Sometimes a cigar is just a cigar, as Freud said. But in McKeesport, a severed penis that a gas station clerk believed she spotted yesterday was actually a urine-filled sex toy.

"It turned out to be fake," McKeesport Police Chief Joseph Pero said today.

A couple entered the GetGo station in the 200 block of Fifth Avenue about 5:10 p.m., and the man asked a female store clerk to heat in the microwave an object wrapped in a paper towel.

Police Chief Joseph Pero said the clerk complied but noticed a strange odor. When she handed the object back to the man, it became unwrapped and she saw what resembled a penis.

The couple left the store separately, and the clerk called 911.

Chief Pero said the woman who was in the store contacted police this morning and said the object was a sex toy filled with urine. Chief Pero said she explained it needed to be heated to body temperature for use in an employment drug screen she needed to take.

The chief did not have further details and said he expected the woman to come in to speak with police later today. He said he did not know the names of the man or woman.

The store clerk, whom police did not identify, was "visibly shaken," Chief Pero said.