It's a Tuesday evening in the middle of Dark Mofo, Hobart's art festival of sex and death.
I'm at an impossibly hip bistro for dinner. It's tiny and beautiful and the service is faultless, though the food is not as good as they think it is. The table barely fits me and my toy, wedged between a coat rack and the bar.
The waitress is young and curly-haired with a septum ring and Blundstones. Her forearms are covered in fine golden hair a shade lighter than her skin. I wonder if her armpit hair is the same beautiful shade, and suddenly I see it in damp ringlets, see her on her back, arms stretched above her head, naked, lying next to me...
"Can I get you a drink to start?"
My toy is not permitted to speak.
"I'll have a Camapari and soda, and have you got a rosé or an interesting white for him?" I nod my head in my toy's direction.
"You know I have something very interesting open tonight that might fit the bill" she says, reaching for a bottle on the bar behind my toy.
"Let me give you a taste of this. It is an orange wine from WA." She pours a generous mouthful into the glass in front of my toy. I wave away her offer to pour a taste into my glass, and pick up the glass in front of my toy.
The wine is a deep, sunset orange.
"What an extraordinary colour." I swirl the wine in the glass and bring it to my nose to smell.
The waitress begins to explain the maceration process used by the wine maker. I lift the glass to my lips and tip the generous tasting pour into my mouth, my eyes on her. She explains how the winemaker uses Gewurtztraminer and Shiraz grapes separately fermented on skins, and then mixed. I nod, suck air through my teeth to aerate the wine and swish it around my mouth.
I drop my eyes to My toy. His head is bowed, enough to show defence but not enough to draw attention. He's watching me, alert, intent.
I spit the wine back into the glass neatly and place it on the table. My toy flinches as if he's been pinched, then his cheeks flush the same colour as the wine. The waitress is silent, I feel her eyes on me. The wine swirls, cloudy, bubbly with salivary protein. I exhale with satisfaction and look up at her.
"That is delicious, excellent suggestion. He'll love it." I slide the glass towards to her. She hesitates for a moment, then pours a full pour into the glass. She looks at my toy and smiles, then turns her head to me.
