These two women had been friends for a long time, even though they were as different as jogging shoes and high heeled spikes. Letitia was the kind of woman whose bedroom was strewn with discarded outfits tried on in a hurry and thrown on the bed; with crumpled-up panty hose; with talcum powder dusting the bureau tops; with lost earrings beneath the corners of the bedspread; and over all a faint perfumey odor mixed with the odor of makeup, female skin, and Ivory soap.

Marvella's bedroom had all its surfaces clean and polished with lemony scented furniture oil. The nap on the carpet was vacuumed so it all lay in one direction; there were many little boxes in the drawers, and a magnetic bobby pin holder sat neatly on the mirrored tray with the perfume atomizers. Her scarves and underpants were neatly rolled or folded, and she made her bed as soon as she arose by pulling the covers up to her chin and then sliding smoothly out. Marvella's bed was a waterbed, of all things, certainly out of character for her. Her Ex and she had bought it, hoping it would save their marriage. It hadn't. Marvella's bedroom smelled of potpourri sachet which she put into her drawers, and of the pomander of cloves stuck into an orange that hung in her two eight-foot long walk-in closets.

Letitia enjoyed smoking, preferably Camels or Luckies, but she had quit these two hundred times, for the fear of cancer eating her lungs and turning the spongy tissue within her quite substantial breasts to green bile. She, as many fearful puffers afraid of the Big C, as it was called, smoked low tar filters now. Marvella did not smoke at all, and in fact had several times considered giving up Letitia as a friend, for reason of Letitia's filthy habit. This was typical of the great battles between smokers and non-smokers happening in those days. Letitia also had the habit of crossing her legs in a slit skirt. This showed onlookers too much flesh and they came on to Letitia more than to Marvella, even though Marvella, if she had to say so herself, was better looking than Letitia.

Once they were in a bar together with the rest of the singles, busily looking about for handsome men to sit at their table with them, buying them drinks and flirting, and perhaps dancing with them, if there were two handsome men in the place, which was quite rare. Usually there was just one handsome man in the place, and the rest ranged from average to ugly, which is the way it was in the midwestern regions where they made their hone. One time, when they had been skiing in Aspen their eyes had been treated to not only one bar full of handsome men, but many bars full of them—and handsome women, too—. There was a rumor that they trucked the average and ugly people out of town at sunset and let them back in at sunrise, to perform such tasks as sweeping the streets and washing the dishes in the restaurants, but neither Marvella nor Letitia had been able to ascertain the truth of that.

Once, at a singles bar near their town, the handsome man came over and showed his pearly whites and asked Marvella to dance, complimenting her on her fine blonde hair and her long red fingernails. Marvella preened a bit and gave him a gracious thank you.

Then Letitia crossed her legs in her slit skirt right in front of the handsome man and he came over and asked Letitia to dance and that was the end of Marvella's adventure for the evening, while Letitia dated the handsome man for two weeks, a long time for her, and told Marvella on the phone that he was marvelous in bed, though quite small.

Marvella tried not to be jealous of Letitia's success with handsome men, but this time she had te let her know the consequences of stealing your best friend's handsome man, and Marvella refused to talk with Letitia on the phone for four or five days. She didn't want to hear Letitia boasting of her exploits and telling of her conquests. Show then a little swarthy leg, Letitia often said, and they’ll come panting after you.

Marvella did a self-evaluation, as was popular in those days, and decided she would have to be a little more racy, and not so prissy. She began to work on her laugh. Previously she used a polite giggle, in fact a titter, and even put her hand up before her face when she felt the urge to titter, for she was embarrassed to show her teeth, for fear they were too yellow or not straight enough. Toothpaste commercials gave many people such fears, and denture commercials were worse. Marvella told Letitia that one day, Letitia threw her head back and laughed so hard she snorted, deep gasps and whines obscene over the humming wires. Letitia laughed a lot, and she wasn't afraid of showing her teeth, or even her tonsils, and the sound of her laughter made others laugh, too.

You're a real moaner, Letitia told Marvella one of the handsome men said to her while they were making love, so Marvella did another self-evaluation and began to try to moan while she made love, but the men she made love with grunted so much that it was difficult to moan. In fact, Marvella was not often moved to moan while making love, though she did sigh occasionally, especially when she had what she thought was a peak experience.

Letitia said her two heroines were Ava Gardner and Dyan Cannon, both of whom, she was sure, moaned while making love, and if they could do it, why couldn't she? Marvella countered with her heroines, the late Princess Grace of Monaco, and Mary Tyler Moore, who wouldn't discuss such things. It was a Friday night and the two women were talking on the phone, making plans to go to that new place to see if they could meet handsome men.

Letitia crossed her swarthy legs in vain that night, although one gnome like man who resembled Squiggy on Laverne & Shirley, did succumb to her slit skirt and ask her to dance. He laid his head on the tops of Letitia's rather substantial breasts, though, and seemed to salivate. Well, this grossed Letitia out, and she declined to dance with him again, saying No thanks, buster, I hate slobberers Then she turned and left the dance floor, going straight to the cigarette machine to buy a pack of Luckies or Pall Malls. She wondered what she was doing here if the men drove her to taking up non filtered cigarettes again, and she sat at the table puffing defiantly.

Marvella lucked out, though. That night Marvella met the handsomest man either had ever seen, and though he was only 21, much too young for either of them, he liked to run his fingers through Marvella's fine blonde hair during. a slow dance, and he kissed the tips of her long red fingernails so gallantly that Marvella forgot their age difference and took him home to bed. She wasn't disappointed, either, and she found herself admiring his   . . . , she told Letitia on the telephone as soon as the handsome young man left the next morning, before Marvella took her pleasantly aching, well-used body off to work. Marvella smiled with satisfaction as she heard the sound of a match strike. She could almost smell the lucky smoke coming through the wires as it blew out of Letitia's thin and aquiline nostrils. Letitia often reminded Marvella of a horse, more a Percheron than an Arabian mare, while Marvella reminded Letitia of a Shetland pony or a cocker spaniel.

Marvella found herself quite busy then, trying to balance her various lives, including her friends, Letitia, and her teenaged children on the one side, and the 21 year old on the other. Per work suffered; it was inevitable. The 21 year old was part of that new generation of men who like older women, especially good looking ones, which Marvella certainly was, if she did say so herself. Even Letitia called her attractive when she talked to possible blind dates for Marvella and that was something.

She and the 21 year old man, whose name was Kevin Comer, one of many Kelvins the world at the time of his birth was blessed with, began to have an affair. At least that's what Marvella called it. Kevin would pick her up in his 1073 Olds Cutlass, and they would play loud rock n' roll stations on the FM dial of his $350.00 M~-FM/Cassette stereo, and drive to the country.

Riding and drinking beer, throwing the bottles out of the windows into ditches, with Marvella's blonde hair blowing out the window, what a life. Marvella sat silhouetted into the sunset, gazing admiringly at Kevin 's strong wrists on the wheel, and she knew true love. Her children, thank god, spent most of the time with their father, a rich and successful professor, who made three times as much money as Marvella did, from the sale of his basic textbook, even though Marvella had to admit she did all right. Why shouldn't he have the kids, he who could support them in the style to which they were accustomed, she told Letitia. Why not, indeed? Letitia answered, just so long as you don't feel guilty. Marvella refused to feel guilty. She just wouldn't.

Marvella's secretary, Dakota Strider, a Native American from one of the Sioux tribes and the best executive assistant a woman ever had, was getting tired of answering the telephone with calls to Marvella from Kevin. He called her morning, noon, and night, and every hour on the hour, and Dakota could barely understand him, since he seemed always to be panting. Is he a jogger? Is he calling you just after he comes home from his run? Dakota asked. But Marvella kept her counsel and did not tell Dakota about this new man in her life—perhaps she felt ashamed, he was so young. She began to call him My Dear Boy, especially in her moans.

Marvella especially moaned when she and My Dear Boy stopped the car on a woods road far away from home, climbed into the back seat of the 1973 Olds Cutlass, and made love. My Dear Boy was so tall he sometimes had to stick his head out the window while she lay scrunched beneath him, her backbone thumping on the well worn springs beneath the upholstery of the seat. One day he couldn't wait to have her, and wheeled into a small roadside park named after a former governor of the state.

As they bucked and writhed the car rocked and the windows steamed, Marvella moaned and My Dear Boy got so hot he opened the window to stick his head out, and who should be there but a state policeman. Marvella stared up at his Smoky the Bear hat, and she winked. He leered and looked straight down into her moist mouth, onto her startled but satisfied face, and said, OK kids, this isn't the kind of rest the sign says to take, break it up. Marvella, so delighted to be called a kid that she whooped with laughter, remembered that only recently she had barely been able to muster a titter. She credited My Dear Boy with her liberation.

Soon things began going from fantastic to pretty good, Marvella told Letitia on the phone one evening, for Dear. Soon things began going from fantastic to pretty good, 'Marvella told Letitia on the phone one evening, for My Dear Poy began showing up at Marvella's office, just when she had a meeting or a staffing. Dakota, who was as discreet and capable as any good executive assistant, had trouble keeping him out One day, as he sat in Marvella's office beneath the art show poster framed in glass and silver, right next to the large weeping fig, drinking a coke, he asked her if he could speak seriously to her. She had to say yes, though she would have preferred him not to. She thought fun was fun; but work was work, too, and never the twain should meet. So she sat putting a coat of nailpolish on her beautiful pointed nails, listening to him with a mounting sense of boredom, even dread.

I’'ve got it all figured out, he said earnestly and with a certain amount of fear. I will be finished with college next year, and I will marry you, if you agree to have one more child, because I have always wanted to be a father, and I want you to be the mother of my children. Will you? He got down on his knees.

My Dear Boy, was all Marvella could muster.

When he told Letitia she could barely keep her voice from breaking, as Letitia broke into gale after gale of laughter. The telephone was rocking so much it almost jumped out of "Marvella's hand, and the smoke coming through the wire w's so thick Marvella wondered if it were indeed true that people who hung out with smokers got cancer, also.

He's everything I ever wanted, said Marvella helplessly, wondering why she even bothered to tell Letitia her triumphs, and submit herself to such disdain. He's young, strong, gets all A's in school, with a good future in front of him as a gym teacher. He’s a sixteen letter man and will be president of the Jaycees with all the connections he's got from the state university boosters. Why, he can pick me up and carry re over the threshold, he is so strong, and he can bring me breakfast in bed, he so adores me, and I can decorate the house any way I want because he lets me have my way in areas where I know best, and when he hugs me my knees get week, and when he makes love to me, why . . . And her voice trailed off to nothing at the sudden rise of memory in her aching center.