Free The Widow's Guide to Sex and Dating by Carole Radziwill

snakes have two penises, by the way, one on each side of their body. I’m so jealous.”
    “That must be why cheating men are called snakes. You didn’t ask me about Beatrice.”
    “Shh!” Ethan said. “Rule number one: you never talk about Beatrice! Rule number two: don’t talk about Beatrice!”
    “Oh, come on. She said something about the book. Isn’t that weird? She said I’d write it. I can’t imagine.” Claire made a face.
    She thought about Charlie and his strange passions. He was passionate about many things, but it was comfort, not passion, he felt toward Claire. While Claire wanted to believe that combinations exist, of man and woman or man and man or woman and woman, that can satisfy both sexual desire and love, Charlie refused to entertain such a notion. To him, it was completely absurd.
    “Ethan, do you think love and sex are incompatible?”
    He walked down the hall and sat next to her on the couch. “I think they’re inconveniently tangled up.”
    “Is that the same thing?”
    He popped a pickled bean in his mouth.
    “Are you angry with him?” he asked.
    “Who, Charlie? About what?”
    He waved a hand around in the air. “The other women. All the…” He trailed off.
    She was silent for a few moments. “They’re ugly,” she said finally. “Have you ever seen one? I don’t get the fuss.”
    “Have I seen what?”
    “A Giacometti. They’re bony and protruding.”
    “I saw the photo in the paper.”
    “The surrealists were obsessed with sex. They thought monogamy was bourgeois.” Claire pronounced the French word slowly, dropping the last syllable— boor-zhwah . “They took the penis, in and of itself, much too seriously.”
    “Not possible!” Ethan said, feigning horror.
    Claire smiled. “Anyway, Charlie could screw circles around them—not with me, necessarily, but in general. He was adventurous, let’s say. He lived what he wrote. I knew that when I married him.” She thought about the end of affection—when does it stop and why? She thought about women who grow contempt for their husbands but love their children no matter what. Sisters who dote on brothers, in spite of the same troublesome tics they find insurmountable in lovers—clothes strewn about, carelessness with food, televised sports for hours on end. She thought about the mercurial nature of art, the wasted talent of forgery artists, how they never receive due acclaim. She thought of Sande, Walter White’s lover, who was perhaps living out the last days of her own dwindling fame. She wouldn’t think of Charlie’s pre-mortem screw. The intercom buzzed and startled her. Before Claire could speak, Ethan jumped up to let in the delivery man and paid him in cash—leafy greens, bright-colored fruits, fatty sardines, and, as a concession to Claire, Diet Coke.
    “Food is therapy,” he said. “You need supplies.”
    “I’ve never heard that.”
    “Well, maybe it’s not, but you’re turning into one of those skinny little sculptures yourself. Charlie always had food here. It’s comforting. And listen, no one can know what really goes on inside a marriage, but for what it’s worth, from what I could see, Charlie’s love for you was real. It was as true as he was capable of, and that’s no small thing.”
    “Beatrice said I’m going to have gluttonous men.” As she said this, Claire eyed Ethan suspiciously. All he talked about anymore was food. “Also a man in a black suit plays a role, and there might be someone violent.” She recalled how angry Richard had been on the phone.
    “Honey, that is between you and the divine.”
    “She made it sound like I’m going to sleep around. She mentioned a lot of men.”
    “I’m not listening.”
    “And Sasha in a fuchsia dress.”
    “Don’t say one more word, Clarabelle, I mean it.”
    “But no love.” Ethan covered his ears and started to hum.
    “Okay, I get it.”
    They watched the end of an old movie together, and when Claire fell asleep, Ethan let