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“Mine?” he asked, surprised “I thought this hat you alanted”

“I did But not like this”

“You shouldn’t have done it, then” He shrugged “You ever hear of ‘free will’?”

“You have to fix this,” Lola said

“Can’t,” he said He opened the bag of cheese doodles and stuffed four into hisfor Mindy Gooch”

“What?” Lola exclaiht you hated her”

“I do But I don’t have to hate herpaid a hundred thousand dollars a year Working in the new- it Those people don’t know squat”

“And what am I supposed to do?” Lola demanded

Thayer looked at her, unmoved “How should I know?” he said “But if you can’t ot you, you’re a bigger loser than I thought”

June arrived, and with it, unseasonably eather The terees for three days; already the Gooches’ apartment was too war air conditioner Sitting beneath it oneanother book, he listened to the sounds of his wife and son packing in Sam’s bedroom next door He checked the time Sa any minute—as soon as they did, he would read Lola’s sex colu of his book tour, exhausted and jet-lagged, he’d claied to get over to Lola’s apartment six times in ten days and, on each visit, had made fantastic love to her One afternoon, she had stood above him while he spread open her labia and licked her firm little clit; on another occasion, she’d fucked hi her bottoer in and out of her puckered asshole In the evenings after these encounters, Mindy would coood mood He would reply that yes, he was, and after all his hard labor, didn’t he have a right to be? Then Mindy would bring up the country house They couldn’t, she conceded, afford a house in the Ha in Litchfield County, which was just as beautiful, and maybe even better than the Hamptons because it was still filled with artists and not yet overrun with finance types In her usual pushy way, Mindy had convinced him to drive up to Litchfield County for the weekend; they’d stayed at the Mayflower Inn to the tune of two thousand dollars for two nights while they looked at houses during the day Mindy was, Ja their choices to houses under one point threewith every one, but in an act of defiance, perhaps, Mindy had signed Sam up for a ton, Connecticut, where Sa in the dorm of a private school

Nohile Mindy was packing Sa if he dared take a quick peek at Lola’s column In her last installment, she had written about the ti her with a vibrator and his own penis Unlike Mindy, Lola had the good sense to change his naas, they could be terry He had even bought her an ena all the wo cash so Mindy couldn’t trace the purchase He looked longingly at his coain, and if so, what she’d said But with Mindy in the apartht hiot up and went into Sam’s room

“Four weeks of tennis,” Jaet bored?”

Mindy was placing packages of white cotton athletic socks into Sa “No, he will not,” she said

“I hate this business of taking on the custo with basketball? It was good enough for me”

Mindy snorted “Your son is not you, Jaured that out by now”