Page 63 of Stags

“Oh,” he said. “Got it.”

“And it’s romance because they fall in love.”

“That didn’t seem loving,” he said.

“Well, by the end, it always is,” she said, sticking the book back on the shelf. “Sometimes, I have to admit, it’s sort of less hot by that point. It’s sort of hotter when they’re less nice to her.”

He gave her a look she might have termed horrified.

“I mean…” She considered. “It’s just really hot when they can’t control themselves, I guess, when they want her so bad they just lose it.”

“Is it?” He selected another book.

“What are you doing?” she said, taking that one from him.

“I think I might want to take up this hobby of yours,” he said. “If I want to buy one of these books, I can, can’t I?”

“You’re not really going to read it.”

“I totally am if it’s all like what I just read. Actually, where is that jackal book?”

She shook her head.

“Oh, whoa, they’re pirates?” He picked up a different book, paging through it.

“I do not usually read the reverse harem books, anyway,” she said. “So, that’s not my hobby.”

“No? Not into gangbangs?”

She snorted. “Actually, I do think that’s hot, but I just have a hard time suspending my disbelief for it. Like,sure, there’s four hot guys and they’re totally happy taking turns and none of them are jealous of each other, yeah,right.”

He put the book back on the shelf. “Okay, never mind.”

She laughed.

He laughed, too. “Maybe I’m not really the target audience.”

“You think?” she laughed.

“Yeah, but they don’t write books like that for men,” he said.

“Oh, sure, they do. Like, whatever, James Bond is that.”

“Um, James Bond books did not have that kind of graphic descriptive… action in them,” he said. “They were written in like 1950 or something.”

“Really? They’re that old?”

“Yup,” he said. “No, women are different about sex than men are.”

“I mean, maybe,” she said.

“Like, less ashamed of it,” he said.

“No,” she said. “I don’t think so.”

“This is like…” He gestured around. “This is just on a regular street, in a book store, and…”

She shrugged. “I guess I see what you’re saying.” She pointed. “Anyway, I’m trying to go over there, to the fantasy section.”

---