One time after posing, a cup of hot coffee wasn’t enough to warm me up, or so I told Nils, and he lighted a fire in his fireplace, and I stood before it, getting all warm and toasty. On one side of the mantel was a statuette of a black cat, and on the other side a statue of a boy with a pronounced erection. The boy and the cat faced each other, almost as if they were having a duel. It made me think of my Aunt Pauline’s cat, Anastasia, though Anastasia wasn’t black, she was pure white. Aunt Pauline also had a ceramic figurine of a butterfly. The butterfly was almost as big as Anastasia, and one day Anastasia bit off one of the butterfly’s wings. Snap, just like that. Aunt Pauline saved the broken-off wing in a silver candy dish. Now the butterfly couldn’t balance, but Aunt Pauline found a way to keep him propped up. Then, almost a year later, Anastasia bit off the other wing. At least now the butterfly could balance on his own. Standing in front of Nils’ fire I wondered where the butterfly was now—Aunt Pauline died about ten years ago, back when I was in high school. Then for some reason I had this thought that the cat statue on Nils’ fireplace was going to bite off the boy’s penis. Snap, just like that. For some reason this thought pleased me, and it also made me want to suck Nils’ cock. Once I was warmed up, I took another sip of the coffee, and then I followed through.

I didn’t tell Nils about Anastasia and the butterfly until after.