the girl who cried orgasm

She had a medical condition that caused her to have an orgasm every time she sneezed.

She worked at a factory that packaged pepper.

Her favorite pastime was dusting.

Everyone knew her. She had made a spectacle of herself in every corner of the city. Her performances drew varied reactions, from disgust to envy.

Her condition made dating a bit tricky.

This was one of the many topics covered in an interview with a local TV station. “Sneezing is a coordinated, autonomic response to stimuli” she explained, “It works to expel a foreign body. Sort of the exact opposite of the orgasm. Well… hopefully that’s the case.” She said it deadpan until the reporter laughed and then she allowed herself a smile.

“I think it intimidates men to know that if the date doesn’t go well I can just look into a bright light and call it a night.” Puzzled, the reporter asked about the bright light. “Well, I’m also a ‘photic,’ from the Greek meaning ‘of light,’ meaning that bright lights make me sneeze. And when I sneeze…” she trailed off and once again the reporter chuckled.

The cameraman did not. Something she noticed after her second witty comment did not elicit a response.

After the interview was over and the man was packing up his equipment she wandered over and asked if he found her story interesting or irritating. He shrugged and replied “I hear a lot of crazy stuff.” She smirked and said “So I’m crazy?” “That remains to be seen” he stated impartially as he hoisted his bag onto his shoulder and turned to leave.

“Why not find out?” she asked as suggestively as the situation would allow. She didn’t know why she found his indifference endearing but she did. He laughed. “I’ve seen the show before. At a grocery store. You had your fellow shoppers hustling their children out of earshot. There would have been less chaos if someone had pulled out a gun and waved it around in the air.”

It was her turn to laugh. “So you won’t go out with me?”

He shrugged again and said “Why not.”

A few hours later he picked her up at her apartment and they made their way to a local restaurant. They had a pleasant meal and the topic of her condition never came up. She appreciated that.

When it was time to drop her back off she felt obliged to invite him in for coffee. Coffee led to more and soon they were stumbling into her bedroom in the throes of passion. Some moments later she had an orgasm.

Not just any orgasm.

He didn’t know what to expect and what she delivered was equal parts French composer Charles-François Gounod’s aria Ah! leve-toi, soleil and the song of the Eurasian reed warbler. Far superior to what he’d witnessed in the spice isle at the Piggly Wiggly. He had no idea at the time that it was her first real orgasm.

Shortly afterwards she sneezed and no theatrics followed.

She admitted that for all those years she’d been faking it. She was a fraud. She’d seen that scene in When Harry Met Sally and… “Well, I sort of got carried away.”

“That’s sort of fucked up” was all he had to say on the matter.

Anxious to change the topic she then offered “Did you know that the iguana sneezes more than any other animal?”

“I did not” he replied.

They both yawned and then fell sleep.

(and yes, I wrote the whole damn story just to try to get ONE person to image what a female orgasm that consisted of Ah! leve-toi, soleil, from Act II of the French opera Roméo et Juliette, and an Eurasian reed warbler sounded like)