Things were going normally after a fashion. Taught a class, failed a number theory test, won a submission fighting tournament. A normal week in the life.

Then I got a phone call from my buddy Jeff. Jeff happens to be a gengineer, which makes him the most interesting of my employed friends. He takes bits of cellular DNA, transfers it to new creatures via a vector virus and watches curious things happen.

He works on company stuff, some biotech R and D thing that I always forget the name of, trying to find some gene that will apples stay good on the shelf for fifteen years or something. But in his spare time, he studies a different kind of chemistry.

Now maybe you heard of the study about the mating habits of voles and how it relates to people, and of course maybe you haven’t. I’ll sum up for those who don’t read the best of science writing collections at the end of the year. The vole has mating habits a lot like ours, mostly monogamous, lots of affairs.

A vole will be in a contented domestic relationship, meet an unpaired wild vole, and before you know it, mad vole love ensues. The vole leaves and the female vole returns to its domestic bliss, the cuckolded vole none the wiser.

Now, before you get bored and start snoring the way I would if someone was lecturing me about vole’s let me get to the interesting bit. Vole’s have a certain hormone, largely present and active in human beings. Higher levels of this hormone increase the speed of the mating process, meaning the bored housewife may or may not cheat. The bored vole lady dosed with this hormone, cheats and cheats fast. Interested yet?

Of course this is meaningless, no one has a way to check how this works on human girls, there’d have to be studies, and the FDA would be all over the research scientists like a Rove on CIA outings.

All of which brings me back to Jeff. I asked him what he thought of the study when I read about it. He read the more erudite versions in the Science Journals and it got him thinking. So in a homemade lab, he’s been raising voles and vectoring viruses and seeing how much he can fuck with what Lady Nature intended.

But he’s got ethics. So do I of course, but mine tend to be a bit more bendy than his.

“Did you understand anything I’ve just tried to explain to you?”

“Yeah, sure. All the bits where I was awake.” That didn’t help calm him down at all.

“You’ve got the attention span of a second tier chimp.”

“Is that good?”

“No.”

“Damn. Come on, what’s the progress. Without the science speak.”

“Fine. In layman’s terms, I’ve been analyzing what makes the lady vole’s cheat. And I’ve been trying to apply that to relationship dynamics in humans.”

“Veering into science speak.”

“Don’t play dumb, I know you understand.”

“Understand yes. Eyes glazing over? Also yes.”

“Fine. You know the whole idea, women respond to being treated badly.”

“Yeah, try and be nice and you’re screwed. And not in that good way.”

“Well, according to my studies, scientifically I mean. Personal experience matches your observations exactly.”

Let me interrupt and explain for a moment. Jeff is a good guy but about 350 pounds. The man is large and only in somewhat decent shape. So many of the ladies ignore, disdain or just use him in between guys they’re actually interested in. He’d be bitter but instead throws himself into his work. And only occasionally beats the hell out of guys for having better luck than him, which makes him a better man than I.

“So what’s that all lead to Gunga Din?”

“It means that I don’t think they do respond to being treated badly by men, they respond to the men who treat them badly.”

“Run that by me one more time.”

“Sure. What if the chemistry of men who treat women badly is subtly different, a faint pheromone that some girls respond to, hard wired almost. It’s not the behaviour, it’s the kind of guy who phenotypically exhibits that behaviour.”

“Well how the hell are we going to test that.”

“Ah hah, that’s where you come in. We’re going on a science field trip.” So that’s how I got talked into going to County to collect sweat samples and urine samples from convicted domestic violence felons. Let’s just say it was the worst Sunday ever and leave it at that.

So Jeff studied the samples, compared it to our own, and lo and behold he found something. He then dived into his research and I didn’t hear from him for weeks.

My life went on. Collected three slaps and a kiss on a night out at a club, got my ass kicked in training at the studio and spent a weekend doing nothing but trying to understand Fermat’s little theorem. Still didn’t.

Jeff called me. “Get over here.”

“Fuck off. I don’t like peremptory tones.”

“Get the fuck over here please.”

“That’s better.”

I hopped in the decrepit old van and cruised over.

“Whachya got?”

“I have the elixir of life! Or doom. One or the other.” And he gave an evil laugh.

“Have you left your apartment recently?”

“Just to go to work. Why?”

“Less social skills than usual.”

“I don’t care. I have transcended social skills.” He gave another evil laugh. Don’t get me wrong, it wasn’t like he was changed into a mad scientist or corrupted by power. He just gets like this when he’s excited and hasn’t had company for awhile.

“Chill Jeff. What’s the excitement about?”

“Well I’ve found support for my hypothesis. The chemistry of abusive men is slightly different than yours and mine. And female vole’s respond to it. A vole previously ignored by females, doused with the chemical scent is suddenly, well not ignored.”

“Good for him. What’s that mean for us?”

“Well potentially, we a. might never spend the night alone again and b. I might make a zillion dollars.”

“Don’t you mean we?”

“We hell, I’ve done the work, all you did was collect sweat and urine.”

“For which I deserve millions at least.”

“Well, we can’t sell it yet. It has to be tested, and I’m not mentioning it to any company until we’ve got a finished product. The corps will fuck you.”

“Faster than a necro can fuck a corpse?”

“Exactly” he agreed.

“So let’s test it.”

“No way. You’re going to test it. I’ll observe.” “Fucking voyeur.”

“Scientific, impartial observer.”

“That’s what I said.”

“Fine. So what will happen is, we’re going to go to a club, you’ll approach a girl at the bar that you would never have a chance with…”

“How we going to determine that?”

“She’ll be female.”

“Fucker.”

“Now, you’ll approach her after spraying yourself with this” he handed me a cologne bottle “and I’ll record the results. And if she slaps you the way we would expect her to, then we’re back to the drawing board. If she actually talks to you for a few minutes we’ll know we’re on to something.”

“And you’ll be voyeruizing the entire time.”

“And enjoying your humiliation, absolutely.”

“If she goes home with me, it doesn’t prove anything.”

“Of course not” he agreed. But I think he was hiding a grin beneath his beard.

We got to the club, parked and paid our way in. The joint was packed full of the hipper than thou. We probably stood out like a pair of sore thumbs.

Our jeans were bought at Target and not Rhodeo Drive or Melrose Place. Oh fucking well I thought to myself. That’s what happens when you drive to L.A.

I voiced my thoughts to Jeff who was eyeing the bar.

“Check her out” he said and nudged me with an elbow like a croquet mallet.

I did and she was worth checking out. Mid twenties and busting out all over. Black cocktail dress that clung to what needs clinging, pale skin, gorgeous black hair and stiletto fuck me heels.

“aaaahhh” I drooled cleverly.

The croquet mallet dug me in the ribs again. “Go scent up and talk to her.” And as an afterthought “and close your mouth. You can’t get anywhere with your tongue hanging out unless you’re Michael Jordan.”

This is where Jeff really needed me. He’s too shy to approach a girl like that, even just to test a hypothesis. I’m as shy as the next guy, as long as the next guy isn’t Jeff, but I usually manage to not let it stop me. Someday I’ll tell you about the butterflies I feel before a cagefight.

So I applied the odd cologne, and almost choked. It smelled horrible. I mean it smelled like ass and cheese. I coughed a few more times, walked past her once (sometimes my feet won’t turn on the first pass) and then oozed up to her at the bar.

“Did it hurt?” I asked her.

“Did what hurt?” she asked dutifully with an air of long suffering and tolerance.

“When you fell out of heaven” I said giving her my best grin.

The mild fuck off I was expecting seemed to die on her lips. She crossed her legs instead, and that took awhile.

Eventually I was looking at her face again and she leaned forward.

“I haven’t seen you around here before” she said conversationally. Conversationally mind you. I wanted to flash a huge thumbs up at Jeff but that didn’t strike me as nonchalant.

“Nah, first time here. Can I buy you a drink?”

She looked at me, shook her head, trying to clear it. I imagine her thoughts were “he’s not super cute. He’s not rich. Why do I want him to put his hands on me?”

I smiled my first real smile of the night. “You look tense. Let me buy you a drink.”

“Okay” she said meekly.

I ordered a Mimosa for her that cost about a paycheck and tried to put a casual arm around her. She immediately leaned into me and pressed her face to my neck.

At this point I had to admit it wasn’t my charm working here but rather Jeff’s chemical elixir. And that meant I was officially taking advantage of this girl, which was wrong. Right?

Her hand had stolen around my waist and she started nibbling on my ear. That’s very distracting when you’re trying to contemplate ethics.

“Let’s dance” she said. I let her lead me out to the dance floor where she plastered her body against mine. It felt really good. Then she turned around and begun to grind her ass against my cock. Which believe me had woken up to look around a while ago.

Her ass was unbelievable, the right mix of soft and firm, just like the rest of her. A few guys looked like they wanted to cut in, but a grin and a look from me persuaded them that they didn’t really want to after all.

I didn’t know what to expect, would the chemical effects diminish over time? If anything she seemed just to get more into me. I wanted to test some limits so I reached for her hair and gave it a firm yank, pulling her closer to me. She made a sound low in her throat and ground herself harder against me.

“Let’s go to your place” I whispered to her.

“Okay” she said.

I cradled her breasts with my hands, they were full and soft and absolutely unaided by underwire.

We made out by her car. I pushed her against it, kissing her neck and biting her shoulder. She licked the bottom of my ear and blew her desires softly.

We made it in the car, but not back to her place. I was in the passenger seat when she climbed over the gear shift and straddled me. With one deft hand she had my own gear shaft out and my protests died stillborn as did any thoughts about condoms. She slid me inside her and that unique liquid warmth caressed me. I almost came right there as her tight pussy engulfed me.

It was everything right with the world, the warmth caress that lit my spine with sensation, my face trapped in between her breasts. Taking mouthfuls of that delightful flesh and trapping it between my teeth, biting, stopping only when her cries of delight became a momentary cry of pain.

Then licking a nipple, a rose bud atop an ice cream cone, until it stiffened and became erect, blowing at it, feeling her writhe at the additional stimulation: the cold metal of my tongue piercing a change from the heat of my mouth.

“I need you” she whispered in my ear. I pulled her hair and turned her face so I could whisper in hers. “You’re mine” I told her and she writhed as her whole body shook in pleasure.

She lifted herself slowly off me, so that the cool California breeze chilled my cock. Then she lowered herself back down, taking away the chill with impossibly wonderful heat of her. She did that again, moving the entire length of my shaft, only faster and faster each time. I couldn’t take it and neither could she. I came, a spurting that seemed to last forever and drain all of my energy. She came a few moments later, her cries piercingly loud in the confines of her sports car.

I was debriefing Jeff the next day.

“So how was it?”

“It was fucking amazing. She did anything I asked. Ankles warming her ears, okay. Turned around, ass in the air, okay. Face down, ass up, okay. Best sex of my entire life, professionals included.”

“So everything went perfect then.”

“Not exactly.”

“What happened?”

“The next morning” I told him mournfully.

“She woke up and the effects wore off.”

”Not exactly, we never went to sleep.”

“You lucky dog” he said chuckling.

“Not exactly. Around dawn or so we took a shower together.”

“So…” Then he got it.

“Oh shit” he said.

“I started rubbing her back, soaping her breasts and she looks at me and pulls away. You know the way you do when you wake up next to the coyote girl you took home from the bar?”

“But you were the coyote girl?”

“With fucking bells on.”

She called me a cab, gave me cab fare and told me I had better be gone in half an hour, and went into her bedroom and locked me out.”

“That’s fucking cold.”

“I know. I had to beat on the door for five minutes before she threw me my clothes.”

“Fucking bitch.”

“Hell of a night though, hell of a night.”

“Yeah. I wish I’d tested it out.”

“But we needed a trained scientific voyeur remember?”

“Sure. But next time you observe.”

I wanted to object but it only seemed fair.