... having been breathed out

She knew now that she loved [the bear], loved him with a clean passion she had never felt before. Once, briefly, she had had as a lover a man of elegance and charm, but she had felt uncomfortable when he said he loved her, felt it meant something she did not understand, and indeed, it meant, she discovered, that he loved her as long as the socks were folded and she was at his disposal on demand; when the food was exquisite and she was not menstruating; when the wine had not loosened her tongue, when the olive oil had not produced a crease in her belly. When he left her for someone smaller and neater and more energetic and subservient to his demands, she had thrown stones at their windows, written obscenities with chalk on the side of their building, obsessed herself with imagining the neatness of his young girl’s cunt (he had made Lou have an abortion), dwelt on her name (though she never saw her until years later and discovered her to be quite, quite plain), carved anagrams of her rival’s names on her arm, in short, surprised herself with the depths of her passionate chagrin at losing a man who was at heart petty and demanding.

For a week, she had loved the Director. For longer than that, perhaps. Certainly she had been in need of a sexual connection. Cucumbers, she had found on investigating the possibilities suggested in Lysistrata, were cold. Women left her hungry for men. The Director shared her interests, was charming and efficient; they had much in common when they fucked on Molesworth’s maps and handwritten geneologies: but no love.