Carrie Pilby (14 page)

But did I have
too
good a time? I don't want to be lured so easily into doing something wrong. He is dishonest. Even if he's charming, he should pay for what he's doing.

I walk home lost in thought, and barely reconnect with my surroundings until I emerge from the subway near my house and the cold air hits me.

 

When I get inside, there's a message from Matt saying he wanted to just tell me again that he had a really nice time and he'll call me soon. He must have called from his cell phone, right after I left him. Even David never called me right after a date to tell me he had a good time. Why didn't I meet someone like that in college? I can accept not having met someone like that in high school. Even though Shauna did.

I definitely have to go to that Harvard Club mixer. There must be
some
interesting young people who can get my mind off relationships with impossible parameters.

I also am still supposed to meet up with Kara on Friday, and I should have some responses to my personal ad by then. Hopefully at least one will be worthwhile.

No more sitting on my buttocks. I am going to get out there and be someone's Shauna before I miss out and end up forever just being someone's me.

Friday afternoon, six hours before I'm supposed to meet Kara at the club, I call the 900 number to get the responses to my ad.

I sit at my desk with a notebook to record the information.

“You have five messages,” the automated voice reports. That's pretty good. As long as they're real.

“Hey, whut's up?” the first one says.

Oh, no. I know I said I'd go on a date with any of these people, but already, I can tell I can't.

“My name's Jimmy and I'm five-ten, 185, brown and brown. I'm looking for someone nice, good-looking, warm—” he pronounces it “wom” “—who likes dancing, music, and having a good time. If that sounds good, you can give me a call at 718—”

I press the button to skip to the next charmer.

“Hi. I'm Michael. I don't usually answer these.”

That's encouraging.

“But your ad caught my eye. What can I tell you. I live in Queens, I'm in sales—”

Probably Dunkin' Donuts.

“I come from a big family, I like playing tennis, and I drink a lot of coffee.”

Figures.

“My hobbies are going to the movies and just having a good time. Anyway, you sound nice. So maybe we can talk more. Give me a call. 718—”

I write his number down. Even though we don't have much in common, he sounds normal. That's a sad standard: He doesn't sound like a psycho, so I'll go out with him. But Michael is bachelor number one.

I forward to the next one.

“H-hi, my name's A-Adam, and, uh, I think I m-meet your requirements. I went t-to T-Tufts University, that's near B-Boston, and I don't know my IQ, but I got 1280 on my SATs, that's p-pretty good, right? I'm twenty-two and I j-just moved t-to the city.”

I want to hang up. And I hate myself for it. This guy is smart, so what's my problem? Obviously, I'm just as superficial as everyone else. He's a stutterer who sounds like he spits when he talks. I want to bypass him just like people bypass me because I'm not a partier or because I have morals. Is that fair?

No.

But why does dating have to be fair? I'm tired of feeling like a misfit, and if the first person I start dating is equally socially inept, it will make me more of a misfit. Don't I deserve, for a change, to win?

Nonetheless, I owe it to A-Adam to give him a chance. I am going to stick by my moral codes. Not judging people on superficial standards is a big one.

“I-uh-I know you didn't ask about looks, which is probably why I liked your ad so much—”

Okay, Adam's not superficial, and he actually read the ad. Points.

“But in c-case you're wondering, I'm five-nine and I have dark wavy hair. My m-mother thinks I'm good-looking.”

Points for humor.

“My interests include movies, d-dining out, not really into the c-club scene, and I like just having nice talks. I really hope to hear from you. Oh, I don't know if I said, but my name is Adam. Anyway…so, uh, yeah. I'm better in person, if you meet me. I'm at 212—”

Okay. Out of these two guys, I'm bound to get a date. They sound desperate enough. What was I worried about? And there are still two to go.

I press the button to skip to the next one.

“Hi, H-Heather. M-my name's A-Adam. I just l-left a m-message but I think it might have been too l-long, it cut me off and I don't know if you got it. Anyway, I'm usually not this spastic. Heh, heh. W-what I said l-last time was, I'm nice and I like movies, and I really liked your ad, so I hope to meet you…”

I skip to the last ad.

“Hi, I know you might find this unusual, you didn't state an age range in your ad, but maybe we can at least be friends. My name's Don, and I'm forty-six, and I own a coupla computer stoahs in the city. I don't remember back to my test scores, but I do pretty well when I watch
Wheel of Fortune.
I'm basically looking for a lady to take around, show her a good time. I like opera and the finer things, and I'd like to spend money on a classy lady like you. So give me a cawl.”

I hang up. Something about “lady” bothers me. I know that it's considered un-P.C. to say “girl” these days, but “woman” makes me think of the full-figured diagrams that used to be in the pamphlets we got in elementary school sex ed entitled “Your Body and You.” And “lady” is worse. There should be age rang
es. “Girl” goes from one to thirty. “Woman” goes from thirty-one to a hundred. “Lady” goes from forty to a hundred, but she has to work in a casino.

I believe I've done some good work today. I have the urge to put the phone numbers away until later.

But I think of Matt. He seemed better than all of them. I admit that I'd sort of like to see him.

I go to the dictionary to look up his favorite word, “doozy.” It says that it may have come from Duesenbergs, which were luxury cars in the 1930s. I've heard them mentioned in old movies. That's really cool. I'd like to tell Matt about it. But I know I shouldn't call him.

Maybe Michael or A-Adam from the personals will be just as interesting. It's worth giving them a shot. So I press *67 on my phone to protect my confidentiality, then return phone calls from both of them. But of course, neither is home because it's during the workday. I don't leave messages. I'll try again later.

 

At night, I'm not sure what to wear to meet Kara at the club. I'm not going to wear what girls who go to clubs wear: clothes so flimsy they freeze. They spend the evening walking bent over with their arms crossed in front of themselves. I'll be warm and unsexy.

When I get to the club, it's dark and crowded. I feel nervous, but then I see Kara, aka Deviated Septum, rounding the corner. “Traci blew me off,” she says. “She's a flake. I'm so tired of people who are like that. Let's go upstairs.”

We have to walk single file because it's so crowded, and I fear losing Kara, but she continually looks back at me. It's nice. Everyone seems tall, and lots of people are wearing black. The second level is quieter, and there's a strange blue light hanging over everything, cigarette smoke wafting into it. The tables are lit with round red candles. At one, a man is clasping a woman's
hands in the middle and staring at her. Neither of them is saying anything. They're either madly in love, or extremely drunk. If there's a difference.

Kara sits down, opens a matchbook and strikes a match. A tall black waiter with a shaved head arrives and bends over. “What'll you ladies have?”

Kara looks at me. “I'll have a Cosmo,” she says. I don't say anything, so she adds, “Sex on the Beach.”

“What's in that?” I ask.

“You'll like it.” She waves the match out and takes a drag on her cigarette. “I guess you can get it without alcohol, but what's a virgin Sex on the Beach?”

I shrug. “How's Dickson, Monroe?”

“One big party,” Kara says, and then she laughs.

“I shouldn't have asked.”

“Hey, I admire your optimism.” She looks around. “No cute guys here tonight. Or girls.”

“I met one yesterday.”

“Girl? Or guy?”

“A guy. We had dinner together. I'm not sure about him. He's…stuck on an old girlfriend.”

“Forget it,” Kara says. “You'll never measure up. And don't believe it if he says he wants to stay friends with her, either.”

The waiter delivers our drinks. “The guy I had dinner with doesn't drink at all,” I say.

“What a weirdo,” Kara says. She accidentally tips over her drink, then picks it up. “As you can see,” she says, “I've already been drinking.”

I look back at the couple who've been staring at each other. Suddenly I notice that one of them is wearing a ring. Is it a wedding ring? The guy notices me staring, so I look away. I ask Kara, “What do you think of people who cheat on each other?”

She shakes her head. “I think that's so low, cheating.”

“You don't approve?”

She stubs her cigarette in a clear brown ashtray. “I do not. I'm pretty liberal, as you know, but cheaters are the lowest of the low. I mean, how do you justify that?”

I just shrug.

“You're going to cheat, don't get married. Don't have a boyfriend. No one's putting a gun to your head. People who complain about their significant others make me sick. No one forces you to commit to a relationship.”

This amazes me. Even people like Kara, who seem to advocate doing almost anything, will still come up with rules to stick to and to judge others on. I guess their sticking to
some
moral code makes them feel like they're good, even though they flout so many others.

“You know how you can find out if someone's having an affair with someone?” Kara asks.

“No.”

“Ask her if she knows his middle name.”

“Oh.”

“It always works. When people are in love with someone, they always want to know their middle name. Women especially. Men don't do it as much. Women will always want to know the middle names of men they like so they can use them to tease them. What was your English professor's middle name?”

“Lance.”

“See?”

I smile. “I guess you're right.”

“Did you ask him?”

“What his middle name was? I guess I did.”

She laughs. “Once I was dating this guy and I found out his middle name was Seymour. I couldn't be attracted to him after that. I don't ask anymore.”

She stands two matchbooks up like tepees. It's funny the
things people will do with paper when they have nothing else to do.

“This guy you met yesterday,” Kara says, “did you sleep with him?”

“No,” I say.

“Do you want to?”

“I…I don't know.”

“Remember,” Kara says, pointing to her nose. “Deviated septum.”

“Got it.”

“But you never rush in, right?” she says. “You haven't been with anyone since professor…what's-his-name?”

“David. Harrison.”

“How can you stand it? That was years ago.”

I shrug. “I'm asexual, I guess. I'm just not obsessed with it.”

“You haven't met anyone in the meantime who you'd just want to throw off your clothes and jump on top of?”

“No. And way too many people do that. If you just do it to do it, why does it mean anything?”

“Why does it have to?”

“Because…it should.”

Kara waits for more.

“Because you can get diseases. Because you're reducing it to nothing. And people can still get pregnant because of it. It's immoral for a reason. Not just something in the Bible, and I'm not a religious person, anyway.”

A guy bumps into my chair, then keeps walking. The music downstairs ebbs a bit.

Kara shrugs. “You've said you're asexual. But then, if you don't have urges to do things, how do you know that you're really moral?”

“If I had them, I'd try to control them.”

Kara shakes her head. “Everything in the world is based on
feelings, or level of feelings. If you had a greater sex drive, you might not think people were sex-obsessed.”

“Maybe. Maybe not.”

“Well, consider this,” she says. “It does make sense to do everything based on logic, but no one in the world does.
No
one. It doesn't matter what they say. If we thought everything out and acted according to our conclusions, there would be no murder. Why does a guy kill or steal or rape? His urge to do it, or desire to do it, overcomes him. He doesn't think it's right. Okay, maybe in some cases he does think it's right, but usually he knows inside that it's wrong. There are basic things we do that make no sense. Next time you have an urge to do something, even something small, like put on the radio, stop yourself. See how it feels. Maybe you can stop yourself for a few seconds. But if you really, really want to hear the radio, you won't be able to stop yourself for very long. Now, there are some things we are lucky enough to have built up a moral aversion to, and then our thoughts become part of our feelings. We find killing someone for no reason not only cruel and immoral, but repugnant. If I tell you I'm going to step on a baby, you have a visceral reaction. You don't have to compute it mathematically and tell me it's bad. Do you?”

“No.”

“Where does this come from? Socialization? Maybe. But maybe it's a part of us. We are all made with different kinds of urges. Some of us love to cook. Some of us love to swim. Our differences keep the world running. Some of us have monster sex drives. Some of us can get along without it. Some of us are attracted to both men and women. Some are only turned on by young boys.”

“Are you saying that's right?”

“Not at all,” she says. “Because it's not fair to the kids. But for a second, think about someone who is only turned on by young
boys. What if that really is the
only
thing that turns him on sexually in his entire life? Think about someone who has to go eighty years without fulfilling any sort of desire toward something that turns him on. And believe me, being turned on, and actually fulfilling that feeling, is the most amazing rocketship ride in the world. But what if, because of the way you are, the only thing that can bring you to that height of all heights is forbidden? What do you do?”

I don't know what to say to that.

“Get counseling? Maybe. If the only thing that turns you on is something that can hurt another person, yes. But we think that a kiddie sex abuser, in our society, is the lowest form of human imaginable. The kind that not a soul has sympathy for.”

“And you do.”

She shakes her head. “No.”

“So…I don't get the point.”

“The point is, there are cases where urges can hurt innocent people, and we have to be careful about them, but there is middle ground, and there are times when moral laws can't govern everything. Like the antiquated wait-until-you're-married-for-sex deal. How can you blame people for wanting to feel good?”