It had been a long and pleasant evening. The double date started with a dinner out, then progressed to dancing and drinks at an upscale club, and was now ending up at Steve and Dana's place for light night banter.
Rachel loved evenings like this. She enjoyed dressing in her sexy strapless night club dresses and she loved socializing with their best "couple friends". She sipped her martini and smiled while her husband good-naturedly argued with Steve about someone from work. His hand rested warmly just above her knee, fingers slowly stroking the inside of her thigh.
"I don't think he's ever going to get married," Timothy was saying. "He's a good guy, but he's so ugly that he's never going to get a date, much less a wife."
Steve shook his head. "No, he'll get married. He's homely, no doubt about that, but he makes great money. There's some girl out there who'll work with that combination."
"Dana!" Timothy looked to the bar, where the blonde was mixing a late-night cosmopolitan. "Would you marry an ugly guy just because he has money?"
Dana turned and gave the two men a studied look. Even more than usual, she looked stunning in her blue-sequined cocktail mini-dress. "Do you really need to ask that at this point?" she said, perfectly deadpan.
Rachel giggled. Dana and Steve had been married for six years, one more than she and Timothy. In truth, Steve was quite handsome and he also made good money. But even at that, Rachel secretly thought that he had shot the moon with Dana. She was a bombshell, coupling a perfect face and figure with a great brain and an easy self-confidence. She had even been an NFL cheerleader for a couple of season while she was finishing her master's degree.
The men howled with laughter.
"How about you, Rachel?" Timothy asked. "Would you marry an ugly man if he had money?"
Rachel feigned coyness. "I marry for love," she said, mimicking her best Scarlett O'Hara accent and waving an imaginary fan. "Looks and money have nothing to do with it."
Dana returned to the conversation circle. When she sat down, her dress rode so high on her thighs that Rachel was sure she was going to flash the group. But as always, she expertly crossed her legs and hid just the right amount at just the right time. Dana had a knack for living on the edge and always coming out on top.
"So Rachel is a good girl. How about you men?" she asked. "A saggy old woman with watermelon hips wants to marry you, and she wants to have sex every night. Do you do it? How much money would she need to leave you in her will?"
"Hey, sex is sex," Timothy teased. "A woman wanting sex is not a deal breaker. Leave me a couple hundred thousand and a five-year life span for her, and I'm in."
"Absolutely," Steve agreed. "It's different for us men. Just turn the lights out and leave us some money and we'll let Ruth Bader Ginsburg ride us all night."
"Ewwwww," the women responded in a chorus.
"Really?" Dana demanded. "So you would have sex with someone you aren't attracted to? Every night?"
Steve took a draw on his bottle of Heineken. "Well," he admitted, "it wouldn't be my preference, of course. But if I was in that situation I think I could do it."
Rachel was usually the most proper one of the group, but she couldn't resist a question. "Wait a minute," she said. "You're men. You have to ..." she hesitated, but had no diplomatic way to proceed. "You have to be aroused to have sex. We women can just lie back and think of England if we have to. How do you get aroused if you're not attracted to someone?"
Timothy nodded in acknowledgement. "Good point. I don't think we would get aroused. At least, not by them."
"We'd need another method," Steve added. "But that's easy. We'd think about you or Dana."
"Or you AND Dana." The two men tittered like junior high boys, which all too often they were.
"But could you get turned on by the ugly woman?"
Steve wrinkled his nose. "I don't think I'd need to. That's the point. We men have rich imaginations."
"But could you?" Rachel pressed. "Could you get turned on by the ugly old woman?"
"You mean physically?"
Dana was more blunt. "Hard. Could an unattractive woman get you hard without you fantasizing about something else?"
Timothy looked at Steve, and both men shrugged. He was almost sheepish. "Well ... if the lights are out ..."
"It's all pink on the inside," Steve added, and the two men clinked beer bottles.
"A mouth is a mouth." Clink again.
"A hand is a hand, even if it's got arthritis." Clink again.
Dana leaned in for the kill. "What if it's a male hand?"
The two men cringed independently.
"A hand is a hand, right?" Dana clinked cocktail glasses with Rachel.
Timothy decided it was time to change the subject, so he turned the tables. "What about you? Could a woman turn you on?"
Dana laughed. "Have you seen women?" she said without hesitation. "Women are sexy. An attractive woman can turn anyone on."
"Including you?" Timothy challenged.
"Oh, yeah. Give me the green light with a hot woman and I'll jump her like a pirate. Assuming Steve will let me."