How I Became a ‘Man Thief’

How you enter the insidious world of biting lips and kissing a man who in societal norms is off limits and never to be looked at is as harmless as an encounter at Chopsi’s, the local night club.

Ripped jeans and surrounded by men perhaps a decade younger than him ought to have been a sign of some kind of trouble but he buys you a drink and you think this makes him a gentleman.

He tells you after the escapades of pretending to not be interested that that specific night, your eyes shined and he knew he had to be careful with you as you were a forbidden fruit.

But that specific night you were much more concerned about maybe meeting a nice bloke amidst the heap of drunks.

You had only gone out to interact with the rest of the fable youth, a generation you don’t necessarily relate to, and also to feel what it is like to be sexy and wanted in a rhombus way. You liked that you pierced in tank tops with a skirt that revealed your lovely legs.

That was a harmless encounter with the tall tattooed Finn, an encounter you hadn’t thought of much but which sparked a catastrophe of events thereafter.

The jaunts of becoming a man thief gets officially set in motion when you have returned from a weekend-long getaway with the most beautiful man you believe you had ever set your eyes on – who a couple of nights ago had kissed one of your friends only to admit that he was interested in the writer friend and felt coerced in the whole thing.

You tell your model friend that you don’t know what to do, and she beams back that “I can understand your predicament, I mean there is girl code that you need to respect”.

You look at her a bit bewildered, all you meant was that you felt it was moving too fast and didn’t know how to be with him.

But without thinking about it, the waves are crushing at your feet, the Swakop sunset is beautiful and you have a French accent lying next to you.

Besides being breathtakingly gorgeous, he is not only well versed but well-travelled. His sense of wonder and adventure intimidates you and yet keeps you intrigued.

The two of you speak of meditating by the ocean and fall asleep in bathtubs immersed in your readables.

And when he is not looking or at best when he falls asleep, you stare at him trying to configure how someone can be so striking.

He is the kind of guy you wouldn’t want to fall in love with, because your mind keeps asking ‘how does he like me?’

Within that you shut yourself the whole weekend, and perhaps lose any meaningful correlation you could have had with him.

And so you find yourself feeling a slight bit empty and aching for something you can’t quite put a name on.