"Alice, mind a late evening visit? I want to celebrate." My voice cracked. I was trying to sound cool and collected, but didn't.

"What's up?" she put on a cheery voice, although I knew she was tired from overwork. "You know I always like it when you come by, even if you are a failed artist."

She liked to remind me of my dim prospects as a writer.

"I haven't failed," I ducked. "I haven't had time to fail. Anyway, I think I found a solid job lead. Remember my friend Homer, the big wheel at the Chiropractic school? He's recommending me as their future director of data services. I'm not switching from computers to writing yet."

"Well, hot damn," but careful not to be outcompeted," she added. "Then maybe you'll be a proper manager again."

"Oh. Ouch. And what am I now?"

"Never mind. Get over here. I'll put a bottle of that white zinfandel in the frig. We can watch a movie or something."

"I like the Or-something idea," I chuckled. "It'll take me about an hour to drive. Not too late?"

"How much time have I got left," she said a little wearily. "Get over here." Alice was not one to waste an opportunity.

By Midnight, we had curled around each other and fallen asleep. Romance has circles under its eyes at our age.

Alice set her alarm to ring at an early hour without telling me. She hoped a few hours rest would conjure up some action.

Five thirty AM. Wheep. Wheep. Wheep. Her clock jerked me awake. It didn't bother Alice. She could sleep through a train wreck. I knocked down all the little bottles of hand cream, body oil, and liniment stashed in her bed's headboard. I swept my rubber arm around in the dark, feeling for that damn clock. Alice stirred. She had no compass either. Disoriented by an unusual sleeping position with me in her bed, she guessed blindly where the clock was and struck at its snooze button. Wrong way. She punched me square on the cheek, just below my eye. I groaned. In the same instant, I found the clock, wrapped my fingers around it, and dragged it, praying-mantis-like, under the covers. I couldn't turn it off. I finally snuffed it by popping the plastic back open with a fingernail thrust that degutted its batteries. Alice assumed she'd turned off the alarm when she punched me and stopped thrashing. We lay tangled in a miscellaneous position, drained by too little rest.

Exactly ten minutes later. Wheep. Wheep. Wheep. Alice had a heavy sleeper's backup alarm. The little stabs of noise startled her. She resumed thrashing, swinging for a snooze button, and belted me hard on the nose. I moaned and rolled away in unexpected pain.

"Ouch," I yelled. I was sure I'd have a bruise. I sniffed. A little wet in the left nostril made me wondered if I was bleeding on the sheets.

"She did it," I cursed to myself. "She bloodied me. I know it." I determined to suffer so I could justify an adequate revenge. No jury would convict me. I was innocent by reason of unconsciousness, disoriented by a blow in the dark.

"They'll understand," I plotted. "Knocked cold, even as I slept. Whacked by a driven woman."

I rolled toward her, but realized my scheme of delirious reprisal wouldn't work. She would know I was awake if I grabbed her. That fact alone would wipe out my defense of reflexive counter-attack.

Wheep. Wheep. Wheep. Her alarm increased its volume. Meep. Meep. Alice hit me again.

"Ow. Damnit!" I yelled.

Alice woke up enough to realize she was facing away from the other clock she'd stashed behind junk in the headboard. She stretched and nailed the snooze button with the flat of her hand. Seven more minutes of quiet bliss. In less than fifteen seconds, Alice twitched involuntarily, asleep. I lay with glue-coated eyelids, trying to dream.

Forced-air heating automatically ignited. A gust exhaled through the bedroom vent. I began to plan my excuses for staying in bed another half an hour. I didn't have to get up so early and her house was freezing. Who can do anything useful when they're shivering? Wait for things to warm up.

Wheep. Wheep. Seven minutes gone. The alarm blitzed again. "God, how time flies when you don't want to get up," I thought. I scraped the pieces of the first clock from under the sheets and shoved them into the headboard. Quickly, I pulled my arm back, sheltering from the chill. "Come on, central heating," I prayed.

Meep. Meep. Alice groaned, grabbed the backup clock and killed it. She snuggled backward into the curl of my body. I pulled the quilt up to our ears and wrapped my arm around her. I always marveled at the way we fit together perfectly.

A piece of mischief popped into my head. "I want the police," I mumbled. "I want polaroids. I'll file the pictures with my lawyer. I'm an abused boyfriend."

Without moving, she giggled, "Why?"

"I'll use `em at the trial. See the bruises?" I said in the pitch black.

"You ain't got no bruises," she laughed away from me. "And besides, it's dark as night in here. What's your story?"

"You hit me. You vicious beast. You boyfriend abuser. You hit me right in the face, my best part."

"I didn't hit you either."

"You did," I whined in a pouting voice. "You did. Right here." I pulled her hand so her fingers could feel my nose. "Careful," I said, immitating the voice of a man with a cold. "It painful."

"I didn't hit you," she laughed again.

"Yes, you did. The alarm went off and you punched me."

"I didn't hit you. I was turned around and thought you were the clock. I just turned you off."

"You sure did. I want medical attention. Call 911."

"You call `em."

"I can't call. I'm suffering." I tightened my arm around her.

She cuddled closer. "You're not suffering," she insisted and wiggled a little to tease me. "But I can make you suffer." She reached one arm behind her, grabbed my manhood, and pulled.

"Ouch! I'll take pictures. You can't bobbit me," I cried. "You'll be on TV as a boyfriend abuser. You'll write books about how innocent you are, but nobody'll believe you. You'll go right up to TV cameras and flash those baby blues, and everybody'll say, `Sure. Right. She couldn't do it. Like hell she couldn't. She beat him black and blue in his sleep.'" She yanked again. "Aww!"

"I didn't beat you up. I just turned you off," she argued flatly.

"You're doing that now! I'm just an innocent boyfriend, lying here, minding my own business sleeping when, Bam! Somebody punches me out." She yanked again. "Aww!" I unwound my embrace. She reacted with familiar remedy and covered her breasts. I pulled her on her back and uncoiled her arms. I put my hand on one breast and twisted it as if I was tuning a radio."

"Oh! Why you... I'll show you suffering," she threatened.

She rolled toward me swinging her pillow. She wallowed across me, lept off the edge of the bed, and ran toward her dresser. She found it the way a touch typist finds numbers on the top row of a keyboard. She was wide awake, completely oriented in the first tinge of morning light sneaking around the curtain edges. She removed a camera from a drawer and turned. Without my glasses, I could vaguely see her aiming.

"Show me the bruises," she yelled. "I want evidence. Show me. I'll show the world what a pampered and spoiled man you are. Go ahead. Lay there and look wounded. You lazy bastard. I'll show `em."

The room was too dim for the automatic lens to focus. She fumbled with the camera. That gave me a second. I turned away and stuck my butt out of the covers. "See that," I yelled. "Take a picture of that." Simultaneously, it occurred to me I was more than a half-century old and acting like I was sixteen. I tried to put the thought out of my mind.

"I will. I'll do it." She suddenly asked herself in a private, academic aside. "I wonder if they'll develop?"

She couldn't work the camera in the dimness, so she put it down on the dresser and returned. She jumped on me. We wrestled around in a complete free-for-all, me inside the covers and her on top. She reached under the spread with icy hands and started to tickle me.

"I'll get you. I'll get you," she hollered.

"No, no," I protested, laughing as we rolled around. "You beat me. I'll make a million dollars off the book sales alone. Every good-looking broad in America will be after me."

"The hell they will. I'll kill you first."

She raked my side with her nails and tickled harder. Then she leaned away to grab a pillow weapon. I freed one arm and came up, wrapping blankets around her. I pushed her on her back.

"Now I got you," I triumphed. "Your worst nightmare, trapped, smothered, buried, just like-dare we use the word, the horrible word-just like MARRIAGE!"

"No. NO," she play-acted. "I'll never do that again. Never! You know I don't like no more husbands. But," she paused her mock struggle and squeaked in a Marilyn Monroe mimic, "If I did, it would be you."

"My poor honey," I taunted. "My poor honey don't want no ball and chain." I switched to a prosecutor's voice, "AND is a vicious boyfriend abuser."

I come up on my knees and tore the covers away from both of us. I began to tickle her furiously. She laughed and screamed and wiggled free. She seized her pillow again and knocked me on my back. Then she fell on top of me.

"Good morning," she whispered in my ear, extending the tip of her tongue.