Page 53 of The Pleasure of Panic

“No, I’m not embarrassed. I just want to concentrate on you, that’s all.”

“Awww… you’re trying be a good witch.”

He laughs, slaps the laptop closed, and says, “I’m ready. You ready?”

I nod. “Just remember, she said—”

“I heard her. I was sitting right here.” He reaches for the clamps, stands up, pulls me to my feet, and comes at me again.

I put my hand up to stop him. “Whoa, there, buddy. Didn’t you pay attention? You gotta get my girls ready for this. She said you gotta talk dirty to them first.”

“To you, dingbat. Not them.” He laughs.

“OK, so talk.”

He shrugs. “What kinda dirty talk do you like?”

“You know,” I say, unable to look him in the eye. “The usual.”

“Oh, my God. You’ve never done that either? Jesus Christ, Issy! You’re practically a virgin.”

“I have,” I say. “Just… it didn’t go very well.”

His eyebrows slide up his forehead in… what? Surprise? Curiosity? “Explain.”

Curiosity, I guess.

“I mean… it was all kinda weird.”

“Like he wanted you to call him daddy kind of weird?”

“Daddy? What? No! Is that a thing? Gross!”

“Nope,” Finn says, shaking his head. “No one does that. What’d he say?”

“Oh, man. Don’t make me repeat it.”

“Come on, I gotta know where your boundaries are. You heard the sexpert. Gotta be safe and shit.”

“OK,” I say, taking a deep breath. “He wanted me to like… tell him what to do.” Finn blinks. “Like, explicitly.” Finn blinks again. “Or he wouldn’t do anything.” Three more blinks. “What?”

“That’s it?”

“He wanted me to say things like, ‘Put it in my pussy.’ But then he’d be like, ‘You didn’t say, ‘Put your cock in my pussy.’’”

“OK.”

“What? That’s weird, right?”

He crosses his arms, places a hand over his mouth like he doesn’t want me to see him smile, and then says, “Totally weird.”

I slap his arm. “That’s normal?”

He shakes his head no, but it turns into a nod pretty quick. “Totally vanilla ice cream, babe. Sorry. Pretty much standard dirty talk right there.”

“OK, so what do guys say?”

He opens his mouth. Closes it. Tries again. Fails. Says, “Maybe we should skip the dirty talk.”