"trying to get laid"

Andrew even tried impressing her with his new job, in which he wore a suit and made enough to buy three BMWs a year, but Helena just could not bear the thought of having sex with him again. If you could even call it sex. The first time he lasted less than five minutes. The second time he was so drunk he gave up and fell asleep. They joked about it sometimes, but lately their friendship, which was distant from the beginning, had stalled into his attempts to get her into bed.

They had lunch once a month at the bistro across the street from their apartment complex. She ordered a double shot of espresso, black, no sugar. He ordered a large pastry, usually some sort of strudel. They sat by the window and watched the crowd hurry by.

“C’mon,” he coaxed. “I know you get lonely sometimes, don’t you?”

“I do not,” she said.

“I bet if I get you drunk you’d do it.”

“You tried that already. Let’s face it.
It’s just not going to happen.”

“What if you’re just dying for it, you know? All I’m saying is that I’m available,” he said, taking a bite into his pastry. He wiped his hand on the napkin.

“You can’t deny our humanly impulses.”

Leaning forward, she said, “Listen, I know you think it’s going to happen, but it’s not. We go through this every month.”

They were friends, he thought, who’d had sex. The truth was that he was slightly embarrassed. He knew she’d told his friends, had actually joked with one of them one night at the bar about his impotency one night. He would remember his failure all his life and he would attempt to fortify his self-esteem with his job as a financial consultant, his new television set, or the supermodels he sometimes met in New York, but really it was shame that kept him in his pursuit to redeem himself. That and he had no chin.