ROSIE vs. PSYCHO;

I would have included this in the previous post, but that would have monopolised it and made the scroll bar disappear; plus I don't want it contaminating Fox/Yoav/Aron Ralston. I just defeated the purpose. Oh well. 

*clears throat* I was totally sexually harassed on the bus today! I am not best pleased. In fact I am still partially jittery & freaked out, but what-ho. My recount is gonna be like when you have a genuinely terrifying dream that just sounds ridiculously funny when you tell someone else, but anyway. This is how it went;

• I am minding my own business near the back of the bus, listening to some Bananarama or some such, relaxing because I have my routine down pat and know this bus will get me to English spot on time, when the bus stops, at a bus stop, and a boy of about 17 gets on, and my eye happens to cursorily glance over him and he smiles and waves as if he knows me and I think Poor bastard thinks I'm someone else.
• Yon psycho pauses halfway up the stairs after ascertaining the second story's emptiness, comes back down, sits next to me. Shit, do I actually know him? I am not a particularly ignorant person when it comes to people, so I'm doubtful that I know him and have forgotten him. So he wedges his feet against the seat in front so I am pretty much trapped, and his elbow grazes against me and he says Sorry and I mouth Sorry even though it wasn't my elbow and so far it's a little odd but not sinister. And then, he begins to talk;

(I should note here that he is exceptionally good-looking in a Peter Pan kind of way. I don't mean he was wearing green tights and had hair brighter than fire; I mean he had that kind of mischievous and slightly vacant/lost aura. His eyes were piercing and blue and strangely hypnotic and ringed with long dark eyelashes, the kind only boys have and all girls want. This made the whole thing a little more disturbing somehow.)

PSYCHO: Hi :).

ROSIE: Hi.

PSYCHO: What's your name?

ROSIE: Rosie. I should have said any other name but my own, goddamnit.

PSYCHO: What? *bends ear toward me*

ROSIE: ROOOSIE. What's yours?

PSYCHO: Derek. Nice to meet you. *offers hand*

I just realised that I did in fact shake his hand. I would now quite like to boil it.

PSYCHO: So where are you going?

ROSIE: Uni. Should have said anywhere but where I was actually going. Have just remembered a woman got raped in Byers Road last week. I am going to Byers Road. Given, she got raped by a black guy of around 5'4, and yon psycho is white and around 5'10, but you know, a rapist's a rapist.

PSYCHO: What :)?

ROSIE: UNIIII.

PSYCHO: Why do you talk so quietly :)?

ROSIE: I don't know. *shrugs helplessly*

PSYCHO: Okay. Where are you from?

ROSIE: Clydebank. Seriously, you'd think I'd have picked up survival tactics by now. ANYTHING BUT THE TRUTH YOU TWIT.

PSYCHO: Do you go out with someone?

ROSIE: No... Omg, what is wrong with you? Yes, I do, he has a blackbelt in castrating rapists on buses.

PSYCHO: How come?

ROSIE: *starts to feel sorry for self but does not feel like giving her psychological life story to someone who does not want to get inside her mind* I don't knowwww :(.

PSYCHO: What age are you?

ROSIE: Eighteen.

PSYCHO: *whistles like he's looking at a red convertible and says nothing*

ROSIE: *doesn't understand whether this is old or young for him; feels strangely like an old woman/victim of ageism all of a sudden*

PSYCHO: If you knew me better and I asked you out, what would you say?

ROSIE: I-I don't know. ALWAYS SAY NO, ALWAYS SAY NOOOO.

PSYCHO: Want to go upstairs?

ROSIE: *eyes the stairs, glares at the bunch of dicks around her not helping, knowing that he knows there's no one else upstairs* Um, no.

PSYCHO: Why not?

ROSIE: Because I like sitting downstairs.

PSYCHO: What?

ROSIE: *hears how fucking stupid this sounds the second time around* ...Because I...I like sitting downstairs...:(.

PSYCHO: Come on, let's go upstairs.

ROSIE: No :).

PSYCHO: Come on.

ROSIE: Noooo :).

PSYCHO: I won't do anything, I promise.

ROSIE: *alarm bells go off in head, horror drenches face of blood, his sentence becomes inverted* 

PSYCHO: If I asked you out now what would you say?

ROSIE: *feels momentarily empowered* No :).

PSYCHO: Aw :(. How not?

ROSIE: Because I don't know you.

PSYCHO: Okay :) *looks game* What do you want to know about me?

ROSIE: Nothing :).

PSYCHO: Come onnnn, ask me anything. What do you want to know?

ROSIE: Nothingggg :).

PSYCHO: Aw okay then :(. *stews for several seconds* Where do you come from?

ROSIE: *partially horrified at his dementia* Clydebank. O. M. G. I hereby give up.

PSYCHO: Yeah I know, but I mean originally?

ROSIE: *confuzzled, she over-pronounces like he's the foreign one* CLYDE-BANK.

PSYCHO: Really? But you have a pure weird accent man.

ROSIE: Well you are quite the charmer, aren't you?

PSYCHO: *looks Rosie up and down like she's turned into a giant T-bone* You look nice.

ROSIE: *thinks she is not wearing anything particularly come hither; thinks in fact she looks rather like a boy; thinks the boy beside her is a right dick* Thank you...?

PSYCHO: You're welcome...Rosie? And what's my name? *grins like he thinks I will have forgotten, like he's been all gallant up till now*

ROSIE: Derek.

PSYCHO: Yep. So what would you say if I asked you out again, now?

ROSIE: No :).

PSYCHO: Aw :(. *sits for five minutes in silence, sighs, nudges Rosie's knee with fist* I'll see you later okay?

ROSIE: If I ever see you again it will be too soon. Okay :).

PSYCHO: *slouches off upstairs*

ROSIE: *breathes sigh of relief and tries to ignore the chagrin heating up her face, as if she incurred the damn incident, makes plans to run full pelt as soon as she gets off bus so PSYCHO won't rape her in the hospital car park*

....And then in our Classics tutorial we spent an inordinate amount of time talking about the rape of the Vestal Virgins. Anyway, Domino's is assuaging me, so s'all good. I must write myself a post-it with instructions to buy pepper spray.


                                                                                                                                                                

As of editing this on 12th April 2012, I think it's safe to say the Rosie of last year overreacted to young Derek. But I'd just like to reassert a little more maturely and with that handy thing called retrospect that it is NOT okay to make a stranger feel uncomfortable/vulnerable, regardless of gender. Even if, Markus (who later boasted of posting the first comment below), the person has no ulterior motives and is simply 'hitting on' you. I don't know about anyone else, but I don't care to be whistled at like I am a red convertible or looked at as though I am a juicy T-bone and the one staring is a cartoon dog. And I do not think that is an insane preference.

*feminist rant over*