Shane has girls with arched spines, vertebrae like stepping stones for her fingers to walk. Piercings, tattoos, plains of perfect white skin. She has girls with blonde spikes, girls with soft brown curls, girls whose shoulder blades make her wet from across the room.

She has, in her mind, a catalogue of spots: the junctures of neck and chin, dimples at the small of the back, thigh just above the knee, where a touch of her tongue will bring gasps, groans, and all depths of sighs.

Her women, they show her things, because they think she isn’t looking.

Shane is helplessly, disastrously in love with them all. She is crazy for women, if never for any one.

She loves their noises and smells. She loves to leave them happy, calm, tangled up, asleep, in white sheets as she tugs on her clothes and steps softly from the room.

But that is only a tiny, transient love, buried beneath her swagger and smile. So when she talks to Marina, it is only about fingernails and made-up faces with long, curled eyelashes and shampoo scents left on pillowcases.

When she and Marina talk it is usually because they’ve been abandoned in the awkward aftermath of a bar run, when whichever friend was mediating their subtle battle for amoral high ground has left to hang on a girl. They are suspicious, self-righteous, each sure that her particular brand of casual affair is best.

They never talk about broken hearts or desperate phone calls. There are limits to their unapologetic confidences. There are untold regrets.

Shane doesn’t watch Marina flaunt her ***** to the bathroom. She watches Jenny watch her, watches Jenny stiffly touch her date and front to Francesca.

Alice’s hand grabs her arm, but Shane is up and moving toward the door.

When she pushes through, she finds Marina leaning against the wall, waiting, disappointed to see her.

Shane catches her own reflection, the green ring still glowing on her head, a misbegotten angel.

“Hey,” she says, passing into a stall.

“Hey.”

“She isn’t going to come,” Shane continues through the door. “She was, but Francesca stopped her.”

“I wasn’t waiting for her.”

“Yeah.” She lets the silence fall, measured by her zipper, the flushing toilet, and the creaking of the opening door.

She walks to the sink and turns on the water, her eyes on her hands. “You know, I thought it was sick, at first,” she says. “I mean, she looks fifteen, and she was so obliviously happy with Tim.”

Marina glares. “She’s not fifteen. And she’ll be happier now.”

Shane nods. “Then I thought it was cruel.”

“You have authority when it comes to cruelty, Shane? Because you bring them wine and flowers and always stay until morning.”

“I don’t let them fall in love with me.”

“Some of them do.”

Shane stops wringing her hands under the faucet and catches Marina’s eyes in the mirror. “I never plan for them to fall in love with me.”

“I didn’t plan-”

“No, I know,” Shane mumbles. She turns off the faucet. “Because then I realized that you were falling for her, too.”

Marina shifts her weight and sharpens her stare. “Why did you come in here, Shane?”

“Look, I’ve never gotten what you have going with Francesca.” She fixes on Marina’s reflection, a lazy shrug lost in her slouch. “If it works for you, it doesn’t bother me. But she’s a *****, Marina, and whether you meant to, you’ve already fucked Jenny up.”

Shane crosses the room for a paper towel. Marina glances at her back, then away. “Say what you came in here to say.”

Shane balls up her paper towel, shoves it into the trash can, and walks toward the door. “If you love her- *****, Marina, if you like her, don’t let Francesca hurt her.”

Marina stares at herself. Then at the image of Shane leaning her back against the metal, saying, “She’d take you back, you know. After all of this, she’s crazy for you.You can’t ***** her in bathrooms, anymore.”

She pushes the door open. “She deserves more from you.”

She turns, adds, “they all do,” and is gone.