Wear lipstick. No, you don’t usually but you’re trying to look ladylike, masquerade as someone your mother would be proud of—not this untamed gnarl of flesh and desire you’ve become.
Arrive early. Scope out the restaurant or bar for a bouncer or bartender, then sit close enough you can believe there is protection nearby.
Wear pants. Yes, it’s sexier to wear a dress or skirt—sluttier too—but you know better than to have your legs accessible for a stranger’s fingers to creep between.
When he arrives, you will feel it. Maybe the hair will prickle on the back of your neck, maybe your arms will spring up goosebumps or maybe you’ll start to sweat.
Act cool. Say as little as possible: just a yes when he asks if you’re her.
Or if your neck prickled in that bad way—you know—no.
Laugh a lot. Let your hair fall into your eyes and leave it there, you dark mystery. If you want him, you should remain elusive at least until the entrees arrive.
If you insist on drinking—which you will, you’re so anxious and sweaty—limit yourself to two drinks. Any more and you’ll get sloppy and you remember what happened with Cody Murphy.
Don’t tell him what happened with Cody Murphy.
Tell him instead some charming anecdotes about your awkward younger self. Since you were in no way charming, tell him your college roommate’s hammock story as if it is your own.
Cross your legs, uncross them. This is not an invitation, just a suggestion.
Maybe it’s an invitation.
He doesn’t look anything like Cody Murphy, thank god. Although a little more musculature wouldn’t hurt him.
But he’s nice looking, really, and those eyes are kind.
When was the last time you went out with someone with kind eyes? Have you ever?
Oh god here you go talking to yourself.
Go to the bathroom to refocus. Stare in the mirror as long as you need to until you reinhabit your body.
Be careful, when you walk back toward the table, not to wobble.
You will show no signs of weaknesses. There is power in your womanhood. You of pants on a first date, of fight classes, of weaponry.
What Cody Murphy did was not your fault.
You could not have stopped that or prepared for it or reacted any differently than your body did.
Then.
He’s looking at you, your date. His name is Eric and he’s handsome beyond those gentle eyes. His hair is gelled into tame curls but you’re sure in the morning it feels like crowded feathers between your fingers.
This man, you think, would never leave you like an animal sliced open, a carcass to be devoured, to rot.
You should switch to water.
When he talks, listen.
Try to quiet yourself.
Yes you’ve been trying to do that all this time but if you focus harder, you might be able to sustain it.
He is talking about his kids—he has two—and the way his eyes crinkle at the corners makes you wonder how it must feel to be adored as they are.
What must it be like?
My father used to snap chicken necks, you say.
You’ve really gone off script here. That is not a charming anecdote.
Your date though looks at you with an intense curiosity.
When I was a kid, I would ask him all the ways he killed them.
What were the ways? your date asks. He is calm, ready to receive you.
Sometimes he would just use his two hands, pinch between its windpipe and neck and twist. Sometimes he would step on them, or whip it around in circles above his head.
Your date nods, takes a drink of water.
He scared me.
Your father?
Focus.
I’ve been a vegetarian since I was eight.
There is silence then, just a beat or two and it is not uncomfortable.
Do you want to get out of here?
You’re not sure who said what last, you just know that you do want to get out of here where the air is stuffy and so full you can’t make out your own voice and there are men at every table and even though no one is grabbing you by the leg, the waist, the neck, you feel frantic and flighty.
Pick up your purse. Slip your hand inside. Feel around, aha, there it is. The stun gun, exactly where you tucked it.
Outside the winter cools your flushed face.
You are walking toward the crosswalk in that strut of yours, purposeful.
Text me your address, you say. So many ways you have learned to safeguard yourself.
But when you turn to look at him, he isn’t on his phone; he is reaching for your hand.
His fingers slide between yours.
They are soft, shy.
You had forgotten what this feels like.
You can’t explain what comes over you or this feeling so foreign, but you hear a voice you believe to be yours say, you tender beast.
That must be the drinks talking.
But him? He smiles, laughs.
You’re about to ask him where he plans to take you.
He pulls you into his coat first.
You can see his heart beating through his sweater. You lay your hand there.
You tender beast, you say again, this time in a whisper.
Holly Pelesky writes essays, fiction and poetry. She holds an MFA from the University of Nebraska. Her prose can be found in Roanoke Review, The Nasiona, and Jellyfish Review. She recently released her first collection of poems, Quiver. She works, coaches slam poetry, and raises boys in Omaha.