Bear Skinned Beauties

Zip Monberg—lithe, kinetic, a comet on eight wheels—ricochets through the hush-and-taffeta sanctum of Madame Slinger’s atelier, a Paris-by-way-of-New-York salon where mannequins breathe and every seam hums with libido. Parcels fly, silk tears, and the boy-messenger becomes accidental cupbearer to a triangle of appetites: Bull Slinger, porcine mogul of ready-to-wear, whose roving eye stalks the showroom like a searchlight; Mrs. Slinger, couture-queen with shears for a scepter; and Zip’s own trembling sweetheart among the frocks. A single flirtatious pinch detonates domestic warfare—mannequins topple, tulic cascades, Zip is booted through the door, ricochets into a dental surgery where nitrous oxide dissolves the city into sylvan hallucination. Under the gas, the boutique’s mannequins shed paint and propriety, becoming dryads who waltz with a cardboard satyr-Bull while Zip, toothless and weightless, learns that desire is just another costume to slip on or shrug off. He awakens mid-extraction, sees Bull ringed by these half-remembered nymphs, grins through the ache, and yanks the mask back over his face—choosing the dream over the debt, the forest over the fabric.