We are lying in bed. He squirms up close to me, running anxious fingers up my inner thigh. “Do you want to maybe have sex?” he says.

“I’m on my period.” I can’t hear anything but the hiss of air being forced out of his nostrils. He rolls away, pulling at the blanket and hunching his back at me. I stay quiet for a moment, chewing on my lower lip.

“We can still cuddle,” I say, and I move my body up against his back, forcing my tiny arms and legs to stretch to over his side. After a few seconds his body uncrunches, and he rolls over, covering my face with kisses. He rubs himself up against my body, and I am not sure if he is trying to let me know how frustrated he is or if he is just trying to masturbate on my leg. His face is blocking off my air; I push him flat on the bed and rest my head on his shoulder. When I wake up in the morning my neck hurts.

I am reading a book, sitting on the couch with my feet tucked up underneath me. He’s watching TV, some sitcom. When he hears a line that’s funny he repeats it loudly and slowly, as if he’s trying to explain to a partially deaf person. I turn a page; it’s hard not to look up at the globs of color moving around on the screen. I look up, and he is staring back at me with a smile. When the commercials come on he gets out of his chair and runs over to the couch. When he leans over to kiss me he knocks my glasses off with his, and when he takes both our glasses off he pokes his nose into my eye. I tilt his head with my hands and give him one hard, quick kiss on the mouth. Then I push him away and turn back to my book.

“I lovie, lovie, lovie you,” he says.

“I love you, too.” I don’t look up from my book.

We are lying in bed. He rolls towards me.

“Do you feel like a little hanky-panky?” He bounces his body up and down on the bed while he says this, perhaps in case I misread what exactly hanky-panky entails.

“I don’t really feel like it,” I say, “I’m under a lot of deadline stress right now, and that sort of kills my sex drive.” He stops bouncing.

“Am I not sexually attractive to you anymore?” I’ve heard this before, and tonight I wonder why I never get to say this. He is always telling me how pretty I am, how hot I am, how I make him want to just jump all over me. It never makes me feel pretty when he looks at me. I feel like covering up and hiding. I feel like dressing up is just going to incite him, that somewhere in his head I would only dress up to excite him.

I look at him and realize that somehow his constant questioning of his attractiveness has made him less attractive. Power of suggestion maybe. I know that he’s attractive; I even remember how handsome I thought he looked when I met him. He intrigued me then, a handsome guy who acted like he was just cute.

“Of course I still think you’re attractive.” I look over at the phone. I fear hearing it ring. I fear that he will pick up the phone and that it will be the call for me. A stab of guilt. I rub my hands up and down his back, pull him on top of me. It’s just easier this way.

We’re eating at a sushi restaurant. He keeps reaching across the table for my hand. It was cute the first few times he did it.

“So,” he says, “have I told you today that I love you.” Yes he has, but he tells me he loves me anyway.

“I love you too,” I say. Inside I wonder if he just doesn’t have anything else to talk about. Or if maybe he just wants to make sure I’ll say it back to him. I’m tired of reassuring him. Sometimes when I go out with other men, even my gay friends, I wonder how it will look to him, already have a list of what we did every minute prepared for his insecurity.

“Lovie,” he says.

“Wuvie,” I say back, like I’m supposed to. It’s actually easier this way to say wuvie; it’s just an us word, a word that has no other meanings to knock around in my head.

I’m walking in the door. I’ve been out, working. I had a drink with a friend. Everything on me smells like the cigarette smoke of the bar. I look at my watch before I take it off; it’s past two AM. On my way to the shower I hit a filmy purple nightie hanging from the bedroom door. He’s asleep in the bed next to a rose. It should be sweet, but it only makes me feel guilty for spending any time away from him. I wonder if he means for that to happen, at least a little part of him. I put the nightie by the shower. When I get out, all clean, I put the nightie on, but it’s too small for me. I can hear him moving. I glance at the phone, but it doesn’t ring.

“Did you see what I got you?” He looks at me, disappointed that I’m not wearing his present.

“It doesn’t fit.” The words come out terser than I intend to sound, but I’m tired.

“Can I at least see you try it on?” I head back to the bathroom to shoehorn myself into the bit of fluff and lace. When I come out he stifles a laugh.

“It is too small.”

“No kidding, Einstein.” Now his lower lip is sticking out, just a little. I’ve hurt his feelings; it doesn’t seem to matter to him that he hurt mine. I’m still standing in front of him, bulging out of the lingerie in odd places. I know he meant for us to have sex, but I just trade the nightie for a comfortable t-shirt, put the roses in water and turn to face the telephone. Soon I will be asleep.

We’re in bed. I stare at the phone. Any minute I know it will ring. He pushes against me, into me.

“You’re so beautiful,” he says, and I know he means it. I just feel owned. And tired, I can’t even muster the energy to move under him. I barely rock back and forth. The phone sits silent, and I only feel a desperate hope that it will ring. He rolls off me, already halfway to limp.

“Do you want to snuggle?” Since he’s got his way, and since I’ve rebelled in a passive way that he can understand, he feels magnanimous. I don’t want to touch him anymore; I finally understand the feeling of repulsion. As he moves towards me, it pushes my skin backwards. Soon, it has to ring.

“What are you looking at?” He is only asking to make noise. He can’t stand silence. If the phone won’t ring, I just want to sleep, but he needs to fill the room with inconsequence.

“Nothing, I’m just staring into space.”

“Oh.”

I shut my eyes.

It’s morning. I can’t breathe. He’s hugging me in his sleep, one arm around my waist the other around my neck. I shake him off my throat. He starts to rustle his way awake. The phone rings. I pick it up.