From “Safety Man”
by Dan Chaon

Safety Man is all shriveled and puckered inside his zippered nylon carrying tote, and taking him out is always the hardest part. She is disturbed by him for a moment, his shrunken face, and she averts her eyes as he crinkles and unfolds. She has a certain type of smile ready in case anyone should see her inserting the inflator pump into his backside; there is a flutter of protective embarrassment, and when a car goes past she hunches over Safety Man’s prone form, shielding his not-yet-firm body from view. After a time, he begins to fill out—to look human.

Safety Man used to be a joke. When Sandi and her husband Allen had moved to Chicago, Sandi’s mother had sent the thing. Her mother was a woman of many exaggerated fears, and Sandi and Allen couldn’t help but laugh. They took turns reading aloud from Safety Man’s accompanying brochure: Safety Man—the perfect ladies' companion for urban living! Designed as a visual deterrent, Safety Man is a life-sized, simulated male that appears 180 lbs. and 6 feet tall, to give others the impression that you are protected while at home alone or driving in your car. Incredibly real-seeming, with positionable latex head and hands and air-brushed facial highlights, handsome Safety Man has been field-tested to keep danger at bay!”

“Oh, I can’t believe she sent this,” Sandi had said. “She’s really slipping.”

Allen lifted it out of its box, holding it by the shoulders like a Christmas gift sweater. “Well,” he said. “He doesn’t have a penis, anyway. It appears that he’s just a torso.”

“Ugh!” she said, and Allen observed its wrinkled, bog man face dispassionately.

“Now, now,” Allen said. He was a tall, soft-spoken man, and was more amused by Sandi’s mother’s foibles than Sandi herself was. “You never know when he might come in handy,” and he looked at her sidelong, gently ironic. “Personally,” he said, “I feel safer already.”

And they’d laughed. Allen put his long arm around her shoulder and snickered silently, breathing against her neck while Safety Man slid to the floor like a paper doll...

Ontario Review #52