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throwing Lila a bone; of course she knew Lila had always secretly lusted after Oscar and also secretly judged Teddy for being what Lila perceived as rough on him. But neither of them wanted the slightest crack of a schism between them or could afford one; even though they both had children and grandchildren and other friends, in a nearby daily sense, as someone to count on, Lila was Teddy’s mainstay, and vice versa.
    â€œOf course,” said Lila, seeing right through her ploy and accepting it as the small peace offering it was. “Anyway, who’s this new one?”
    â€œHis name’s Ralph Washington,” said Teddy. “Sounded wet-lipped on the phone.”
    â€œWhat did you think of the first one, besides the fact that he was earnest?”
    â€œHenry Burke? In the end, I liked him. He was insulted at first that I’d made him a tan-colored mush; then he took a couple of bites.” She paused a moment to remember something, smiled inwardly, and added dryly, “I think he fell a little in love with me, actually.”
    â€œReally?” said Lila. “How old is he?”
    â€œI would say forty, maybe a little older.”
    â€œA boy,” said Lila.
    Teddy said with a gleam in her eyes, “I bet I could have seduced him.”
    â€œHow would you know? I’m not sure I would be able to tell such a thing at my age.”
    â€œHe was…ripe for the taking, in a general sense, and he was surprised by his attraction to me, which is always an advantage in seduction. When a man is tipped off balance, there’s nothing easier than knocking him over.” Teddy flicked the air with her index finger.
    â€œDid you
want
to?”
    â€œOnly to prove I could. And at my age, that’s not enough of a reason.”
    â€œAt your age, I’d say that’s a great reason.”
    â€œSo I could tell you all about it over breakfast today?”
    â€œOf course,” said Lila.
    â€œI bet you can’t wait to get these biographers to yourself.”
    â€œOh, come on, Teddy.”
    â€œActually, Henry didn’t care for my lack of proper humble womanly devotion to Oscar any more than you ever did; it almost scotched the whole deal. But once we got off the topic of Oscar and onto the topic of his sex life, he was all mine, although he may not have realized it.”
    â€œHis
sex
life?” Lila sputtered with laughter. “What did he say?”
    â€œThat he’s married to a forty-two-year-old woman in love with her newborn baby boy. I bet they tried and tried and tried, and Henry mistook this bonanza of sex for lust for him, and once she got what she wanted, wham-o, no more blow jobs to get him hard and afternoon quickies and hot couplings at the kitchen sink. He’s shunted aside, useless, the cast-off male….” She stopped, went off into some private reverie again. “I know, let’s make a bet. Let’s see who can fuck a biographer first.”
    Lila waved her away. “What are you going to cook for this second one?”
    Teddy cocked her eye at Lila. “No bet?”
    â€œNo, no, I’ll just live vicariously through you,” said Lila, trying for light teasing, but dismayed by the edge in her voice.
    â€œYou’re right,” said Teddy, not missing a beat. “The whole idea is ridiculous.”
    â€œBesides,” said Lila after a silent deep breath, “it doesn’t seem right, an old woman with a much younger man. Remember that movie
Harold and Maude
? That wrinkled crone with a teenage boy. I never understood why so many people loved it.”
    â€œMe, neither.” Teddy laughed. “But I wouldn’t mind seeing my old carcass in bed with a nubile forty-year-old body…. For him, no doubt, it would be terrifying and distasteful, but for me it would be glorious. All the men our age are so…old, aren’t they? They have ear hair, their teats droop, and they look cadaverous.