Lolita. He was reading Lolita. The utter perversions of Humbert Humbert; questioning his own. Confessions of a white widowed male indeed. Page after page of lust. When would his stop?

Married. He did all that was required. Trash taken out each night after dinner. The car maintained. A garden tilled in the spring. Leaves raked in autumn. It was a miserable life.

From his office downtown he’d watch with a gleam in his eye as young girls walked up and down Main Street in plaid skirts hiked above the thigh. He’d shuffle through papers; pretending. His whole life was pretend. The graying man with the slight paunch was bored by anything but. What a bore his life had become. If his wife brought coffee one more time after dinner he would leave. He swore to this. Where was his beer, or, gin and tonic? Put away long ago.

And where were the frills and ecstasy in making love to his wife? They hadn’t touched in years. Still, he watched the girls. He watched the girls.

How enchanting it would be to introduce himself to one of them, he thought. Oh how they’d laugh, he whispered. A fat middle aged man like me. Then again, everyone laughs at me, he cried. That’s what you get when you give up.

Tonight he would tell her. Say it to her. I am done with this. He thought these thoughts to be sober and of good intention. He wanted to be drunk on life.

But, he had no courage. Sat at dinner at six, trash was taken out at seven, and evening decaf served in the den. He watched television and dozed off and on while she knitted. He dreamt of girls in see through white tops and patent black leather shoes. He dreamt of whiskey on a veranda. He dreamt of Humbert Humbert, his hero.