The wind whips past us, deafening, and talking is impossible. Maybe I could shout, and he’d hear me, but my heart is pumping too frantically in my chest for me to be able to form sentences. If I tried to talk, I’m sure the words would just come out as a garbled mess. So I clench my teeth while I clench my hands on his leather jacket, squeezing his belly. I rest my helmeted head against his back and take long, deep breaths, trying to calm myself.

 

We zoom through Los Angeles, a phalanx of motorbikes, engines reaching crescendos again and again, and then stopping at traffic lights, only to reach more crescendos. When we stop at the lights, LA-type women sometimes smile at one of the bikers, waving painted-fingers. Some of the bikers catcall and whistle, and the women giggle. When we stop for the fourth time, one of the women looks at me with something like a scowl on her face. I find myself wondering what she’s thinking.

 

Would she guess I’m a feminist? The wind picks up again, and the woman becomes an ant behind us. Would she guess that I’m making a game to empower women? Would she guess I’m committed to equal rights?

 

The answer is obvious: No, she would not.

 

The truth is, though, I like being treated differently because I’m a woman. It’s something I’ll only admit to myself. It goes against everything I should stand for. I should hate the idea. I should find it laughable. Oh, you have breasts and a pussy, good for you! That should be my train of thought. But no, my train of thoughts runs on very different tracks to an entirely contradictory destination. Maddox was right; I rarely let men hold doors open for me. But not because I don’t want them to, but because I feel like I can’t. Now—

 

How can I figure this out? How can I make sense of it?

 

I find the town, the pedestrians, and the glare of the LA sun on the visor of the helmet receding around me. I close my eyes and try and tackle this problem with a programmer’s logic. What, exactly, do I want? I want to be appreciated for my mind, it is true, but I also want to be treated special, to have flowers bought for me, to enter a restaurant on the arm of a man and be gasped at by other men. Are these wants too different?

 

I find myself digging my fingernails harder into Maddox’s jacket.

 

I want men to want me for my body. I know it’s true. I want men – or at least the right man – to drool over me. I want to be objectified. But I also want to respected. I wonder how many other women hold these two opposing wants. Maybe it’s this: I want a man to approach me for my brains and my ambition, and then focus on my body. I want a man to see past my looks and into my mind, acknowledge it, respect it, and then move onto objectifying me.

 

You’re making no sense, a voice whispers. It’s like you have two different people inside of you: the slut and the scholar. Which is it, Eden? What do you want to be? Do you want to be the nerdy girl who focuses on her mind and her work, who grows old without a lover and accepts that she’s naught more than her mind? Or do you want to be the sexy, sassy girl who shakes her ass and who all the guys want? The get-up-on-the-table-and-dance girl who everyone loves, the good-time girl. You can’t have both. You can’t be both. Not now, not here.

 

Why not? I ask.

 

Because life doesn’t work that way.

 

I let out a sigh and open my eyes, pushing the thoughts from my mind. I can’t make sense of it. It’s a problem I’ve wrestled with many, many times. And each time I end up frustrated and no closer to a resolution. A feminist or a floozy? That is the question…

 

If my gender theory professor could see me now, she’d probably say something smart about the duality of the mind, or some such nonsense.

 

We’re out of town now, driving over eighty miles per hour toward the ocean, the wind whistling in my ears through the helmet, a sound like going fast through a tunnel.

 

The absurdity of what I have done hits me right in the chest, causing my heartbeat to go from frantic to a series of explosions. I am clutching onto the leader of an outlaw biker gang, hurtling toward the ocean, the outskirts. Suddenly I’m sure that I’m going to witness a brawl between The Miseryed and another gang, like in a movie. Maybe Gangs of New York. I’ll be forced to stand there and watch as two rival gangs pummel each other into the ground. And if The Miseryed loses…

 

Maddox, after all, is my only defense, and I don’t even know him. If he falls and I’m alone, what will happen to me? I swallow a huge lump in my throat. I don’t imagine it’ll be pretty.

 

By the time we pull into a large car park near the docks, I’m considering throwing myself from the bike, thinking I’ll wait for it to slow down and just jump, run away, maybe call the cops.

 

What the hell have you done, Eden? What the hell are you thinking?