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Sally. The bed was empty. It upset me badly. I had expected her to be there and was all ready to crawl right in bed with her and make love before getting back to work on my second novel. Now that the first one had sold I really had to go ahead and finish the second. At the moment it was only forty-five pages long.
    But Sally was gone and there was no note. Her thingswere still there, though. At least she hadn’t left me. I went outside and tried to decide where to look for her. I had an awful feeling in my stomach. Of course she could just have gone for a walk. Sometimes she took walks at funny times.
    Then I noticed Jenny Salomea. She was sitting in her yard with her back against the big tree. She had on a red bathrobe and was hugging her knees with her arms.
    “Good morning,” I said, walking over.
    “Your wife left with a gentleman,” she said. “I told you last night you were boring her.”
    She looked at me a little too triumphantly. I felt as un-triumphant as I have ever felt. I also felt a little weak in the legs, so I sat down near Jenny in the dewy grass.
    “I guess you do love her,” she said. “What made you think she loved you?”
    “I don’t know,” I said. “I guess she was grateful to me for about a week, for taking her away from a guy in Austin.”
    “You should have just screwed around awhile,” Jenny said. “You didn’t have to marry her just because she acted fond of you for a couple of days. But that’s you, right?”
    “I don’t know what’s me,” I said.
    Jenny yawned. “I read that book you loaned me,” she said. “All that sounds like fun to me.”
    I had gone from feeling horny to feeling very unhorny. Jenny was so sure Sally didn’t love me that I was convinced. I was not really in the habit of having somebody love me, but believing that Sally did had felt wonderful for about three weeks. Realizing that she didn’t took a lot of the fun out of life. She was probably off screwing Rick Leonard, at that very moment. I didn’t dare ask what the gentleman looked like. The real complication was that I loved her. I had given myself over and had no mechanism for taking myself back. Despite her problems—I guess they were problems—shewasn’t very hard to love. Jenny Salomea held my hand for a while. She could tell I was in no mood for sexual novelties.
    “Don’t look so blue,” she said. “Maybe he was her brother. Anyway, you sold your book. You’ll probably be famous.”
    I shook my head. “That won’t make her love me,” I said.
    Jenny looked disgusted. “You better learn to call a bitch a bitch,” she said. “Otherwise you’re going to lead a dog’s life, like Sammy has.”
    “I don’t want to call anyone a bitch,” I said.
    Jenny was getting angry. She stood up and tugged at my hand. “Okay, Danny,” she said. “That’s enough of that. Don’t sit there looking like an only child. Come on upstairs and let’s do something. I can’t stand a man who gets depressed over nothing.”
    “It’s not nothing,” I said. “It’s my marriage.”
    “Your marriage is nothing, okay,” she said. “It’s not worth an ounce of pigshit. I can tell what kind of girl she is, even if you can’t. You married a bitch and she doesn’t love you and she won’t stay put. So what? I married a queer. He hates the way I smell, even. Tough luck for both of us. It happens to a million people a day. I’m not going to sit in the yard and mope about it all day. Come on upstairs and help me have a little fun. I need a little fun. I never have—much fun.”
    She saw I wasn’t coming, and turned and went to her house. The seat of her red bathrobe was wet, from the dewy grass. What she had said made plenty of sense. There was no point in avoiding anything. I got my bike and pedaled over to Rick Leonard’s apartment, about six blocks away. I don’t know what I expected to do, except not avoid anything, but it didn’t matter. Sally wasn’t there. Rick was playing chess when I