Calls from their husbands are the only thing that breaks up the dull routine of everyday life and fantasies of reunion are fed by sultry texts that have infused romance back into these marriages.

It happened, when the sun arose, that God prepared a sultry east wind and the sun beat on Jonah's head, so that he fainted, and requested for himself that he might die, and said, It is better for me to die than to live.

One sultry, sticky morning, I woke up to find a long column, about 20 feet long, of tiny black ants trooping through a crack under the front door, up through the entry hall, and into the kitchen. The line of ants climbed up onto the counter, where they were painstakingly carting bread crumbs and grains of soggy cooked rice and white sugar back outside.