waste on the dating game, which carries no guarantee of success, is another hour you can’t spend on almost anything else.

Think of all the money you spend in clubs and bars. There are cover charges. There is buying drinks for girls. Then, when you finally get a woman’s attention, you’ve got to try and keep it, and that means spending a lot more money. It means dumping funds into buying dinners, even cards and gifts and tickets for shows. There are so many things you’ll have to deal with… and all in the name of getting the chance to do it all over again and waste even more money. Is it any wonder, then, that most women treat dating as a way to get a guy to pay for them to go out to dinner and a show, or to go out clubbing and drinking, without ever really taking that guy seriously? It’s the natural outcome of a process like this. Girls are looking to see what they can get from you. They know you want to be with them and they use this as leverage over you. You have no guarantee that all your money and time spent won’t end in failure and disappointment.

That, without a doubt, is the worst part of a bad system. When you spend all that money, you have no guarantee that your new lady friend won’t just leave you high and dry and find somebody else she likes better. Where will you be when the bottom falls out of all your plans?

There’s a better way to engage in dating and relationships, and that is not to play the game at all. What if you never had to deal with a girl’s drama or emotional baggage? What if she showed up promptly and never stood you up… ever? What if when the date was over she promptly left? And what if you could count on what this would all cost you, with no hidden costs and no reason to expect to be asked to pay for things outside the scope of the date itself? Well, when you book one of our New York escorts, you get all of these things. You get the opportunity to spend time with a beautiful woman without pressure, without stress, and whenever is convenient to you. How excellent is it to finally have dating be both fun and convenient? You desire the company of beautiful women, and we can provide it for you! But first, you have to let go of the traditional model of dating.

Stop killing yourself to accommodate the whims and desires of a woman who doesn’t care about you! Stop putting yourself in the poorhouse to cater to her needs! A New York escort comes to you when it is convenient for you. She leaves when the booking is done and she won’t bother you after that. And if you want to see her again, you don’t have to compete with any other man for her time. All you have to do is contact us and book her again and she’s all yours. How perfect, and perfectly convenient, is that? And of course there are no hidden costs: You book your escort for the duration you want, and that is all you pay, plus the cost of whatever date you then go on. These are all things you can plan and anticipate. When you can have dating like this, why and how would you ever go back to doing things the old way? How would anyone go back to traditional dating after experiencing this much more improved method of finding, meeting, and spending time with the most gorgeous women in the city? We think it’s time you got what you deserve.

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“My view is probably not going to be the most popular with theology types,” she admits, “but I just can’t help it. I believe in some kind of higher power, sure. I believe that the universe is so beautiful, and so complex, that it probably isn’t random. But I also can’t believe in a creator who would make men and women, make them so wonderful together, and give them the gift of romance together, and then make that romance forbidden and bad so much of the time. Does that make any sense? I don’t think it does. I think it’s much more likely that it’s us, the human beings, who have gotten things wrong. I mean, if the creator of the universe is infallible, and yet we keep changing what we say he thinks about this and about that, if he is indeed a he and not a she and not an it, then what does that say about us, the human beings? It’s a lot more likely that we’re the ones who are wrong. We’re the ones who keep screwing up our interpretation of what is right and what is wrong. I refuse to believe that the act of love, the beautiful act of romance between two people who find comfort in each other, is ever something bad. It’s just too wonderful. It’s too beautiful and sensual. There has to be some kind of appreciation for that in the universe. If there isn’t, if there wasn’t, I don’t think I could believe in a higher power.”

Sandy explains that she has her life together, but she has a few friends who have been in twelve step programs, and she got the phrase “higher power” from them. She also has some interesting thoughts on her friends’ lifestyles. “I don’t fault anybody for turning to that serenity prayer,” she says. You know, the one where you ask that higher power to give you the strength to handle what you can’t change, the courage to handle what you can, and change it, and the wisdom to know the difference between something you can change and something you cannot change? I think that’s a pretty powerful sentiment. I do think, though, that for some of my friends, the whole step-program things becomes kind of a lifestyle for them. I don’t think that’s bad either, but when you start doing all your socializing at a group like that, and that’s where you meet people and even where you find people to date, I can’t help but wonder if maybe you’re overdoing it just a little. But I don’t know. I don’t judge anybody. That’s not my place. I just want people to be happy.”

Sandy explains that she feels a little guilty about all the attention she gets, being so good looking, and she knows she dresses to accentuate that, but in the end, it’s what she knows, and what she truly enjoys. “I don’t define myself in terms of being with or needing a man, but I do like attention. And I know I’m a good looking woman. I was born and grew up into a hot girl, and I don’t see any reason to make apologies for that fact. I know I’m lucky. Some women, their beauty is more a work of art than a work of nature, as the saying goes. A lot of girls need a lot of help, from a bottle or from a surgeon’s knife, to look as good as they want to look. I have been fortunate in that I look good without a lot of extra help, and with some working out and some attention to detail, I’m smoking hot and super sexy. But I realize not every girl has that, growing up. And I know that looking like I do has opened doors for me. That’s just a fact of life. The pretty girls always get more attention and more opportunities. I refuse to feel guilty about that fact, but I do recognize it. And I hope nobody thinks I’m arrogant about it. I don’t ever think that I’m special because I happen to be lucky enough to look good. I take care of what I have and I put a lot of work in over my appearance, but that’s not the same thing. I know I was born with an advantage. I try to stay humble about it.”

“That’s one of the reasons,” Sandy adds, “that I love going out with my dates for dinner and drinks. I like walking into the room on my date’s arm and waiting to see the guys’ heads turn. I like knowing that their own dates are angry when that happens, that they’re jealous. Every guy in that room is wishing he was my date. Every girl in that room is wishing her own date would pay attention to her, not me. I know it’s a power trip and it’s almost kind of mean, and I don’t think of myself as mean. But I like the attention very much, and I hope it never stops.”

“I know it sounds irrational,” she says, “and probably, for a lot of people, an office job is exactly what they’re dreaming of getting, working toward getting. I certainly don’t mean to insult anybody by saying that I fear it. It’s just that I’ve always had this paralyzing, crippling fear of being bored. To me, boredom is the worst emotion you can feel. I think I would rather be dead than be condemned to be bored. The saddest thing I ever saw was this science fiction television program where there’s this intergalactic traveler and his companion, a woman he picked up from an office somewhere along the way. I forget the exact details of how it transpires, but the traveler and his companion have all these fantastic adventures. Then something happens, and he basically has to put her back where he found her… and the worst part is, she doesn’t have any memories of what happened, so all those adventures they have, all that excitement, might as well have never occurred. She is condemned, not to death, but to a life of eternal boredom, where even in her own mind, she has never been anything but a perfectly ordinary person working in an office doing boring things that will never matter to anyone outside that little company. I couldn’t imagine anything more horrifying. It actually made me sad to think about it, not for this fictional character, but because it was at that moment that I realized the thing I feared most in the world. What I most dreaded was living a life that didn’t matter, a life filled with drudgery and work that didn’t matter to anyone. I think that night, while I was thinking about it, I almost had a panic attack. This job saved my life. It was the perfect job for me, and it saved me from exactly the type of work that I didn’t want to do.”

Betty goes on to explain that getting hired as an escort showed her a world that she didn’t realize was possible. “Imagine that you have the opportunity to live a life of excitement and adventure,” she explains, “and I don’t mean with a time-traveling space adventurer. You’re told that your hold job is to meet new and exciting people, interesting people, how are as excited about the chance to meet you as you are to meet them. Not only are the people you meet going to pay to take you out and enjoy your company, but you’re actually going to get paid for doing so. And all you have to do, in exchange, is take responsibility for how the date goes. You just have to take charge and make sure that the person you meet, the person who is so interested in talking to you and spending time with you, has a good time. And this incredible adventure can go on day after day, night after night, if you’re just willing to say “yes” to the job. Wouldn’t you say yes to that opportunity? Wouldn’t you see it as salvation from the nightmare of boredom, the mundane existence that you fear so much will come to pass?”

When the pressure starts to become too much, Betty has the perfect strategy for withdrawing and clearing her head: She goes to the nearest beach or pool. “Depending on where you are, of course, you can’t always find a beach when you want it,” she admits. “I have to say I prefer the beach to lying out poolside. But a pool will do, especially if it’s a big nice one, and the advantage of a pool is that you don’t have to worry about getting sand where you don’t want it to go. I love to lie out in the sun on the beach when I can, though. I am very fond of my body, and I like to give it the best tan I can, with a minimum of tan lines. If I can find a beach where they’ll let me lay out without my clothes, that’s ideal, but that’s rare. It’s harder to find that kind of beach than an ordinary public beach. But to be honest, the thrill I get from tanning out on a public beach is a little greater. I like to dress in a thong string bikini if I can get away with it, and then I’ll lie out there and let the whole world take in what I’ve got. I don’t mind that guys go by extra slow, and they take more trips past me than they need to, so they can get a good view. And I’m sure a few of them have taken my picture. That’s okay too. I don’t mind that. I like being an object of desire. Going to the beach lets me indulge my exhibitionist tendencies while giving me the chance to really relax and unwind, and just release all the cares of the day or the week. When you’re in the sun next to the water, or swimming in that water, it’s really impossible to let anything get to you. The world can’t touch you when you have access to sun, sand, and surf, but in a pinch, going poolside will do. It’s actually a little easier to meet a nice man in a pool than it is at the beach, because there are fewer people at the pool. I’ve met some very nice guys at hotel pools. I really have.”

Betty is absolutely one of the best girls we have available to us. She’ll take on any fun night you care to have.

We get along pretty well; we always have.  I was a temp when they hired Bill as the newest writer in Communications.  He was loud and talked a mile a minute, but he was friendly and didn’t act like I was some lower species of life because I wasn’t a permanent employee.  When Advanced Applied Sciences finally hired me full-time, it was Bill who lobbied to have me moved over to his office and out of that miserable cubicle I shared with three printers, the fax machine, and two photocopiers.  Everyone shared an office, either with someone else or a bunch of office equipment.  The price of a rapidly expanding company, Bill used to call it.

Bill brought in a cooler and we’d keep sodas in our office and throw darts at a dartboard Bill hung from one of the reference shelf brackets.  Our boss Julie disapprovingly labeled our space “a glorified college dorm room.” We laughed behind her back.  I didn’t have an opinion and I don’t think Bill gave a damn; he had a problem with authority and had been nursing a hatred of Julie since she’d been hired.  None of that mattered to me.  I was just happy, finally, to be a full-time employee with benefits.

My wife Deb and I would get together with Bill and Ann for dinner once in a while.  I even went one weekend with Bill and his friends to play paintball.  We went to the gun show one weekend and Bill kept telling me I should buy a gun, though I figured Deb wouldn’t be thrilled.  I settled for a pellet gun.  Bill did his best to hide his disappointment.

We’d been working together for months and I still hadn’t decorated my half of the office.  Bill’s martial arts posters and rank certificates threatened to expand to take over all of the available wall space.  He liked to “nest,” as he put it, and I’ve never met anyone who decorated his office with more crap.  His bookshelves were full of reference books, grammar guides, and several novels he’d written and published himself.  He was a freelance writer on his own time and dreamed of getting paid to sit in a Starbucks and write science fiction all day.  I told him that as much coffee as he drank now, he’d be dead in two years from heart failure if he spent eight hours a day in a coffee shop.  I think he saw it as a great way to go.

I couldn’t argue too much with his dream, though.  If it was me, I’d be doing pencils for Marvel or DC, maybe one of the other labels, and I’d be sitting right in that coffee shop with him if I could fit a drawing board in there.  Back in the real world, he wrote documentation for the municipal and private water filtration systems AAS built and sold.  I illustrated those manuals, turning photographs, computer-aided drafting files, and other people’s half-baked ideas into line art.  Neither of us thought of what we did as particularly interesting, but it wasn’t unpleasant and we were paid pretty well.  Our supervisor was a little unpleasant — Bill liked to say I had a gift for understatement where the subject of Julie was concerned — but, all in all, we had good lives.

The first time Bill’s wife called, we still had those good lives.

The warble of Bill’s phone, which played electronic music from some video game he loved when he was a kid, caught us just as we were getting ready to leave.  Bill scooped it up before the vibrate feature kicked in and started it skittering across his desk.  “My wife,” he told me, which I knew well enough by then meant, “I have to take this.”  Bill’s desktop was a shrine to two people — his wife and himself, in that order.  I’ve never known anybody who kept pictures of himself on his own desk the way Bill did.  We used to joke that he was vain.

Outnumbering all the pictures of him at the shooting range, sparring with his teacher Eric, posing in front of Star Wars props at the Museum of Science in Boston, and standing with wax figures of famous people like Donald Trump, were pictures of his wife.  There were wedding pictures, pictures from honeymoon resorts, pictures in front of landmarks like the Empire State building, and pictures from half a dozen other vacations.  Magnets — those gift shop magnets you get from places like amusement parks and tourist museums, the kind with your name on them — were attached to the metal struts of his shelves and the side of his filing cabinet, repeating the names Ann and Bill for anyone to see.

Of course he was going to take the call.  When he wasn’t waiting for her to call, he was sending her text messages.  I would see him bent over that phone laboriously tapping away at the keys and chuckle to myself.  He is devoted; I’ll give him that.

“Bill Potter,” he said.  He paused, and then said, “Hi!”  That was my cue.  Only his wife got a “hi” that happy from him.  I stepped out of the office and went around the corner to the water fountain so he could chat with her in peace.

He found me in the hallway a minute later.  “All set,” he said.  He was twirling his card key on its lanyard.  “Do you want to drive, or shall I?”

Then he exploded, and I realized just how weird the world was.  And now I wait every day for the people I know to explode.

I don’t have many friends.

The creature, the man, had died. Not dead like the first time, but truly dead, lying in a tangled, wet heap at the base of the dumpster like a marionette with its strings cut.  Its head was caved in and a small pool of blood — not much at all — had congealed on the grimy asphalt.  Half a bloody cinder block had been tossed aside nearby, clearly the weapon used to brain the thing.

Laughlin sighed in relief.

Realizing suddenly that he was standing around with a gun in plain view, he hurriedly tucked the Glock back under his shirt and looked around.  It was a miracle no one had found the body yet, but given its condition and its smell he could see why no one had gotten closer to investigate.  The shadows around the dumpster made it look like just so much other trash.  Risking another guilty scan to either side and behind him, Laughlin held his breath and crept closer, grabbing the thing by what was left of its ankles.  It was missing one shoe; the formerly white sock was stained black from sole to ankle.

Heaving with all his might and feeling something pop in his abdomen, Laughlin wrenched the filthy thing up and into the open dumpster.  Parts of it sloughed off as he did so and his shirt became smeared with its fluids.  Gods, the smell of it!  He couldn’t hold it in anymore. He crouched in the shadows, puking his guts out.

At least, he thought, standing bent at the waist, his hands on his thighs and his stomach clenching, it’s all over now.

Jack got up.

The Styrofoam cup fell to the sidewalk, spilling its precious cargo of change and crumpled dollar bills.

With slow, unsteady steps, Jack — no longer caring what his last name might have been — began to walk.

Ann Belkirk, hurrying back to the Mall building, passed the homeless man as she entered the glass doors.  She was more or less used to the street people, given that every weekday she walked the gauntlet of stinking, grasping paws and staring eyes.  Provided they stayed out of her way, she ignored them, though she was never comfortable around them.  They were a blight on downtown Syracuse that the city’s politically correct denizens seemed unable — or unwilling — to cure.  A proposed ordnance to outlaw “aggressive panhandling” had been doomed before its conception.  No, the homeless were a fact of life downtown and those who lived and worked in the area simply put up with them because they had no choice.  Those who didn’t walk that daily gauntlet sniffed about “compassion” at those who did.  Bill, being overprotective, had actually written a series of eloquent but overwrought letters to the editor of the Post Standard in support of the ordnance.

Ann smiled at the thought, shook her head, and made her way back to work.

She did not see Jack turn, his eyes red with burst blood vessels.  She did not see him shamble after her, only to stop when he encountered the closing glass door.

She also did not see the African-American woman who worked at the greeting card store.  She did not watch as that woman left the Mall, only to stop when Jack blocked her path.

Ann was not watching when Jack sank his teeth into the woman’s throat.  She did not see nearby people scream and run as blood sprayed from the woman’s torn carotid artery.  She was not there to see Jack gnaw hungrily into the woman’s stomach for several minutes before he rose to find other, more stimulating prey.

Minutes later, Ann was not present to see the dead woman rise and, with slow, unsteady steps, begin to walk.

Laughlin cleaned himself up as best he could in the bathroom of the Hess station down the block.  Then he stopped at a diner downtown and had some coffee and toast in an effort to settle his stomach.  The diner was quiet and he could hear the staff muttering about the scheduling of Flavor of Salt City stealing their Friday lunchtime crowd.  He wanted nothing to do with those crowds.  He waited as long as he thought he could, sitting in his booth alone, then took the little Siemens phone from his pocket and flipped it open.

He dialed the number and listened as it rang once.

“Miller.”

“This is Laughlin,” he said.

“And?”

“It’s done.  Somebody beat me to it.  Crushed its skull with a cinder block.  I stuffed it in a dumpster off Warren street, in an alley near the bank.”

“A bank?”

“Yeah, the HSBC.  You know, the one that gets robbed all the time.  There’s an alley just west of there, off Warren.  The body’s in the dumpster.”

“I’ll send a team.  We don’t need some trash man finding it.”

“Fine.”

“Laughlin.”  There was a pause.  “How exposed are we on this?”

“I think we’re okay.”

“You’re certain?”

“No.  I’m as certain as I can be, though.”

“All right.  Get back here as soon as you can.”  Miller disconnected without further comment.

The Glock was digging into Laughlin’s stomach.  He would be glad to be rid of the thing.  Regardless of what Miller said, Laughlin figured he’d damned well take his time.  It had been a hell of a morning and he’d earned a rest.

“My new agent is going to have his work cut out for him,” Kimberly laughed.

“Mmm,” Bryon nodded.  “Let’s take a shower.”

She laughed at his not-so-subtle change of subject but was happy to agree.  They stepped into his large, glass-enclosed shower and luxuriated in the hot, pulsing water, marveling at each other’s beautiful bodies.  Seeing Kimberly’s hair wet and draped across her shoulders as she threw her head back was an immediate turn on for Bryon.  He soaped her body, lingering over her breasts, her stomach, her bottom…  She returned the favor and washed every centimeter of him, stroking him to hardness with one soapy hand while rubbing lather onto his legs and stomach with the other.

They finally toweled off and Kimberly put on Bryon’s bathrobe.  He wrapped a towel around his waist.  They went out into the living room, where Bryon started a fire in the fireplace.  He had a luxurious “bearskin” rug, a synthetic blend (he hated the thought of killing an animal just for its pelt) that felt soft and sexy against Kimberly’s skin.  She stretched out in front of the fire, listening to it crackle.

Bryon walked out from the kitchen area carrying a basket.  “My sister and her new boyfriend sent us an engagement gift.  It was delivered here first thing this morning,” he said.  He had a bottle of sparkling rose wine and two glasses in his other hand and managed to get everything neatly on the floor without dropping it.

“Bob’s Sexy Fruity Chocolates,” Kimberly laughed.  “What else is in here?”  There were several small packages and plastic bottles.

“Let’s find out,” he reclined on the lush rug with Kimberly, pushing aside a fold of the oversized robe to bear her breasts.  He moved his hand down across her stomach, feeling the warmth of her body.  She leaned over and they kissed, slowly and sensually, eyes closed, the fresh scent of soap tickling their noses as Kimberly’s wet hair brushed across Bryon’s face and chest.

“Always, love,” she told him.

“Always.”  He reached into the basket and produced a small plastic bottle in the shape of a man and woman intertwined.  “Honey,” he said.

“Yes, darling?”

“No,” Bryon laughed.  “It’s a bottle of honey.”

“Oh,” she laughed at that.  “What are you going to do with that?”

He smiled and pulled the belt of her robe, pushing the garment off her shoulders.  She shrugged out of it and pushed it aside.  Then he put his hand on her breasts, gently pushing her down onto her back.  “Stay there,” he said.

He uncapped the bottle and drizzled honey onto one of her nipples, letting it spread in a tiny golden pool that dripped down her breast.  She shivered.  He dripped honey on her other nipple, watching it get hard as he did so.  Then he slowly, lovingly licked both of her breasts cleaned, sucking them and running his tongue across her stomach when he was done.  She began to grow warm with desire for him, the smell of the honey mingling with her own passion.

He opened the box of chocolates and removed a cherry-flavored square.  He dangled it above her full lips and she took it into her mouth, sucking his fingers as she took the candy.  He felt himself stirring, her lips impossibly sexy, her tongue reminding him of all the areas of his body she had explored with it.

“Kimberly,” he sighed, “I never knew I could be this happy.  Not with anyone.  You’re so incredible.”

“I love you, Bryon,” she said simply.  She sat up and reached for the wine.  They had a few sips in front of the now roaring fire, the heat from the flames fanning the fire in their blood.  Kimberly looked through the basket and found a bottle of her own.  There was also a small bag of chocolate-covered strawberries.

Giggling, she took the smallest of them, laid back, and placed the fruit on her stomach over her navel.  Bryon leaned over and picked it up with his teeth, licking her stomach again.  He ate the fruit and took another from the bag, placing this one in her mouth.  Then he leaned over her, placed his mouth over hers, and bit into the berry, taking half of it with him.  They did this several more times, their tongues meeting and the juices mingling as they kissed each other deeply.

She pulled the towel away from his waist, stroking his hard member a few times, then pushed him onto his back. The bottle she’d selected was of chocolate syrup.  She uncapped it and poured a generous stream of it over the head of his penis, watching it drip down the shaft to pool on his lap.  Then she began licking and sucking him, enjoying the sweet syrup as much as the groans of pleasure from Bryon’s lips.  She kept it up until he was on the brink of exploding and then lapped up the last drop on his body.

Bryon, inspired, sat up and rolled her over onto her stomach.  He took the syrup from her and poured it over her bottom.  It dripped down across her buttocks and between her legs.  She shivered again with anticipation as he began licking her clean, his tongue exploring and probing her, making her moan and buck with passion.

Sticky and overwhelmed with fierce desire, they were both relieved when Bryon finally lifted her hips and entered her, stroking deep and whispering her name as he made love to her.  They did it again and again, trying every position they could imagine.  Bryon kissed her hard as they faced each other and he moved inside her.  He nibbled her ear as she arched her back, Bryon taking her from behind, and he fondled her breasts and held her hands, her fingers laced in his, as he lay on his back and she rode him to powerful orgasms for them both.

Just when they each thought they were exhausted, their passion for each other and the sculpted curves of their bodies drove them to want more, to desire more, and they  went to Bryon’s bed and made passionate love repeatedly through the night.

They had known each other for four days.

They had loved a life’s worth in that time.

“Wait until you see the paper,” Bryon had chuckled.

She sat down at her kitchen table as Bryon placed eggs, toast, and coffee in front of her.  Romance Rampant at Erotic Writer Roundup, the headline announced.  Beneath it was a story on the ErotiCon, a subhead mentioning “Kimberly Ransom’s Generous Gift” — and a full-color photo of Bryon pulling her into the dressing room to make love to her.

“Oh, my,” she giggled.  “If I wrote children’s stories my reputation would be ruined.”

“Admit it,” Bryon said.  “I’m research for your next book.”

“Yes,” Kimberly teased.  “It’s called, Find the Love of Your Life in Three Days or Less.”

“Oh,” Bryon said, sounding disappointed.  “I thought it would be called, I Was Bedded Repeatedly by a Powerful Love God, by Kimberly Ransom.”

“That’s the sequel,” she said, deadpan.  They had laughed until it hurt.

The memory brought a smile to Kimberly’s lips as she pulled into the Heart’s Desire Press parking lot.  Patrick’s yellow Volvo was there.  She wondered what he’d say about all the media coverage.

Patrick Scott was beside himself.  He was supposed to be happy.  Kimberly was all over the news; the media couldn’t get enough of her charitable gesture, they loved the storybook romance of this Bryon Fiore’s proposal and fling with her at the ErotiCon, and they were raving over Between the Silky Sheets — giving Kimberly’s latest book the best reviews she’d received yet in her stellar career.  Heart’s Desire was sitting pretty amidst all of the promotion, projected sales of Kimberly’s work going through the roof along with HDP’s other in-house authors.  Patrick, as Kimberly’s agent, stood to gain from all of that.  In theory, his star was rising with hers.

He should be happy.

He was not.

He’d made no secret of the fact that he wanted her.  Now she’d gone and gotten engaged?  To some jerk she’d only just met?  What kind of bad romance novel plot was that?

Just then, Kimberly swept in, looking as lovely as ever.  Patrick felt something twist in his stomach.  He was an okay-looking guy:  average height, average features, blue eyes, thinning blonde hair.  He was no body builder, but he wasn’t Quasimodo or anything.  He had a good, professional job.  He’d done a lot for Kimberly — but she was still out of his league.  He couldn’t stand it.

“Patrick,” Kimberly said, stopping in his doorway on the way to her own office.  “How was your weekend?”

“This… this… this…” he stammered.  “This is a train wreck!”  He waved a newspaper at her.  “You look like a slut!”

“Oh, calm yourself, Patrick,” she waved a hand.  “What’s bad about whirlwind romance?  It’s exactly the type of story we sell here.”  She held out her hands, indicating the HDP offices.

“I’m getting complaints!” Patrick whined.

“Complaints?  From whom?”

“Uh… from the Council for Human Unity, Morality, and Principle!  It’s… it’s, uh, a local community standards organization, and they won’t stand for this.”

“Patrick, the acronym for that organization would be CHUMP.”

“What?”

“Do they even exist?” she demanded.  Patrick shook his head reluctantly.  “Look, Patrick, what’s this really about?”

“Kimberly,” Patrick stood and went to her.  She backed up, but Patrick followed.  Before she realized it, her back was to the wall of the hallway.  Patrick put a hand on the wall, closing in on her, his free hand reaching out to touch the lapel of her jacket.  “Kim, you know how I feel.  We’ve known each other for years.  You know me.  You don’t know this guy.”

“’This guy’ is Bryon and he’s my fiancée!” she said angrily.  “Now get out of my face, Patrick.”

He didn’t listen.  Instead, he leaned in and kissed her on the lips — just as the door to the office opened.

“Kimberly, I couldn’t wait and wanted to surprise…” Bryon stopped when he saw Kimberly pushing Patrick away to break the kiss.  “What the hell is going on here?”

Patrick marched up, leaving the shocked Kimberly staring at them both.  “Look here, Pretty Boy, she’s come to her senses and you can’t just –“

Bryon hit him.  Hard.

Patrick fell to the floor with a heavy thump.  Bryon looked at Kimberly, his eyes sad rather than angry.  Without a word he turned and stalked out the door.

“Bryon, wait!” Kimberly started to follow.  Patrick got to his knees, holding his jaw and groaning. “Patrick,” she said angrily, “You’re fired.  You’d better be gone when I get back.  I’m informing HDP that you’re no longer my agent.”

“I’ll sue!” Patrick sputtered.  “I’ll sue him, too.”

“Unless you want the entire industry to know why I fired you,” Kimberly threatened, “You’ll keep your mouth shut.  Leave quietly and I’ll say we parted mutually.  Sue anyone and I’ll make sure everyone knows what a pig you are.  You’ll never work in this business again.”  She left him with his jaw hanging open.

Running to the parking lot, Kimberly was too late.  The late model Honda speeding away was Bryon’s.  She found her keys and got in her own car, hoping he would not get too far away.

In the car, she tried dialing his wireless phone from hers.  He didn’t answer.  She ended up following him all the way to his building, an upscale high-rise in the city.  She parked and took the elevator to the penthouse suite where Bryon lived.  She rang the bell impatiently, then rang it again.  Finally, Bryon opened the door.

“How could you?” he demanded, flinging the door open.  “What am I to you?  Don’t you love me?”

“Bryon, please,” she begged.  She reached out for him but he turned, shrugging her off.  “Please, can I come in?”

“He thought about it for a moment and then stepped aside.  She walked in and looked around.  His apartment was lovely and richly appointed, speaking to both success and a tasteful masculine eye for décor.

“Bryon, it wasn’t what it looked like,” she told him, feeling lame even as she said it.  Patrick is my agent and has always had a crush on me.  I didn’t realize just how jealous he was.”

“Wait,” Bryon said, suspiciously.  He was trying to force himself on you?”

“He was,” she nodded.  “It’s good that you hit him.  He had it coming.”

Bryon looked like some wrathful demon.  “He tried to force you? He repeated furiously.  “What’s his last name?  I’ll destroy that bastard.  He’ll never work again.”

“You don’t have to,” she said, though his protectiveness and his willingness to fight for her left her feeling… turned on.  “I fired him.  He threatened to sue and I told him if he did, then he’d never work again.”

Bryon relaxed only a little, pacing around the apartment like a caged animal.  “When I saw you… I thought…”

“I could never do that to you, Bryon,” she said, going to him and embracing him, resting her head against his broad chest.  “I love you with all my heart.  I think I knew it from the moment I saw you.  I could never betray you.  You’re the man for me, the only man.  I want you to be able to trust me, Bryon.  I’m sorry.”

“Don’t be,” Bryon shook his head.  “It’s not your fault.  I just lost my head.  The thought of you with another man… it was too awful.  I just went berserk.”

“I love you,” she said again.  “That won’t change.”

“I love you, too,” Bryon said, smiling.  “Come on into the living room.  We’ll relax and forget about this.  And I’ll put some ice on my hand.”

“He’s lucky you didn’t dislocated his jaw,” Kimberly laughed.

“It wasn’t for lack of trying.”

The percentage of women with fake breasts is probably a lot higher in places like Hollywood and other areas in and around California and New York City, which are places that are central to the entertainment industry (and to the porn industry).  Think about how many porn stars you’ve seen, if you’re into that kind of thing, who very obviously have giant, round, fake boobs that don’t in any way look real.  It’s like that old episode of Seinfeld, where a gorgeous Terri Hatcher tells Jerry Seinfeld that her breasts are “real” and “spectacular” after he obsesses over figuring out if they might be real or fake.  The difference matters to some men, because they want a breast that looks and feels real when they get their hands on it.

For many other men, though, it doesn’t matter to them if their woman has fake breasts or real breasts.  In fact, it’s not at all uncommon for men with means to pay to have their girlfriends’ breasts augmented, as a way of giving themselves a present that is far better than any lingerie they might buy their wives or girlfriends.  When you think about it, asking a woman to get fake breasts because you think it will make her sexier is the ultimate in giving yourself a present.  If she is willing or, even better, very much wants the procedure and is grateful for it, so much the better.

We are spoiled in today’s day and age because we have become very used to safe, effective procedures like breast enlargement.  We think of it as almost nothing.  But famous people die sometimes while undergoing routine cosmetic procedures because there is always a risk of something going wrong when you are anesthetized or when you have surgery.  You can pick up a nasty infection in the hospital while undergoing routine cosmetic surgery, and hospitals tend to be the sorts of places where the scariest infections breed, multiply, and infect other people.  There’s a famous sports star who had cancer in his jaw who now has a staph infection in that jaw because he spent so much time in hospitals with a compromised immune system.  Infections in hospitals are a huge problem, and we are overusing antibiotics as a society, making infections we could once easily kill much harder to eliminate.

There is a reason that big breasts are referred to as “Future Lower Back Problems.” You may not realize it, but a woman who is born with naturally large breasts doesn’t always think this is a good thing.  Walking around with large breasts can cause you serious back pain problems because you’re holding up that weight all day long.  There have been famous Hollywood starlets who got big breasts through surgery and were happy to take off their tops in R-rated movies… and then, later, they had the breast implants reduced or removed altogether because of the pain the implants were causing them.  Famously large-breasted model Kate Upton, whose boobs are natural, made the mistake of saying in an interview that sometimes she wished they could be smaller.  Fans of her as a model were outraged and she had to walk back her comments for fear of the backlash.  But most women understood where she was coming from.

There are porn stars and other people operating in the sex-related industry who are known for outrageously large breasts, either because they got balloon-sized implants or because they are naturally large.  (Very overweight women frequently have very large breasts, too, although we don’t usually think of them as attractive for this size advantage.)  For the most part these large-breast freak shows appeal to a specialized audience, but not to men on average.

Most men want a woman who is in proportion.  Yes, they like a generous rack on their women, but there are men who prefer small breasts too.  Men just want a woman who is toned and in shape, a woman who wants sex as much as they do, and a woman who enjoys the act with them.  It isn’t enough to be with a woman who enjoys sex if she acts like she doesn’t want to have it with you specifically.  Where is the enjoyment in that?

At one time, and may this is still the case, if you went out to Nevada and places where prostitution is legal, it was possible to book time with certain porn stars for private dates.  In this way, members of the audience who had the money could fulfill the ultimate fantasy.  They could pay to have sex with the porn star of their dreams, and they would have an incredible story to tell their buddies afterward.  Imagine firing up your favorite adult movie, sometimes as a joke when drinking with your pals, and being able to tell them what it was like to be with that porn star.

Well, whether her boobs were fake or real probably won’t enter you head when you do tell a story like that.  That is the not-so-secret secret of breast implants when all is said and done.  Get implants if you want to and it makes you feel better about yourself.  Guys won’t care if your chest is fake or if your chest is real.  They just want you to look good, and if you let them get their hands on you, they are that much happier.