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'What do you smell, Big?' I asked her softly. 'Is there a stench of old stale sex?' She shook her head. My nervous part lay under her nose, across her upper lip.

'But your hands ...' Her voice had a thin crack in it.

'I touched a poor beat-up fag all covered with pee and perfume, Big. I walked him home. We shook hands.'

I had to sit her up against me before I could unlock the double arm-bar and plant a bloody kiss on her neck, my tongue still bleeding sweetly down my throat. Above my left ear, my scalp stretched tightly over the swelling knot where the dresser had clouted me. I imagined the damage to the lingerie drawer. Were the panties shaken up by the blow - unfolded and flung into the deepest corner of the drawer, where they lay worried? Wondering, whatever it is out there, I hope it doesn't want to wear me.

Later, in a gentler battle on our bed, Biggie said, 'Move your arm, quick. No, there ... no, not there. Yes, there ...' And making us both comfortable, she began to glide under me in a way she has that always makes me feel she's going to get away. But she never does, and she doesn't mean to. It's almost as if she's rowing us somewhere, and I'm just pacing myself to the easy strength of her stroke. The secret is in her tireless, driving legs.

'This must be good for skiers,' I told her.

'You know, I have some muscles,' said Biggie, rocking easily, like a broad boat moored on a choppy sea.

'I love your muscles, Big,' I said.

'Oh, come on, not that muscle. I mean, that's not even a muscle, really,' she said. 'I mean, I've got a lot of muscles for a girl.'

'You're all muscle. Big.'

'Well, not all muscle ... No, come on, that's not a muscle, you know damn well.'

'It's better than muscle, Big.'

'I'm sure you think so, Bogus.'

'And this is better for you than skiing, Big. And more fun too ...'

'Well, I'd hate to have to choose,' she said, and I gouged her for that.

Heavy as she is, Biggie can roll with momentum, like a boat caught and borne along by a breaker. I floated her - a slow ride. Apparently we weighed nothing at all. Then the sea shifted and pitched us suddenly ashore, where our weightlessness went out of us and I lay as beached and leaden as a log under sand, and Biggie lay under me as calm as a pond.

Later she said, 'Oh, bye-bye for a while. Bye-bye.' But she didn't move.

'Bye,' I said. 'Where are you going?'

But all she said was, 'Oh Bogus, you're not such a bad person really.'

'Why, no, I'm not, Big,' I said, intending to sound flippant. But it came out all hoarse and thick, as if I hadn't spoken for a long time. Oh, the slow, furry voice of the successfully laid. I remember how I met you, Biggie ...

15

Remember Being in Love with Biggie?

THROUGH THE QUAINT gloom of the Tauernhof Keller, I carried the swooned Overturf toward the stairs. I wasn't worried about Merrill. The mismanagement of his diabetes had him frequently fading out and in again - his system alternately empty and too full of sugar.

'Too much alcohol,' Herr Halling said sympathetically.

'Too much insulin, or too little,' I said.

'He must be crazy,' Biggie said, though she was concerned. She followed us upstairs, ignoring the harping from her ugly teammates.

'We should go now,' one said.

'It's not our car,' the other told me. 'It's the team's car.'

Crossing the landing with Biggie alongside me, I was conscious of her seeing how short I was. She looked a little down on me. To compensate, I pretended Merrill was no strain to carry; I tossed him around like groceries and took the next stair flight two at a time, letting Biggie see: he is not tall, but he is strong.

Marching Merrill into his room, I cracked his head on the doorjamb, which I had veered into thanks to blind spots induced by breathlessness. Biggie winced, but all Merrill said was, 'Not now, please.' He opened his eyes when I dumped him on his bed and he stared at the overhead light as if it were the ultra-high beam over an operating table where he lay rigid, awaiting surgery.

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