He produced a rope of fake pearls. They cinched them under her breasts, coiled them around her neck.

Marie said: “This seems wrong, though. I don’t like being tied.”

Eugene agreed, and they never used the pearls around neck or over her wrists, or around her ankles again.

***

. . .Eugene barely hears the phone ring. But it rings. On the roof, Eugene is laying down sod. He lays it over the shingles. He has a bucket of worms. He lays down the sod and sprinkles it with worms.