"Here. Take them back. I don't want them."

"They get better," he said without looking up. "Flip through them all. You'll see."

"No… I don't want to see," she protested, pulling the pictures close to her as a middle-aged couple and three children walked past.

The boy wouldn't take them. He kept working at her shoe, starting to whistle as he put his brush away and began using a polish-stained rag.

Not knowing what to do, Paula stood nervously with the pictures in her hand and her foot propped on the shine box. She had never seen anything like that awful picture, and her mind was still reeling from it. She thought of throwing the lewd pictures to the sidewalk and running back into the leather-goods shop. But she didn't. She merely stood there trembling, watching the boy finish her right shoe and letting him put her foot on the sidewalk and pull her left foot onto the box to shine her other shoe.

As the shock wore off, she realized the photo had also had another effect on her. Butterflies seemed to be darting around in her stomach-the same butterflies that always tried to fly out of her when her boy friend kissed her passionately and struggled to put his hand under her dress.

Feeling lightheaded and ashamed of herself, Paula brought the pictures up and furtively looked at the top one again. It was in color. A very dark Mexican man and a fair-skinned girl were lying on a bed, fondling one another's genitals as they kissed. Paula stared intently at what the girl held in her hand. Recently her boy friend had tried to put her hand on something very similar. She hadn't let him, of course, but it had excited her just brushing her skin through his trousers.

She couldn't resist going on to the next photo, and it was even worse than the first. She heard herself gasp again as she gawked unblinkingly at the perverted act it depicted. The girl was on her knees, bending over the man, taking his big prick into her mouth! Paula felt a chill dart up her spine at the pleased expression on the girl's face. Feeling somewhat nauseated, she slipped the disgusting photo off and put it on the bottom of the stack.