She planned it, and I made sure her efforts weren't wasted.This is the sports fan who made a bet that she could distract me while I was watching footb...ll. I told her that buying a vibrator was cheating. I never did see the end of the game.And now, somehow, this is the girl who is spooned in front of me in our bed, naked and soft, warm and sleepy, her dark hair sprawling over our pillows.I can't see her eyes, but I know they glitter wetly, mirrors of her happiness.She pushes slightly towards me. ”Titus asked, “Where did you go for your last vacation?”“We went to Rat World. When you have kids, your choices of vacation spots are kind of limited. You have to go places they enjoy,” Charlie answered.Titus said, “Let me make sure that I have a good understanding of your life. You have an okay job. You have no debts. You have a reasonable mortgage on your house. You have a wife with whom you are still having satisfactory sexual relations. You have two kids who don’t cause you any trouble. You. I always took it that she was genuinely enthralled by something whenever she gave this look.My look remained disdainful as I walked home from work. I had, had a bad day. A typical bad day. I arrived at the house and walked into the kitchen. The back door had been left open and so I was about to walk out of it to see where my wife was. However, something caught my eye, through the kitchen window. I could see something moving in a strange fashion just over my next door neighbours fence. Intrigued. “Nervous?” he asked.“No, I’m not nervous. I’m scared shitless. I’ve never had to speak in public before.”“You’ve given this talk in Seminar.”“Yes, but that was only our class. This is the entire department -- juniors and seniors, grad students and faculty.”“Consider it an honor,” Lucas replied. “The prof thought your talk was good enough for the general seminar.”“This can be a tough room. Remember last week’s seminar? Some of the questioners were merciless.”“That was because the guy was.