Eye of the Tiger

Hi, my name is Sarah and I'm a maneater.

Yikes, Sarah!

I've seen it in the animal kingdom: If a dog notices weakness in another dog, the stronger dog will attack. A cat will play with its prey before going in for the kill.

I'm pretty good at smelling weakness, or nervousness as the case may be. I don't know what happens inside me, but I will sit there and psychologically toy with the boy for hours while smiling sweetly from the other side of the table.

It's not good for me to be the alpha in relationships, because it's very clear that I will misuse any power.

Saturday night, I'm out with the Kissing Bandit. Whatever confidence he did have evaporated when N called him up ranting, "Now I have to work with her, so you better be on your very best behavior. If she comes in to work on Monday and tells me about some god awful thing you did, I will have your head!"

He's nervous. He flat out says he's not very good at first dates. Matter of fact, he has a list of things he's not allowed to talk about.

"Like what? What's on the list?"

"My family, ex-girlfriends, Bob Saget, porn and sex, my family again, my sister, religion..." he continues for quite awhile covering most topics.

"So, uh, anyway," he says, "I just want to preface this by saying I'm looking to settle down. I'm 30; it's time to get serious about dating. I do want to get married and have kids..."

I almost choke on my beer. He is the second person I've been out with this week who has brought up the m-word on the first date. I don't know what makes them think this is okay.

"So this isn't a date so much as it is an audition for marriage," I quip back.

"Well, er, no. That's not what I meant."

He's nervous. I can smell it.

We're both thespians, him more recent than me, so I switch the subject to acting.

"Being a drama major really helps with everyday life," he begins. "It's made me a really good liar. I can act my way out of almost any situation I don't like."

"So you brag that you're good at lying? What do you lie about?"

I feel the claws coming out. I meet his eyes and lean across the table, "Are you a liar?"

Yep, they're out.

"No I'm really honest! Ask me anything embarrassing and I'll tell you the truth."

Attack! Attack!

"When was the last time you masturbated?"

He puts his fork down and turns a couple of colors and begins to nervously laugh at my verve. He looks at his watch and pretends to count hours. I laugh so hard that I've lost the ability to breathe and just clutch my chest.

His left eye begins to twitch.

I have succeeded in getting him so worked up that I ignite his facial twitch.

"Omigod, you're twitching!"

Telling him he's twitching doesn't actually help with the twitching.

It's not something I do consciously, but I've always been one to poke at wounds. When I was a child I used to walk up to my mother and press her bruises, "Does that hurt? What about that one?"

Uh, calling Doctor Freud.

Maybe I do it because I was always the one bullied. Being the youngest of six, I've had to learn to hold my own. And with the fight or flight reflex, I've always been a fighter.

Ask Anne from the fifth grade-- bitch deserved her goddamned canoe tipped for making fun of me.