He drew the coat up higher. "This?"
"Uh-uh," she said.
He flung the overcoat back over his hips, his legs sprawling, and said, "This way?"
"Yes," she said.
Stern said, "Jesus," and ran upstairs to sink in agony upon the bed. But he felt excited, too.
On the weekend, several days later, as Stern unloaded cans of chow mein from the supermarket, his wife said, "He has big arms."
"Who?" Stern asked, knowing full well who she meant
"The man," she said. "The man who said that thing."
"Oh," Stern said. "What do arms mean?"
The third and final time was when they sat one day beneath a birch tree while their son dug a hole in the dirt to China. The kike man drove by in his car and Stern's wife said, "I hate that man."