“Are there any hot boys at your school? In your class or…?”
“Yeah…”
“Would you like to have sex with one of them?”
“No…”
“How about Jackson?”
“No, he’s gay.”
“Oh.”
“Yeah, he likes guys.”
That was a surprise. I felt really stumped. What could I do now? Honestly, I had no idea about any of the boys in her life. I had spontaneously come up with the idea of taking some attractive guy in her circle and getting her to think about him as a potential partner, but the only one whose name I could remember was gay? Just my luck.
“Are there any other guys you like?”
“Yeah.”
“Yes?”
“Yeah, my dad.”
Dammit. Back to that.
“Anyone else?”
“No, just Dad.”
“Any boys in your class that you feel attracted to?”
“No.”
“Why is that?”
“They’re not Dad. I like Dad.”
Aaaand back to square one again. I was moving around in circles.
“What do you like about a guy? What turns you on?”
“Strong arms… he has a nice voice… Dark… I like dark… and tippy. Sharp and tippy…”
She was getting a bit incoherent, mentioning several other things, none of them really making a whole lot of sense.
“Okay, you’re doing fine, Alisha… you’re very good.”
“Yeah…”
“I want you to think about dating.”
“I don’t like dating.”
“Oh?”
“Yeah. Don’t like dating.”
“Why is that?”
“Dunno.”
That was new. I couldn’t believe I hadn’t heard this before; we’d been doing this for weeks and this was the first time it had actually come up. I was just going to seed the idea that she could go on a date with someone and that it could be really nice… but now she was saying that that was a stumbling block? Not just general inhibitions, but dating itself? I had to keep trying.
“Alisha, I want you to think about a restaurant. One that you like. Do you see it?”
“Yeah.”
“Picture yourself inside it. Do you see it?”
“Yeah.”
“Where are you?”
“Arby’s.”
“Okay.”
“I like burgers.”
“That’s good. Now, I want you to picture a young man standing there, not too far away from you.”
“Mhm…”
“He’s got really strong arms…”
“Mhm…”
“And he’s tall…”
“Yeah…”
“Just your type.”
“Yeah.”
“Maybe you’re his type too. After all, you’re a classy, sexy woman…”
“Like Mom.”
“Exactly. And everybody wants your mom, right?”
“Mhm…”
“So they should want you too, right?”
“Yeah…”
“You can get any guy you want.”
“Uh-huh… because I’m sexy.”
“That’s right.”
Okay, I needed to round this off, chipping away at her inhibitions again. This time, directed specifically at her unwillingness to date. At least, I needed to get her to see what opportunities lay ahead. If she didn’t like dating because she could only see the problems and not the potential successes, no wonder she didn’t like the idea.
“Now, the next time you see a boy you like, you’ll feel an urge to say hi to him. You’ll feel like it might be a good idea going to Arby’s with him, sit down and have a burger. It doesn’t have to go any further than that, but you like burgers…”
“Yeah… I like burgers…”
“Maybe you’ll even like him. He has strong arms…”
“Yeah…”
“Maybe you’ll want to have sex with him. If you want, you could do that. You know?”