These are the things that I hate about myself.

But it isn’t like the hate is constant and overwhelming. I just…feel it sometimes. I reflect on it sometimes. And when I do it makes my cheeks turn that particular shade of red…it makes my eyes close in disgust with myself. Because most of the time I convince myself that I’m ok…that I’m this certain wholesome person…this woman who has these certain upstanding things. A job…a mom and a dad and a hometown…an alma mater. But then I remember the things I hate about myself and the wholesome, upstanding image I’ve created in my mind floats away to be replaced by reality. And that’s usually a really ugly sight.

It usually is.

Because my reality is late nights and whispered, insincere I love you’s, and stranger after stranger parting my waters and walking through me just because they can. It’s my own fault, really. I offer myself up to them. And I know that when they say I love you, they think it’s true. They think they mean it. And I know that should be enough. But about ten minutes after they’ve finished, their words are what leave a bitter taste on my tongue…their words are what haunt me. Because I love you just magnifies the meaninglessness…the insincerity of what I’ve done…of who I am. I don’t even get paid for having sex with total strangers. I just do it because… I don’t know why really. Some shrink would probably tell you I hate my father, or my older sister’s ex-boyfriend called me fat one too many times… But really it’s because of this.

It’s really because these are the things that I hate about myself.

I was pumping gas on my way home from work on a Friday in July. Scranton is a small town, so I’d usually drive to someplace like Wilkes-Barre or Dickson City to find a bar…a nook or cranny where I could sit and feel…I don’t know…empty, I guess…where I could sit and wait for somebody to fill me up. I was pumping gas because I needed it. Because it was Friday and I had gone to Dickson City the week before…so I needed something farther this week. Something new. I had a road trip in front of me, so I was pumping gas and impatiently tapping my foot to the shitty music they were piping through the speakers, watching the numbers snick by and cursing the high prices.

He was pumping gas, too. Only he was pumping gas and watching me instead of the numbers. I couldn’t help but notice. I looked up.

“Staring is impolite in most places, you know,” I told him, shouting a little bit so that he would hear me over the echo of Toni Braxton and the hum of gasoline. He blinked and shook his head at me.

“You…Uh…Wha?” he stuttered out, and I grinned at him…warm and slow because even though I could tell by looking at him that this guy was everything I didn’t want in a man, he had that glazed look in his eye…he was glassy and distracted and looking at my body like it’d been cooked medium rare and served with a side of mashed potatoes. I wanted that look. I was addicted to that look. So I grinned…I raised my eyebrows, and I leaned toward him…my forearm braced on the roof of my Toyota.

“Did I spill something on my shirt?” I asked calmly, still grinning because I knew he was nervous…afraid of me. Grinning because everything about this was ridiculous.

“No, no, sorry,” he replied in embarrassment, his hair dark and a little bit sweaty against his brow. His gaze shifted down to the pump in his hand and I felt a twinge of disappointment. I wondered if I wasn’t making myself clear.

“What’s your name?” I called out. His eyes shot up to me then…met my amused stare, and I could almost feel him swallow.

“Um…my…wha…? Uh, Michael,” he forced, glancing around and probably wondering if I was some kind of psychotic hitch-hiker, or a thief. I smiled, realizing that “temptress” was not up this guy’s ally, and a grin just wouldn’t do. I consciously softened my expression…hoping to calm him down…hoping to make something happen.

“Nice to meet you, Mike. I’m Susan,” I introduced, waving my free hand a little bit, taking in the way that his tie was crooked and his sleeves were rolled up…the way that it seemed like he’d had a bad day…a bad week maybe…and he just exuded this sort of helplessness…this sort of uselessness… He was not my usual fare. I mostly dealt with cocky mid-life crisis jocks who wanted a reminder of their past conquests. Drunken lawyers who’s wives wouldn’t get down on all fours. Faceless men who wanted a faceless woman for one night only. This guy wasn’t really faceless. He had character…he looked back at me with panic dripping from his pores and I thought I might never forget that face, if only for the fact that he seemed a little bit pathetic. Vague warning bells started to go off in my head, but I ignored them out of curiosity.

“Hi Suuusan,” he drawled lazily, jerking his head to the side and quirking his lips like my name was sour on his tongue. I frowned.

“You’re not having a good day, are you Mike?” I asked with a little bit of a chuckle, wondering why I was even bothering with this. I glanced at the meter and thought my tank had to be almost full…I’d been standing there for like forty-five minutes. When I looked back at him he was shrugging tired shoulders.

“Not…my best. No,” he admitted quietly, barely audible over the final chords of Unbreak my Heart. I squinted over the top of my car and ran a hand through my blonde hair, tangling my fingers in its waves because it was something to do.

“Let’s go get a drink,” I suggested. He froze and stared at me…calculating…considering…his mouth hanging open and the pump in his hand clicking to tell him his tank was full. He jumped and pulled the nozzle from his car, placing it back where it belonged and turning to assess me and my motivations. I smiled innocently back at him and shrugged as if to say What the hell, right? He offered me a half smile in return.

“A drink?” he repeated dumbly. I laughed and he smiled wider.

“Yeah, just a drink. Relax, Mike, I don’t want a diamond ring or anything.” His eyes flicked away from me and he pursed his lips at one of his back tires. I wondered if that had been the wrong thing to say for only a moment because he turned and opened his car door suddenly.

“Yeah ok, a…drink would be…cool cool,” he grinned, and I bit my cheek to keep from rolling my eyes as I pulled the nozzle from my car.

“Cool cool,” I repeated, hating the way that it sounded.

These are the things that I hate about myself.

We went to a pub…Molly’s…and sat in a booth in the back. I ordered scotch on the rocks because it made me feel tough…it made me feel like someone who was strong and could handle her own complexes…her own habits… People who drank scotch made choices and stuck to them. People who drank scotch never cried themselves to sleep. So I ordered Dewars on ice with a splash of water, and he ordered a beer.

We sat there and watched each other drink for a while…and I was waiting for him to hit on me…for him to comment on my bust size or ask me why he hadn’t seen me before…but none of that was forthcoming…in fact he wasn’t speaking at all…wasn’t really even looking at me…until I finally asked him why his day had been bad. He shifted in his seat uncomfortably and shook his head.

“It was just…To tell you the truth, most of my days are…” I thought I noticed a sheen of liquid in his eyes, but he blinked and it was gone. “It was pretty normal,” he finished, sucking down a quarter of his beer. I nodded.

“So all of your days are bad?” I interpreted. This was an area I was familiar with…most men in bars in Wilkes-Barre hated their jobs…it made sense that Scranton wouldn’t be any different. He flinched and shook his head again, almost convulsively, swallowing back some certain kind of emotion…something that was particular to him. My brow furrowed as I leaned toward him in the shadows.

“I just…” he cleared his throat. “I think I try too hard,” he muttered, quiet…ashamed. I frowned.

“Why do you think that?” I asked him. He laughed coldly into his beer.

“Because it’s true.” He made this admittance even more quietly than the last, and began peeling the labels off his bottle of Blue Moon. My hand snaked out and pressed against his fingers, stilling him. He met my gaze.

“Why?” I whispered. He moved his mouth a few times…guppy-like…unsure. He was everything I had never been with…all self-consciousness and inexperience…all solitude and misfortune. He was lacking the false bravado I had gotten used to from business men in suits…he was lacking the false bravado that something told me he usually toted around with him. He’d had a bad day…and was reacting in a way I wasn’t used to in men. I was fascinated. Riveted. He licked his lips.

“I just…want…” he squinted, “…something,” he breathed. I nodded, enjoying the way his eyes were heavy on mine…the way his breath hitched because our skin was touching. Want me, I thought, simultaneously wondering why I was willing him to want me when I didn’t really want him… He cleared his throat and interrupted my thoughts. “Everyone I work with is at a party right now,” he muttered. I pulled back and sipped at my scotch with raised eyebrows.

“Why aren’t you with them?” I asked. He smiled and nodded a little bit, finishing peeling the labels despite my efforts to stop him.

“I was not invited,” he told me bitterly. That was when it hit me…he was different because he hadn’t been shunned by his girlfriend or his wife…his day wasn’t bad because his boss had reprimanded him. He was different because he’d been shunned by everyone he knew. He was alone. Palpably and torturously alone. I felt sure, then, what would seal the look of desire onto his face…I felt sure what would guarantee that I was what he needed.

“They have it wrong,” I whispered, leaning back into the booth behind me and waiting for the reaction…waiting for him to come to me the way that I knew he would. “Your friends,” I clarified, “they have it wrong.” And I frowned a little because something inside of me meant it...and I waited for a reaction.  He did not disappoint.

My apartment was dark and quiet except for that he kept asking me if I was ok…he kept whispering questions at me, instead of statements, and it was unnerving me, but I instructed myself to just keep going. I gripped his belt and unfastened it mechanically, shushing him.

“Is this ok?” he asked, despite my request that he stay silent. I rolled my eyes.

“Can you just relax?” I realized belatedly that it was a harsh tone of voice…that I could’ve been killing the mood…that I had let my emotions rise up to somewhere close to the surface and that was breaking all of my rules. “Please?” I added quietly, smiling up at him. His eyebrows quirked at me and he nodded, probably less because he was conceding and more because he wasn’t sure what else to do. He was quiet when he wasn’t asking me for reassurance, and I was grateful for that. I was not a fan of talking in bed…especially not of grand sentiments and statements meant to make oneself feel less…dirty. Less like the animals that we are. I kissed him when he tried to ask me if we should slow down. He responded…and I thought it was because that was what he was used to doing…even if it wasn’t what he wanted.

He was awkward, fumbling…trying desperately to please me as much as he was being pleased. I wasn’t used to that and it sent a lightening bolt of confused desire through me. Mid-life crisis football players and self-important lawyers never wanted to give as good as they got. They wanted to take and then leave, all the while convincing themselves that that wasn’t what they were doing.  Not him. He was careful…shaking…shy in his requests and eager to reciprocate my sexual sentiments. I didn’t want to let him reciprocate because this was not a union…this was not what he thought…and I needed control.

But he was persistent…pushing into me carefully instead of just letting go and losing control, the way I suggested. He was sincere, swiping his thumb against my center until I stiffened beneath him in tense fear and arousal. And he shifted from asking if it was ok, to telling me that it was…to promising that it was…and I came with tears in my eyes because that never happened…that wasn’t supposed to happen. He came later…quietly…telling me he was sorry instead of telling me that he loved me.

I stared at the ceiling and asked him to leave. He was quiet beside me for a while, unmoving, and then he took a deep breath and I was terrified of what he was about to say.

“You shouldn’t do this to yourself,” he told me, his head turned toward mine on his pillow. I looked back over at him resignedly, registering the way that he was honest…soulful…likeable, and thinking there must’ve been a reason he hadn’t been invited to the party…thinking he was isolated because he chose that like I chose this…because there was something that he didn’t like about himself. And, whatever it was, he was wrong.

“Neither should you,” I told him. He nodded and left the bed, turning on the shower and washing himself clean of the evening. When he left, I promised myself with tears in my eyes that I would never do this again.

Because these were the things that I hated about myself.

And he was right.