I have a confession.  There’s someone I like a lot these days.   I think he may be interested, too.  We may never find out, however, as my infatuation has bordered on half a year and I have yet to say a word to him.  But, oh, the glances we give each other.  Our mutually timed trips to the water fountain at the gym.  Sometimes when he does his squats I swear he’s pointing his ass directly at me.  Everything is so laden with meaning.

When I recite these incidents to Reuben he rolls his eyes and says it’s so Jane Austen of me.  In other words, I’m a pussy.  But I think I’m more Edith Wharton.  The romances in my fantasies are always left unrequited and unfulfilled.  I just can’t bear to imagine a happy ending. 

What would I write about if I was no longer neurotic?  Would I even be interesting anymore?  Happiness, henceforth, must be overrated.

And so I stalk Gym Boy.  I prey upon him from afar, observing and analyzing every piece of detail.  When older, unattractive guys ask him if he’s using a piece of gym equipment, he’s very nice and says yes I am but would you like to work in with me?  He is too perfect!  Good looks and good manners!   With his spiky blond hair and sharp, intense features he looks like the type who would be cast as the bully in teen flicks.  But, alas, he’s kind hearted too.  Awwww….

I think he senses the weight on his shoulders – the burden to be one of the truly good looking ones of his generation.  Others look to him to define how a good-looking person should act.  And he leads by example: we should always try to be nice to our elders. 

Plus, he drive an Audi TT.  Oh, Cassandra would look soo good sitting in the passenger seat.  He could go down on me when we pull up to a red light.  The fantasies are endless.

There’s so much I want to say to him.  I’m going to beg him to have coffee with me.  There’s a lot I want to unload off my shoulders too.  Burning questions I need to have answered.  Issues of global importance.  The very future of humanity is at stake.  It keeps me awake at night.

Please, just have one cup of coffee with me, so I can ask you:

Can I eat your ass?

Please?

But, of course, you can’t just come right out and ask someone that, silly!  That would be so tacky.  It would show a real lack of character and upbringing on my part.  It’s just not done in polite society.

Don’t you think I, of all people, know this?

That’s why I am going to ask him in French!

Tags: intro