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She dressed up. She wore her special lipstick, Red Revolution, her red barrettes, and black lace panties & bra under her dress. Leopard-print tights. She shaved her legs. She went to the café to meet a new client. You were hopeful - you know this work brings her pleasure and meaning, that she's fascinated by everybody she meets, curious about their stories, their bodies, their desires - even their insecurities. Especially their insecurities. You've been dating for a while and you're impressed by her perceptive ideas, her active listening skills... Her presence. No matter how many others she's with, you know that when she's with you, she's *only* with you.

You have her devoted attention. And she wants yours, too.

She's had a stressful day. She was stood up at the café. Each time somebody entered, she looked up from the book she was reading, snuck a surreptitious glance toward the door, wondered, 'Is this him?'

As time passed, she realized what was happening. She felt embarrassed to have saved the second chair at her table when others had wanted to sit down. But she felt calm, too. Reading a short story collection, eavesdropping on the conversations around her. When she came home, you were there, waiting for her, all tucked into her bed. You've been sleeping over more often.

She gets into bed with you and tells you about her day, about being stood up. She wants you to comfort her. She's reading Hellgoing by Lynn Coady, hoping she can write with such skill and detail, with such insight and sensitivity. Someday. There's a story she read, An Otherworld, and she tells you about it, she related to it and thinks you'd appreciate the story - a girl who's become self-deprecating about a previous relationship, about her idealization of a Kurt Cobain lookalike who she ran away to the forest with, and who one day came home and listed everything he disliked about her, and then left.

You're falling ****. She hopes you'll read the story in the morning. Maybe she'll read it to you out loud over coffee, after morning sex.

She strips slowly, lifting her dress, lowering her tights. Dances a little to tease you. You want to touch her, but you're so tired, buried under blankets while she stands beside the bed, revealing more and more skin, her tattoos, her small tits that you love to hold while she curls into you, a little spoon. She watches you while she dances. Looks you in the eye. Mopes a little.

When she's naked, she gets into bed with you. She's so glad you're spending the night, so glad you appreciate listening to the rambling thoughts and feelings of this bookish weirdo. As she reaches toward the lamp to darken the room, she kisses you, and you reach for her soft, pale flesh, the curves of her wide hips, and you hold her close, hoping she'll never slip away.