Before It Starts

I show up to parties wanting one good night—real conversation, some drinks. Anyone can manage that. But it gets late and all the couples are fused together in the corners and I’m forced to celebrate for them when I’m actually furious about it. So I grab my friend and we spend the ride home picking apart what I did wrong, which guy I should have actually talked to.

When I meet someone, I lose it completely. We haven’t even left the bar and I’ve bonded with all their friends, rearranged their apartment, decided we’re building a whole life together. But we’re never actually together, never official, so it evaporates before it really begins.

I need noise. Silence terrifies me—I’d rather talk absolute bullshit than be quiet long enough for someone to figure out I’m boring. I’m good at sounding like I know things I don’t. Politics, economics, whatever—I can fill an hour talking about it while understanding almost nothing.

I check myself in every mirror. Forget names the moment I hear them. My ex said I was scattered, perpetually late, chaotic. She was right.

I like women who actually think, who know things without having to announce it. That intelligence without the performance. It’s the only thing that matters.

What I want is the four-year-old version: see someone, yell that’s mine, end of story. Can’t skip to that part though.