Jon was glad to have Zoe with him as they walked through the mall. Without her he would feel so exposed, vulnerable. He knew that whatever came their way, she would protect him. She always did.
It was just the way it was with boys and women. Sometimes, late at night, he lay in bed wishing that it was different, but it wasn't. And it never would be. Not only were boys physically smaller than women, but no matter how hard they tried, no boy could resist a command given to them by a woman.
Jon's mother had explained it to him a few years earlier. Something to do with evolution, how the part of a boy's brain that controls will-power is severely atrophied. Any command a woman gives a boy would be accepted without question. Usually the boy will see it as a natural, self-actuated idea. His mother had demonstrated by getting him to get down on his hands and knees and eat the cat food she had just put on a plate. The memory of the soft, wet, meaty food washing down his throat, and how he had accepted it as something he would do normally, was still fresh in his mind after all that time.
"This way," Zoe commanded, giving a slight tug on his leash. Jon hurried after her, struggling as she took long strides into a store. His legs, shorter than hers, were also hampered by the stiletto heeled shoes his mother had picked out for him that morning. She had explained to him, as she usually did, that boys should wear shoes like that when going out to slow them down. The last thing that a woman wanted was to have to go running after a confused boy.
The store that Zoe took him to was one that pampered to the needs of both women and boys. He grinned as he looked around, taking in sights that he usually didn't get to see when stuck at home. Brightly coloured outfits, frills, leather, every style was available for boys, catering to the whims of every type of woman. Jon saw that Zoe had already picked out a grey t-shirt for herself and was leading him into the boy's section. He wondered what she would pick out for him.
Whatever it was, he was sure that he'd like it.
