Free A Nearly Perfect Copy by Allison Amend Page B

difference in the touch itself, the pheromones that the other person gave off? Or was the excitement all in the mind—did the brain send signals to the arm hairs to tingle, the webs of the fingers to itch, the toes to curl?
    They turned down a street he didn’t know. She unlocked the front door, and without a word, without turning on the stairway light, she walked in front of him up the stairs.
    Her apartment was an efficiency, tidy and compact. On her walls she had framed vintage Tinsley’s catalog covers. There was a red velvet love seat and a bed. He sat on the love seat.
    Colette turned on the electric kettle. Then she sat down next to him and turned her face to his. When her lips met his, Gabriel let her take the lead, keeping his hands on her hips.
    The kettle clicked off and Colette pulled away. She spoke for the first time in minutes. “How do you take it?”
    “With sugar.”
    As she was making the coffee, her phone rang. She answered it andbegan to chat, using so much slang and speaking so quickly that Gabriel had trouble understanding what she was saying. She was talking to a good friend, that much he knew, because she called the person
pote
, an old-fashioned word that meant “mate” or “buddy.”
    Still talking, she set a tray with coffee and biscotti down on the love seat and then went into the bathroom, closing the door behind her. Gabriel sipped at the coffee. Her voice went quiet. What was she talking about in there? Hadn’t they come back to her place to screw? Gabriel felt suddenly confused by the evening. Had he completely misinterpreted her signals? He decided to wait until she came back, and then say a quick good-bye.
    He’d finished his coffee by the time she emerged from the bathroom, wearing a black boned corset and high-cut lace panties. Gabriel was surprised at her aggression. Pleasantly surprised, and immediately aroused. He stood up and she steered them toward the bed, undressing him quickly, biting his nipples. Her silence was exciting. Once he was inside her he looked down and smoothed her hair back from her head. The intensity of his feeling surprised him. She didn’t even blink, not for hours, it seemed like, and then he closed his eyes. Because he was embarrassed. Because that’s what you were supposed to do when fucking. Because he was afraid.
    The next day, after Gabriel had gone to work and put in a couple of hours at the studio, he stopped by Colette’s. She was home, and dressed in a business suit that Gabriel thought made her look like a sexily stern airline attendant from the 1950s.
    “Oh!” she said when she answered the door.
    “I don’t like the telephone,” Gabriel said. “Is it okay?”
    “Come in,” Colette said. “Sorry it’s such a mess in here.”
    Gabriel thought the words must have been a reflex because they’d both left together that morning. He realized he was still wearing the same clothes. He also realized he should have let a couple of days go by before he contacted Colette again. She made him unnaturally and uncharacteristically nervous. She was so obviously out of his league, intellectually, socially, aesthetically, that he wanted to make sure she had no time to think it over.
    “You probably think I’m a strange person to appear on your doorstep.” He leaned in to kiss her and she accepted the kiss on the lips. “Ipromise I’m not a …” He wasn’t sure of the word and let the sentence trail off.
    “I’m not worried,” Colette said. “Let’s go out to dinner.”
    Gabriel had to stop at an ATM in order to pay for the evening. In two nights, he spent as much on restaurants as he usually did the entire month for food. Dating was an expensive habit.
    A week later, Gabriel, hoping to stem the hemorrhage of money that Colette’s young professional lifestyle was costing him, packed a picnic and took her to the studio. She held his hand on the
métro
.
    In his dark space she examined the paintings by peering at them closely, commenting