p style="margin: 0px; text-align: center; font-stretch: normal; font-size: 11px; line-height: normal; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue';"span style="font-weight: bold; text-decoration: underline;"And Yet…/span/p
p style="margin: 0px; font-stretch: normal; font-size: 11px; line-height: normal; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue'; min-height: 13.1px;" /p
p style="margin: 0px; font-stretch: normal; font-size: 11px; line-height: normal; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue';"Whenever he looks at her, she feels naked anyway. So what's the harm in the reality of it?/p
p style="margin: 0px; font-stretch: normal; font-size: 11px; line-height: normal; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue'; min-height: 13.1px;" /p
p style="margin: 0px; font-stretch: normal; font-size: 11px; line-height: normal; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue';"So many women she knows would do - and, really, many span style="font-style: italic;"had /spandone - unspeakable things to get into Lenny Bruce's very blue hotel room. Here she is; span style="font-style: italic;"a lucky one/span. And yet… He isn't span style="font-style: italic;"Lenny Bruce/span to her. Well, at least not at that moment. Right now, he's just Lenny. span style="font-style: italic;"No. /spanNo span style="font-style: italic;"'just'/span; that's a disservice. He's span style="font-style: italic;"Lenny/span; her mentor, her colleague, her friend. /p
p style="margin: 0px; font-stretch: normal; font-size: 11px; line-height: normal; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue'; min-height: 13.1px;" /p
p style="margin: 0px; font-stretch: normal; font-size: 11px; line-height: normal; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue';"Lenny had been there for all her big moments. The night she and Joel got engaged, who did they see perform at a burlesque joint? span style="font-style: italic;"Lenny Bruce./span The night Joel left her and she word-vomited her very first comedy set all over the audience at the Gaslight, who was there to share the back of the police car after her arrest? span style="font-style: italic;"Lenny Bruce./span Her first night of freedom, the official first night of her new reality, when she took her first hit of pot and went to her first jazz club, who did she do it with? span style="font-style: italic;"Lenny Bruce./span Who introduced her for her first really successful gig and got her foot in the door, and whose arms did she immediately run into when she'd finished? span style="font-style: italic;"Lenny Bruce/span. Her first date with Benjamin, who did she take him to see? span style="font-style: italic;"Lenny Bruce. /span/p
p style="margin: 0px; font-stretch: normal; font-size: 11px; line-height: normal; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue'; min-height: 13.2px;" /p
p style="margin: 0px; font-stretch: normal; font-size: 11px; line-height: normal; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue';"She could go on, but for the sake of her sanity, it's enough to know that he'd been there for all of it, and there'd always been the promise of a blurring of the lines. Now, here they are… Her first ever raided gig, in the middle of the biggest snowstorm that New York has ever fucking seen, the night before he plays Carnegie Hall, and who's there to steal a newspaper and offer her his jacket and get her out of the elements and into his newly painted hotel room? Lenny. span style="font-style: italic;"Goddamn./span Bruce. It's clear there's a myriad of reasons why this would be a terrible idea; in short, he's just about the most complicated fuck she could've picked. And yet…/p
p style="margin: 0px; font-stretch: normal; font-size: 11px; line-height: normal; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue'; min-height: 13.1px;" /p
p style="margin: 0px; font-stretch: normal; font-size: 11px; line-height: normal; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue';"And yet there he is, staring at her with those deep, sad, just-saw-a-puppy-being-kicked eyes of his, with such sincerity and warmth that she almost loses herself. The silence between them is heavy and thick, almost tangible, as she scrabbles around desperately for something funny to say. She draws a blank. How could there be anything funny to say with that much promise and tension swirling around them? She wants to float around in it; to swim in it until her fingers go all pruney and the metaphorical chlorine of the moment has saturated her skin. /p
p style="margin: 0px; font-stretch: normal; font-size: 11px; line-height: normal; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue'; min-height: 13.1px;" /p
p style="margin: 0px; font-stretch: normal; font-size: 11px; line-height: normal; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue';"While she holds his gaze, and her head is still in the midst of its clunky swimming pool analogy, she wonders what he looks like in swim trunks. Well, not span style="font-style: italic;"specifically/span swim trunks, but her mind plays around with whether he ever wears anything that isn't that exact slim black suit with its crumpled off-white shirt (that had probably been white once upon a time), and its matching thin black tie. Its basically his uniform now, she supposes. If a child wants to go as Lenny Bruce for Halloween, the first thing their mother would do - once she'd picked herself off the kitchen floor and stopped praying for her kid's soul - is buy a slim black suit, with a white shirt and thin black tie, and then roll up and down over it all with the car. Point is, she can't imagine him naked anymore than she could picture him in a vest and slacks, and yet naked Lenny Bruce is, right now, a very real, tangible possibility./p
p style="margin: 0px; font-stretch: normal; font-size: 11px; line-height: normal; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue'; min-height: 13.1px;" /p
p style="margin: 0px; font-stretch: normal; font-size: 11px; line-height: normal; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue';"She knows where this is heading; she's known since the second they stumbled, bedraggled and snow-covered into his hotel lobby. They've been skirting around this for a while, at least since that sticky-hot night in Florida when he'd held her a little too close while they danced and she'd promised him it would happen before he was dead. Maybe even before then, too. Perhaps they'd really been dodging this particular, very palpable attraction since the moment they met… She wonders what it says about her that she wouldn't step over the threshold of impropriety with him when he was Lenny 'just-divorced-and-living-in-a-pay-per-day-Florida-motel' Bruce, but was now actively considering it with span style="font-style: italic;"Mr. /spanLenny 'personalised-hotel-room-for-Carnegie-fucking-Hall' Bruce. Perhaps she needs him to be up on the pedestal she'd put him on before it becomes a reality? Perhaps it's an ego thing. Who knows? All she knows right now, is that he keeps fucking staring at her./p
p style="margin: 0px; font-stretch: normal; font-size: 11px; line-height: normal; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue'; min-height: 13.1px;" /p
p style="margin: 0px; font-stretch: normal; font-size: 11px; line-height: normal; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue';"The sunshine in his face when she admits to the show corset is delicious. There's something about him that always has an air of playfulness and mischief, but there have only been very few times over the course of their friendship when she has seen him actually smile. It makes her wish she'd been able to make it happen more often; the whole world should be able to enjoy Lenny Bruce's when he's happy. And yet right now, it's just for her, and she wants nothing more than to keep it that way. /p
p style="margin: 0px; font-stretch: normal; font-size: 11px; line-height: normal; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue'; min-height: 13.1px;" /p
p style="margin: 0px; font-stretch: normal; font-size: 11px; line-height: normal; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue';"On anyone else, it would've been one hell of a cheesy line. span style="font-style: italic;"Quoting her own act back at her like some sort of horny parrot./span And yet the sincerity in his eyes tells her that he really believes it. He span style="font-style: italic;"did /spanlisten to her, and for that one shimmering moment when she looks at him, she really does feel more important than God. Somehow, without really noticing, they've tiptoed over the line they've been toeing and the atmosphere has palpably shifted; it's time to make a decision. Crunch time, shit or get off the pot…or words to that effect. span style="font-style: italic;"Now or never/span./p
p style="margin: 0px; font-stretch: normal; font-size: 11px; line-height: normal; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue'; min-height: 13.1px;" /p
p style="margin: 0px; font-stretch: normal; font-size: 11px; line-height: normal; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue';"The ball's in her court though, he's seen to that. It's funny that people don't think of him as being gentlemanly; King of Obscenity, Chief Executive of Impropriety, and yet here he is leaving breathing space for her to make the choice for them. She considers her options carefully and realises there's only one obstacle, really. Unfortunately, that obstacle is span style="font-style: italic;"Eugene./span Not span style="font-style: italic;"specifically/span Eugene, of course. As if she'd ever choose that poor unfortunate over the enigmatic comedic genius in front of her; it would be like choosing an expired can of tuna over fresh caviar. Eugene is really just the form that her nagging doubt has taken in her mind because he was the first sad-sack male comedian to make the assumption that she must've already slept with Lenny for him to have bothered to introduce her set at the Gaslight. /p
p style="margin: 0px; font-stretch: normal; font-size: 11px; line-height: normal; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue'; min-height: 13.1px;" /p
p style="margin: 0px; font-stretch: normal; font-size: 11px; line-height: normal; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue';"There has always been the suggestion that she and Lenny were only friends because of the potential for sex. Perhaps it's a fair assumption, even if the context is crass and devoid of nuance. Only now she's firmly putting herself in the position of officially becoming 'the girl comic who fucked Bruce to get ahead'. The question now is whether she still cares… She decides she doesn't, but with one, very important caveat: in the fog of it all, even when they're naked and all boundaries have been resolutely demolished, he mustn't ever forget that she is very, span style="font-style: italic;"very/span funny./p
p style="margin: 0px; font-stretch: normal; font-size: 11px; line-height: normal; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue'; min-height: 13.1px;" /p
p style="margin: 0px; font-stretch: normal; font-size: 11px; line-height: normal; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue';"span style="font-style: italic;"'I will be laughing through the entire thing.'/span/p
p style="margin: 0px; font-stretch: normal; font-size: 11px; line-height: normal; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue'; min-height: 13.1px;" /p
p style="margin: 0px; font-stretch: normal; font-size: 11px; line-height: normal; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue';"It's all soft, subtle, and oh so very Lenny. She smiles as he tilts his head down towards her and kisses her gently. She barely moves, letting the moment land. It's momentous, these few seconds of engulfing silence between them; heavier than the air the night they danced, thicker with uncertainty and promise and a sense of relief that they've finally crossed the line. She feels herself relax, her arms reaching up and draping along his shoulders as she pulls him closer. It's all out of her control, and she lets herself give in to it. There's the soft crunch of a zip, and suddenly her dress is on the floor. He quips, she smiles, the dance resumes./p
p style="margin: 0px; font-stretch: normal; font-size: 11px; line-height: normal; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue'; min-height: 13.1px;" /p
p style="margin: 0px; font-stretch: normal; font-size: 11px; line-height: normal; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue';"She realises very quickly, though, that she'd made a huge miscalculation before they'd even started. Back when she was still debating with herself on whether tonight would be the night, she'd assigned him the label of 'complicated fuck'. She was wrong. It is far worse than that, because immediately - from the way he holds her, so gently, as if she is a cotton wool dream that will simply dissolve - she knows that for him, this isn't a 'fuck'. She doesn't know exactly what they are to each other after this. Certainly not a relationship, maybe not a one-night-only arrangement either, but one thing is absolutely crystal clear in her mind as his lips meets hers with a tenderness she isn't quite expecting from him: he is going to make love to her. /p
p style="margin: 0px; font-stretch: normal; font-size: 11px; line-height: normal; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue'; min-height: 13.1px;" /p
p style="margin: 0px; font-stretch: normal; font-size: 11px; line-height: normal; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue';"For a second, she thinks about the state of her hair, all disheveled and damp from the blizzard, but almost immediately dismisses it when she remembers who she's with. Joel (and even to some extent, Benjamin) was always treated to the fantasy of her; the perfectly coiffed curls, the makeup that would make a china doll jealous, the 'nice Jewish girl' mouth that, when it came down to it, would say anything and everything he'd wanted to hear, even if it would've made a French whore blush. But this…? This is span style="font-style: italic;"Lenny/span, the man who's heard and seen it all. He already knows she swears like a sailor on leave on a good day, he's seen her slinging dick jokes with the best of them and never missing a beat. He knows she's no lady, no perfect, prissy little fantasy and what's more, he span style="font-style: italic;"prefers/span that. He's an observer of the human condition and she - perfectly imperfect Midge Maisel - is more important than God to him, even if her hair span style="font-style: italic;"does/span look like shit./p
p style="margin: 0px; font-stretch: normal; font-size: 11px; line-height: normal; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue'; min-height: 13.1px;" /p
p style="margin: 0px; font-stretch: normal; font-size: 11px; line-height: normal; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue';"He kisses her like she's fragile. No, not span style="font-style: italic;"fragile/span, that's the wrong word…it's not like he thinks he might shatter her if he holds her too tightly, it's as though he wants to feel everything so intensely. He kisses. Her like she's span style="font-style: italic;"precious./span Something to be admired, held to the light. It's glorious./p
p style="margin: 0px; font-stretch: normal; font-size: 11px; line-height: normal; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue'; min-height: 13.1px;" /p
p style="margin: 0px; font-stretch: normal; font-size: 11px; line-height: normal; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue';"When his body finally - blissfully - sinks into hers, though, she finds she's impatient at him taking his goddamn time with her; wanting his movements to match the passionate heat within his kisses. And yet…when he rolls his hips so languidly over her, savouring every second inside her body, she forgets why she ever wanted anyone to rush. He stops for just a second, holding himself above her with a level of self control that is honestly enviable./p
p style="margin: 0px; font-stretch: normal; font-size: 11px; line-height: normal; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue'; min-height: 13.1px;" /p
p style="margin: 0px; font-stretch: normal; font-size: 11px; line-height: normal; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue';"span style="font-style: italic;"'I lied. I'm only gonna laugh at the end.'/span/p
p style="margin: 0px; font-stretch: normal; font-size: 11px; line-height: normal; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue'; min-height: 13.2px;" /p
p style="margin: 0px; font-stretch: normal; font-size: 11px; line-height: normal; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue';"If she'd been in control of herself in that moment, she might've quipped back. As it is, the last thing she wants him to do right now is talk, so she pulls him breathlessly back towards her. It's only in the last second before their lips meet again that she sees it in his eyes…/p
p style="margin: 0px; font-stretch: normal; font-size: 11px; line-height: normal; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue'; min-height: 13.1px;" /p
p style="margin: 0px; font-stretch: normal; font-size: 11px; line-height: normal; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue';"She's never considered him to be breakable before. He'd always seemed so solid, so sure of himself and the world around him, even when he'd been slumped on the pavement drunk out of his mind. And yet… And yet here he is, span style="font-style: italic;"vulnerable./span At this proximity - wrapped up in his arms as they move together, him inside her, her engulfing him - she can look at him. span style="font-style: italic;"Really, truly look at him. /spanHis eyes tell her everything she might've ever wanted to know. All the ways he'd lied to her before when he'd brushed off her soft rejections as not mattering, all the ways he thought of her; as his friend, as his equal, as a dream that he might wake up from soon, and then how the reality of her naked has somehow surpassed the imaginings of his very talented, creative brain. His eyes also tell her that regardless of what this is - whether it's a one time, never to be spoken of event, or whether it becomes something they span style="font-style: italic;"do /spantogether, like drinking or bantering - he loves her. He's span style="font-style: italic;"in/span love with her. span style="font-style: italic;"Completely/span. In ways she has never experienced before. And it makes him incredibly, dangerously fragile./p
p style="margin: 0px; font-stretch: normal; font-size: 11px; line-height: normal; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue'; min-height: 13.1px;" /p
p style="margin: 0px; font-stretch: normal; font-size: 11px; line-height: normal; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue';"And yet… And yet despite it all, despite their circumstances, despite all the ways this could go horribly wrong for them both, she would give anything - even the feeling of standing on a stage in front of a packed audience with a like-minded sense of humour - to have him look at her like that, with that raw, honest vulnerability for the rest of her goddamn life. /p
p style="margin: 0px; font-stretch: normal; font-size: 11px; line-height: normal; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue'; min-height: 13.1px;" /p
p style="margin: 0px; font-stretch: normal; font-size: 11px; line-height: normal; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue';"Whenever he looks at her, she feels naked anyway. So what's the harm in the reality of it?/p
p style="margin: 0px; font-stretch: normal; font-size: 11px; line-height: normal; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue'; min-height: 13.1px;" /p
p style="margin: 0px; font-stretch: normal; font-size: 11px; line-height: normal; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue';"So many women she knows would do - and, really, many span style="font-style: italic;"had /spandone - unspeakable things to get into Lenny Bruce's very blue hotel room. Here she is; span style="font-style: italic;"a lucky one/span. And yet… He isn't span style="font-style: italic;"Lenny Bruce/span to her. Well, at least not at that moment. Right now, he's just Lenny. span style="font-style: italic;"No. /spanNo span style="font-style: italic;"'just'/span; that's a disservice. He's span style="font-style: italic;"Lenny/span; her mentor, her colleague, her friend. /p
p style="margin: 0px; font-stretch: normal; font-size: 11px; line-height: normal; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue'; min-height: 13.1px;" /p
p style="margin: 0px; font-stretch: normal; font-size: 11px; line-height: normal; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue';"Lenny had been there for all her big moments. The night she and Joel got engaged, who did they see perform at a burlesque joint? span style="font-style: italic;"Lenny Bruce./span The night Joel left her and she word-vomited her very first comedy set all over the audience at the Gaslight, who was there to share the back of the police car after her arrest? span style="font-style: italic;"Lenny Bruce./span Her first night of freedom, the official first night of her new reality, when she took her first hit of pot and went to her first jazz club, who did she do it with? span style="font-style: italic;"Lenny Bruce./span Who introduced her for her first really successful gig and got her foot in the door, and whose arms did she immediately run into when she'd finished? span style="font-style: italic;"Lenny Bruce/span. Her first date with Benjamin, who did she take him to see? span style="font-style: italic;"Lenny Bruce. /span/p
p style="margin: 0px; font-stretch: normal; font-size: 11px; line-height: normal; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue'; min-height: 13.2px;" /p
p style="margin: 0px; font-stretch: normal; font-size: 11px; line-height: normal; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue';"She could go on, but for the sake of her sanity, it's enough to know that he'd been there for all of it, and there'd always been the promise of a blurring of the lines. Now, here they are… Her first ever raided gig, in the middle of the biggest snowstorm that New York has ever fucking seen, the night before he plays Carnegie Hall, and who's there to steal a newspaper and offer her his jacket and get her out of the elements and into his newly painted hotel room? Lenny. span style="font-style: italic;"Goddamn./span Bruce. It's clear there's a myriad of reasons why this would be a terrible idea; in short, he's just about the most complicated fuck she could've picked. And yet…/p
p style="margin: 0px; font-stretch: normal; font-size: 11px; line-height: normal; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue'; min-height: 13.1px;" /p
p style="margin: 0px; font-stretch: normal; font-size: 11px; line-height: normal; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue';"And yet there he is, staring at her with those deep, sad, just-saw-a-puppy-being-kicked eyes of his, with such sincerity and warmth that she almost loses herself. The silence between them is heavy and thick, almost tangible, as she scrabbles around desperately for something funny to say. She draws a blank. How could there be anything funny to say with that much promise and tension swirling around them? She wants to float around in it; to swim in it until her fingers go all pruney and the metaphorical chlorine of the moment has saturated her skin. /p
p style="margin: 0px; font-stretch: normal; font-size: 11px; line-height: normal; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue'; min-height: 13.1px;" /p
p style="margin: 0px; font-stretch: normal; font-size: 11px; line-height: normal; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue';"While she holds his gaze, and her head is still in the midst of its clunky swimming pool analogy, she wonders what he looks like in swim trunks. Well, not span style="font-style: italic;"specifically/span swim trunks, but her mind plays around with whether he ever wears anything that isn't that exact slim black suit with its crumpled off-white shirt (that had probably been white once upon a time), and its matching thin black tie. Its basically his uniform now, she supposes. If a child wants to go as Lenny Bruce for Halloween, the first thing their mother would do - once she'd picked herself off the kitchen floor and stopped praying for her kid's soul - is buy a slim black suit, with a white shirt and thin black tie, and then roll up and down over it all with the car. Point is, she can't imagine him naked anymore than she could picture him in a vest and slacks, and yet naked Lenny Bruce is, right now, a very real, tangible possibility./p
p style="margin: 0px; font-stretch: normal; font-size: 11px; line-height: normal; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue'; min-height: 13.1px;" /p
p style="margin: 0px; font-stretch: normal; font-size: 11px; line-height: normal; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue';"She knows where this is heading; she's known since the second they stumbled, bedraggled and snow-covered into his hotel lobby. They've been skirting around this for a while, at least since that sticky-hot night in Florida when he'd held her a little too close while they danced and she'd promised him it would happen before he was dead. Maybe even before then, too. Perhaps they'd really been dodging this particular, very palpable attraction since the moment they met… She wonders what it says about her that she wouldn't step over the threshold of impropriety with him when he was Lenny 'just-divorced-and-living-in-a-pay-per-day-Florida-motel' Bruce, but was now actively considering it with span style="font-style: italic;"Mr. /spanLenny 'personalised-hotel-room-for-Carnegie-fucking-Hall' Bruce. Perhaps she needs him to be up on the pedestal she'd put him on before it becomes a reality? Perhaps it's an ego thing. Who knows? All she knows right now, is that he keeps fucking staring at her./p
p style="margin: 0px; font-stretch: normal; font-size: 11px; line-height: normal; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue'; min-height: 13.1px;" /p
p style="margin: 0px; font-stretch: normal; font-size: 11px; line-height: normal; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue';"The sunshine in his face when she admits to the show corset is delicious. There's something about him that always has an air of playfulness and mischief, but there have only been very few times over the course of their friendship when she has seen him actually smile. It makes her wish she'd been able to make it happen more often; the whole world should be able to enjoy Lenny Bruce's when he's happy. And yet right now, it's just for her, and she wants nothing more than to keep it that way. /p
p style="margin: 0px; font-stretch: normal; font-size: 11px; line-height: normal; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue'; min-height: 13.1px;" /p
p style="margin: 0px; font-stretch: normal; font-size: 11px; line-height: normal; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue';"On anyone else, it would've been one hell of a cheesy line. span style="font-style: italic;"Quoting her own act back at her like some sort of horny parrot./span And yet the sincerity in his eyes tells her that he really believes it. He span style="font-style: italic;"did /spanlisten to her, and for that one shimmering moment when she looks at him, she really does feel more important than God. Somehow, without really noticing, they've tiptoed over the line they've been toeing and the atmosphere has palpably shifted; it's time to make a decision. Crunch time, shit or get off the pot…or words to that effect. span style="font-style: italic;"Now or never/span./p
p style="margin: 0px; font-stretch: normal; font-size: 11px; line-height: normal; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue'; min-height: 13.1px;" /p
p style="margin: 0px; font-stretch: normal; font-size: 11px; line-height: normal; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue';"The ball's in her court though, he's seen to that. It's funny that people don't think of him as being gentlemanly; King of Obscenity, Chief Executive of Impropriety, and yet here he is leaving breathing space for her to make the choice for them. She considers her options carefully and realises there's only one obstacle, really. Unfortunately, that obstacle is span style="font-style: italic;"Eugene./span Not span style="font-style: italic;"specifically/span Eugene, of course. As if she'd ever choose that poor unfortunate over the enigmatic comedic genius in front of her; it would be like choosing an expired can of tuna over fresh caviar. Eugene is really just the form that her nagging doubt has taken in her mind because he was the first sad-sack male comedian to make the assumption that she must've already slept with Lenny for him to have bothered to introduce her set at the Gaslight. /p
p style="margin: 0px; font-stretch: normal; font-size: 11px; line-height: normal; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue'; min-height: 13.1px;" /p
p style="margin: 0px; font-stretch: normal; font-size: 11px; line-height: normal; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue';"There has always been the suggestion that she and Lenny were only friends because of the potential for sex. Perhaps it's a fair assumption, even if the context is crass and devoid of nuance. Only now she's firmly putting herself in the position of officially becoming 'the girl comic who fucked Bruce to get ahead'. The question now is whether she still cares… She decides she doesn't, but with one, very important caveat: in the fog of it all, even when they're naked and all boundaries have been resolutely demolished, he mustn't ever forget that she is very, span style="font-style: italic;"very/span funny./p
p style="margin: 0px; font-stretch: normal; font-size: 11px; line-height: normal; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue'; min-height: 13.1px;" /p
p style="margin: 0px; font-stretch: normal; font-size: 11px; line-height: normal; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue';"span style="font-style: italic;"'I will be laughing through the entire thing.'/span/p
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p style="margin: 0px; font-stretch: normal; font-size: 11px; line-height: normal; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue';"It's all soft, subtle, and oh so very Lenny. She smiles as he tilts his head down towards her and kisses her gently. She barely moves, letting the moment land. It's momentous, these few seconds of engulfing silence between them; heavier than the air the night they danced, thicker with uncertainty and promise and a sense of relief that they've finally crossed the line. She feels herself relax, her arms reaching up and draping along his shoulders as she pulls him closer. It's all out of her control, and she lets herself give in to it. There's the soft crunch of a zip, and suddenly her dress is on the floor. He quips, she smiles, the dance resumes./p
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p style="margin: 0px; font-stretch: normal; font-size: 11px; line-height: normal; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue';"She realises very quickly, though, that she'd made a huge miscalculation before they'd even started. Back when she was still debating with herself on whether tonight would be the night, she'd assigned him the label of 'complicated fuck'. She was wrong. It is far worse than that, because immediately - from the way he holds her, so gently, as if she is a cotton wool dream that will simply dissolve - she knows that for him, this isn't a 'fuck'. She doesn't know exactly what they are to each other after this. Certainly not a relationship, maybe not a one-night-only arrangement either, but one thing is absolutely crystal clear in her mind as his lips meets hers with a tenderness she isn't quite expecting from him: he is going to make love to her. /p
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p style="margin: 0px; font-stretch: normal; font-size: 11px; line-height: normal; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue';"For a second, she thinks about the state of her hair, all disheveled and damp from the blizzard, but almost immediately dismisses it when she remembers who she's with. Joel (and even to some extent, Benjamin) was always treated to the fantasy of her; the perfectly coiffed curls, the makeup that would make a china doll jealous, the 'nice Jewish girl' mouth that, when it came down to it, would say anything and everything he'd wanted to hear, even if it would've made a French whore blush. But this…? This is span style="font-style: italic;"Lenny/span, the man who's heard and seen it all. He already knows she swears like a sailor on leave on a good day, he's seen her slinging dick jokes with the best of them and never missing a beat. He knows she's no lady, no perfect, prissy little fantasy and what's more, he span style="font-style: italic;"prefers/span that. He's an observer of the human condition and she - perfectly imperfect Midge Maisel - is more important than God to him, even if her hair span style="font-style: italic;"does/span look like shit./p
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p style="margin: 0px; font-stretch: normal; font-size: 11px; line-height: normal; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue';"He kisses her like she's fragile. No, not span style="font-style: italic;"fragile/span, that's the wrong word…it's not like he thinks he might shatter her if he holds her too tightly, it's as though he wants to feel everything so intensely. He kisses. Her like she's span style="font-style: italic;"precious./span Something to be admired, held to the light. It's glorious./p
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p style="margin: 0px; font-stretch: normal; font-size: 11px; line-height: normal; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue';"When his body finally - blissfully - sinks into hers, though, she finds she's impatient at him taking his goddamn time with her; wanting his movements to match the passionate heat within his kisses. And yet…when he rolls his hips so languidly over her, savouring every second inside her body, she forgets why she ever wanted anyone to rush. He stops for just a second, holding himself above her with a level of self control that is honestly enviable./p
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p style="margin: 0px; font-stretch: normal; font-size: 11px; line-height: normal; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue';"span style="font-style: italic;"'I lied. I'm only gonna laugh at the end.'/span/p
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p style="margin: 0px; font-stretch: normal; font-size: 11px; line-height: normal; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue';"If she'd been in control of herself in that moment, she might've quipped back. As it is, the last thing she wants him to do right now is talk, so she pulls him breathlessly back towards her. It's only in the last second before their lips meet again that she sees it in his eyes…/p
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p style="margin: 0px; font-stretch: normal; font-size: 11px; line-height: normal; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue';"She's never considered him to be breakable before. He'd always seemed so solid, so sure of himself and the world around him, even when he'd been slumped on the pavement drunk out of his mind. And yet… And yet here he is, span style="font-style: italic;"vulnerable./span At this proximity - wrapped up in his arms as they move together, him inside her, her engulfing him - she can look at him. span style="font-style: italic;"Really, truly look at him. /spanHis eyes tell her everything she might've ever wanted to know. All the ways he'd lied to her before when he'd brushed off her soft rejections as not mattering, all the ways he thought of her; as his friend, as his equal, as a dream that he might wake up from soon, and then how the reality of her naked has somehow surpassed the imaginings of his very talented, creative brain. His eyes also tell her that regardless of what this is - whether it's a one time, never to be spoken of event, or whether it becomes something they span style="font-style: italic;"do /spantogether, like drinking or bantering - he loves her. He's span style="font-style: italic;"in/span love with her. span style="font-style: italic;"Completely/span. In ways she has never experienced before. And it makes him incredibly, dangerously fragile./p
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p style="margin: 0px; font-stretch: normal; font-size: 11px; line-height: normal; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue';"And yet… And yet despite it all, despite their circumstances, despite all the ways this could go horribly wrong for them both, she would give anything - even the feeling of standing on a stage in front of a packed audience with a like-minded sense of humour - to have him look at her like that, with that raw, honest vulnerability for the rest of her goddamn life. /p
