Page 15 of A Man for the Holidays

“Yeah.”

“Olivia is the manager of the clothing store, and yet the other day when you came to life, or whatever it was that brought you to me, I was talking with a man called John Newton.”

“Yeah, so?”

“Olivia Newton-John. Olivia and John Newton. Tell me that’s not a coincidence?”

“I don’t understand?”

“Never mind. Forget I mentioned it.” The lights in the theater dim slowly and eventually turn off, as the volume increases in the speakers, and the movie in front of us comes to life. I slide down in my seat, making myself as comfortable as possible, then slowly lean my head on Quinn’s muscular, broad shoulder and smile.

“That movie was spectacular, and now I totally understand what a romantic musical is all about and why it’s one of the greatest musicals in the world,” Quinn tells me, as we step outside the theater some two hours later.

“I told you.”

We make our way through the crowd of people and when we walk past the box office, I hear Quinn talk to someone. I turn around to see him speaking to… a statue?

“What are you doing?” I ask.

“Saying hi to Christian.”

I look at him with wide eyes, “Is he one of yourfriends?”

“Well, I know him. We used to be on display in the window together for a short while before they moved him to other stores in the mall. I guess they no longer had use for him so decided to use him here.” He steps away from the statue, then leans in and whispers in my ear, “I don’t really like him. The guy is a stuck-up, arrogant asshole.”

I let out a loud laugh as I make my way toward the bathroom, when I feel Quinn tug on my arm.

“Um, I have this sensation, between my legs. I don’t know how to explain it, but it’s not the type of sensation I felt before when we were talking about sexy time. This is different, in fact, I’m actually starting to feel a little bit of pain, just below my tummy.”

He places his hand on his stomach and gently rubs it, then he raises his head and looks at me, a look of sheer terror and confusion on his face.

“You must have drunk too much in the theater and now you have to pee.”

“Pee? Wait, I’ve heard that somewhere before. Yeah, that’s right, I remember hearing a lot of little boys and girls telling their mommies and daddies that they need to pee. And they would always place their hands down on their thingy’s and walk funny.”

That has me chuckling even louder, and when Quinn glares at me, I try and contain myself. “Why are you laughing at me?” he asks.

“Because you’re so cute when you call it a thingy.”

“Okay, so it’s my penis, dick, cock, whatever. The point is it stings like crazy right now.”

I grab a hold of his arm and the two of us head into the restrooms. I lead the way over to the urinal against the wall and lower my voice to barely a whisper so as to not draw the attention of anyone around us.

“You do know how to do this, right?”

“No. I told you, I’ve spent my whole life as a mannequin. I don’t know how to do a lot of this stuff.”

“All you need to do is lower the zipper on your jeans, then reach into the small opening, slide your fingers inside the fabric of your underwear and pull out your thingy.”

I say the words trying not to laugh as I give him a quick demonstration, all the while trying not to tempt myself to glance over and inspect his package. When we’re done, we wash up and quickly make our way back out into the foyer.

“Are you telling me you haven’t peed the entire time you’ve been alive?”

“Well, I don’t really know. I may have when I’ve showered, I can’t really tell with all that water. And this is the first time I’ve had anything proper to eat or drink.”

“No, it’s not. What about when we had lunch together the other day at work?”

“I had one slice of a peanut butter sandwich, and I didn’t drink anything.”

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