The expert, followed by Chris, went through a small door to a side room and stood in front of a glass display case filled with different models of vibrators. The expert put her hand on Chris’s shoulder and asked in a friendly tone of voice, “May I ask how much you’re willing to spend on a vibrator? We have models ranging from ten dollars to two hundred dollars.”
“I can pay. It should be a good model though.”
“This makes my job easier.”
The expert bent and took out a gadget in the shape of a long, large penis with a bent part that looked like a tree branch jutting out on the side. On the bottom was a white round part that, Chris figured out, was the housing for the battery. Pointing to it proudly, the expert said, “This model is called the new and improved Impulse Jackrabbit; in my opinion, it is the best in the world. You’ll see how it takes you to heaven. It will cost you a hundred and fifty dollars plus twenty dollars for a box of cleaner. Is the price okay?”
Chris nodded. The expert explained the component parts of the vibrator and the way to use it, and then she took out a DVD and said, “Before using it, I advise that you watch this DVD. Is it going to be cash or charge?”
The expert swiped Chris’s card then gave her the receipt to sign. Then she wrapped the vibrator, the box, and the DVD carefully and put them in an elegant bag bearing the store’s logo. She handed it to her and said, “I wish you happiness with the Impulse Jackrabbit. You can call me any time if you have any questions. Consultation is free for a month. I’ll think I’ve done a successful job not only when you use the device, but also when you’ve got rid of the slightest embarrassment when you do it. Always remember that you’re exercising your right to sexual fulfillment. Please consider the vibrator like a shaver or hair dryer, just a device that makes our life easier and more beautiful.”
BUT CHRIS DIDN’T GET OVER her embarrassment easily. It wasn’t exactly embarrassment, but a sort of strange feeling. She took the train with the Impulse Jackrabbit resting in its elegant bag. At the beginning, she felt that the hand holding the bag was somehow separate from her body. Then she fell prey to the fear that the bag would fall to the floor or tear suddenly, revealing the vibrator, and all the passengers on the train would discover that the dignified lady in the dark green suit and dark glasses had bought a gizmo so that she could have fun with her vagina. Chris resisted the worries, assuring herself that the bag was sturdy and impossible to tear. She recalled what the expert had said and told herself: I am not doing anything shameful. My body belongs to me and I have a right to enjoy it in the manner that pleases me. It’s not fair that I should suffer deprivation just because Salah is unhappy with his life. I am not going to deny my desires or bury myself because after thirty years, he discovered that he did the wrong thing by immigrating to America. I have a right to enjoy sex as much as I want.
The logic of her thoughts was convincing but it did not reflect the whole truth. There was something missing that she knew but ignored. Her sexual problem was only the scab on her wound. There were profound sorrows burdening her heart. Salah was asking for a divorce? After all the years they’d lived together, he wanted to leave her? Just like that? Shake her hand and go? He wanted to turn into a person from the past, from memory, a picture in an album that she’d look at sometimes and return to the drawer? Why had he stopped loving her? Had he fallen in love with another woman? Had he lost interest in her because she was getting older? Had she, without knowing it, turned into a boring, talkative old woman? Had she neglected her appearance? Did Arab men always need younger women and was that why they had more than one wife? Had Salah kept an Oriental man’s mentality in spite of the years he’d spent in America? Or was the truth that he had never loved her? Had he deceived her all those years? Had he married her to get an American passport? To enhance his social status? To be the successful immigrant university professor married to an American woman? If that was true, why had he stayed with her all those years? Had he left her after getting his American citizenship, it would have been easier. She would’ve been able to forget, even forgive him. She was young then and could’ve started all over again. But now it was as if he had used her all those years then decided to throw her in the garbage. How could he bring himself to hurt her so much? Even if he didn’t love her. They had lived together a whole lifetime and he couldn’t undo that in just one moment. He had no right to do that. Those thoughts kept boring into her like bouts of chronic pain; her feelings of misery doubled her need for pleasure. She was instinctively driven to confine her consciousness to her body to escape the heavy burden of her sorrow.
Chris took a hot bath then went back to her room, where she had been sleeping alone ever since Salah left her. She turned on the laptop, inserted the DVD, and followed the operating instructions attentively. Then she lay on the bed, took out the vibrator, and felt it with her fingers. Its head was extremely smooth; the stem was studded with protuberances like pointed beads. Why was it called “rabbit”? Was it because it looked like a rabbit or because it was obedient and amicable? She slipped under the covers and rubbed the vibrator with the moisturizing liquid according to the instructions then gently inserted it. For the first time she felt how large and hard it was. As soon as she pushed the operating button, she felt an urgent desire to urinate. That feeling left her little by little, leading to strong, exciting, and escalating sensations: waves of devilish tremors that shook her whole body relentlessly. She bit the pillow in order to prevent herself from screaming. The pleasure was fierce and brutal, without fantasy, affection, or a partner. It was pure, wicked, burning pleasure that kept hitting her hard, as if it were a whip or a bolt of lightning, delivering her in the end into the throes of a mighty orgasm that shook her in successive waves then left her exhausted with delight.
In the morning, under the stream of a hot shower, she felt her body invigorated, as if born anew. Her head was clear and her muscles were rid of tension, as if she had slept soundly for a whole day. The Impulse Jackrabbit had catapulted her into soaring orbits of pleasure that she had not known even in her wildest nights with Salah. Day after day she celebrated nightfall, taking care of her body then bringing the rabbit to it as if it were a real lover, as if she were in love with it. She was going to love anything that gave her all that happiness, even if it was a battery- operated device. She treated it kindly, cleaned it carefully, rubbed it with the liquid with extreme care, and wrapped her fingers around it softly, as if afraid of hurting it or causing it pain.
After spending several nights with the rabbit, she began to introduce new variations. She would begin with watching a pornographic movie, fondling herself, then inserting the rabbit; that way she could have two, sometimes three orgasms. She also let herself go totally unconstrained: she screamed loudly with pleasure until she got hoarse. She no longer worried that Salah might hear her. She was sure their life together was over. He had breakfast alone and lunch out and closed his office door to avoid seeing her. So what if he heard her nightly screams? Or even saw her sleeping with the Impulse Jackrabbit? She no longer cared about him. Actually, she overdid the screaming bit, motivated by a deep inner desire that he hear her. She wanted to tell him, “Here I am getting the pleasure you’ve deprived me of! Here is my body, which you have abandoned and tormented with your impotence, enjoying pleasure and being liberated time after time!”
Dr. Salah, however, did not hear her. Not only because the basement was isolated and far off, but also because
