How did I know, at that moment, with absolute certainty, what was to unfold? It was in their faces. Everyone was watching everyone else, meeting each other’s eyes except, of course, for the woman in the sunglasses—smiling, teasing, daring. It seemed to be a game. Who was going to begin? Who was to go further than the others had already gone?
In that moment when I first realized what was going to happen, I experienced a tumultuous confusion of impulses and feelings. I felt scalded with embarrassment and a feeling of almost ridiculous naïveté that I had not understood sooner. I felt an irresistible desire to leap from my chair and run away, and I felt paralyzed. I felt almost sickened with fear, and I felt almost painfully excited. I know I was blushing and trembling, and my hands were sque
