I was just about to shrug all this off when I felt someone, or something, burning a dildo-shaped hole in my back. Slowly, I turned around and saw him. His little tag said: “Joey.” Joey! Medium-sized, gray jelly, on the droopy side, but still happy to see me. Only half aroused, but hey, I like a challenge. No fancy attachments, nothing glowing, no flashing lights, no built-in wi-fi. Just: the guy, or I should say: the guy part of the guy. He hung out on the far side of the shelf, just chillin’, while the others tried to crowd him out and kept up the tease with me.
“Look at me!” the ben wa balls called.
“Don’t listen to them,” a giant black dildo purred. “You know I got it goin’ on.”
“Hey, hot stuff!” a painful looking contraption cooed. “Come on over here…I’ll make you forget your own name…”
But they were all wrong. It was as if only Joey and I were in the room; everything else had gone blurry. Nothing else mattered. We shared…something. A smile, a laugh. A connection. And yet, I did nothing (fool!) except follow Sara around like a helpless puppy as she shopped, a vagina-shaped basket draped carelessly over one arm. As she tallied up her wares and we turned toward the exit I glanced back at Joey. My heart ached as I watched a scrawny goth girl pick him up, flop him around a bit, giggle, and finally put him back down on his…head. How humiliating, I thought. Kids can be so cruel!
Months went by. Seasons changed. The sandals went in storage and the warm woollies came out, still; I couldn’t get Joey out of my mind. Was he still sitting there on the shelf, his tender underparts gathering dust as his brothers were snatched up and put to good use? I felt his loneliness, his despair, his ennui.
One snowy afternoon as I was flipping through the local paper I saw the notice: “Close-Out Sale! The Grand Opening, an adult ‘novelty’ store for women in
