Xavier was standing in front of the paper towel dispenser, futilely waving his hands. “Come on, damn you! Spit it out!” The unit was one of the newfangled motion-sensing ones the building had installed during a bird flu scare, but it never seemed to register Xavier’s gesticulations.

“Allow me.” An older man, tanned and with a long white ponytail, was in line behind Xavier.

Xavier obligingly stepped aside. “Is there a trick to it?”

The older man nodded. “The towel dispenser, he is just like a woman,” he said. “One must know how to stimulate it.” The man held out his pinky, daintily inserted it into the towel slot, and moved it a fraction of an inch.

A paper towel whirred out of the slot; the man performed the feat again to get a towel for Xavier. “Is it really that simple?” Xavier asked. “Sticking your finger in there?”

“You must press lightly against the razor-sharp serrated teeth just inside the slot,” the old man said. “Just enough to make it give you what you want, but not enough to draw blood.”

“Just like a woman,” Xavier said wonderingly.