THE HARRIED HARE

Read at your own risk.

Her smile immediately disarmed me, a rare feat. I've been told I give off a barbed wire vibe, but this little rabbit slipped under the perimeter wire, dangling aluminum cans notwithstanding, and wiggled that adorned nose, and I put my shotgun down and decided to chat. We discovered common ground in writing and art. And then…

I’m queer, she said. She's leading with that. OK. You’ll see it when you check out my website.

Great. It’s all I can muster, and I wonder if fag is back in vogue now. Queer has been off the polite company menu for quite some time. I’ll ask down the road a bit. I’m still assessing my prospects. The open-air bar bustles behind us. I popped in to have a quiet beer after a hammer-and-tong work week, and we struck up a conversation, she, and I. It was her first day on the job, and she is fetching in her company attire, a big horsehead logo on her tan, starched shirt. I Google queer when she leaves to serve the couple down the bar. I notice that Miriam Webster has changed the definitions of female and vaccine. I'm not sure which is more foreboding, but I know it's not a welcome turn.

She did not look me directly in the face the next time we met at the bar. It had been two weeks since we chatted and traded links to our respective websites. Gone was the easy smile, the perfect teeth, and the soft electric connection. The plug is still game, but the socket is closed—tight. Perhaps it is the weight of her four nose rings that dragged those eyes to the floor. She is no rampaging bull, it is obvious, and her petite frame has the skeletal arithmetic of a twitching parrot safely caged in a gilded aviary. She is built for tethered flight, a kite bobbing in a relativist breeze, I soon discover. Her twitching discomfort is unmistakable.

I am not looking for a fight, but I am not retreating, and I am curious. I glance at her orange crocs since they are the main draw for her gaze.

What’s wrong? My black camo hat flies a Gadsden Flag. I could not be clearer.

I read some of your writing. The horsehead logo is snorting weak steam.

Super, I read some of yours, too. The one about your girlfriend’s head and the pumpkin patch was interesting. I’d like to meet her. I mean that. I don’t meet many interesting people.

Yeah, I don’t know. Chloe’s hair is lilac and incongruously elaborate, perhaps trying too hard. On the other hand, I'm not extraordinary at identifying hues without labels—disrobed crayons gave me fits as a kid. So is that color for show? Or is it a tragic accident? I’ll never know.

Lots of your language is offensive. Mother, father, stuff like that. I found your reference to lipstick lesbians especially appalling. And the cancer story should have come with a trigger warning. That was brutal. I had a friend who told me about a friend who had cancer, and it spun me into a dark place.

And me without a flashlight to offer. How rude.

How’s your friend’s friend now? Or was it your friend’s friend’s friend? My expression is expressionless.

Fine, I guess, but that's not the point.

Not dying from cancer is typically the most salient point. I swat a dive-bombing fly.

I tell her the title of my next book is Trigger Warning. She shifts her weight from one foot to the other. My feet are planted.

I order a pint of Belgian ale and a side of truffle fries.

And the rabbit hurried off.

I leave a decent tip on the way out.