Bad Behavior: Stories

by Mary Gaitskill

Everybody has their sadness. And most people are scared of it.

“You don’t love women. You’re just trying to live out some kind of porno fantasy invented by men with the corniest props you can find,” a gay woman had told her.

“You like everything.” “I’m ready to like things.

They stood linked by a delicate membrane of remembered intimacy.

She was not particularly pretty, but her alert, candid gaze and visible intelligence made her more attractive than most pretty girls.

Lily almost never giggled; it was a strangely unpleasant sound.

They lay there in silence, not even scratching or shifting. Every time one of them swallowed, it was obvious that she was trying to do it quietly.

“She still lives like a hippie, though. I don’t think she misses the big ranch they had at all. She certainly doesn’t miss John. The only time she’s ever mentioned him was to say that she was always surprised at how stupid he turned out to be. It’s weird. It’s like it never happened.”