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Pricks that picked on other kids. Bullies.
Some dude tried to start a fight with him in a bar once for hitting on his girl.
He hadn’t been hitting on her. She’d been hitting on him. He saw what was happening and caught the guy’s fist and slammed it on the bar, told him to find another sucker to fall for his girlfriend’s games before he got his ass kicked.
“I don’t like being told what to do either,” she said. “I never felt I had a voice. Where we lived we had to follow the rules for our safety. It sucked, but we did it. When I came to America to live with my grandparents, it was another set of rules.”
“For your safety I’m sure,” he said.
“Another form of safety. They thought I was naive and I’ll admit I was. I probably still am to many.”
“Not as much as I think you want people to believe.”
“No one wants to be thought of as naive,” she argued.
“Some do.”
“Are you saying I do it for attention?”
She was getting worked up and this was where he tended to put his foot in his mouth with a woman.
He was trying to do more than have sex with her and then send her on her way. He’d have to navigate it so that she didn’t think it was more though.
Yet with the shit coming out of his mouth, he’d be lucky if she wanted to come back a third time.
“I’m saying that I think sometimes you do it for attention. You’ve been honest with me and I’m being honest with you. You’ve said you’ve got daddy issues so that means you want attention. You also said you have crappy taste in men.”
Her shoulders dropped. “You’re right.”
“And you give in too easily.”
“I lasted just as many days as you,” she said, poking her finger into his side. She had a point.
“Stand your ground,” he said. “Argue with me if you want.”
“Thanks, but not much to argue about. I admit it. I liked attention when I was younger. It seems like nothing works the way I want it to. I didn’t finish college because I didn’t apply myself well enough.”
“I’m sure it had more to do with you trying to figure out life in a new country.”
“There is that. Most don’t get it. Just because I’ve got dual citizenship and have been around the world and want to be in America now doesn’t mean I knew everything I should have for the eighteen years prior.”
“How did you get your schooling?” he asked. That had just occurred to him.
“My mother was a teacher before she quit her job to travel with my father. She teaches English as a second language to the local kids and anything else they ask of her. She home schooled us or taught us with them in the classrooms when we were younger.”
“What do your brothers do?” he asked. “It seems you three girls turned out well.”
“You’re the first person to say I did,” she said. “Even up until a few months ago people would say I don’t get it. Or I’m young yet. Sometimes to my face, but mostly behind my back.”
“Then fuck them,” he said.
“I know. I never want people mad at me either. It’s a weakness I’ve got.”
“You’re getting down on yourself for no reason.”
She shrugged. “Mark went to college for business. I’m not sure what he does, but he lives in Japan now. He travels for his job, but he’s been there for a few years and seems to be happy enough. Chase is at Columbia University in med school. He’s going to take after my father.”
“He wants to work for Doctors Without Borders?”
