For the longest time, I considered any space with copious amounts of books to be a “safe space.” Libraries, bookstores, my apartment–all were places that I could hide away from the stresses of life, love, and (of course) my terminal awkwardness.

Around most people I vacillate between two extremes–incredibly loud, or extremely quiet, and often sport a lost-and-vacant expression that most often resembles a cracked out deer in headlights.

This makes getting a date pretty hard. Add to this over ten years at an all girls’ school and you may see why I still find the opposite sex strange and mystifying. For me, interacting with boys is like interacting with unicorns. Very sexy unicorns.

So when I got hit on at my local big box bookstore, I was a little more than confused.

Enter the dude. Average height, fairly good-looking and extremely outgoing. However, completely not my type.

“Hey!” he smiled at me.

“Er, hi.” I replied back, suddenly mesmerized by the gold buckles on my boots. I’d never noticed how shiny they were before.

“I just wanted to say, that I saw you going up the escalator and I was captivated by your style. It’s just so cool. But your glasses, they especially make it for me.”

“Er, thanks. Uh, this is uh, me, uh, being, uh, lazy.” Already, I had assumed the stand-offish, mumbling monotone.

“If this is you being lazy,” he cockily quipped, “Then how do you normally dress like?”

“Better.”

While talking to him in a flat, barely audible tone, I experienced something close to an out-of-body experience. I was aware that I was talking to someone, and responding to their questions in a manner that made me seem like a self indulgent, overeducated, pretentious brat–however, I just couldn’t stop the frequent name dropping, the meandering explanations–the cloying verbosity. Also, I couldn’t stop messing with my hair.

Did I feel “hip”? Kind of. Was I man-repelling? Not enough.

“Your vibe seems very awkward,” he said, after prying out of me what I do, where I go to school and other bits of inane self trivia that wouldn’t even get you to the next round of Jeopardy. “Very awkward, but very personable. Like you seem like a big hipster, but nicer.”

There it was. My least favourite seduction technique–negging. Negging (also known as the backhanded compliment) is a carefully placed insult designed to make the recipient feel slightly bad about themselves, but is usually followed by a compliment. It’s annoying, irritating, but in some situations extremely effective.

“Like you know what’s wrong with hipster girls,” he said, “The red lipstick. They look like clowns.”

“I have it in bright purple.” I said, my monotone returning with a touch more annoyance.

“Do you enjoy living in Halifax during the school year?” he said.

“Yeah. I kind of hole myself up with my apartment with my cat, and just write a ton of shit, it’s great.”

“Well, that’s borderline cat lady,” he said, “But I can totally see it. You neglecting your cat while you type your stuff up on an antique typewriter that you bought just [for the purpose] of writing your stuff.”

I was not impressed. I needed to shut it down, and fast.

“Actually, that typewriter belonged to my dead grandmother. Thanks for that.”

Sometimes, the truth will set you free.

~ Natasha Hunt