The Question

“So like. How do you write your male characters?”

I stop stirring the sugar into my tea and glance up, wordlessly raising a brow.

“I mean you know, we traded stories for editing and I totally would have thought you were a guy, the way you write them. So. How do you write your male characters?”

I snort at her. “I sit back with a six pack and watch football until I feel manly.”

She rolls her eyes at me. “No, Val. I’m serious. How?”

“Sometimes I throw in a cigar.”

“Val!”

“I go get a playboy magazine…”

“VALERIE!”

I smirk. “Alright. Fine, fine. Bear with me for a moment and I’ll ‘explain’ it to you.”

She sits back in her seat, looking amusingly petulant. I read over her work, sappy stuff worthy of old Nicky Sparks himself. Not that there’s anything wrong with that, but considering the fact that she spends so much time perfecting the voice of her pretty southern belles, it’s no wonder she’s struggling.

Unfortunately, it doesn’t make the question any less stupid.

“Do you have any idea how many galaxies are in the universe?”

“…No.”

“Nobody knows for sure but it’s predicted at something absurd, like, one hundred billion.”

“…Okay. So?”

“So imagine with me, if you will, the number of planets that exist out there with different types of creatures. Different forms of life. The billions…no, the trillions of species, not even humanoid, with other forms of communication. The sort of thing you take right out of star trek.”

“Is there a reason for the nerding out? You’re dodging my question.” She crosses her legs and looks positively huffy.

“On the contrary I’m right on it. Let’s try smaller. How many species are predicted to roam this single planet?”

Annoyance crosses her face again. “I don’t know. Wow me.”

“About nine million. There are nine million insects, mammals, amphibians, reptiles…”

“Okay National Geographic, enough already!”

I’m seriously starting to think she’s going to throw her chai at me.

“The point is, there are endless forms of life, both known and unknown, in numbers that would probably blow your mind as bad as one of Lovecraft’s old gods. Sentient, non-sentient, and somewhere in between.”

“Right. Okay. And the point of all of this was?”

I shrug and stir another spoon of sugar into my tea.

“My point is that it boggles you that I can relate to someone based on whether or not they have a penis."