I said, "Let me go along my path. If I find myself thinking about you, if I find myself missing you, I have your number, I have your e-mail address."

I stayed at the back of my car, its wetness against my legs, arms folded, shaking my head.

Across the way I saw lights come on in three townhomes. Eyes were in windows.

The smell of two lovers comforted me. Their fingerprints, it was as if they were holding me.

Logan snapped, "Are these sexual experiences, is fucking around, is it simply about the experiences and being with a bunch of men? Do you think you'll be able to settle down with me and become a respectable woman once you've experienced enough men? How long will you be a whore?"

"If I behave the way you behave, and I am honest about it, why am I a whore?"

"Because that's what a whore does."

"Don't talk to me like that, Logan. Don't you ever talk to me like that."

He looked me up and down. "I guess that explains why you look the way you do."

"What's your excuse? I got caught in the rain. You look like you forgot to take your meds."

"You look like you've been rode hard and put up wet."

"I was. I was rode damn hard. And I enjoyed it. You have no idea how I enjoyed it."

"Is that right?"

"And you know what? Since you have to know, I was with two men."

He chuckled, not believing me. "Takes two men to replace me?"

"Would take two of you to do what one of them did to me."

Logan glared like I was both a liar and a whore, like he wanted to slap me down because in his mind this yoni was his. He glared like he was about to rush over and mark this territory with his seed.

He asked, "Why are you doing this to me? Why are you lying to me?"

"I was with two men. At the same time. And it was wonderful."

"What, you think I'm not a man? You think you can just say any kind of shit to me?"

He stared me down, now beyond angry, a little boy with his feelings hurt, his emotions extreme.

Like my mother, when riled, my words were irrational. I couldn't hold my tongue.

Defiant, I said, "Did you like the way they tasted?"

"What?"

"When you kissed me, when you put your tongue inside my mouth, did you like the way the men I was with tasted? Did you like the taste of their dicks? Did you like the taste from their come?"

My words were surgical, each syllable sharper than a tool used for castration.

His mouth dropped open, his face in shock.

I wasn't done. He had pushed me, cornered me in my own life, and I wasn't done fighting. This argument was a reprise of an uncompromisable situation, and I wanted the battle over right now. My adrenaline was pumping, my clarity had evaporated, and all I had was unmanageable anger.

I asked, "Did sticking your tongue down my throat and tasting come, did that taste good?"

He let his umbrella fall, rain falling and assaulting his face, dampening his senses.

He growled. "Tell me you're lying."

"How does it feel to taste the come of another man?"

He spat hard, retched like he was about to regurgitate a lung, then wiped his mouth and came toward me. Then it came hard, it came from within me. Regret. It arrived. And with regret came fear.

"If I went upside your head a time or two, your ass would see Jesus and start acting right."

"Are you threatening me?"

"Lot of places to bury a body between here and Memphis."

His out-of-control expression combined with those deadly words, that terrified me.

I bolted away from Logan, hurried to the back of the garage, ran out of my heels, fled in bare feet.

He cursed me.

I saw my face on CNN, MISSING underneath my photo as police teams, cadaver-sniffing dogs, and volunteers walked through woods looking for my remains, what hadn't been eaten by wildlife.

I pushed the button for the Liftmaster, made the garage door go down.

Logan remained in the rain, water soaking him and the cardboard box at his feet.

I went inside, ran up one level, went to the kitchen window, saw Logan wasn't leaving.

He stood in the storm like he was that mentally imbalanced man from the movie Psycho.

My heart was on the verge of exploding.

Moments later he started ringing my doorbell.

I screamed, "This is the reason why I don't want to be in a relationship...too much damn drama...people like you create so much drama...people like you...you suck people into your goddamn drama."

The doorbell rang a thousand times.

"What the hell is your problem? Showing up in Atlanta...in my city...expecting a compromise in your favor...trying to get me as if this were some game...this isn't a damn game...this is not about us being in a stupid competition...you expect me to sacrifice...to have the kind of responsibility you want me to have...shit...you're here...a damn storm...wrote a six-page letter...a damn six-page letter."

He knocked on the door, told me he wasn't leaving. I dialed 9-1-1. Minutes after that, Smyrna PD showed up. As soon as one squad car pulled into the cul-de-sac, another one appeared.

It had come to this. I didn't want to create a public, shameful moment, but it had come to this.

There was no justification for Logan's actions. The meter on his intelligence was showing one bar, if that. Some men only took seriously the words and advice that came from men carrying loaded guns. I felt a deep sadness inside, tremendous pressure on my chest, a shortness of breath.

I felt the opposite of plea sure.

Two officers stayed downstairs, detained Logan, who was now ready to leave. Two officers came to my door. I told them what the problem was, told them he was an ex from Memphis, told them I had moved to Atlanta to get away from him, told them I hadn't seen him in months, told them he had come to Atlanta uninvited and had been harassing me all day, told them I hadn't called him in months, told them he had somehow obtained my address and now I was scared for my life, told them I wanted this on record in case anything happened to me.

They asked, "Did he assault you, ma'am?"

My hair was wet. My makeup horrific. I looked down at my tattered dress, at my scarred knee.

My appearance was that of a traumatized victim.

I had been assaulted. But not by Logan.

Uncomfortable with the truth, I had to manufacture a quick lie.

I told them I had been out drinking, got locked out of my car in the rain, and I had fallen down, stepped off a curb and tumbled. Their eyes told me they didn't believe my stammering falsehood. All I had to do was nod my head and point at the big black man who was about to join history with Rodney King, and say Logan had done all of this to me, and have him incarcerated and put on a chain gang with the rest of Georgia's black men, men the system would rather pay tax dollars to keep incarcerated than send to college. But I didn't. I emphasized that Logan had threatened me. I told them he hadn't touched me, just threatened to do so. Told them he had threatened to have someone bury my body in the woods.

They said, "Ma'am, we have to take into consideration your appearance."

He said that to me like I was an irrational battered spouse living knee-deep in denial.

I folded my arms across my breasts, nipples standing tall.

I said, "I just want him off my property. I just want him to leave and not come back."

The good old boys went to have a man-to-man talk with Logan. He was surrounded by the officers, blocked in. They made him face the first police car, rain falling on his head as they searched him from head to toe, then they put him in the back of one of the police cars. It made me feel uneasy, but this was his doing. He had pushed it to this. All he had to do was leave me be. Now he felt like I did, like his freedom was being taken, like he was a prisoner. I should've lied. Should've said he pushed me, assaulted me, made me fall and scrape my knee. But lying like that, that wasn't me. I watched. Four white officers were detaining one black man. Flashing lights. The neighbors saw. The neighbors would talk about this amongst themselves. Once again the darkies were entertaining the white folks. Once again they would be worried about their property values going down and the safety of their children.

Lights were on in the homes of neighbors. The president of the homeowners association appeared, a bearded man who took his gerbil-size dog with him everywhere he went.

Forever eased by. The rain died down.

Neighbors stared from windows, cups of tea and coffee in their hands.

They let Logan get out of the police car, escorted him back to his Range Rover.

He frowned up at my front door, shook his head, like I was the bad guy in this madness. Like I was the evil one because he came here on bended knee, his fantasy to take me back to Memphis and make this wild horse a tamed, uxorial mare. I'd stab myself in the heart before I took that ring and pledged a lifetime of meritorious ser vice.

I saw inferiority raging in his eyes. I was powerful beyond my wildest dreams.

Now I saw the real Logan. The man who thought he owned a Mercedes dick, but his shit was equipped with a Pinto engine. If I stood next to him in the mirror all he would be able to see was himself. He was a narcissist-spoiled, arrogant, haughty, snobbish, and downright bitchy when things didn't turn out in his favor. He was used to hiring and firing. And for once he had no say in the matter.

Badges and guns followed him out of the community. I hoped they trailed him down Atlanta Road and made sure he got on 285. Hoped they made him cross the state line and go back to Tennessee.

Shoes off, I still had on my wet black dress, that wetness now cold and clinging against my skin.

Logan was gone. I hoped that sonofabitch was gone for good.

I rushed through my home.

I hurried over all three levels, looking for any gift from Logan, any card, any present, tearing up anything I found, breaking what was breakable, throwing anything that was connected to him in the trash, throwing things into the garbage violently, like I was a goddess gone mad.

I lost it, yelled like he was still here, still in my face, my voice echoing, "I don't want to be with you. You know I don't want to be with you. You are too controlling. You don't fucking please me. You don't fucking fulfill me. You never have pleased me. Never. Do you hear me? Never, never, never. Do you feel me? Could you understand that? Of course you don't. Narcissistic bastard. Why in the fuck did you have to write me a damn six-page letter? A fucking six-page letter. Who does that shit anymore?"

He made me curse. He made me curse a lot. He pulled me to his level and made me vulgar.

He had too much power. Too much.

I removed my damaged dress, threw its remains into the bathtub.

I stepped into the shower, washed away the wonderful scents from my identical sins. Men I would never see again.

Not long ago I was in my car singing. Dancing in my spoiled dress. Happy. Until I had seen Logan. One glimpse of him and my happiness had been reversed. This was a crime. I had been robbed. He had robbed me of the elation and positivity that had been flowing through my body.

I closed my eyes, wished myself back in time.

Wished myself back to experiencing the praises of four hands, two tongues.

Wished myself back to bliss, couldn't let Logan make my wonderful experience end like this, couldn't let him dilute my night of satisfaction. I went back to the moment when Karl walked into the W, relived the night until I made it to my car, body soaked with rain and my dress mangled beyond repair.

TEN.

Three hours ago I was inside a luxurious suite at the W, one that looked like an extension of heaven, a suite in paradise decorated with whiteness that glowed underneath dim lights and a dark sky.

It was raining, heaven-sent tears inspired by our moving exchange of desire and passion, tears inspired by what was marvelous. The sky thundering, applauding the wonderful sex it had witnessed.

While Mark washed his face and prepared to go home to his wife, I dressed without showering, prepared to return to my life, left Karl sleeping in the bed. My eyes stared at Karl's tattoos, at the name Kenya inked in his flesh, at the image of her as an angel wrapped inside beautiful wings. My voice whispered a soft good-bye to him. I eased out of the room, left with Mark in the middle of the night.

During the elevator ride to the lobby Mark kissed me.

He held me and kissed me like he was still hungry for me, like he hadn't been kissed in years.

He whispered, "I wanted you to myself."

I smiled, flattered and surprised by his desire for me, but didn't reply.

Men didn't have to have just one lover. If a man only had one, he was defective.

To choose. Or not to choose. I didn't want to choose.