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“No.”

I waited. But she said nothing more and returned to eating and leering, as if ‘no’ was answer enough, which it really wasn’t.

“Well—how long have you known one another?”

“We met last night. At the club. So we’re not attached or anything.”

She flicked her tongue again, and realization slowly seeped into the important parts of my brain.

“The club?” I asked, suddenly more frightened. Morgan looked away nervously. “The club…?” I repeated, remembering his requested destination of the previous evening. Like a bat to my skull, it exploded into my head. Instantly, things made much more sense. A terrifying kind of sense. But sense.

“Yeah,” Ms. Waboombas said, winking at me again. “The club where I work. It was a slow night last night. Not even any reason to get up and dance, let alone get naked. So we got to talking, him and me. Normally I don’t like the customers, but Morgan’s all right sometimes. He’s into comics.”

“Comics? You like comics?” I asked, cutting my buttered newspaper and becoming more shocked by the second. In my seemingly endless lifetime, I’d never met a woman who enjoys comics, other than in the abstract—except manga perhaps, but that’s not really ‘comics’ as ‘comics fans’ think of them—and I’ve known even fewer who look like Ms. Waboombas. Yes, fewer than…um…‘none.’ It’s possible. Negative numbers exist for a reason. Anyway, what I’m trying to say is: she was actually quite attractive, though in a predatory sort of way, and that made her comics interest all the more unusual.

“Sure, I like ‘em,” she said. “They show women in a positive light. Sexy and tough.” She pumped a fist in that ‘sexually alluring to Mastodons’ kind of way. “Built.” She took another spoonful of food but didn’t let that interfere with her talking. “I write my own.”

She leaned back to show off her costume, dripping milk down the front of it. The front of it being mostly breast matter. “This is my character. War Woman.” She smiled, obviously proud of…well…everything.

I studied the design more closely. It was made from some kind of metallic fabric, decorated with random weapons, and featured, primarily, a lot of empty space. She had two unusual circular objects at the center of each tightly fitting bra cup, and I focused on them, curious as to what their design represented. After a moment or two of intense study—which she seemed to thoroughly enjoy—I realized the decorations were what doctors sometimes refer to as ‘areolas’.

Ms. Waboombas wasn’t wearing a ‘costume’. She was covered in body paint.

I made a sound—not unlike a horror-stricken little girl—and dropped my spoonful of sugar-salted newspaper. Then I turned my eyes back up to Ms. Waboombas face, and she laughed—or burped— again.

“Yeah,” she said to me, beaming. “Morgan helped me brush it on this morning. I can tell you like it.”

Morgan—popping another muffin into his mouth— smiled at me as though he could die—right now—a happy and deeply fulfilled human being.

Ms. Waboombas stood up—all six-foot-plus of her—and left a paint imprint of her muscular backside on my dining room chair.

“Looks good, don’tcha think?”

She meant what was left on her, not on the chair.

Slowly, she turned side-to-side, then once all the way around, completely, as if she were modeling actual clothes. It was a different kind of fantasy look from the one I was used to working with every day. Manschingloss would have run screaming from the room, viciously clawing his eyes out. Of course, he was gay, so fashion was far more important to him than raw, steaming, feminine sexuality. Still—the point is—her ‘outfit’ was not something that would have been approved for sale at Wopplesdown Struts. Or even to clean the floors there for that matter. Besides, the only pieces of actual cloth in the ‘costume’ were strap shoes; a bandana tied around one thigh; several belts, which gave support to her various, arcane weaponry; and a thong. The rest was nothing but shaved, painted skin.

Tough