Brad gave a yelp of joy, settled the handset onto the desk, and ambled at a more leisurely pace until he was behind it. He then noticed he was not alone.

Liz, for some reason devoid of Ethan, was sitting in one of the stained, cheap, plastic chairs which ostensibly served as a place for visitors to wait. (In reality, most visitors simply stormed to whichever office they wished to visit. If you were lucky, they might duck their head in and inform you of their presence.)

“Uh, hi, Liz,” Brad managed. “What’s, like, up?”

“We need to talk,” Liz said.

It was the conversational equivalent of having a piano drop on your head while strolling on a sidewalk. The air leaked out, and Brad sat slumped in his chair, waiting for the rest to unfold.

“I am concerned.”

“You’re, ah, what?” Brad asked.

“Concerned. About us. And things. We aren’t really dating.”

“Well, I guess not, but I kinda thought maybe we would be, I mean, now,” Brad said.

“If you’d asked me out on a date, I might have said yes,” Liz said. “I thought you were nice, even if you had so many flaws. Like the drugs. And that way you like to be so sarcastic. When you asked to come over, you seemed so desperate, I thought I should say yes. But I didn’t – wait a minute.”

She got up and closed the door to the reception area. Brad had never seen that done before. In fact, he was almost positive it was strictly forbidden. This was a place of openness. Never of secrets. Still, that seemed the least of his worries.

“Anyway, I let you come over because you seemed scared. Or upset. Or something. I never thought you just wanted to come over to take advantage of me. I should have known. You’re a boy. That’s what boys do.”

“But, like, that wasn’t what I did,” Brad said. “I mean, sure, it was what we did did, but it wasn’t why I came over. Or what I meant to do. It’s just what we did. What we ended up doing. And, it, um, seemed mutual. Y’know.”

“I didn’t say you forced yourself on me,” Liz said. “I said you took advantage of me. That’s not the same as rape. If you’d forced yourself on me, I’d call the police. Not sit here all alone with you and talk to you again.”

For whatever perverse reason, naked Liz was back in his mind’s eye. She cavorted even more lewdly than she had earlier in the week, back when he didn’t have firsthand carnal knowledge of her body.

That firsthand experience lent an uncomfortable degree of reality to imagination. Why now? Was his mind really so far gone from his own control?

“Thanks, I guess?” Brad said. “But I really wasn’t trying to take advantage of you. I just like you, you know? I have for a while. You’re hot, and we get along.”

He was stretching things a bit. He’d found her strangely sexually compelling, but that wasn’t really the same as “hot,” and he wasn’t sure if he would’ve described them as “getting along,” either. Not before sleeping together, anyway.

Come to think of it, just how should he play this thing? Maybe it was a gift from God – a sort of “Get Out of Liz Free” card, dealt by the fates.

Numerous warring factions were arguing for his mental attention, and there was nothing close to a consensus on the right way to go. He’d just have to blunder mindlessly along.

“So you think we should ‘be together’ be together? I’m not just some conquest you’ll brag about to your friends? You’ll do the honorable thing now?”

Honorable thing? Just what the heck was she talking about? Marriage? Moving in together? Blood pact? Cutting off his ear and mailing it to her in a box? Whatever she meant by honorable, he was pretty sure it did not mean asking what honor entailed.

It was like the prices at a Rolls Royce dealership: If you had to ask, you probably couldn’t afford it. Though they do come with an umbrella in the door. Which didn’t have much to do with Liz, aside from the fact that she was built a bit like an umbrella.

Task at hand.

“I, um, think I’m a pretty decent guy,” Brad said. It seemed the safest way to suggest that this whole honor thing might be up his alley, without committing to, say, being baptized into the Church of the Armageddon Apostolates. Brad was leery of baptism. And apostles.

“You can think whatever you want,” Liz said. “But I don’t think you’re ready. I think you’re just scrambling to talk your way out of being in trouble. And I don’t think that being with me should be trouble. Or that I want to be with a man who feels that way. About me. Or us.”

“You, like, don’t?” Brad was now lost. Was she dumping him? Had she just proposed marriage? Or maybe forced him to propose marriage? And then rejected the very same marriage proposal she’d just forced him to make? Odd.

“You’re … I think you’re great,” Brad continued. “You’re kinda surprising me here, is all. I don’t always think things through really far. But I like you. I thought you liked me, too. Sorta figured that’s all we had to figure out, for now. Didn’t know there was, like, some kinda pop quiz involved. Or that we should be hiring some kinda wedding broker. Like an arranged marriage, only no parental involvement.”

“Are you making fun of me?” Liz asked. “Is this all funny to you? You’ve had your way with me, and now you can laugh at me?”

“Hey, no, you’re totally discombobulating me here,” Brad said. “I don’t think this is funny. I think it’s absurd. They’re related, but different. Funny is when something happens to someone else. Absurd is when it happens to you. This is definitely not funny.”

Brad began to fidget with the mouse, opening up solitaire as if digital card-playing could somehow provide guidance or insight with his current predicament.

“You’re not even going to pay attention to me?”

“I’m flustered, man, I’m flustered!” Brad said. “This is, I don’t even know where this is coming from, okay?

“I was on cloud nine, right? Everything was groovy. Then you come in here like some sorta avenging angel, and you kick me off my cloud. Like you’re some sort of slumlord in heaven, and I’m late with the rent. So now I go from jamming on a lyre, maybe munching on some grapes, to plummeting in a free fall, screaming something totally inappropriate for my former digs.

“Whole time, you’re standing over me, up on that cloud, hollering down that I’m not taking it all seriously enough. Dude, I’m taking this way seriously. I can’t take it much more seriously. Feels like my head is going to melt.

“I thought you liked me too? How’d I get so far off base? So wrong about where we were?”

“We had sex. That is a very serious thing,” Liz said.

Brad found her choice of words unfortunate: Just hearing her use the word “sex” caused his naked imagination-Liz to begin doing her bump-and-grind routine in his head all over again.

“It doesn’t mean that I’ve just become some doormat you can have a meaningless carnal tryst with.”

“Dude, I never said that! I thought it meant we were, like, boyfriend-girlfriend! That isn’t meaningless. That isn’t some tryst. It’s serious. And it’s fun. And it’s good for us.

“That’s how it should go. You like someone. You fall in love. You date. You have sex. You get to know each other.

“If all goes well, you decide to stick it out for the long haul. You get married. You have kids. A house with a garage. A modest IRA account.

“But you don’t jump straight from the sex to the wedded bliss, man. You can’t do that. You gotta feel things out. Figure out if it’s right. I mean, seriously, we don’t know that yet.”

“All the times we’ve talked here at the office, none of that allowed us to get to know each other in any way?” Liz asked. “That was just a way to kill time and end days for you?”

“Sure, there was, like, some knowledge exchanged,” Brad said. “But there’s a big difference between the chitchat you have with a coworker, and someone who you’ve gotten sweaty-sticky with. You don’t usually need a shower after you’ve shot the breeze at the office. Kind of different animals, those.”

“I’m not going to let you derail our serious conversation with your lewd remarks,” Liz said. “This is too important.”

“Yeah, we’re a regular Potsdam here,” Brad said. “You wanna be Stalin? I’ve got dibs on Truman. Although maybe Churchill’d be more appropriate. He and I sorta share similar body types, even if he was a little older. So, yeah, guess I’m Churchill. Heck, maybe you should be Truman.”

“I’m a girl, stupid,” Liz said. “I’ll be Lady Marmoset.”

“Uhh…?”

“She was a countess in one of my past lives,” Liz explained. “So if we’re going to be famous, powerful people, I’ll be Lady Marmoset.”

Brad blinked, then quietly pulled open a Web browser window so he could double-check with Wikipedia. He’d thought a marmoset was a sort of marsupial, but no – it was a type of monkey. Either way, not very dignified for a dignitary.

“You, like, remembered her name? Or did you just make one up to fit her?”

“I remembered it, obviously,” Liz said. “I think maybe it’s Gallic. Or German, or something.”

“Well, yeah, why not?”

“You’re making fun again.”

“Nuh-uh. I wouldn’t dare,” Brad said, which was true. If he allowed this to get funny, he was liable to double up in laughter, which’d put him into serious trouble, if past experience was any indicator. “So, she, uh … lived in a keep? Or a manor house, or what?”

“She ruled over an entire castle,” Liz said. “Held lots of dances. And made sure the peasants were happy. She was a very generous ruler. And an excellent seamstress. She made all her own dresses.”

“Married to Lord Marmoset, I take it?”

“I don’t remember being married when I remember that life,” Liz said. “So I guess she was divorced. Or maybe she didn’t like him, so she cut off his ears while he was asleep and he bled to death.

“I’m sure she could’ve just said he was possessed by the devil when she did it; people did that kind of thing all the time back then. So she would’ve gotten away with it. She was very clever. You should’ve seen some of the dresses she made. They were beautiful.”

“Probably had calluses on her fingers then,” Brad said.

Liz frowned, wrinkling her whole face. “Of course she didn’t. She was a lady. Her skin was milky and soft. She probably never had a blemish in her whole life.”

Brad couldn’t help wondering if Liz had watched Moulin Rouge, heard the song, and then somehow, in her twisted Liz brain, gotten Lady Marmoset from Lady Marmalade. Probably throw in one of those dull, informative videos from high school, and you had a pretty workable theory. Still, there was the matter at hand.

“Sure she had ’em. She was a seamstress. All those needles, pricking her dainty, aristocratic fingers. She pretty much had to build up calluses on her fingers.”

“You’re just hateful,” Liz said.

“Dude, I wasn’t being hateful. I was just exploring the implications of her life. If I wanted to be hateful, I’d delve into personal hygiene back then. And I don’t just mean bathing.”

“She was NOT dirty!”

“Seriously, relax,” Brad said. “She’s dead. No reason to worry about it. We can, like, just celebrate her good side, if you want. Like all those grand balls and fancy dresses. And how she didn’t douse herself in perfume to cover up the stench of unwashed humanity, nor did she muddle through during her monthly visitor without the advantage of modern tampons or pads. No way.

“She was a delicate, dainty, callus-free flower who probably smelled like Ivory soap with just a hint of lilac or rosewater, I’m sure. I’d totally love to share an elevator or subway ride with her, especially if the thing got stuck for a few hours with the ventilation fan off.”

“You’re just jealous because you don’t remember any of your past lives,” Liz said. “Which means they were probably ugly, boring lives not worth remembering in the first place. Otherwise, why forget?”

“Oh, I can think of lots of reasons,” Brad said. “Maybe I just goofed off too much in infancy, didn’t work hard enough at remembering. Or perhaps I was a stoner in a lot of my past lives, and didn’t even remember them while they were taking place.

“Or I might’ve died badly. A good, slow, agonizing death probably burns clear most of the memories of more pleasant times. Be kinda like holding an electromagnet next to a hard disk, only more fiery sensations of pain, right?

“I’m sure, if I remembered that kinda death now, I’d just mistake it for birth agony, or whatever the heck you call memories of birth. I know there’s some clever term for it, just have no idea what the term is.”

“You’re just making excuses,” Liz said. “Really, you’re afraid you had lame lives. It’s okay if you did. Most lives aren’t worth remembering. It’s not your fault if you’re average. That’s why they call it average. Because it’s what so many people are.”

“I’m not entirely convinced that’s why they use the word ‘average,’ but I guess you’ve got the gist at least. For all I know, maybe I do have past lives. It isn’t like I’ve gone looking for them.

“Whole concept creeps me out just a little. It implies that maybe there’s life after death, but you’ve got to be fortunate enough to remember this one. Otherwise, you may as well be plain old dead, y’know?”

“I think it’s wonderful to have past lives,” Liz said. “There’s no reason to be afraid of them. They can’t hurt you. They’re all dead.

“Plus, they’re you. So if you deliberately don’t remember them, it’s sort of like you’re killing yourselves. Which is very mean.”

“Well, um, dunno that I have a rebuttal for that one,” Brad said. “Guess if you accept your, like, postulates, you’ve got a valid conclusion. Weird postulates, though.

“Not to be confused with weird prostitutes. For those, you’ve got to go out on North, by the cemetery. Not that I know firsthand. I mean, I’ve driven past. That’s all. Hookers sort of scare me.”

“Maybe they’re what you need,” Liz said. “So you could have your sex without having to commit to anything. Without it having to mean anything. And so you could catch some nasty disease to teach you how bad you are for being so shallow. Something to make your penis turn a funny color and fall off, with lots of puss and sores.”

“Dude, seriously! Where does this stuff come from? Way, way overkill. I mean, I haven’t even said I didn’t want a commitment. In fact, you were the one that rejected me when I asked, I think. Whole thing was a bit hazy. But it’s not like I turned you down. It was totally the other way around.”

“I didn’t turn you down, I just decided that you weren’t really going to ask me. You were just humoring me. Because you thought I’d backed you into a corner, when all I’d done is tried to find out if you had honorable intentions when you took advantage of me.”

“Again, look, I didn’t take advantage. Things just happened. And I am an honorable guy. I like you. I don’t know if that means we should run off to Vegas and get hitched, but it sure means I’ve committed myself to you, okay?

“How is that not good enough? How much do you want, anyway? Do I have to go try to find a jewelry store that’ll let me buy on credit, pop the question on bended knee?”

“You’re making fun again. It’s a stupid defense mechanism.”

“I dunno that it’s really a defense mechanism,” Brad said. “It’s kinda how I start figuring things out when it’s crisis time, which isn’t really a defense mechanism. More a survival technique.

“Defense implies I do it to push people away. I don’t. I just find humor a good thinking tool when things get tricky. It’s, like, mentally flexible.”

“So is rubber. But you shouldn’t have a head full of rubber. That’s an insult,” Liz said. “Maybe if your brain is too flexible, good ideas bounce off of it. Just like the nursery rhyme.”

Brad couldn’t really refute her. Some arguments, by their very absurdity, couldn’t be debated. Still, he could object on the basis of a technicality.

“I’m not sure that’s a nursery rhyme,” Brad said.

“Is so,” Liz said. “I’m rubber, and you’re glue. Whatever you say bounces off of me and sticks to you. It rhymes. Glue and you. And it’s for kids. So it’s a nursery rhyme.”

“Doesn’t exactly have the same street cred as your average Ring Around the Rosie,” Brad said. “And I don’t know that you’re gonna find it in a lot of, like, Treasury of Inanity for Children, y’know?”

“It’s part of the oral tradition,” Liz said. “It doesn’t need to be in a book.”

“Some traditions are better than others,” Brad said. “So I won’t argue the point.”

“Arguing is nearly all you do,” Liz said.

“Nah, I don’t argue,” Brad said. “I disagree. To argue, you have to get all, like, pissed off and stuff. Yell, maybe. Make disparaging remarks about the person you’re arguing with. Bring up their hygiene, or breeding, or both.”

“You’re insulting all the time. And you try to be funny. Those traits are combative. Being combative is just like arguing.”

“So, you’re saying I have a sort of argumentative nature?”

“I guess so,” Liz said. “Or maybe you’re just an ass.”

“Maybe,” Brad said. “I’ve got enough other flaws. No reason I couldn’t put that on the list, too. If I’m so bad, why’d you even get mixed up with me in the first place?”

“You’re nice sometimes,” Liz said. “And you’re funny. Even if it’s a mean funny.”

“Now, see, that criticism hurts,” Brad said. “I try to always use my funny for good, not evil.”

“So try harder.”

“Turn away from the Dark Side, eh, Yoda?” Brad said. “I mean, really, I do try. Humor is a tool for, like, improvement. It makes people happier. It criticizes, but in a good way. I really take its, like, societal role seriously. So I kinda disagree with you on the whole mean-funny thing.”

“Fine. Maybe you just seem mean.”

“I think that’s the same as being mean,” Brad said. “What’s the point of being a great guy if everyone thinks you’re a jerk? That’d be sorta like being a really great driver who just happens to get into accidents all the time. If I seem mean, then odds are, I am. I just didn’t think I was, is all. Kinda depressing, actually.”

“You’re weird,” Liz said.

“Yep.”

“Maybe you’re not that mean,” Liz said. “Maybe you’re just negative. I don’t like it when people are so pessimistic. I guess that could seem mean to me.”