While I waited for the audience to arrive, or not arrive, I nervously adjusted the sterling silver necklace of dangling silver "kisses" around my neck. Matching chains ringed my wrist and ankle. And an adorable pair of icy silver "kisses" swung from my earlobes. Which were not pierced. And which never wore earrings. When I moved, I chimed like sleigh bells, are you listening? It was too, too corny but I knew I had to expect this kind of harassment from the silver familiar for messing with Snow's concert kissing shtick.

An hour later my cheeks were warm with success. The large room was packed with everything from Goth girls to giggling Red Hat matrons.

The chatter noise level was high and the four major food groups-fat, salt, sugar, and caffeine-had dwindled to crumbs and empty paper cups.

Most of the women had shucked off their mules, tennies, high heels and biker boots to sit on the circled folding chairs. Content, they finally regarded their hostess with interest.

"You may be wondering why I've gathered you all together," I began.

They laughed as expected at my murder mystery opening line.

"How many here have had the Kiss?"

A smattering of hands shot up.

"And not?" Many more hands.

"I'd like the Haves to sit on the right side of the circled chairs."

"And the Have-nots?" asked a red-haired women.

"May sit on the left side of the room."

"'Left' is right," the redhead shouted as she moved. "You're sort of in the middle, ain't you?"

I nodded and kept that very place. "Yup. An almost-ran. So. Let's hear the Haves describe the Brimstone Kiss. Isn't that what the rest of us are all dying to know?"

The nods and murmurs were so unanimous that the Haves visibly preened.

"Just start anywhere. The first touch of his lips."

"Not there," said an ethereal girl wearing a wispy pixie haircut. "The first sensation is being buoyed up by the crowd, this human wave seeking to wash aground on the stage floor."

Hmms of agreement punctuated her testimony. This was beginning to feel like a revival meeting.

"Then," the girl went on, running a hand over the back of her neck, "he snares you with one of his white silk scarves. It's as smooth and strong as spider-silk. Your head lolls back-"

Ummms of empathy. Women on both sides of the room are rocking left and right, right and left. A woman on the right leaps to her feet, her head thrown back to testify in her turn.

"The scarf pulls you up, up, up. It's as strong as steel. You feel you'll never fall back."

"And then," the first girl went on, her voice vibrating with triumph, "his lips reach mine."

"Yesss!" the crowd croons.

"How do they feel?" the inquiring reporter puts in. "I need hard evidence."

"Soft as silk. Cool. Like a fountain in the desert. I feel the tingle of electricity meeting running water. Heat and meltdown. And then-"

"Yesss," the women hiss, eyes closed, feeling the moment.

"His tongue."

"His tongue speaking in tongues," the women shout.

God! They loved that their rock idol was soul-kissing strangers? Wasn't that… unsanitary? Not that I didn't get the rocky mountain high part.

"The tingle starts in my lips and wraps me in an electrical storm of satisfaction."

Tingle. Kinda like my Lip Venom gloss. Snow has some kind of built-in Lip Venom? These women could buy the special effect. I need to hand out Lip Venom samples along with the high-sugar desserts. Wonder if the manufacturer would donate?

"The tongue is killer!" the wispy young woman declares. She is now shouting. "The back of my throat starts vibrating and then I'm thrumming all over, but deep in my throat the spasms start and they don't end. They just don't end. Wave after wave of absolute pleasure. Then I just fall away. I feel his icy palm on my forehead and the connection is broken. I'm still twitching with the sublime spasms. I guess he's gone, but my body is still possessed by the Ghost of his Brimstone Kiss."

Silence. Some of them recognize the sensations. I can tell by their dreamy eyes and slack lips. Some ache for the sensations. I can tell by their closed eyes and deep sighs.

A few, like me, remember and recognize similar symptoms.

As the chant of "Ah, men" goes up in the room, I inhale the bracing aroma of strong coffee and come to the only possible conclusion.

Snow's Brimstone Kiss bestows multiple orgasms.

Try to compete with that using a coffee klatch and a fistful of chocolate candy.

The second act of my private self-help group was even more interesting. All the Have-nots began to testify, rising one by one and baring their souls and their libidos.

The longer this went on, the more I wanted to shrink into the floor like the Wicked Witch of the West and disappear. Not because I can't take forthright talk, although that's a bit rough for one of my genteel and ignorant convent school background, but because I'm starting to feel guiltier and guiltier.

As the talk turned to vibrators and jackrabbits, which I learn are not wild hares, but a super-powerful variety of vibrator, I began to see that the Have-nots have not ever had a sexual orgasm. Some of them must be seventy or older.

Surely there is an Orgasm Fairy somewhere who sees to women like this. No?

Here I thought I was one of them. After all, forty percent of girls, good or bad, don't, according to statistics. Yet, despite my anxieties, my handful of assignations with Ric have all been orgasmic. I must be a freak! He must be a stud! Of course, there haven't been that many encounters. I could crash and burn any minute. Or not crash and burn.

And I should stand up here telling these poor women to just get over it? Cocaine. Him. His Brimstone Kiss. I feel like the Grinch who stole Christmas. The Witch who would steal the ruby red slippers. The reporter who announced the deaths at Lakehurst.

Guilt won't help me find Lilith. Plus, it was time for me to try to wean these women off the instant orgasm dream.

"But," I pointed out to the Haves, "not one woman who's got a Brimstone Kiss has ever gotten another, right?"

Disconsolate heads shook. "No, not even anyone on the online chat groups."

"So you're all pining away for something that will never happen again. But, cheer up! It did happen. You're way ahead of the Have-nots over there."

I did not see happy smiles.

"Tell me about your jobs, what you do for a living." I started pointing and they started talking.

"Waitress" comes up frequently. "Cocktail waitress" a bit less frequently. These women say the pay isn't union, but the tips are good. Others are fast-food restaurant employees. Wal-Mart greeters. Grocery store clerks. Every job is in Las Vegas to be close to the source.

"Do you really want to spend your lives underemployed waiting for something that may never happen?"

There is silence, at least, if not lively "No's!"

"Wouldn't you like to be free of your obsessions, able to date men who stand on the same level as you do? I'm sure some of them out there kiss pretty good."

This merited the "No's" I was looking for earlier.

"Don't you know in your heart of hearts that there's more to life than chasing something that hard to get? The perfect man or a hormone high? And how long does the Brimstone Kiss last, anyway?" I asked the Haves.

"Until he moves on," one woman admitted.

"To the next fan girl. Whom he leaves coming down without a parachute. You have to catch the lucky girl to keep her from banging her head on the concrete floor. And does Cocaine care? No."

Frowning brows told me I was making progress.

"Once again, it's all the guy's way and the women can wait. And wait. And wait. Don't you want to be free?"