The Boyfriend

by Freida McFadden

And I’m terrified that the moment I get her alone, I will wrap my fingers around her pretty, white neck and squeeze the life out of her.

“If I closed my eyes and imagined the perfect girl, it would be you.”

“Well,” he adds, “except for your arms.” “My arms?” “They’re kind of flabby.” He wrinkles his nose. “But other than that, wow. Like I said, you’re the perfect woman.”

What a great meet-cute. I can already imagine telling the story to our children. This jerk was trying to kiss me, and that, kids, is how I met your father.

I wonder what it’s like to cut into a person with a scalpel. To feel their skin separate under my hand. To see their insides. I can’t wait to find out.

Truth be told, I’ve only kissed a girl once, and I didn’t even want to do it. She kissed me. Except the only people who know about that are me and her. And now just me.

After all, the less time I spend with the chief of police, the better.

I have something called von Willebrand disease, which basically means that if I get a papercut, I’m going to leave a trail of blood behind me.

Romance novels give you an extremely unrealistic concept of romance. If I were a character in one of those books, our meet-cute would have quickly been followed by Mystery Man ripping off his T-shirt to reveal gleaming, rock-hard abs and then thrusting his throbbing loins against me.

Why is dating so hard? Why can’t I just find a great guy, marry him, and live happily ever after? Is that really too much to ask for?

I have spent the last half hour scrolling through Facebook while contemplating deleting Facebook. I

Is anyone besides me not procreating right now?

at this rate I am never going to have children of my own. I can’t fathom the situation in which this would possibly happen.

“Will you come, Tom?” she asks me. “Come?”

My head is spinning, and it’s not from the wine.

Wow. Thanks, Jake, for spoiling our postcoital bliss.