Asking for Sex vs Asking Someone Out & 4 Ways To Ask A Guy Out excerpt

Here’s another excerpt. This time it’s a contemporary romance. It’s the same old girl meets boy formula except girl takes the initiative and wants to ask the guy out but cannot seem to do it. It’s short + plus sweet, perfect for light reading. I had lots of fun writing this drawing from my experience traveling in Indonesia. Like the protagonist, I’ve never tried asking a guy out (or maybe I did but didn’t think it was a date. More like hanging out as buddies). Asking someone out for a date because you think you genuinely like him is like stripping naked in a park and walking around for all people to see you.

For example, asking someone for sex vs asking someone out for real –I’ll take the sex part any day. Much easier. Well for starters, it doesn’t hurt so much  –figuratively. “Oh, you don’t like me? Move on to the next boy.” And there’s less chances you get rejected because pff! not many people can say no to sex. But when you ask someone out, it’s shit hell scary because you’re putting yourself in the line. You’re shoving everything you have up front –body, personality, the whole package. And you’re asking this person hesitantly, “Would you like to get to know the real me?” And if they say no, then that means they can’t be bothered knowing you.

And that’s it. You’re screwed. Because nobody deals well with rejection. If anything can bog down your self-worth, this is one of the quickest and efficient ways to do it. All it takes is one word, “NO.” Pouf! It’s the end of your world.

I’ll write a lengthier post on how to deal with rejection soon. Stay tune for updates.

I just realized I could have inserted this blog post into the story before submitting it. Oh well, there’s always room for revisions. Speaking of romance, there’s a site where you can get your daily fix of romance. Best of all, the stories are free. Head over to read-a-romance to fulfill your cravings of love.

Would she get to ask the guy out? Find out by emailing me-ksirine.yu at the gmail.

4 Ways To Ask A Guy Out

1. Get to Know Each Other

I first met Marco in a foreign bookstore in Jakarta. I had been reaching up for a copy of Tracy Chevalier’s Girl with a Pearl Earring when Atkins’ New Diet Revolution fell down instead. When I put it back, I must have upset some delicate balance of the book order universe because it suddenly rained copies on my head. Stephen King, Danielle Steele, Ernest Hemingway, Margaret Mitchell, Helen Fielding and an Oscar Wilde or two.

“Are you the new hired help?” A hand shot out and picked two copies of Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince off the floor. It belonged to a cute backpacker with some string bracelets on his arm.

“No, are you?”

He grinned back and together we managed to put the books back on the shelf. His name was Marco from Holland and here’s some of the things we had in common:

1. we both love traveling
2. fantasy novels
3. eldest in the family
4. fear of credit cards

We’re also both nature lovers but of a different kind. He loves trekking and camping while my version of climbing is sitting on a palanquin fanning myself while a group of men carried me up the steps of a mountain (which by the way, really happened when I was in the Guilin countryside of China).

Those four hours standing there just talking passed by as if it was a dream you didn’t want to end. We were exchanging stories about our experience in encountering the Bromo volcano in Java which he circled five times. I didn’t have the heart to tell him I got left behind during the climb. And I was the youngest in the group.

Finally he said he had to go. He had a bus to catch.

Ask him out! My mind screamed.

Oh god, what should I say? Are you doing anything tonight? Stupid, he just said he had a bus to catch. What if he has a girlfriend or worse, what if he’s married?

I just stood there paralyzed with fear –all these white hot flashes of doubts coursing through my veins. I’ve crossed the border of Myanmar. Went to East Timor and saw rockets blazed its skies like it was New Year’s Eve. Found myself stuck in a religious conflict in East Indonesia. All these I’ve managed to do alone and got out of, miraculously unscathed.

But I can never ask a guy out.

As if I was seeing a film played in slow motion, I watched Marco wave goodbye.

Ask for his number!

Email address!

Do something!

My hand shot out and grabbed a random book.

“Wait! Don’t you want to buy this?”

Marco stopped. He took one look at the cover and turned red. “Um—not really.” Then he ran.

I looked at the title and almost dropped it in horror. On the cover were two women kissing and a title that read: Be True to Yourself! Living the Alternative Lifestyle.

—End of Excerpt

Other related posts:

Can Aliens Breakdance?- Sub Dio story excerpt

Comparing the Short Story and the Comic Script– First Experience of a Fiction Writer

Why I Write

Writing Updates-The Magic of Storytelling

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