“Do you masturbate?” I asked her, trying to figure out how to make her come. “I do,” she said promptly, “with the showerhead.” “You shove the whole thing in?” I raised my eyebrows. “No, silly,” she frowned playfully, “I just spray the water over my pussy.”

Addendum (February 2, 2000)

As I was reading the last sentence of “The Afternoon Wind,” written on August 7, 1985, where I ruminate about “so many desires mercifully left unfulfilled,” I suddenly remembered the showerhead in my parents’ bathroom in Belgrade. Back then I would often masturbate while sitting in the bathtub and spraying my asshole. The spray was pretty powerful, and my orgasms were powerful, too. My homosexual fantasies date from the mid-1980s, I suppose, when I would spend up to three months vacationing in Yugoslavia. As soon as I remembered the jolly showerhead, I thought of Lesley, too. In retrospect, I cannot figure out why I have not made the connection much earlier.