The dewy night melted away in the early morning warmth. Outside the sky was just lightening to yellow.

I felt wide awake even before I opened my eyes, and, even with spare time, got up and moving, unable to sleep. Raf wouldn’t come by to pick me up for some hours. After getting showered and dressed, I went down the elevator past the lobby towards the cornerside café adjoined to the apartment lobby. Being so early, the place was clear. A waiter put me on a table and took my coffee order – specifically in a bottlecap. As I drank the regretfully weak coffee, I studied my phone, checking emails before texting Raf my location. The coffee was so disappointing I ordered another; but that one, too, tasted exactly the same. So I had some water. The white Chrysler soon rolled up out the front.

It was warm when we arrived on set, the sun high in the cerulean sky. The set was a private house, quaint Colonial-style, being rented out by the production company, and currently crowded with film crew. The streets were lined with cars so Raf parked some blocks away, where the trailers were set up in a clear park area. One of these trailers had the costumes and changing rooms.

"JERRY," the set costumer said, "I’VE GOT FIFTEEN MINUTES TO TRANSFORM YOU INTO A PUPPY. BUT YOU'RE ALREADY TINY AND CUTE, SO I SEE A LOT OF POTENTIAL."

She directed me to my costume, stored separately so it didn’t get lost amidst all the full size costumes.

There was no other way of putting it: my costume was...interesting. Staring at it, blank-faced, it was apparent in an instant what Stan meant when he said Ryan Kaint was a ‘walking talking dog’. It was a realistic dog creature suit; styled like a bipedal white Alsatian, a miniature bodysuit covered in white fur, with padded paw hands and feet, and a disturbingly life-like dog head.

With the costume on, sans the head, standing on the make-up counter and gazing at myself in front of the light-bulb surrounded mirror was disturbing. The special effect technology these days was more advanced than I realized. With the head on, I was virtually blind, as the head had detailed eye effects, with the slimmest panel of mesh around the eyes, out of sight beneath the eyelids, to provide slits to see out of, and only then in direct light source. Standing in shadow, the mesh panels were useless.

Offside, an assistant director quickly coached me on how to walk and move with the suit on, and gave me some pointers for conveying my character through movement. The AD then introduced me to some of the other actors, in particular Nicole Brookes, the actress playing Lacey, Ryan Kaint’s owner. Throughout the film, her character had to pick me up and hold me, and behave naturally doing so. Crew were keen to get us to establish a bond so she didn’t act surprised by me while shooting was taking place. She also had to get familiar with holding and touching me, so that it came across as natural once cameras started rolling.

“HI!” said Nicole, staring down at me in wonder, now costumed in the dog suit and sitting in Raf’s hand.

Nicole had an easy, confident drawl that endeared me to her almost immediately. Not to mention, she’d already been run through hair and make-up and come out the other end looking pretty damn sleek.

“I’M NICOLE.”

“I’m Jerry,” I said.

“I HONESTLY HAD NO IDEA WHAT TO EXPECT,” she exclaimed, her eyes roving my costume, “BUT OH MY GOSH, WARDROBE HAVE DONE SUCH A GOOD JOB – YOU LOOK JUST LIKE A PUPPY! – BUT ON TWO LEGS!”

Then I was transferred from Raf’s hands to hers.

“OHHH, BUT YOU ARE SO SMALL,” she said, feeling my weight, and unable to resist pushing her fingertips into my fur covered stomach, and stroking it, “AND SO SOFT!”

I was technically too small to be even a puppy, but some scenes were going to mask this with forced perspective, and VFX were going to manipulate the rest. A hasty screenplay update clarified that Ryan Kaint was the ‘runt’ of his litter.

“AM I GOING TO BE HOLDING YOU THE ENTIRE SHOOT?” Nicole said with thinly concealed eagerness, glancing at the assistant director, as if for permission.

Instead, ‘Lacey’ needed to be coached how to walk with me in tow while not breaking from her acting, and whilst fighting the urge to look down where I was all the time. Because of my suit’s head impaired visibility, I kept accidentally walking into her ankles and making crew laugh. She fought the urge to scoop me up and rub my tummy or kiss the top of the head of my costume; a couple of times she relented, and sometimes the director was so pleased with the fluidity of these spontaneous interactions and how naturally they fit into the context of the scene that it was decided they would stay in the cut.

To combat the poor visibility of my costume head, the script supervisor had the idea to spray a trace of sharp perfume on Nicole’s ankles to help me locate her while in suit – if not by sight. I was dubious about my ability to track by scent alone but the director loved it: claiming it would make my performance more method, forcing me to navigate and experience the world more like an actual hound, by my nose. With my head almost desperately pointing in the direction of Nicole’s ankles – actually straining to catch her perfume – and the tail motor running like an eager wag, it gave the appearance of an ultra-attentive pet hound enamored solely with his owner, and the production team were over-joyed with the illusion.

Even between shooting sessions, I had to keep the costume on, and even with the camera not rolling I was receiving regular pats to the head and stomach rubs from the actors and random members of crew, and all encouraged by production, to facilitate my staying in character.

*

One day, my bladder began to cramp while on set. I’d drank too much that morning and now my jaw began to grit in anguish and I had to stifle a groan every time Nicole’s fingers wrapped around my middle or queasily stimulated my lower belly with a playful tickle or poke. I did my best to stay in character and respond with the starry-eyed affection the script called for, even as my bladder raised an internal siren for release.

The next time the director yelled ‘cut’ and there was a break between shooting sessions, I began to hurry over in the direction of Raf, sitting off to the side, chatting with an assistant. Before I could get his attention, something closed around the neck scruff of my costume, lifting me up into the air like a crane. My stomach pulled tight with surprise, and I wondered if I’d been snagged on some stage machinery, before rotating to find myself looking into a pair of wide, youthful eyes. It was a young girl, maybe seven. In fact I’d seen her earlier around the perimeter of the set, touring with an aide, and guessed it was one of the crew’s kids, but hadn’t paid a lot of notice before now. Worse, it didn’t seem she’d noticed me before now.

She peered down inscrutably like some childlike omniscient deity, trying to figure out the tiny features and mechanics of my dog-head mask. My head was parallel with her lips, which were partially open in dumbfounded interest. Rhythmic blasts of stale heat rushed between the lips and directly against my tiny face, fanning through the dog ears and synthetic fur. She beheld me as if I was some strange insect she’d just discovered and it was making me incredibly uncomfortable. For a moment I could do nothing but stare dumbly as she stared back down at me.

Then, I was nearly deafened by the girl’s thunderous roar:

“TINY DOGGY! I’M GOING TO KEEP YOU!”

Her voice chimed inside my skull like a gong, triggering an instant migraine.

“No, kid,” I said weakly, “please let me go—”

“WOW! YOU CAN TALK!” Her squeal of excitement blared in my face. Cringing, ears ringing, I answered:

“I’m not a toy, I’m a real person.”

A scaled-up finger pointed right in front of my face – more accurately, it was a thumb. And the large, long nail edge was angled right at my eyes, which weren’t well guarded in the dog head. The nail looked jagged; roughly trimmed, and had specks of dirt trapped underneath. For that matter, the thumbprint was smudged faintly with dirt or dust, outlining the circular thumbprint. My heart hammered in fear as the blown up digit came right for my face. At the last second it darted under my jaw to jab at my neck. The long thumbnail delicately hooking into my throat, searching for a non-existent speaker installed there. The thumb and finger rubbed back and forth, scrubbing my face around between them in some enthusiastic act of petting.

“I – no – ack –!”

I could barely enunciate words with the added pressure being placed on my larynx. As the pressure shifted back and forth around my neck, it felt like my head was about to be unscrewed – and not my mask head, but my real head.  Desperate and out of words, I emitted some panicked yelps and the hand drew away from my head, allowing it respite. But the huge child face was still staring at me with wide-eyed wonder. Then she grinned, filling me with dread:

“YOU’RE A TALKING PUPPET!”

“No, I’m a person, like you.”

Then my neck scruff was released while my waist was pinched, I was flipped around, clumsily readjusted in the girl’s grip as there was poking and prodding against my tailbone, forcing open the zip on the back of the costume which allowed a rod to jam itself up from my butt, along my spine, stopping at my head. Not a rod, but her pointer finger. My body was snapped straight as the suit pulled taut like I’d fattened up. I was rotated back to stare up helplessly at the kid inspected my improvised fit upon her pointer finger, the inside of which my spine was stretched out against, with the fingerprint rammed against the back of my head. I winced at the increased pressure of the suit now straining my bladder.

The pointer of the other hand came like a missile at my face, poking and pushing to marvel at the added tightness of my costume, and the feeling of my body and insides beneath the dog suit. Puppets weren’t supposed to have insides. My chest was prodded, and then a hammering fingertip tapped around my belly. As my abdomen was subjected to this I nearly peed myself as my bladder was squished around beneath the indiscriminate probing. Before I could complain, the finger departed and the world jerked up and down as the other finger, which I was wrapped around like a sailor tied to a mast, was wiggled back and forth.

“WOOF! WOOF! WOOF!” she sang out, continuing to rattle me around through the air with the wriggling motions of her finger, ignoring my kicking legs and groans for help.

The sky dropped under my feet and the air rushed about as I was suddenly upside and staring at the ground zooming by where the sky should be, bobbling and flying helplessly at the little girl’s hip as she ran. The world bounced and whirled past with dizzy unpredictability, while my arms and legs swung and whipped all over the place like a ragdoll.

I’m being kidnapped by a seven year old, I realized absurdly.

The ground jarred to a halt as the girl cried:

“DADDY!”

“WHAT HAVE YOU BEEN UP TO?” an older man’s voice said.

“LOOK WHAT I FOUND, DADDY!”

The world spun back upright as I was shoved up towards the face of one of the assistant crew members I’d never seen before. Even after the girl’s hand stilled, the sky continued to circle slowly, nauseatingly, and for a minute I couldn’t speak, fearing I’d throw up.

“WHERE DID YOU FIND THAT?” the man said, squinting down at me.

A pair of thick fingers captured the muzzle of my face between, giving it a squeeze, and then turned my head to the side to peer at my scalp. I cried out in alarm.

“HOW DOES THIS THING WORK?” he said, interested by the sound I’d made. “I DON’T SEE A MOTOR ANYWHERE. LET ME TAKE A LOOK—”

His enormous stubby fingers surrounded my head, closed in and drew tight, capturing my skull between them. With one fluid yank, I slid off the girl’s finger by my head, and the world was sent tumbling around as he rolled me back and forth on the slightly roughened surfaces of his palms.

His thumb ran back and forth over my stomach, as if stroking the fur of my suit, but as his fingertips bumped my stomach it produced spasms of bladder pain.

“Uggggh…” I groaned, trying to fend for my gut from his curious probing. “Please stop, I’m not a puppet! I’m an actor, I’m working here – this is my costume!”

“OH, I KNEW THAT,” he said, unable to conceal his surprise, “BUT I THINK YOU FOOLED MY DAUGHTER A SECOND. YOU LOOK MORE LIKE A PUPPY THAN A PERSON,” and reconsidering, “AND MORE LIKE A PUPPET THAN A PUPPY.”

He chuckled.

“JOKING OF COURSE,” he grinned, as his fingers subjected my middle to a friendly pinch, “WELL, NOT ABOUT THE PUPPET BIT – YOU DON’T WANT TO BE A LITTLE PLAYMATE FOR MY DAUGHTER?” he said suddenly. “SEE THAT; SHE’S UTTERLY FALLEN IN LOVE WITH YOU, AND YOU’D BUY ME A COUPLE OF HOURS TO WATCH THE GAME.”

I thought he’d say ‘joking’ again, but he was staring down at me like he expected a response.

I swallowed, my throat suddenly achingly dry.

“THERE’S A PAID GIG IN THERE FOR YOU,” he went on, “THINK ABOUT IT: YOU PLAY BOTH BABYSITTER AND TOY! WHAT COULD BE MORE CONVENIENT?”

I started:

“Sorry, I—”

He tapped my belly several times in an impatient attempt to get my attention again. I grimaced.

“NO DEAL? WHAT ABOUT HIRED ENTERTAINMENT AT CHILDREN’S BIRTHDAY PARTIES? DOES THAT SOUND MORE LIKE YOUR STYLE?”

“I’ve got to return the suit after shooting,” I said quickly. I didn’t know what would happen to the suit after filming was done, but it provided a convenient way out. Plus, he seemed to need reminding that I was a grown man, and that the suit was just a costume and not actually part of me. And little kids would probably have even more trouble making that distinction, if they recognized I was living person at all, and not a talking toy.

Costume department actually had four identical Ryan Kaint suits in storage, but I decided not to mention that.

Unable to drum up interest in his ‘side hustle’ the crew member gratefully released me again, and I made a mad rush at Raf, who accompanied me to one of the portable toilets that had been set up in the parking area down the street.

Finally, at the end of the shooting day, Raf drove me back to my apartment, picking up some dinner on the way. My skin felt gritty, covered in dry sweat from wearing the dog suit all week, and my muscles twinged from the unusual physical activity demanded in pretending to be a dog, plus occupying certain positions for extended periods of time while standing on set.

I had a quick rinse in the sink, and then came out and ate some dinner with Raf, not a home cooked meal, but still the best thing I’d had all day.

“THIS DRINK; NO DEAL FOR ME. TAKE IT, MAN.”

He held out an aluminium can in his hand, platinum-colored with a label that said ‘Kolade’.

“Gimme,” I nodded without thinking, assuming it was soda. “What is it?”

“ENERGY DRINK. THEY RAN OUT OF RED BULL AT THE STORE, BUT I DON’T KNOW MAN, IT’S CHOCOLATE OR SOMETHING. I'MMA PASS.”

I wasn’t an energy drink person; preferred a hot drink like coffee for a caffeine hit. Also, it was very late for stimulant; the sky was a rare shade of blue with the rapidly encroaching nightfall – the only time in the day the sky was properly blue in St Palma was not in daytime, but night.

Still, the chocolate made me think it probably wasn’t very strong.

“I’ll try it.”

He poured some into my miniature Nineteen39 mug and I took a sip. It didn’t taste like an energy drink anyway, but like – not chocolate – but iced coffee milk with a carbonated fizz and the very faint tang of Coca-Cola. Weird, but not bad. I guzzled the whole mug down and looked up for a refill.

“GOOD STUFF?” Raf observed, pouring me some more. I quickly downed that, too.

“DON’T WANNA OVERDO IT,” he said. “NO MORE SPACE!” He poked my substantially undersized gut to illustrate.

He was about to put the can away in the fridge without thinking but I stopped him, anxious not to see the end of the Kolade until his next visit.

So, he poured out the remainder into several plastic shot cups he’d bought at the store, and put wrap over the tops like drum skin, and each held on with an elastic band, and left them on the table for me. If I wanted one, I just punched the wrap with a toothpick, and tore it at the edge to create a drinking hole, like a self-fashioned can lid.

The next morning I popped another shot of Kolade before showering, and it had me wide awake once I was towelling off. Then back to the set of ‘Alpha’ for another day’s shooting. Invigorated by the energy drink, the dog suit seemed a little less cumbersome, my nose became more sensitive to Nicole’s perfume, my lines a little more familiar, my brain even racing a little ahead in the script.

We carried on doing the occasional behind-the-scenes ‘method’ bits to stay in character during shooting breaks; if we saw each other in passing she would hail me down, I would gallop adoringly up to her feet, the little tail on my costume wagging mechanically (it was triggered by motion, I had no control over it) she would scoop me up, flip me over in her hands and scruff up my stomach, coo at me, make kissy noises.

During moments between my takes my body automatically tensed up, always with anxiety mounting up to my next line – would I remember it? Was it going to sound right? I’d do my part, the director would yell ‘cut!’ and then it would be the same thing, re-take.

Then break, only for my muscles to be hot and wire-tight. With sweat rolling down inside the dog suit, I asked a technician to let me linger around the big circular wind machine, hoping someone would switch it on for a test, and the air flow would cool me down (if it didn’t blow me away).

Before we went back on set, Nicole found me pacing around restlessly, stretching and swinging my arms and asked me if I was nervous.

“No,” I lied. “Just tense.”

The more experienced actor, she didn't appear to have this problem, but took pity on me. She scooped me up in one hand, clasped her thumb and forefinger around my neck and began rolling them into my shoulders. I eased into her hand, grateful she was not such a famous actress that she had walled herself off from genuine interaction with co-cast.

Back for another week of shooting. I was becoming a recognized, integral member of the shoot and there were no more solicitations for a side gig as hired children birthday party entertainment. In between shooting, Nicole would whistle, and I would come running, tail wagging, before getting plucked up by the scruff of my neck and hoisted up to her beaming face as she tickled me with an outstretched index finger while I squirmed, dangling from her hand, and tried to remember to bark and huff, and not squeal. She playfully pushed the muzzle of my costume with a fingertip, scratched my ears, stroked my spine, pressed her nose into my neck. All in the name of ‘staying in character’. But it worked. I was being molded – groomed – into my role like the so called Pavlovian dogs. I didn’t think about Ryan Kaint’s motives anymore; I put the costume on and became him. Nicole’s perfume had lodged so stubbornly in my unconscious by now that I could have located her in the dark. Even the wagging of my tail seemed tuned to it.

“SOMETIMES I FORGET THERE’S A LITTLE PERSON IN THERE…” she chuckled down to me, as I lay sprawled in her cupped hand, peering into the face of my costume as if trying to see the human eyes behind the realistic dog face, “…SOMEWHERE.”

“That’s good,” I said. “It means we’re doing a good job.”

When I put the costume on, I was Ryan Kaint, and when I took it off, I was Jerry. It was an easy transition. But I couldn’t help but wonder how much of the affection in her eyes was Lacey and how much was Nicole. I also wondered how much of this off-camera ‘character enrichment’ would make it onto a special feature on the DVD. And whether Jen would ever see it.

* * *

It was evening, the sky glowing magenta. I’d just returned to the apartment from shooting and decided to call home.

Tearing open a wrapped shot cup of Kolade, I sat on the wooden surface of the bedside table, which Raf had helpfully slid against the bedroom window, so that I could sit by the slit in the window, catch the cool – if acrid – breeze wafting over the foothills, and gaze through the glass onto the dusky purple street below, where pedestrians strolled up and down with the leisurely ease of the twilight hours. Farther, the city skyline was black through the haze.

To get the wrapped cup onto the table, I’d tied string to the elastic band and ‘winched’ it up. The wrap over the top had kept the liquid spilling out. A Kolade after the work day was quickly becoming a cherished habit, even though energy drink past afternoon hours probably didn’t do my sleep cycles a favour, but after a busy day shooting I often had difficult shifting gears into downtime late in the night anyway.

“Hey there, you,” Jennifer’s flirtatious voice came from the phone in my lap. Out the window, the hydraulic hiss of truck brakes.

“Hello,” I replied, and humoring her: “is this my gorgeous girlfriend speaking? I was just—”

My voice hitched in my throat.

I had adjusted the phone settings allowed me to hear her at normal speaking volume and now a spontaneous wave of dizziness overcame my senses, and my chest seemed to cramp up like I might cry. It had been several weeks since I’d seen her, and though we spoke on the phone regularly, I was still struck in unguarded moments by random zaps of homesick longing for her. But it wasn’t just the homesickness. Hearing her at normal volume on the phone created the illusion I was talking to her at normal size again. Not seeing her physically present for several days now only completed the illusion, plunging me back into a past time when we’d been dating at same stature. The déjà vu and the homesickness all bound up together made my heart literally ache.

“….Yeah?” she cut in. “You still there?”

I swallowed hard and the feeling subsided again.

“Yes,” I said quickly. “Sorry, my brain is just busy, I guess.”

“What is this, seven thirty?" she said, sounding concerned. "Don’t let them push you too hard, okay? You’re still new at this.”

“I’m finished up shooting for today," I said hastily. "Just mentally unpacking what I did today.”

“Oh…” she went on, sounding hesitant, probably not entirely sure herself what it was I did, exactly, “well, you know, you’ve been out of work for some time now so you’re probably going to have to get used to it again. You still feeling good about it?”

“No regrets. I needed to get out of the house.”

Her tone immediately became brisk:

"Okay. So, who's got you?"

My brow crinkled as if I hadn’t heard her properly.

"Huh?"

"Who's looking after you right now?"

"No one. Not right this instant, I—"

She cut in, with a slight edge in her voice:

"No one's looking out for you?"

"Just me here and I'm relaxing."

"There's got to be someone, like a personal assistant or something. They can’t just leave you alone. No. What happens if you need something?"

“I've got Raf."

“Where is he?”

“His place. It’s late. Anyway, it's fine. I don’t need anything. I like the quiet.”

“Well, find someone and speak up about it to them. Get them working a little for you.”

“Who’s ‘they’? The agency?”

“Whoever you’re working with right now; movie people, whatever.”

“You’ve got it backwards: I work for them.”

“But they owe you legal duties. They have to look after you, it’s the law.”

“I know,” I sighed, regretting I’d said anything. “Everything’s fine. Why are you worried all of a sudden?”

She let out a breath, and after a pause:

“If you say so...” Then she added: “I can’t help it. I miss you.”

“Miss you, too. What are you up to, anyway?”

“Ah, usual stuff, work, and…I keep cleaning the house even though it’s clean,” she muttered, “all the weird stuff you stash in little nooks and crannies… —Oh, I started learning Latin dance.”

“Cool. You still do martial arts?”

“Yeah, I need to burn the energy. But the dancing is kinda like…a martial art set to music, I guess. Fighting…dancing…” she considered, “…maybe not so different.”

“I would go with you,” I suggested tentatively, “– to the dance classes – but…you know.”

I shut up again before the ridiculous mental image caused laughter to spill out of one of us.

“We'll dance at home,” she surged on. “I’ll teach you. You can practice on my hand.”

“Is there something wrong with the floor? That’s, you know,” I added, “the normal place for dancing.”

She countered:

“If you dance on my hand I can tell exactly where you’re putting your feet.”

Considering this, I said:

“You’ve given a lot more thought to this already.”

She was quiet for a second, then admitted:

“The classes are…weird. It’s fine." Her voice spilled out in a run-along drawl: "But my partner’s holding me and he’s pretty strong. Guy’s from, like, Bahrain or something. Stamped on my foot a couple of times, too.”

I smiled to myself, then said seriously:

“He's gotta be strong enough to lift you and do the male role stuff. What’s wrong with that?”

“You’re right," she replied, "there are roles. A lot of acting involved, you could say. Anyway,” she yawned, “I had a class before and I’m kinda tired now, so maybe I’ll let you have your quiet time,” she dramatized the word ‘quiet’ like this was some unusual predilection of mine. Then she said: “When are you going to be home?”

“If everything goes fine and shooting can wrap up, I should get a short break and be home free for the weekend.”

“Exciting – I’ll make sure to leave space in my tummy for you,” she said coolly, but I could hear in her voice the genuine smile she was trying hard to suppress.

My eyes drifted by the window, at the clouds floating over the moon.

“Well....First problem with film-making: nothing goes just ‘fine’. We’re still looking out for some rain to crash the party for the rest of the week.”

“Mmm…and what do you get up to outside of work time?” Her voice tipped with curiosity.

My mind flashed up Natalie’s social media profile page, and my mouth was already half-open, seriously teetering on spilling it to her that Natalie’s campus was in the city.

But I caught myself at the last second.

Maybe Jen knew less about Natalie than I thought; Natalie had denied knowing me to the police. Of course, Jen wouldn’t be so gullible to believe that, but maybe she contented herself that Natalie had been just a friend or even less; someone who let me couch surf in her place.

Did it matter what Jen thought, or knew about my interest in reconnecting with Natalie? She wasn’t here right now, so what good would it do? What if I was wrong, and she did get sulky over it? I’d already heard her dark muttering about Stuart’s new girlfriend, deep down, that still bothered her on some level. And I'd witnessed her rage first hand when she met Stuart's new woman in the flesh.

But if it bothered her so much, why would she give me Natalie’s number? What did she expect I’d do with it? If I then rang the number, wouldn’t that be her fault, in a sense…?

—And I was already thinking up excuses and rationalizations for something I hadn’t even confessed to. Or done wrong. Was I done anything wrong? Oh, screw this crap.

Was I that guileless? I couldn’t even keep a secret – No, not a secret – I couldn’t even keep some things about myself private anymore. If our marriage was going to work at all, I needed to enforce those boundaries. She had her world at home, and her leisure pursuits, her dancing. Well, I had my world now, too, and my pursuits. I was entitled to some privacy even as a married man.

Her voice rang through the phone, snapping my attention back:

“They’ve got to give you free time!” she groaned. She had taken my long silence to mean I’d failed to comprehend her reference to time ‘outside’ work, as if it was a totally foreign concept to me now.

“I’ve got it right now," I said gently.

She said:

“You're busy," she said flatly. "I can tell." She gave a small sigh. "Well...I won't keep you. Stay safe for me while you’re up there, and we’ll talk again soon.”

“Of course.”

“Always love you, baby.” She made a smooching sound against her hand.

“I love you, too. Bye.”

Later I got a text from her that said:

if u were here right now…u would be such a little throbbing mess kissing and fucking my cervix while i watch TV and eat dessert, and a flame emoji.

I replied with a blushing emoji.