Sometimes Ralphie would even make a pot of coffee and walk out to Hector’s Bronco to give him a warm up, carrying milk and sugar. Ralphie informed me Hector took a splash of milk and one sugar like this was information which I could impart on Saint Peter and he would lead me straight through the Pearly Gates to the right hand of God. I’d only watched Ralphie’s Alice, the Waitress impersonation once, doing it while peeking through the curtains. I saw Hector get out of the Bronco, close the door and lean against it while Ralphie poured him coffee and chattered away.

I also saw Hector’s amused yet glamorous smile (yes, I could see it, clear as day, from all the way across the road, it was hard to miss).

I’d never looked again.

My eyes moved to the blackboard that was on the wall by the window. Ralphie put it there weeks ago. On it was a list of names and next to the names there were hash marks. Once I started getting visitors on a regular basis, visitors that came in the evenings when I was home, stayed from thirty minutes to over a couple of hours and never came to the door, Ralphie decided it would be fun to keep track.

The list included “Hawaiian Hottie” (that was Kai Mason), “Just Plain Old Hot Hottie” (that was Luke Stark), “Alaskan Hottie” (that was some big blond guy, named thus because Ralphie said he looked like he could fell a tree by blowing on it and only men from Alaska could do that kind of thing), “Surfer Dude Hottie” (that was a smaller guy with real sun-streaked hair), “African American Hottie” (that was a black man with twists in his hair) and “Native American Hottie” (that was, well, a native American hottie or another one of Lee’s men whose romance had been reported in the papers, Vance Crowe).

By far and away, Hector had the most hash marks.

I twisted my head to look up at Buddy; he looked down at me and grinned. I shook my head.

Then I gave up on Ralphie and settled back in. I was snuggled up to Buddy on the couch, lying curled in a fetal position, my head on his thigh.

It was Saturday evening and we were in the throes of a Veronica Mars marathon (season two DVD). I decided that when I left “Ms. Townsend, Ice Princess” behind, the New Sadie was going to be like Veronica Mars. She was plucky, cute as a button and she had a smart mouth.

I figured, given some practice, I could be plucky and cute and have a smart mouth.

In life, I learned, given enough practice, I could do anything.

* * * * *

It had been one month and two days since I’d been raped by Ricky Balducci.

Never in my life had so much happened in one month and two days.

Never in my life had most of it been so good.

First of all, Ralphie and Buddy installed me in the guest bedroom of their brownstone.

When I got there, Buddy made me do three days of complete bed rest. They brought me food and fawned over me like I was a true life princess. Buddy even helped me shower and when I got embarrassed he said, “I’m g*y and a nurse, I wipe people’s asses for a living. Do you think this fazes me?”

I got over being embarrassed after he said that.

I didn’t go back to work for two and a half weeks. By the time I did, the bruises and swelling had gone and most of the cuts were disappearing.

In that time Buddy and Ralphie went to my apartment. They cleaned it up and packed me up, everything I could want or need was brought to the brownstone and moved in, making the guestroom less of a guestroom and more my room. They also arranged some of my stuff around the house, making the house less Ralphie and Buddy’s house and more our house.

Everything else I owned was put in storage.

Then Buddy called a real estate agent friend of his and put my place on the market. Without asking me and without me telling them what happened they decided the memories there were too bad for me to go back. I would get a new place what they referred to as an indefinite, “Later, when you’re ready,” and I would stay with them in the meantime.

I didn’t quibble.

For starters, I didn’t particularly want to go back to my apartment. But also, it felt nice having someone take care of me. No one had taken care of me since I was eleven years old and I liked it. I liked it enough just to let it happen.

So I did.

* * * * *

About a week after I moved in with them, the doorbell went. Buddy answered it and came back with a short, heavyset lady with spiky, salt and pepper hair and clear blue eyes.

Buddy introduced her as his lesbian friend, Bex. After I shook her hand, Buddy informed me Bex was a counselor at a rape crisis center.

Then Buddy and Ralphie left me with Bex, going, they said, to get Chinese takeout.

At first I was angry. Then I was scared. But Bex talked to me about my gallery, about Buddy and Ralphie, about my shoes, about season tickets for the Colorado Shakespeare Festival in Boulder, about loads of things but not about me getting raped.

An hour slid by before Buddy and Ralphie returned and I realized, only at the end right before she left when she handed me her card and told me to call her anytime, that I liked her.

It took me another week to call her. She’s come to visit me twice. She’s lovely.

By the time Bex came around, we’d already had the parade of hotties sitting outside the brownstone guarding the door, keeping me safe and Ralphie had put up the blackboard.

I was ignoring the parade of hotties and what that might mean.

Ralphie and Buddy didn’t ignore it, they thought it was very interesting and would talk about it all the time.

I didn’t participate in their discussions. That would defeat my efforts at ignoring it which, come hell or high water, was exactly what I was going to do.

Eventually, they’d go away.

Right?

* * * * *

By the time I went back to work, Ralphie and Buddy had showed me how to check the Ice Princess at the door.

I’d never been in a house filled with love.

In the beginning it made me uncomfortable because I felt like I was weird. They were so at ease with each other, affectionate, relaxed, calling each other nicknames, doing things that showed they cared.

It was bizarre.

They also did it with me.

There was no personal space in Buddy and Ralphie’s house. You cuddled on the couch. You kissed cheeks when you walked in the door from work. You left notes when you were going out; making sure you gave details about when you’d be home.

Ralphie brought up my coffee in the morning, pushed me aside in bed, sat in it with long legs stretched out, back to the headrest and gabbed about everything while I sipped my coffee and slowly came awake.

While I watched TV, Buddy forced me to sit on the floor between his spread legs and gave me head massages (he said he loved my hair).