Dinner with a Bad Girl

I feel like the Antichrist, very unwelcomed and unwanted at the dinner table. I glance at the man I'm supposed to be in love with. Whose cheap engagement ring I'm wearing. I glance at his parents, whom both thoroughly dislike me. His mother's brow is furrowed as I poke at my peas which taste like little balls of overcooked cardboard. I imagine she's thinking about how to kill me and make it look like an accident. She doesn't want her son to marry a girl from a poor family (not that I think they are rich by any means but they are much more middle class than my family), with a penchant for black clothing, who is a little too smart for her own good with a decided ability to think for herself. She wants her son to have a good little wifey who will take care of him and spew out good little pink skinned grand-babies. I don't want children. I can't stand anything that cries at 2am that isn't seriously drunk.

'And what I need is a drink' I think to myself. I would sell my left nut for a Jack and Coke at this point while my fiance makes idle chat with his graying father about crap I could careless about. 'How's your car running? How's work? Your friend from high school, Mark, is getting married. You should meet his pretty little wife-to-be. She's a nice girl.' Blah. Blah. Blah.

And there. That's the point of contention. I'm not a nice girl. I'm a bad girl who doesn't want children and doesn't need a man to take care of her. I want an education, a passion and some sort of focus to my life. I don't need my validation from the person who is supposed to be my partner in life not my keeper. I want to dress in tight clothes and spend the night dancing and boozing in some dark bar. I want to smoke cigarettes and talk about philosophy to depressed intellectuals. I want to play poker with men chewing on thick cigars in the backrooms of seedy bars. I want to dance around in my underwear in the living room and fuck on the kitchen floor. I want to smoke hookah in smokey Persian tea shops while discussing the state of Middle Eastern affairs with dark skinned women. I want to taste sweet kisses on the edge of dimly lit beaches. I want to skinny dip in the middle of the night. I want to drunkenly fall into bed with a big smile on my face. I want to talk dirty. I want to drive fast. I want to get the fuck out of here.

As I hide in the bathroom during after dinner coffee and further discussions of 'guess who just had a baby?', I contemplate escaping out the window. I stare at my reflection in the mirror. The understated make-up, the brown top, the sensible shoes... all to fit in with this family so I don't cause a ripple. So I don't spoil the nice little suburban lie. And they still don't like me. I want my slutty black dress back and my over-done black eyeliner. God, I just want to go get a fucking drink! I don't want to be someone I'm not anymore.

I take the cheap ring from my finger and drop it in the toilet. One flush and its gone. Tonight something is going to change.