No Strings

Chapter 52--The End of Blind Dates

I was in my workplace's cafeteria. I wasn't hungry. I was, as usual lamenting my love life.

"Why can't I be a lesbian?"

My office mate looked at me cross-eyed. I didn't laugh.

Because you're straight," he said.

My coworker wasn't the sharpest at conversation. I sighed. At least I wasn't interested in him.

"What is it with men?"

"What do you mean?"

"Seriously, I went on a date--"

"Another blind date? Isn't that your third this month?"

I twirled my Wonderbread lunch on my plate. It wasn't worth eating. There was one piece of processed cheddar cheese and a slice of meat in between the soft bread layers.

"Yes," I said.

"Choose your friends more carefully. Think about it. You can't go on a date with anyone. How well does the person giving out the blind date know you?"

"Yes and confidence is sexy. Making fun of ourselves is cute and being manipulating is how you get a date and love. That screws over the rest of the population. If under a million children suffer child abuse, and there is say another million in abuse, that cuts all of them out of the gene pool, leaving the abusers to reproduce. 'Cause they are the confident bastards that get away with it until they reproduce."

"You're twisting things." That was the best he could manage. I knew I was being unreasonable.

"Look, you girls want a rich man, a good personality, intelligence, looks charisma and confidence. But when it comes to men, it turns one hundred eighty degrees, why? Why expect more from men than yourselves? You should also expect that some percentage of men have been abused too."

He had a point. He was too rational about love. How come he was guru and master when his answer to my laments was crossing his eyes?

He bit into his ham sandwich. He stuffed in a big heap of mashed potatoes and then chewed. He chased it all with a vague resemblance to vegetables--something that looked vaguely like peas and carrots.

"I still think it would be nice to be a lesbian, because then men would love me. They would flock to me."

"Not any men you want. Those kinds only have one thing on their mind. You wouldn't be a lesbian anyway. You can kiss a girl at a bar and get those men. Anymore brilliant reasons?"

A reasonable man. That seemed so unlikely. Then man who showed up for work late and then expected to be paid the regular amount had a degree in love matters? I was rehashing the same point to myself. Envy flared up nonetheless. What was wrong with me anyway?

"Won't it be easier?"

"After the social ridicule, feeling like crap and wondering why the hell you were dealt the gay card when you could have been left-handed, you would still want to be gay?"

I was crumbling the bread in my hand. I didn't have time to buy anything for lunch. Work would be over soon anyway. I would buy something more appropriate next time.

"What does being left-handed have to do with being gay?"

"Ten percent of the population is left-handed. Ten percent of the population is gay. But people take issue with people being gay. In any case, they are both considered sinister."

I raised my eyebrow at his twisted joke.

"Sinister is Italian for left..."

"Oh," I said. And this guy was giving out free love advice. I was repeating myself. The top piece of bread was almost all crumbled. I spotted a pigeon outside of the window look at me with its beady eyes. I wish I could give it to him.