It would go another hour, with Valerie’s back savaged, before someone would find them and stop her.When Francine had come to her senses and seen wha...t she’d done, she ran to the kitchen and sliced her wrists, unable to bear the betrayal she’d committed. It had been Valerie, bleeding herself, and suffering untold agony, who had knelt on Francine’s wrists to stop the bleeding and saving Francine’s life. Both had been outed as sadomasochists and Valerie had lost her job. Through it all, Val had. The conversation wrapped its way around a variety oftopics and we were all engrossed with each other's company. As we movedon to dessert, Richard suggested we move into his media room and that hewould pour us all a nice after-dinner Scotch. Richard returned with threesingle malts on the rocks and he sat between Sarah and myself on hisleather couch. He found some movie on cable and we settled in. Withinminutes of sitting down Richard was leaning over to nibble on Sarah'sneck. And then with what. "What, a mammogram?" Yeah. Weren't you telling Barb and I last week that you've been puttingit off? Now's your chance."Turner's expression hardens. The last thing he needed was some bitchpoking around his tits, touching them, squeezing them, scrutinizing them,and possibly finding his surgical scars and figuring out that they'reimplants. He also recalled how much Angela hated getting breast-screenedand he wasn't eager to go through what she did. And he was worried themachine might bust his. He was in the back office at a desk and reading something. Maybe he had forgotten about me…I walked into his office and stood there…the light was behind me and I wondered if Mr. Emerson could see the outline of my body through my dress. Finally, he looked up…saw me…smiled, said: “Oh yes Sherry…I almost forgot. Come in and close the door. I closed the door and walked to his little desk. We were alone and I wondered about it all. “Let’s talk,” he said, “about poetry and why we study it…how.