Chapter 6

Joe hardly remembered passing out in his bed. Somehow he managed to at least set his alarm clock. His head throbbed slightly from the wine and pot. Putting his pants on over his boxers, his t shirt on, he made his way down to the dining area. Melissa, the pretty student workshop assistant met him with a chuckle. “Bedhead,” she explained.

He shrugged and got coffee and juice and a small bowl of oatmeal, sweetening it with honey. Nodding at the few fellow workshoppers there, he sat beside Melissa. “Where’s your boyfriend?” he asked.

“He’s not...” she started defending herself, then shrugged. “Still sleeping last I left him.”

“Ah,” he smirked.

“I kept him up late,” she winked. “What happened after we left?”

“Another bottle of wine,” he said as mundanely as possible.

“I can tell,” she giggled.

Shy Sarah walked in. She made tea and grabbed a croissant. “May I?” she asked, placing things on top of the table beside his.

“Of course,” he said.

She smiled at him.

“Sleep well?” he asked her.

“Very. The wine and pot conspired to make me pass out.”

“Did you enjoy yourself?”

“Very much. Moira?”

“She’s probably still sleeping,” he said.

“You don’t know?” she asked hopefully.

“I think she prefers sleeping late,” he responded, not really answering her inferred question. “What did you two talk about?”

“Not here!” she proclaimed, though quietly, glancing at the company surrounding them.

He couldn’t help chuckling. Her embarrassment looked cute on her.

“I should probably wake her,” he said. “We don’t need to be late our second day.”

“Especially since your play will be our topic,” Sarah reminded him. “Don’t worry. I’ll defend you.”

“Do I need to worry?” he asked her.

“No. Of course not. I...”

He chuckled. “I’m sure things will get critical. I’m glad you’ll be in my corner.”

“Of course.”

He finished the oatmeal and took a last sip of coffee. He made coffee and poured a juice for Moe and managed to grab a croissant. Hands full, he headed upstairs. “Let me help,” said Sarah following quickly behind him. Her hands held the tea and her croissant. She pressed the elevator button probably easier than he could. When they arrived at Moe’s door, she did the knocking. “You probably need to knock louder,” he suggested.

“What!” they heard shouted behind the door after Sarah’s much louder knock. Sarah went wide eyed, like she’d awakened some ferocious lioness.

“Breakfast,” he shouted back.

A moment later the door opened. Moe looked beautifully disheveled. As usual, seeing her made him harden. “This early shit’s for the birds,” she muttered, moving from the opened door to let them follow her in. Joe closed the door behind them.

Placing Moe’s breakfast on the bedside table, he moved away to let her sit. “Thanks,” she said with her mouth full. “I’m starved.” She swallowed down the juice. She smirked at Sarah, who looked confused until she found the dresser a good enough place to set down her tea and croissant.

“So what did you two talk about?” he asked, sitting comfortably beside Moe on the bed.

“We... , “ Sarah began uncomfortably and stopped.

“We’re still negotiating,” Moe said.

“About me?”

“Of course about you.”

“Do I have an opinion?”

“Do you want an opinion?”

He looked at Sarah. Saw her worry. “What sort of negotiation?” he asked. “Bidding?”

“Compromises,” said Moe.

“What sort of compromises?”

“Well...”

“Let Sarah explain.”

“That’s okay,” said Sarah.

“I want to hear it from you,” he insisted.

“I...”

“Sarah,” said Moe. “You need to man up if you want to get anywhere with this. With him.”

“I can’t man up. I’m a girl.”

They laughed. Even Sarah giggled. She looked lovely doing it. Relaxing. Smiling. He finally noticed her. She wore a summer dress, a soft pastel yellow that clung to her more than the previous clothing had. She had small breasts that appeared to be youthful and buoyant because he could detect no bra straps. As he noticed them, he saw tiny bumps, proving the lack of covering. Her hips flared subtly. Enough to demonstrate a womanly shape. He imagined smallish ass cheeks, firm and young matching her breasts, but with perhaps more flesh to them. The thought stirred him, hardening him further. Moe must have noticed, patting him there.

“Uhm,” he stuttered, standing, revealing more of his hardened condition, and seeing Sarah notice and blush, “I should grab a quick shower and comb my hair. I heard it’s showing how I slept.”

“You look cute,” Moe said.

“You do too,” he smiled, leaning down to kiss her briefly. They had company after all. Nevertheless, she gave his cock a squeeze and chuckled sexily when the kiss ended. “I should ... let you two negotiate,” he said, rushing out the door, with that roughened chuckle of his lover getting louder.

Quick ablutions ended with him combing his hair. Having returned from the shared shower room down the hall wearing the boxers he slept in and patting his hair dry, he got naked in front of the only mirror in the dorm he’d been assigned, a large one affixed to the door. A knock resounded on it. And another, louder one. He laughed.

“Joe?” he heard.

“Just a second, Sarah,” he shouted.

He quickly put on his tight jockeys and his khakis, luckily already chosen and laid out on his bed, and opened the door.

“Sorry,” she said, gazing at his naked torso. His skinny naked torso. He had muscles, but they tended to be on the lean side. Her gaze seemed approving.

“About what?” he asked, grabbing the light blue button down short sleeve shirt and putting it on. That brought her eyes up to his.

“Nothing,” she said bravely, and bravely stood in front of him, buttoning his shirt slowly from top to bottom. Slowly wasn’t a problem. They still had time. So he let her. For some reason he breathed through his nose, smelling her. She had a soft sweetness with a touch of musk. Nothing artificial except maybe her deodorant. She smelled of desire. Again his manhood swelled.

“You look pretty,” he told her.

“This dress,” she began and stopped.

“Yes?”

“I wanted to look pretty. I ... don’t have anything else for that.”

“You shouldn’t hide,” he said.

She finished the last button, her hands lingering near his groin.

“But I’m so good at it,” she said. “I saw her chest too. In fact I saw pretty much all of her. She really does have an amazing body.”

Leaning down, he whispered into her ear, “Can I tell you a secret?”

“Okay,” she gulped, her hands remaining near but not on his sex.

“I prefer petite women,” he told her.

“But she...”

“Yes. I admit her body is built for desire. But yours is built for my desire.” He grabbed her butt and pulled her against him, letting her feel his excitement not only against her body but her hands. It confirmed what he imagined. Round and with some size, but still not much more than two hands full. They felt soft, but with some tautness beneath. He imagined bounciness when he fucked her from behind. An exciting image.

“Joe,” she murmured. He could hear her ambivalence. Desire and fear combined.

He let go. She stepped away. Her eyes looked down, shyly, but also at the swell his desire created. It made her blush more and look up, catching his eyes gazing at hers.

“Another secret,” he told her. “I happen to be an ass man. And yours feels delicious.”

Her face looked stern suddenly. “So you want me- for my ass,” she said.

“And what do you want me for?” he asked.

A crooked grin broke her seriousness. “I like your ass, too, and you’re tall and slim and cute and confident.”

They laughed. Again he noticed how her prettiness shone.

“I would be your first,” he said.

She nodded. “Is it a problem?”

“It means being careful.”

“Moira said you would be.”

“Moira’s the problem.”

“You love her.”

“I can’t. Not really. How can this be anything but temporary? The same thing for you.”

“I live closer to you than she does.”

“You do?”

“Oh right. You weren’t there at the beginning. I’m from Milwaukee. I’m going to Kenyon College.”

“I’ll be going here,” he told her. “So not all that far. Still a few miles.”

“But not New York.”

“No. But what do you really want from me? Right now I’m very much attracted to Moira. I really do want to be with her while I can.”

“Thus the negotiations,” she said. “I really like you, Joe. I really did love your play. I actually like Moira, despite her hold on you. It’s obvious why you prefer her. And not just her sexiness. She’s an amazing woman. I’m ... just ... a mouse.”

He gently lifted her head. “You need to stop hiding, Sarah. You’re obviously talented, being here. You’re pretty, especially when you smile.”

She demonstrated by smiling. And giggling. “And I have a great ass.”

“You do,” he laughed.

“It’s not like I’m after you to get rid of my pesky virginity. I mean, in a way I am. Because it’s proof of my hiding. Of my not letting myself out there to find some boy. I could have, I think. A boy at my high school. I had a crush. But he was as shy as me. In college, the boys either scare me or just seem silly. Sophomoric. You’re not like them.

“But it’s more than breaking my hymen. It’s what happens afterwards. I always dreamed of cuddling. I always thought that would be the best part.”

“In a way, it is,” he said.

“I just know you wouldn’t be the type to gloat after scoring some virgin. I know you’ll care. Do the best you can to pleasure me. And after...”

“What about the negotiations?”

“We should go,” she said, giggling at his frustration.

But she was right. They’d be early, but not by much. They heard a knock on the door.

“Great minds,” he said. She giggled.

He opened the door to his lover. She matched Sarah wearing a summer dress. Black of course. He got harder looking at her.

“We should go,” Moe said.

He grabbed his backpack and they rushed out.

Gene, the head honcho of the workshop, stopped him when he entered. “Did you bring your tape?” he asked Joe.

“No,” Joe said. “I didn’t think I needed to, but it makes sense.”

“You sent a scene from it, but I don’t think I saw it,” Gene noticed.

“No. That scene didn’t work visually. Me and a girl recited it backstage and dancers accompanied it, mostly in the audience area.” Applying to the workshop required sending a completed bit of writing, one that had been worked on for a while, and something raw. Joe had sent the first chapter of his novel.

“I had Jimmy make an audio tape of your video,” Gene explained. “Unfortunately it sounds a bit rough, but I’d actually like to concentrate on the writing, on the words, so we’ll give it a try.”

Once everyone settled down in the circle of desks, Gene pressed play on the boombox. Rough would be kind, but mostly because Eddie’s and Belle’s playing sounded terrible. The words could be heard pretty clearly. Gene stopped it after the first scene. “Anyone?” he asked.

The dandy decided to be an asshole. Not that being critical, negative, didn’t have its place. It was kind of the point in a way. But he was definitely being an asshole. “It’s mostly about the whole thing,” he said. “What’s with the fairies?”

Gene stopped the groans. “It’s actually a fair question.”

“They’re not fairies,” Joe said.

“Joe,” Gene frowned. “You missed the beginning yesterday, so I forgive you this time. The first thing I told everyone was the author needs to be silent when the works get critiqued.”

Before Joe could apologize a hairy young man spoke. Long hair and a beard. Being young and blond kept the beard shorter and somewhat indistinct. He looked as if he had never shaved. Nevertheless he was a handsome fellow, and the pretty girl, a tall and full sized brunette seemed to agree. He talked carefully, as if each word held importance. The way a poet carefully crafts a poem. And Joe figured that was his discipline, since he had gravitated towards the poet yesterday. “It reminds me of Ibsen,” he said. “His first successful play involved magical creatures.”

“And he became a naturalist playwright,” Gene completed the idea. “Interesting, because Joe’s other work he sent us definitely dwells in the real world. What do you think of his choice?”

Sarah spoke for Joe. “Because he dwelled in the world of dreams, he had to make things magical, didn’t he? Especially since in many ways, each scene begins with quotidian concerns and then bends them into surreal places, which, being the nature of the surreal, dreams tend to do.”

“But if he’s following the surrealist tradition,” spoke a chunky young man with dark hair and glasses, looking like he spent hours in libraries rather than enjoying any outdoor activity, “like Bunuel for instance, wouldn’t departing from a realistic place to a place of weirdness be more effective?”

“Except he’s not Bunuel,” a small oriental girl also with glasses sitting beside him spoke. “He’s not trying to shock us with slicing an eye or ants coming out of a hole in a hand.”

“If anything,” said the big girl beside the hairy blond, “he’s more like Cocteau, who did dwell quite beautifully in the magical. Blood of the Poet. Beauty and the Beast.”

“Exactly,” said Sarah. “It’s all about beauty. Making normal things beautiful. Thus the magical creatures, the dancing and the music. And even the words. Mundane, especially at the beginning, and yet beautifully phrased.”

“Poetic, yet realistic,” the hairy blond agreed. “Poetic making it magical, without being flowery or overwrought.”

“Exactly,” Joe thought. “And it was the hardest thing I ever did to make that happen.”

“Good,” said Gene. “Let’s listen to the next scene, and try to be more specific. How do the words work?”

The next scene happened to be Joe’s favorite, his most experimental and his most successful. He worked off the idea of minimalist, repetitive music, like Steve Reich and Philip Glass. Repetition with subtle changes. He had Eddie and Belle listened to those composers and they created something similar. In the scene the boy and girl repeat themselves and each other. The words inflected differently, creating different things out of the same words. Or slightly different words. It had been his hardest to direct, but Tim and Linda had been real troupers, and they seemed to relish the challenge. It created laughter, but its length actually quieted that, and the audience got into it.

“What’s the point?” said the dandy.

“Fuck you,” Joe thought.

“What was the point?” Gene asked.

“It reminded me of the work of Phillip Glass,” said the chunky nerd, “especially his work with Richard Foreman.”

“There’s a spiritual element to repetition,” the hairy blond said carefully. “Ceremonies that bring forth altered states. Zen chanting for instance.”

“It did bring a transformation,” Sarah agreed. “It began like an argument, even if both said the same things, but it became a union. Visually, if you’ll allow me, the two became one.”

“I think it had to do with love,” said Moe. “It’s fundamental nature, both in its strength and its weakness. Theoretically, in romantic love, it involves a unity of souls. A bond. And yet two can never truly be one, can they? Two separate bodies. Two separate minds. Only Vulcans can meld minds.” That brought a chuckle.

“Go on,” said Gene.

“May I?” Dorothy asked.

“Moira?” Gene asked.

“Go for it,” Moira permitted.

“I both agree and disagree with Moe, and that’s the point I think. We are always separate physically and mentally. And yet we bond. We become couples. Families. Singular things. A boy and a girl become a couple. Or a girl and a girl or a boy and a boy. Whatever. The point is, even in the fundamental division between one person and another, we choose to unite, become an entity, and remain one despite the differences. Despite the arguments and misunderstandings. We seek the impossibility of connection, becomes its fundamental to us. To share. To relate. Thus relationships.”

“Moira?” Gene asked.

“Sounds about right,” Moe grinned.

“Again, sorry to bring up the visual,” said Sarah, “but that totem that emerged and hid the two actors, it was like a single form, but it had two faces. Like the greatest intimacy two people can share brings them to form one thing.”

“You mean fucking,” said the asshole, making Sarah blush.

“She means making love, asshole,” Melissa spoke up from outside our circle. “As if you’d know the difference.”

“Ouch,” Joe thought.

“Okay,” said Gene. “This isn’t really working like I hoped.”

“I think it’s been pretty insightful,” the gay poet disagreed.

“Nevertheless, I came prepared.” Gene pulled out a stack of stapled papers and had them handed out. Joe saw the scene he had sent. “Joe, you can read the man. We need a volunteer.”

“I’d like to expose my latent thespian,” said Moe.

Laughter.

“Good,” said Gene. “I’ll read the stage directions.”

And so Joe got to be the lucky one who broke in the workshop. It ended up relatively painless. Unlike another breaking in.

That didn’t happen for a few days. That night, Moe wanted him to herself. She wanted an evening and a night of just them. A sort of dinner date, though they ate at the school’s cafeteria. But afterwards they strolled the campus and the small town of Grinnell. Just the two of them talking and holding hands. They shopped a little. Moe enjoyed a small consignment store, the kind of place she obviously thrived at. She told him about the cool ones in Manhattan. Used clothing stores there, mostly. The owners would even call her when something she might like would come in. Because of his height, places like that rarely had his size. So it surprised him when he found a well-worn leather jacket with insignias of a biker gang called the Barbarians that actually fit him. Moe loved it too. Enough to buy it for him. It was incredibly cheap. “What’s the story?” she asked the youthful middle aged brunette who ran the store.

The woman chuckled. “His wife insisted they get rid of the damn thing. She said he’d look at it and drift off to somewhere else.”

“What’s wrong with being nostalgic?” Joe asked.

The woman shook her head. “Misspent youth. They’d been there together. She’d been his girl. She rode his hog. But he’d gone to prison because of it. Assault. She never said, but I think it had to do with her. She was a lovely girl. Still is lovely. I think one of the gang tried to take her from him. Probably the leader the way I understand biker gangs. Maybe even raped her. When she came home, she was pretty traumatized. Sold her gear right away. Here actually. When he got out, he joined her. Worked at the garage in town. Runs it now. Kept this damn thing. Insisted on it. He must have remembered better times than her.”

“So what changed his mind?” Moe asked.

“They have a girl just coming of age. Beautiful like her mother. Kathy came in the shop, the front store where they sell paraphernalia, her daughter sometimes helping her husband there, and saw her daughter wearing this. Tony kept it in his office. Kathy wouldn’t have it at home. It freaked her out, seeing her daughter in that thing. I think it finally clicked with him, too. Maybe the day before, a gang roared into town. I bet Tony saw one of those assholes gazing at his daughter inappropriately. I guess being an ex-con kept him from beating the guy to death.”

When they left, they each had heavy bags to carry. Moe insisted on one last stop, a merchandise store every small town used to have before megastores. He came in with her. Found a couple things. She insisted he buy them and wait for her outside. Mysterious Moira.

Heading back, they stopped at Dorothy’s. Not to stay and play. Dorothy actually begged off, even though they had no intention to fuck her. They wanted wine. They drank some she had opened, smoking a joint with her, and left with another bottle and a borrowed opener.

Once in Moe’s dorm room, they immediately stripped and went at it like a parched man plunging into a pool. She even pulled him from tasting her. “Just fuck me,” she said.

Even though she started needy, just thrusting and kissing her didn’t seem to be enough to get her off. He knew he wouldn’t last, what with the pace she insisted he fuck her, so his lips took in her nipple, his fingers pulling the other one, his hand guiding hers to her clit. She’d know better what it would take.

He lasted as long as he could, warning her of his imminent climax.

“Just a little longer,” she moaned.

He couldn’t last. So, like the night before with Dorothy, he kept fucking her through his ejaculations until she reached her orgasm. It ended up a strong one. She cried out his name. Her pussy pulsed around his cock. Maybe that, and his continued thrusts kept him hard. He kept fucking her. Her eyes went wide after her convulsive orgasm waned. “You’re still hard?” she moaned.

He kissed her in response. And slowed his thrusts. The kiss ended. Their eyes gazed at the others. Only his cock inside her and the visual thrill of it became the stimuli. He didn’t think it ever felt like making love more than it did then. Only that, albeit faster, with her hips rising to meet him, creating louder slaps of flesh, brought her to her second orgasm. He slowed again, savoring her shimmering interior that acted like a milking machine, though it failed to extract his milk.

“Joe,” she murmured, pulling him into a long, loving kiss. Not the earlier scream. His name came at the end of the orgasm.

When lips separated, tongues touching to extend the moment, she shifted upwards, his cock emerging fully hard, damp from her juices. She turned around beneath him, lifting her incredible ass high. He took his place behind it, aiming and stroking back deep inside her. Leaning over, balancing on his elbows, he took hold of her hanging tits. Fingers pulled on her nipples in his own kind of milking.

“Hard, Joe,” she moaned.

Thus it ended how it began. Him thrusting hard and fast. Bringing him over. “Cum with me,” she moaned, her fingers reaching down to strum her clit.

She actually came first. But he soon followed. He got to feel all of it. The first surge, and the spurts that followed. And her interior welcoming it. Assisting it. Pure ecstasy.

They collapsed. They turned. She lay along his side over him. Soft kisses, lips heated by exertion and bliss. She lifted off his lips, looked down at him and sighed. “I think I love you, Joe.”

“I love you, too, Moira.”

“Shit,” she said.

“Yeah.”

They chuckled. He loved that low for a female, cigarette roughened sound. One of his favorite things he loved about her.

They finally got up. He opened the wine. They had plastic cups. They drank, smoked a doobie. She smoked a cigarette. More than one. And they talked. Not about them, about their necessarily temporary relationship. Instead they talked about others. About Dorothy. About Gene. About other participants. About Melissa and the dandy. When he brought up Sarah, telling Moe he hadn’t gotten her to tell him whatever the two of them negotiated, he saw a twinge of sadness in her smile, despite the chuckle. “I won’t tell either,” she said.

The munchies struck tnem. They decided to return to the diner they had visited the evening before. Dressing commando.

Sitting across from each other in a naugahyde booth, hands touching, eyes rarely moving from eyes, they sipped the decaf coffee and ate. She had apple pie a la mode. He had chocolate cake. Both delicious.

Once naked again when they returned, they cuddled. Their earlier lovemaking had been enough that night.

“Do you want to talk about it? About us?” he asked.

“No,” she said. “It will become what it will be. Perhaps it will become a short story.”

“Live in the moment.”

“Please.”

“Speaking of stories, could you read me one?”

She smiled. “I thought you’d never ask.” She slipped from his arms, her marvelous body moving down the bed, leaning over it so that her pussy winked at him, pulling her heavy shoulder bag onto the bed, she found a small sheaf of stapled paper.

He loved her voice. She read well. Subtly in character, like the best actor.

It ended up being a werewolf love story. Not as insipidly romantic as a series of teen books and their movies would be decades later. Nor as bloody as Clive Barker’s stories would be a couple years later. But somewhere in between.

It took place during the period of transition from small city states and lords to more bureaucratic civil servants in the familiar forest setting for classic tales like Little Red Riding. But the heroine had none of that girl’s innocence. The civil servant’s daughter lusted after the young, muscled son of the village blacksmith who trained in his father’s work. She heard tales of violently torn apart carcasses, deer and boars and even a hunter or two foolish enough to hunt under a full moon. Done in by a supposed lycanthrope, and it had been happening for generations. She saw wildness in the young man’s eyes, especially during that phase of the moon. And sadness. Flirting with him proved his shyness, or perhaps fearing his own attraction to her. But she made headway.

Impatience though had her slip out of her home on a night of the full moon and into the forest. Near where her hoped for conquest would enter it. She heard rustles and tramping. The path had been well trod, so she could make her way quickly through the darkness that had dappled light from the moon bleeding through.

She found him. And others. A family. Taking a deer down. Tearing it apart. It scared her, but it thrilled her. The power of them. The wildness. The violence. The transgressive beauty.

When one looked up and saw her, she knew it was him. She stripped. She told him to make her his. Moments later, bloody claws held her down. A bloody maw surrounded her neck and bit. A thick cock got thicker inside her. Everything felt too painful to endure. But she endured. She didn’t scream. And as quickly as the attack, everything changed. Pain became bliss, as if she had been flooded by morphine, except the drug didn’t mask feeling, it accentuated pleasure. Only then did she scream. In orgasm. And felt his orgasm, his hot cum flood her interior. And his cock stayed inside. A knot too large to be removed. Keeping him inside. Making him stay. Holding her. Licking where his fangs had penetrated her.

And that was it. It had made him hard. She crawled up to it, more like a stalking cat than a wolf, but it made him laugh. “You see why I’ll have a hard time publishing that,” she said before engulfing his glans in her mouth.

He let her suck him for a while, basking in the washes of pleasure it brought him. Then he lifted up and pulled on her hips. She got the message and straddled his head. The sixty-nine brought them both close. Somehow she knew when it needed to be more when he did. She turned around. Her cunt took in his cock. She rode him slowly. Then faster. He watched her wonderful tits bounce until he held them in his hands. One tit got let loose when he brought his finger to her clit. Her bouncing became erratic. When she stilled, arched and growled his name, he took over, fucking up into her climaxing cunt. Until she came down from it.

Rising up, she realized he remained fully hard. Her mouth once more took over the pleasuring. She winked when he told her he might not cum. A finger penetrated his anus. Searching. Finding his prostrate. Not long after he came. She swallowed, looking both victorious and a little uncomfortable.

Once she took the last of it in, he pulled her into his arms and kissed her, sharing his less than appealing flavor. It surprised her. But she soon embraced him, her kissing back a celebration of his appreciation of what she had done for him, the sacrifice of swallowing his bitter semen and its slimy texture.

She sighed when the kiss ended. “I love you, goddamnit.”

“Me too,” he said, bringing her down for one more kiss. Another sigh and she cuddled against him. Only leaving that position to find the blanket to cover them. And they slept.

They changed positions when they slept. He ended up behind her, spooning her. His hand held her breast. He tweaked the nipple. Felt it get instantly hard. “You can stop that in a few hours,” she murmured.

“You’re awake?” he said.

“About the same time as you it seems,” she replied. She shifted her butt. They realized his hardness rested between the cheeks, the glans against her dampening labia. “Damn,” she said. “I’m a little sore. And I gotta piss.”

He chuckled as she hurried off the bed and entered the bathroom, closing the door behind her. He stopped when he realized he needed to go just as much. He told her as much, saying he’d go down the hall to the shared toilets.

“No,” she insisted. “Just give me a minute.”

“I’ll try,” he said. She chuckled.

Only a minute later he heard the flush. A few seconds after, the shower started. He entered as she stepped past the plastic curtain. “I’m flushing,” he warned her a few seconds later. Then he joined her in the shower.