Greedy by Jen Winston

Author:Jen Winston
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Atria Books
Published: 2021-10-05T00:00:00+00:00

* * *

His voice is the first thing I notice. It’s syrupy and confident, sultry and masculine—the kind that, even just when saying “Hey” from across the bar, slips past your ears and shakes your pelvis awake. The second thing I notice is that he’s wearing a T-shirt, which bums me out. It’s not that I need my dates to wear button-ups (that’s Ian’s style, and thus even worse), but it’s always disappointing to confront that I, the woman, had to put more effort into my look. Though my lace-up boots barely qualify as heels, I did spend at least thirty minutes on my makeup—twenty minutes longer than usual. I want to be annoyed, but then he says more words, and I forget any patriarchal vendettas against him.

“You must be Jen.” Each syllable hits me like fresh air. His name is Elias, and I say I’ve never heard this name spoken aloud outside of a church. He says it’s Hebrew, actually, but he’s a Catholic-school dropout. Now noticing his beard, I say he looks like the Bed-Stuy version of Jesus Christ.

“I’ll take it.” Elias smirks.

He walks toward the mahogany bar, orders for us, then waits for our drinks. As he stands I ogle him, gaining a more intimate understanding of his beard—it’s long enough to convey his own maturity, but short enough that I could kiss him without getting a rash. His shiny brown eyes remind me of marbles, and when he looks at a fluorescent flamingo on a nearby wall, I find myself getting jealous of the bird.

After fully taking stock of his appearance, I realize I have no recollection of him from the app—his messages, bio, and photos are a blur. I could check my phone to review our conversation, but something tells me not to—this feels like a rare opportunity to make a first impression in real life. Online dating means your curated profile will always precede you, yet this night had managed to evade preconceptions; it had no existing script. After a year of structuring my relationship around time zones, itineraries, and logistics, not to mention being Ian’s distraction from reality, here’s a chance to take someone as he is, and to invite him to do the same to me.

Elias returns with the drinks. We sit on two barstools, our knees knocking together. To keep things analog, I ask get-to-know-you questions, and though they’re just an excuse to hear him talk, I learn a lot: He’s South African, rides a motorcycle, and is currently doing a PhD on street art at Cornell.

“I love Banksy,” I blurt, then frown. “Oh god, so basic. Please don’t walk out.”

Elias laughs. “Banksy’s all right.”

I mime wiping sweat from my brow. “Phew!”

We spend an hour talking about how street art deserves more critical acclaim. I’m grateful to be an armchair scholar, and I regurgitate things I learned from the brochures at—yes—Banksy’s MOCA exhibit in LA years ago: Street art brings high culture to the masses. Street art subverts everything—cities, global power dynamics, and everyday objects themselves.

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