Lying to her therapist had gotten old. So Chissa’s New Year’s Resolution was to be honest for fifty minutes a week, and it hadn’t gone well. Before Chissa stopped lying, her therapist had been motherly, consoling, dispensing helpful thought gems like, “When things are going badly, I set very easy goals for myself.” But as Chissa relayed constant feats of disobeying logic, the basic tenants of feminism and good sense to have somewhat humiliating sex with unemployed men, her therapist couldn’t hide her hostility anymore. Every week, Chissa knew to look forward to disapproving commentary about her wardrobe, her taste in television and the men in Chissa’s life. Joe became “the guy who did that thing with your tampon.” Nick was “the drug addict with the flesh-eating virus.” And Craig was just the “molester,” though he hadn’t been convicted.

Therapy had formed in Chissa’s mind into a mile-long rain cloud of suspicion over any choice she made. So one Monday, overwhelmed with a bad Mexican lunch and the lack of return phone calls from a date that weekend and an old boyfriend who was in town, Chissa stepped into an elevator to get back to work. The thing stalled between floors giving her thirty minutes trapped with two older female co-workers who stared at her pink heels the entire time, oozing with a mixture of jealousy and chagrin that typified the way that every woman had treated her since she was six. That afternoon she opened her session by saying, “I’m tired of being used,” her therapist nodded gently. And that was nice, because Chissa expected a quick diagnostic snap like, “What do you expect?” But instead, her therapist completely understood and the rest of the session was spent developing a very serious, very detailed plan for Chissa to meet a new kind of guy, the kind of guy she had been avoiding her whole life.

***********

The only interesting things Chissa could remember him saying—as she tried to flood the parsleyish taste of his tongue out her mouth with a Diet Coke and a third piece of chewing gum—was that he studied dark matter and he’d just quit smoking on Valentine’s Day. He definitely seemed like the type who studied dark matter, or some irrelevant yet very specific scientific thing. But the smoking was a bit of a shock. Based on the brown roundness of his glasses frames and the awkward way he sipped at his beer, she assumed he must’ve picked up the habit at an all-night Dungeons and Dragons game or by losing a bet to the older kids on the Algebra team. The image of him with a cigarette dangling off his chapped lips would prevent millions of kids from thinking smoking was cool. She hated herself for being a bit attracted to him as she approached him in a bookstore café. It was just cute—the way he folded his arm, rested his head on it and read like reading was the most pleasing activity in the world. But maybe his smile had been from gas. Like a baby’s smile.

He was—if she was going to be high school about it and there was no other way to be about dating, really—a complete nerd. His laugh, which seemed to rise from the top of his nose and project out of the tear ducts of his eyes, certified that. He was probably a geek, too, if there was a distinction. To her, a geek was a nerd who wasn’t that smart. And he wasn’t smart when it came to placing food directly into his mouth and letting her talk. When she was able to sneak a sentence or two into the conversation, he’d summarized her point and added a thought of his own—a thought that demonstrated that he had completely misunderstood her. It was so frustrating that after the salad, she didn’t say one word other than yes or no. She just nodded along as he explained everything he’d ever thought. And he thought all the time.

Chissa hoped—when he did nice things like chewing with his mouth closed and picking up the check—that the persistent unease might’ve hinted at a sexual tension. But his kiss had disabused her of that fantasy. His eyes were wide open (staring down past her chest, at her stomach?) as he moved in. When their lips connected, he instantly licked and poked at her with his tongue. Then he seized her biceps in a way that suggested that she shouldn’t move at all. So, she hadn’t.

When he was done, he stepped back, wiped his lips with the back of his hand and said, “That was the first time I ever kissed a girl.”

Her stomach sank, in that 9/11 way. The I-can’t-believe-humanity-is-so-sick-and-I’m-here-living-through-it way. “Really?” she asked, because the silence combined with his saliva dripping down her chin was agonizing.

“Just kidding! JK, ” he said and wiped his lips with his knuckles again. “You believed me? I guess that was some kiss.”

“No, I just didn’t know. You’re young.” He was twenty-seven. She was twenty-eight.

Blush tinted the bits of his skin that weren’t occupied with acne and other blemishes.

He took a deep breath. And somehow, he became slightly likeable, leaning toward confident. “I think you dig me,” he said, his lips fighting against the certainty of his words. “Don’t stalk me.” He poked her shoulder and was serious for a second before a laugh burst out of the fat, oatmealy pores of his forehead.

**********

Five minutes later, Chissa was safe inside her house and crushing her gum against her teeth, forcing out every available flavor crystal. She didn’t know where the parsley taste could’ve come from since they’d eaten pizza. There was a salad bar. Maybe he’d grabbed some garnish and swallowed it quickly to freshen his breath. She was considering a fourth piece of gum, when her phone rang.

It was him.

“Just wanted to make sure you got inside safe,” he said.

“I did.”

“I had a really nice time,” he said. “You know, I have tickets for a play this Saturday. Would you do me the pleasure?”

A quick search of her memory revealed that no guy had ever told her that he had a very nice time with her before. No guy ever. Stuck in that realization and the urge to prove it wrong, she said, “What time?”

***********

Chissa was nine when she had her first little boyfriend. She used to make him watch CHiPs with her. They hung out every day until one day he showed up with one of his friends, and Chissa didn’t want to let them in. The boys went around the back and tried to take a sliding door off the hinges to get inside. They didn’t have the strength or the anger to succeed, but Chissa still yelled, “I’m calling the police.”

And when she ran to the phone and dialed the number for time, the boys took off.

As Chissa sat down to watch CHiPs alone, she thought, “I’m just like mommy and her boyfriends.” Or maybe she hadn’t. But she should’ve.

*********

“I wrote about you in my blog,” he told her as he called to confirm the date for a third time.

“What is it?”

“Painfully honest,” he said.

“I meant, where can I read it?”

“Yeah, it’s painfullyhonest.com. It’s Tuesday’s right below the thing about Dark Angel.”

Chissa debated. Should she wait till after their next date before she read it? She decided yes, but the next day when she sat down at work she couldn’t think of anything else to look at. First Date, was the title of the post. “In effect, I was flummoxed by her beauty,” he began. “Everything she said was some new gospel that confounded then saved me. Her eyes were jewels. Her mouth was shaped like cupid’s arrow. I can’t describe her body without sounding ungentlemanly. We talked and talked. I’ve never met someone who was so new to the concepts of cosmology yet so engaged by them. And she got my jokes, which is very, very important to me as lionHeartedBunter and Aphazia8 know. More soon!” He ended it all with as line of smiley faces.

She read it twice and couldn’t make sense of the lips like arrows part at all. The rest she understood. Very simply, it told her, Lying isn’t such a bad thing. But she didn’t even know how to lie anymore. Being quiet was so much easier.
***********
Chissa was out of sorts in so many ways. He was sitting directly to her right in a large theater walled with boxes filled with older people who were all dressed like TV parents. She’d never been in a theater for any event that didn’t have the word “School” in it. And the scent of parsley wafted through the air hitting her nose every few seconds.

He stared at her, like he was trying to figure out if she emitted enough electromagnetic radiation to be observed directly. The taste of parsley swelled over Chissa’s tongue like the beginning of a new illness.

As the lights dimmed and the orchestra rose, he grabbed her hand. Chissa felt the lines of his palm, rough and mildewy at the same time.

“I have to go to the restroom,” Chissa said.

“Want me to come?”

“No. I’m fine.” She excused herself through a line of slacks and cloppy heels. She looked at the stage and saw a woman playing a mother riding out on a cart dragged by a boy and a girl. The story was about to begin. Chissa turned to the door and ran.

By the time she got to her car, her phone was ringing.

It was him.

She turned it off.

Right then, Chissa decided that she finally knew a truth. And it was such a true truth she wouldn’t ever explain it to anyone. Basically, the truth was that the only thing worse than a guy who doesn’t call back is a guy who does.

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