Rhinos

A short story

Of all the factors that tamed the American west, the most important was women. If a man had a woman demanding to be kept in a certain lifestyle, it became natural to forego whiskey and gun-slinging. Clinging onto a humdrum existence went from a defeat to a victory.

Lari learned a lot being married to a history teacher.

The night he took her to Barry’s Brazilian Barbecue ahead of their official attempt at becoming parents, she lectured him on how generations to come would talk about the early twenty-first century as a time when China’s one-child policy and preference for male babies led to a gender imbalance and a dangerous number of unmarried males. Lari turned the conversation back onto their bet, a bet that would serve to lubricate their mutual lust.

“Get ready to lose,” Su Tang said, taking a photo of the waiter who, wearing a cowboy hat, plonked down their beers. “Are you looking forward to doing your striptease for me?”