S E X L E S S

BAMBOOED

"What's so funny?"

"Please, just give me a sec."

The doctor laughed until tears tumbled and rolled down, "oh, my, where have you been all my life?"

"I'm glad I can be some kind of comic relief for you. I don't know what's so funny."

"You know how to punish a man," the man slid back on his chair.

Doctor Sok could not get over the fact the woman decided to take out her IUD and told her boyfriend she was under maintenance until the end of her various aesthetic procedures. Margot then explained she would take no risk, not even with a condom bringing the man's sex life to its knees in a dead zone.

"Margot, when are you going to spit it out?"

"What?"

Dr. Sok sat up, "the reason you hate this man so much. It seems evident it's some type of payback."

"No, it's just me."

"I hear you, but there's always a cause, and I don't know. How many women dating a Calvin Klein model wouldn't want to be all smitten and whatever else."

"Listen, I said I had a low libido. I don't like the gig, I hate the sweat, I hate the after-effort cramps, dicks are plain ugly, and vagina isn't better, I know. I dislike when someone is fiddling with my tits, and I'm not feeling ish. Above all, I detest watching movies or reading books that make the whole thing look glam."

Doctor Sok blinked. He wasn't sure if he was old enough to listen to Margot's depiction of sex.

"You didn't have these issues before having your child, though."

"No, so? Like people can't change?"

Dr. Sok wondered if he should or not ask about her childhood. The man could not put aside the eventuality that past events, perhaps those of her youth, were linked to her current state. No, Margot didn't trust him enough yet to let him dig deep.

"Okay, Margot. Tell me, what would be the ideal scenario for you?"

Margot frowned, "scenario?"

"Yes, like what could potentially be a turn-on?"

Margot smiled; this was something she could answer, "a conversation. One where they'd be no stakes. Not having the pressure that sex is a finality. An exchange feeling, that I'm more than just pussy."

"Is that how your partner makes you feel?"

"Ahh, he doesn't speak. You know he's the type of person who goes yes, huh huh, oh, or no, but he knows how to defend his desire to have sex. It makes no sense to me. He has his world, and I have mine, and we just mingle in bed. I'm not sure if it how, it's supposed to be."

"You want more?"

Margot paused and shrugged before saying, "do you believe you can love someone for life, doctor?"

"Yes, I believe."

"And you're waiting. No, you're with someone. Okay, do you believe the person you're with is the person you waited for? The infamous one with a capital O."

There it was, Margot's magic moment. The woman spoke like a folklore storyteller. She was the human version of The Lion King's Rafiki. There were the cliffhangers and the moment she had one pondering on all the foundations of their existence.

Charya cleared his throat, "yeah, she's that special."

"Is she the one, though?"

The question already tormented Charaya daily. His relationship with Fay was a happy, healthy, and balanced one. He should not have a doubt, yet it subsisted.

"Yeah, she's special."

Margot didn't pick up on the word the doctor said and pursued.

"You're lucky. I thought Ck was the one, and we'd age together. I'd die before him, and he'd follow twenty years after."

"What?"

"Haven't you read the Chinese bones weight songs?"

"No, what is it?"

"In there's a form of Chinese astrological reading one can do by the weight of your bones, birth date. You calculate your weight in Liang. Half a kilo is ten Liang. Basically, you find the verse with your weight, and you can know when you'll die."

"So according to that, you know at what age you'll die."

"Yes."

Charya reflected the idea of knowing his age of death was beyond him, and he couldn't believe an educated woman like Margot trusted such prediction.

"Since I began to reflect on my existence."

Bingo thought Charya as he imagined the event as the source.

"I just wondered if I didn't mess up somewhere cos the damn thing says I will be used and my trust abused."

Charya leaned back and crossed his arms, "so basically, what your telling me is your current partner abused your trust? And that you know it because it's in a song."

There was a short pause, and suddenly Margot got up, took out what Charya assumed was a cloth, and began to wipe the plant she bought at their first appointment. Once done, she stooped down a picked the bag she brought with her that day. There she took out a bamboo stick.

"Here, everyone needs a bamboo plant."

"Margot, you were saying?" Charya prompted making abstraction of her movements.

"Mine is already three meters high."

Charya sighed, concluding the woman didn't want to resume the conversation. There was nothing else to do than play along. "You have a balcony?"

"No, it's indoors."

"Your ceiling is three meters high."

"A little higher. My apartment used to be a car garage repair. The investors made it into lofts. And we bought a unit."

"I see."

Once again, Charya noted the woman lived comfortably. She never failed to stun the doctor with her outfit prepped with designer wear, not the classics like Fay but the avant-garde creators. The area she lived in was formerly known for its ghetto passive was now the oasis of the French bobos with its lofts and duplex condos.

The woman had the material, and yet she displayed a form of aloofness.

Despite everything she possessed, Margot gave off that down-to-earth feeling of someone who valued life even though she covered up with bling-bling.

There was only one thing wrong with Margot's life, and that was her man.

Charya was convinced that the woman would be happier alone or with someone else, but it seemed it was something Margot refused to admit.

What she needed was proof she could not refute. Despite this, Charya didn't want to push. His analysis could be wrong.

The man was not sure to want to shatter the woman's foyer with his amateur assumptions. Again, he could be right in that case; he would be doing Margot a favor.

"Ms. Nzuma."

"Call me Margot."

"Ms. Nzuma."

Margot waved him away, "okay, suit yourself."

"Are you in love with someone else?"

"Ehhhhh, can you repeat?" Margot said, blinking slowly.

"I said, are you in love or attracted to someone else."

"Okay, doc, I'll tell you straight up I'm a faithful woman," Margot said while sliding her head from side to side with sass.

"Have you ever thought of leaving Ck?"

"What type of question is this?"

"Okay, you say you're a faithful woman. Is it your partner's case?"

Margot's gaze flip modes.

Charya had recently watched the last King Kong movie, and he could almost swear he woke the king of Skull Island.