Détente

Sheri and I have been speaking more cordially recently, which is good. And in the spirit of TMI Tuesday without answering any silly TMI questions, I thought I'd tell a very brief story of another prank she once pulled on me. Why? I don't know. Why not?

Many years ago (just after the ice caps had melted once again and the land bridge from Asia across which my family came had submerged and cut us off from the old country, right) Sheri found this big fat ring, not a stone but a ring of solid metal that was just larger than normal, and she decided that she wanted to try it out as a toy. She claimed that she'd tried it on herself and it felt incredible, and I just had to try it too.

So she slipped it on her middle finger and started fingering my ass with it. Some of you already know where this is going, don't you? I admit, it was interesting; the ring sat about halfway down her finger, right above the knuckle, and when it popped in and out it was a bit like a bead, but with a slightly different feeling because it was narrower; I can't really describe it better than to say that it was like if you could transform a bead into a ridge. Something like that.

I was lying ass-up on my bed, face in the covers, fingering myself while she popped it in and out, when suddenly she pulled out but it didn't. "Oh shit," I heard her say. "Lex, I think..."

"What?"

"I think I lost the ring."

"What?!"

"Hang on, let me see..." And she tried to get it out, but it seemed like she was just pushing it deeper. She wouldn't let me get up, just told me to stay right where I was or it might get worse. So she's working and working on it, and the ring feels like it's going to be inside me forever, and I'm thinking panicked thoughts about what we'll say to Mom and Dad, what we'll say to the doctor, no, wait, it's too late for that, we'll have to go to the Emergency Room and what are we going to say there, and so forth.

Finally, Sheri said, "Listen, go sit on the toilet and try to get it out, okay? Maybe you can work it out that way."

I was not happy; I knew enough to know that it probably wasn't going to work (I also know that something like that probably wouldn't have necessitated a trip to the doctor, just a hearty meal of something dense, but I was panicking at the moment, urged on by Sheri's tone). But I got up gingerly, feeling the ring inside me, and went to the bathroom, and just as I was about to sit down, I felt something on my leg. I hadn't noticed it before because I was too preoccupied.

I looked down, and there was a string with a tag on it dangling between my legs, clearly coming from my ass. The tag said, "Gotcha!" And there was Sheri right behind me, laughing hysterically as she reached down and pulled the ring, still tied to the string, out easily.

I believe I may finally forgive her for this on her deathbed.

The folksy lesson is, of course, that you shouldn't put anything up your butt without a string tied to it. The tag is optional.