“I want a guy that reminds me of my middle school boyfriend,” Tara said.
I listened to her the way you listen to good advice—incompletely. This was 2002, after Y2K and 9/11 and a couple other disasters with abbreviated names. I wasn’t sure what I believed in yet but it wasn’t love.
“Describe him to me,” I said, “without gerunds.”
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Last night a man talked me into intimacy and I talked him out of fifty bucks. I took the money to Mark with nine fingers and bought what was either a vintage stamp of John F. Kennedy or a gigantic hit of acid.
If there’s one thing America taught me, it’s life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness, at any cost.
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At one in the morning, I drank from a mug I stole from my friend’s apartment. It was in-laid with pictures of her and her boyfriend’s trip to Venice. I drank oolong tea because it tastes like rice. I wanted something insubstantial, without chewing.
Before I met Tara the next day, I looked at the mirror and saw—this is the bad part—myself.
