a disco. They seem to be talking to me.' 'Don't look at them. It makes me nervous,' I said. 'How can I not?' he said. 'Look at my face when you talk. Not down there or I'll think you are a dirty boy' 'I am,' he said. I said to him that he was like the soles of his feet. "You are like the soles of your feet. You have dirty souls.' Then he persuaded me to take off my shirt so that he could hear them better. He wanted to pull off my bra but I wouldn't allow him to do it - - not at the kitchen table, not anywhere ever. He said that we could be more private in the bedroom and I said no. 'Come on, sweetie,' he said. I did want to kiss him-I've done that before…just that, a little. I didn't want to get caught kissing or being without a shirt and near a man. And he kept on saying, 'Come on, sweetie." So I went back there with him but only after he agreed that we would just kiss. Anyhow, in the bedroom he stripped into his underpants. I was so scared and I kept telling him, 'No, No, I don't want that. We can just kiss' but his fingers kept going up there and down there but never around me in a nice way. Then we heard the door open and I knew it was one of the Semi- independent counselors so I had to hide him in the closet. The counselor stayed for over an hour and when I opened up the closet there he was with a round wet patch on his underwear. He'd peed his underwear. I laughed and pointed at his hole." "I hope you told him that with a hole he was now the woman," Gabriele interjected. Rita began laughing so hard that she choked on her saliva. "You know, all of us have to be cautious -- not just with men and sex (both of which are confusing and should be off limits TO YOU) but everything and everybody. You have to realize that in everything people use each other even though it isn't altogether bad. Think of it this way: if they don't use each other they would have no use of them. You just need to define if that person's use in yourself is your use in him, her, them, whatever. If they are the same, a relationship can ensue. That's my idea." "Oh, you're so smart. I wish I was smart like that. Do you need to use me?" asked Rita/Lily with hopeful childish innocence. Gabriele could not think of a use for her. Simple compassion had plagued her here. She wanted to be home "Sure," she lied. "Something like that. Of course you are one of my few friendly people." She looked at her watch. "My customer will come in another hour, Lilian." Names shifted like tectonic plates. "I really should leave and put Adagio to bed." She knew that Rita was still wondering to herself why Gabriele did not teach her these German shoulder massage and acupuncture techniques so that she could have her own customers. She knew that Rita yearned for a vocation and a bit of pocket money. Rita/Lily's thoughts could be read easily from her eyes. She was so ingenuous and without guile or calculation except when men made her nervous. It was for this that Gabriele actually liked her.