Thomas World by Richard Cox Read Free Book Online Page B

unreasonable, and I’m waiting for her to figure out something is wrong. She grabs me, stroking me…I’m suddenly hung like a horse and Gloria doesn’t say anything.
    Nothing.
    If my wife doesn’t notice any size difference, it must not be there.
    The music in my head is a dark melody. Bass heavy. Loud, driving percussion. I want to pull away from her. I want to get off this couch and walk away, get out of here. If I’m going to lose my mind, I want to do it alone.
    But I promised myself I would trust my senses, which means I must accept my genitalia really is this size, regardless of what I previously believed, and now, on the couch, we—
    You know, this is supposed to be the most fun thing you can do in the world, but right now I’m so nervous and paranoid I can hardly feel anything down there. So I do what any guy would do in this situation—I call up sexy images. Other images. Maybe it’s wrong to do that, to think of someone else, but it’s a lot better than physically cheating on my wife.
    Right?
    So I start thinking about this girl. She sent me a friend request on Facebook a week or two ago. She’s Swedish, twenty-one, a platinum blonde with enormous breasts. Her name is Veronika. I don’t know how she found me, but for several days now she’s been writing me emails asking about the screenwriting process. She’s funny and hot and if you were ever going to have a sexual fantasy about someone, she would be it.
    I imagine running into her somewhere. Maybe I’m on a business trip in Santa Monica, where she attends college. We meet for drinks at a Hollywood bar. Spot a couple of famous actors, grab some dinner, she wonders if I might have a look at a script she’s working on. Do you have it on you? I ask. No , she says. It’s back at my apartment. Would you mind stopping by for a few minutes? Her apartment is small. Starving artist chic. First kiss even before the door closes. Her hands in my hair, my hands on her waist, sliding downwards as we stumble toward the couch. I push her down. Hike up her skirt. She’s not wearing underwear. Her hands on my belt, unfastening, and then I’m on top of her, skin like velvet, tanned legs wrapped around me, I push into her—
    A few minutes later Gloria and I are in each other’s arms, bodies damp, cooling quickly. She tells me she loves me. We lie there a little longer, and it seems like she’s going to say something else. I wait for it, actually hoping she might ask about my newfound size. But the moment passes. Gloria doesn’t say anything. She gently pushes against my chest, which means she wants to get up, and then pads off to the bathroom.
    A little while later we climb into bed, where Gloria pops her nightly Ambien and kisses me on the cheek.
    â€œI love you, Thomas,” she says.
    I smile at her, trying not to scream.
    â€œI love you, too, Junior.”
    Gloria turns on the television. I grab my notepad and try to write a few lines on my new screenplay. It’s about a guy running from the FBI. These two federal agents are convinced he is the mastermind behind a plot to dismantle the country’s electronic infrastructure, and they chase him across the country in an effort to stop it from happening. But the plot isn’t moving as fast as I thought it might, and tonight I can hardly bring myself to look at it. Fifteen minutes later Gloria turns out her lamp, and shortly afterwards I do the same.
    You ever notice how problems become clearer in the dark? How the surreal becomes real?
    â€œBaby?”
    â€œYeah?”
    â€œAre you okay?”
    Questions, too, carry more weight in the dark.
    â€œYeah,” I say. “I’m fine.”
    â€œIt was kind of a weird weekend, wasn’t it?”
    She means the Halloween party and our arguments about Jack, but of course there is so much more than that. So much I haven’t told her. I know you probably think