Odalise, her eyes closed, called me Brad, meaning Brad Pitt. Since Brad Pitt has long dirty blond hair and is layered with all kinds of muscle, and since I’m on the flabby side, pear shaped with black hair, always neatly combed, even during sex, I knew she wasn’t trying to say I’m her Brad Pitt. I seized up immediately and got off her. I didn’t like being on top anyway. She had one of those sunbeam lightbulbs overhead that felt as though it were burning the hair off my head. “Why did you stop?” she asked.
“You were imagining that Brad Pitt was on top of you.”
She pulled the covers over her chest and sat up. “Last week, during sex, you called me Eliza, your first wife’s name, and the week before that, with your eyes closed, in the middle of your orgasm, you shouted Queen Bey! and then on another evening, you whispered, Sing for me, Tay Tay. I could go on.”
“Enough,” I said, lying on my back in the memory foam. Who was I to her, and who was she to me? Were we only the vehicles of each other’s fantasies? What would happen if I imagined making love to Odalise while making love to Odalise? Not sure I really wanted to know. I touched her body, and she touched my face. I whispered in her ear, “Khaleesi,” wrenching her to me. As she rose, she pretended to shake free a shower of silver-blond hair. Her voice grew louder, more forceful, issuing commands in her native language, “Dracarys”—her dragons flying, breathing fire.
Bio: Jeff Friedman
