Big Swiss(57)

“What are you thinking about?” Big Swiss asked after a long while.

“What you’re doing to my box,” Greta said.

“Can you use a different word?”

“Gash,” Greta said.

Big Swiss grimaced. She removed her fingers, dug into the coconut again, and now—well, the party moved to the next room. Big Swiss’s breathing changed, along with her entire demeanor. Greta felt like she was seeing a photograph of Big Swiss at age seven or eight. She looked both knowing and innocent, more receptive to joy and forgiveness, but there, in the corners of her mouth, the hint of a cruel streak.

At the foot of the bed, Pi?on caught Greta’s eye and held it. “If you want me to put a stop to this,” he seemed to say, “just say the word and I’ll bite this bitch’s bare bottom.”

Greta recalled the time Pi?on got a foxtail stuck up his nose while hunting in a wheat field. He’d sneezed about a thousand times before Greta had taken him to the animal hospital, where she’d learned that a dog’s nose has many chambers, and that a foxtail required minor surgery to remove. Along with anesthesia. And eight hundred dollars.

Of course, Greta’s butthole was not a nostril with many chambers. It was more like an antique keyhole. Big Swiss’s middle finger, a bent key. Beyond the extremely tiny doorway, a grand ballroom with a vaulted ceiling. To judge from her face, Big Swiss had finally arrived at the right place and never wanted to leave. Her pupils dilated. Greta could feel her finger looking around the ballroom. Then it swept the floor. Now it rose and fell, slowly and gracefully, in a Viennese waltz.

A few minutes later it emerged, weak and spent. Greta watched to see if Big Swiss might wipe it on the sheets. She did not. Instead, she reached for her sweater dress and slipped it over her head.

“So, it’s true what they say,” Greta said. “About millennials and ass play.”

Big Swiss made a face. “I’m not a millennial.”

“You’re twenty-eight,” Greta said.

“How do you know?”

“You told me,” Greta said.

“Did I?”

Hadn’t she?

Big Swiss looked toward the window and frowned. She was crashing, it appeared, and the comedown was rough. Greta felt it, too—a doomed sadness. Granted, Greta always felt this way at dusk. Although neither one of them had gotten off, Greta suspected they’d be doing this again, very soon.

“It’s getting dark,” Big Swiss announced. “I should head home.”

To her husband. Luke. Greta had thought of him exactly twice, and both times she’d imagined him standing at his living room window, watching his wife wander their yard in a trance. He’d tapped the window to get her attention and had been met with confusion and bewilderment. Who’re you? What are you doing in my house? Then Greta had imagined him tapping her own window. She imagined a pane of glass falling to the floor, his face poking into the room. Who’re you? What are you doing to my wife?

But Big Swiss had probably been thinking of him all afternoon. So, although neither of them had gotten off, Greta suspected they would never do this again.

“Next time,” Big Swiss said, “you can do whatever you want to me.”

Greta exhaled loudly. “Does that include kissing?”

“Yes,” Big Swiss said.

“When?”

“Tomorrow, from three forty to five forty-five,” Big Swiss said.

“I’ll be here,” Greta said.





10


There was a house that existed only in Greta’s dreams, a house she’d been visiting for years. Sometimes it felt like she’d been dreaming about it her entire life, which was why it seemed as familiar as her own face. And yet, it always disintegrated the second she opened her eyes. She only remembered what it had been consumed by in the dream, and of course that always varied. Water, fire, dirt, dead leaves. If she saw a house in real life that she liked or admired, some aspect of it might later appear in the dream house, and so it was likely a hodgepodge of conflicting styles. At any rate, Greta was usually happy to see it—Here I am again, she often thought, remember this—even though Pi?on had died there a dozen times. He was always falling down the stairs or being chased onto the roof, and Greta woke up scream-whispering, or choking on her own despair.

But now, for the first time ever, Greta felt like she was inside the dream house while awake. That’s what being inside Big Swiss’s pussy felt like, a place she’d been visiting in her dreams for years and forgetting. How exhilarating to finally be awake for this, lucid and somewhat in control. On the other hand, how devastating. She was crushed by the number of years she’d wasted.

“You keep making little gasping noises,” Big Swiss said.

“It’s so alive in here!” Greta said.

As alive and abundant as the universe. If Greta spent time here every day, anything and everything seemed possible. She could pilot a helicopter if she wanted, or act in a play. She could make soap, sweaters, sausage. Maybe dance? She had way more rhythm than she realized, along with more nerve endings in her fingers. It astounded her how satisfying this felt, how natural and innate. No wonder lesbians seemed so smug.

“What’s happening to you?” Big Swiss said.

“Nothing,” Greta said. “Everything.”