WHAT HAPPENED TO YOUR CHARM

and your horniness? my friend Shadow’s wife Wanda blurted out during Thanksgiving dinner. They had invited me to join them because I was a lonely widower, but Wanda was talking to her husband. I felt like a dog watching an airplane, so I said, Maybe you should spend more time in nature?

Dinner was delicious. We retired to the living room and my friend Shadow put on March of the Penguins. I found it horrifying and relatable. I knew everything about Thanksgiving, even the bad stuff, but being grateful felt nice. Friendship was difficult for me. For the longest time, I wanted a friend I could say to, you didn’t let me down when I was freezing to death in Antarctica, and I won’t abandon you now. My friend Shadow and his wife Wanda were quoting the movie’s narration back and forth to each other. It was a tidy routine, a ritual. Something was being reset and clawed back. Of course, it was time for me to leave, but I didn’t want to. My friend Shadow had made a plum tart. Their dog Apple was growling with her head on my shoe. If I went home, I’d be forced to check the vile messages on my dating app.

We ate the tart finally. Perhaps, instead, what I needed was a rival.

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