Oftentimes, when I fight with my girlfriend over the telephone, I end the conversation saying, "I don't want to continue this discussion." And then I hang up before she can respond. She pushes me. She doesn't let up and she pushes me button by button until I get to the brink where I am both wired and forced to hang up, or lose my composure and scream back and say things that I probably will be sorry for. I don't want to hang up, I'd rather discuss rationally whatever the subject matter is, so I try to think only of her beauty—her long blond hair, her slender almost boyish figure—but her outbreaks of illogic and hostility eventually transcend these thoughts and I am forced to hang up.

She does this to me so often, and always at night, that I have learned how to deal with being wired at bedtime. To come down from this angst and be able to sleep I have developed a method of coping. I first do ten minutes of deep-breathing relaxation exercises, followed by walking two fourteen-minute miles on my treadmill, and then another ten or fifteen minutes more of relaxation breathing while listening to “The Genius of Coleman Hawkins” featuring Oscar Peterson on the piano, Herb Ellis playing the guitar, Ray Brown on bass, Alvin Stoller on drums and Coleman on the tenor saxophone. Directly after this session I drink a half snifter of Grand Marnier, take two Halcions and finally go to bed relaxed. Very relaxed. Sometimes Gwen, my sexy and blue-eyed girlfriend, feeling guilty for the torment she has put me through, drives from her home, some twenty minutes away, enters the never-locked house, undresses in the hallway outside my bedroom door and then quietly enters my room where she proceeds to peel back my comforter.

She then turns my bedside lamp on dim and reads aloud steamy passages from trashy books while she plays with me until I get hard. Even in the low light I can see her small breasts. She knows how to sit for the greatest effect. Then she will masturbate me or drop the book and do us both at the same time while making up her own steamy passages. When she's finished, she will go to the bathroom and bring back a warm towel and wash me off — kiss and lick me a few times, then cover me up and go back home. This is the only way Gwen knows how to apologize.

The first part of what I've just said is true and I wish like hell it were not. I am tired of the fighting with Gwen. Very tired. The second part is totally a figment of my imagination. It is the way I wish things really were between us. But they are not. Sometimes we don't speak for days after these phone arguments, and neither one of us wants to be the one to call the other and give in, but eventually I usually do. Sometimes, on the rarest of occasions, Gwen will be the one to call, usually on a pretense of something else, and on those occasions her voice will sound like tonal frostbite. I can't deal with that, so that's why it's me that calls. There is yet another complicating factor here. This complicating factor is known as the B MOVIE FACTOR. This complicating B MOVIE FACTOR'S name is Angie. Angie is my closest friend and confidante, but not my lover. We have been in each other's lives for many years.

In every B movie ever made there was the Hero who was always off chasing after some beautiful but worthless skirt. And then there was “the other woman”—faithful secretary, good friend, or co-worker, with the girl next door look about her. You may remember her as the one day-dreaming of a white picket fence, wearing frilly aprons — hot dinners on the table and back rubs—not headaches, after a hard day at the office. Every person in the theater would be thinking the same thing. “You big lug, look, she's right in front of you. Go to her. She's right there."

But the big lug never looked past the fast skirt until the last reel, when it hit him like a ton of bricks. "What a fool I've been. Can you ever forgive me?" he asks frilly apron.

"Of course, you big lug," she says as she stands on her tip toes, wrapping her arms around his neck, and kissing him while bending one knee and dangling her shoe.

At the end of the movie, the orchestra strings play, and "THE END" is flashed written on a blackboard. The big lug erases it, and his little honeysweet picks up a piece of chalk and writes, "THE BEGINNING.” Then they look towards the camera, press cheeks, and the movie is over. Everyone gets up and walks out of the theater with a good feeling. Everyone except for the real-life B MOVIE FACTORS who have been sitting watching the movie alone or with a girlfriend because their big lug is still out chasing the fancy skirt.

Gwen and I had another one of our battle royals tonight and I, once again, hung up on her and went through my usual routine but with no success this time. Finally, about midnight I called Angie. I woke her and told her that all I needed was to hear a friendly voice, and that now that I heard one I felt better and she should go back to sleep.

True to form she asked if she could help — she didn't ask what was wrong. That was the attitude I needed that was missing from my life.

“Would you like me to come over and tuck you in?" she asked as if reading my script. "Thanks, no." But you'll never know how much your asking means. Good night," I said and hung up.

Well, B Movie Factor showed up in her nightgown and peeled back my comforter. The nightgown couldn't hide her sexy body. Her breasts swung loosely and her dark hair falling past her shoulders excited me. Angie was shorter and chunkier than Gwen and tonight I found her incredibly sexy. She poured some warm, sweet-smelling oil over me that she had just nuked in my kitchen, took off her flimsy, straddled me, and massaged my cares away . . . all the time talking softly and sweetly. Each time I reached for her she gently pushed my hand away. She massaged my temples, shoulders, chest and then gently rolled me over and massaged my back and ass. I rolled over again wanting her, but B Movie Factor was off me and had me covered up before I realized what happened. That's all I remember. I was probably sleeping before she got out of the room. I didn't hear her car leaving.

Sometime later that night, I was awakened again by a movement in my bed and realized that Angie had returned to join me. I was sleeping on my stomach and she got under the cover and snuggled up into me. I felt her breath on my arm and neck. She put her arm around me, nuzzled my neck and then seductively and with light pressure from her manicured nails began tracing patterns at my neck and moved down along my back to my well-oiled ass. The raking motion of her nails stopped and turned into a caressing one. She was nibbling my ear and rubbing my ass, and I had a sinking sensation that as good as it felt there was something wrong. I was right. I felt Angie's hand freeze. She stopped massaging. I turned towards her and saw that it was Gwen in my bed and not my B Movie Factor, Angie.

"Whoops," I thought.

Gwen was staring at her hands. She began wringing them furiously as if she were trying to get off burning massage oil.

Gwen and I reacted the same way.

"AHHH!" We screamed as we pulled away from each other to opposite sides of the bed, each of us yanking at the comforter to cover our nakedness, as if we had never been naked together before.

Neither of us said a word as we stared at the other. Gwen wiped her hands on the comforter. She then flung it away and got out of the bed. She stalked towards the hallway to claim her clothes. I watched her trim figure, blond hair and long shapely legs exit and felt a stirring as she bent down to pick up her clothes and carry them off. I tried calling after her but was unable to. I was gasping for air. I couldn't catch my breath.

I heard Gwen's car drive off, tires screeching down the driveway. I reached into my nightstand drawer and pulled out my brown paper bag . . . and as I was breathing into it, trying to get myself under control, I once again thought of Angie. I finally realized what a big lug I'd been. I decided to call her again.

In my haste I had dialed the wrong number, and a man answered and I quickly hung up and dialed her number again. I dialed slowly and carefully this time so as to get it right, but the same man answered again. "Hello," he said, "hello?" In the background I heard Angie's sleepy voice. "Who is it, honey?"

"AHHH!" I yelled into his ear before hanging up. "AHHH!"