In both how she conceived Nathaniel and how she had auspiciously gained the other two she had to applaud the unconventional way it all came about. It was much better than boy meets girl, boy and girl hunger for each other, boy and girl claim each other to have something solid in a world of passing shadows, boy and girl in part briefly dream up a romance for themselves to escape their solitary enclosures, and boy and girl in part become victims of a delusive mist the making of one's selfish genes which say, "Mortals, reproduce so that we, the genes may go on in perpetuity." As Nathaniel blew out the candles, Michael began to cut the cake. He did so within the last remnant of light within dusk while obtruding a cloud of cigar smoke into the room. Cigar smoke and clouds of it over her food was especially loathsome to Gabriele; and yet she didn't say anything. She bit her tongue and ruminated on what this thing called a relationship was. Her higher authority said, "It is an intangible bridge of one person to another that seems more real than the people who make up the relationship. It is keeping one's opinions concerning a man's nasty habits in shackles." "Fire! Something burns in the kitchen," said Hispanic Betty as she returned into the darkness of the dining room after going to the bathroom. She had a handkerchief half wadded up in her hands but bits of it still fluttered in her gestures. "No, he's puffing on an old man's turd." Gabriele's wanton words galloped away like a wild stallion. "Gabriele, why don't you try to be a little more crude if you can," Michael interjected. "Betty, hit the lights if you will." "Turn?" Betty saw the cigar as she turned on the lights. "Turd. Oh!" She realized that which was spoken about was "turd" and not "turn." "Sorry, Hispanic Betty," said Gabriele. "Nathaniel didn't want to wait for you. He had to blow out the candles immediately so that he could inhale his cake." "I waited ten minutes, Betty. How long does it take to piss, anyhow?" "Adagio, women don't just lift the lid and spray. There is delicacy in it." Gabriele hoped to break him of his misconception. "Well, she doesn't make a trickle. I think she puts TP in there to clog up what she thinks is bad sound because I don't hear nothing and we're always running out of toilet paper." Gabriele laughed. "Double negatives are for Spanish, dear heart." Michael said, "My mother would have taken dish soap and washed my mouth out with it if I had said something like that." "Would have?" Gabriele laughed derisively. "Either she did or didn't. If she didn't clean your mouth you wouldn't know that she was a profanity policewoman ready to strike you with her bottle of Ivory dish soap. Am I right? To say 'Would' you would need to know about her doing it so that's proof of you saying something wrong to provoke her to do that outrageous action. What did you do?" "All right, Smarty. Once—just once and I learned my lesson; and no, I'm not telling it."