Attachment Read Online Free Page A

Munyeroo—bashfully, in fact—as a name for the stray cat who’d come along but abandoned them as soon as Mark returned. Clearly it hadn’t appreciated being named after his crude mistress. Jean knew now just what she was going to do. She was going down to the Internet café to open e-mail 69.
    Back in the waiting room, the stately woman in her turban was still sitting patiently. What would she be thinking as she watched a dazed Jean walk past, making for the door? How did people with such raw-looking skin get the idea that they could rule the world? What made you believe you were entitled to happiness? As Jean stepped outside, her idle hand feeling the top of her own head, she couldn’t help imagining that the lady’s crown of fabric wasn’t for cushioning freight, and not for fashion either. Maybe it was an elaborate bandage that covered a gaping hole.
    Jean was practically quivering with adrenaline as she drove to the Internet café, her diesel engine roaring. And then she instinctively pulled over: for the willed caution of delay, the gym. Under the glinting gilt cupola at the top of Le Royaume, the only smart hotel not on the coast, Jean, changed into old canvas tennis shoes and faded sweats, took her place alongsidetwo unimprovably trim and toned women on a row of step machines. Most people came here to develop their bodies. What she wanted to develop was an attitude. Did she dare find out any more about this Thing 2? Could she—or they—survive an affair? And if not, was she remotely prepared to paddle off in her own canoe? Had Mark already done just that? Maybe the whole business of choice had already been settled. He was the one who had acted, and decisively.
    She started to climb. Soon she was hanging on, hunchbacked, as if riding a motorcycle into strong wind, sinking as she gripped the bars, putting as much weight as possible on her arms. The women beside her, both wearing bright Lycra outfits, didn’t seem to notice they were exerting themselves at all; they chatted effortlessly, their rounded backsides pushed up and out like the rumps of show ponies. Watching the ceiling-mounted television hurt Jean’s neck. Head down, she was forced to eavesdrop—which was, she couldn’t help thinking, exactly what she planned to do at the Internet café.
    “Well, every time we meet, he say me ‘You have a beautiful ass, I love di tex ture’ ”—Jean heard “ taste tour”—“always di ass you know. Latinos day love di ass. And den, one day, no more texture. Now he say me, ‘I can teach you song good essersizes for you ass.’ Das how I starting in di tango feet.”
    “Tango feet?” The other climber whipped around, frowning with interest.
    “Yes, tango wit di beat, you know, tango for di feetness.”
    “Oh, tango fit. Cool. Can I have a listen?”
    The other one was Australian, Jean guessed, mesmerized by the sight of the woman’s bouncing chest, as extravagantly upholstered as Tangofeet’s, only Jean thought hers might be real.
    “Chore.” The Argentine, if that’s what she was, passed the earphones to her friend.
    What, Jean wondered, did Thing 2 look like? What sort of “texture” was she? That was an advanced sort of concern, wasn’t it? Jean would settle for shape. She thought of her boyish straight line from pits to hips and moved away to try an arm machine. Settling her bottom on the seat pad, she imagined a man’s body being lowered onto hers, his sneakered feet in the air: 69, the yin-yang of sex positions. A pose for show-offs, Jean thought: fundamentally unserious. You could hardly meditate on your own pleasure doing that. Anyway, Mark was too tall to be the 9 to any woman’s 6—unless Thing 2 was an Amazon. Or would that be Jean, she thought mirthlessly, remembering how the Amazons’ breasts were lopped off to facilitate the use of a bow. Jean never wanted to pick up her mammogram results, let alone a weapon. But the thought of those warrior women emboldened her: she would at