If a Boy Asks You Out

SAM: Rebekkah?

REBEKKAH: Yes, Daddy?

SAM: What’s this?

REBEKKAH: Oh, shit.

SAM: Well, I don’t think that’s what it is, but you’re still not wrong, I guess.

REBEKKAH: Panties?

SAM: No… No, I’ve seen panties, this is something else.

REBEKKAH: Well, I use them just like panties.

SAM: These are not typically used quite the same as panties.

REBEKKAH: Oh, really, Daddy? How are they used?

SAM: Is there something you’re not telling me?

REBEKKAH: I don’t know. Is there something you don’t want me telling you?

SAM: Are you doing something you think I don’t want to know about?

REBEKKAH: Is there something you don’t want me doing?

SAM: Rebekkah. You’re sixteen.

REBEKKAH: I do remember my last birthday, Dad.

SAM: If you want to have a boyfriend, that’s fine, I won’t get mad—

REBEKKAH: Uh-huh.

SAM: I won’t get territorial or possessive.

REBEKKAH: Sure, Dad.

SAM: But these aren’t just boyfriend panties, Rebekkah Emerald Shields. This is a thong.

REBEKKAH: Is that how you pronounce it? Gee.

SAM: Now, are you just wearing these for… practice?

REBEKKAH: Right now, I’m not wearing them at all. You’re holding them.

SAM: Rebekkah.

REBEKKAH: Do you have any idea how weird it is for your dad to talk to his daughter about thongs?

SAM: I shouldn’t have to talk to my daughter about thongs. She shouldn’t be wearing them!

REBEKKAH: Better than the alternative, though, aren’t they? Like, the alternative being… Not wearing a thong?

SAM: Tell me you’re not having sex.

REBEKKAH: I am not having sex.

SAM: Are you telling the truth?

REBEKKAH: That wasn’t part of the deal.

SAM: Rebekkah!

REBEKKAH: Well what if I was having sex? You just said you wouldn’t get “territorial” if I had a boyfriend.

SAM: Having a boyfriend is not the same thing as having sex. You can have a boyfriend and not be having sex. Conversely, it is also possible to have sex without having a boyfriend and that, my dear daughter, is every father’s nightmare situation!

REBEKKAH: Oh, really? That’s the nightmare? Come on, Dad, there’s way worse things than a sixteen-year-old having sex.

SAM: Well, at least use protection.

REBEKKAH: If I was having sex, Dad, do you really think I’d be stupid enough not to?

SAM: Both kinds! The pill and the, the other thing.

REBEKKAH: Condoms?

SAM: Yes, those.

REBEKKAH: I’ve been on the pill for two years, Dad. You buy them for me?

SAM: Do you have a boyfriend, though?

REBEKKAH: Oh my God!

SAM: Well, I just wish you would tell me!

REBEKKAH: Why?

SAM: Because I want to be part of your life! Because I can feel you shutting me out.

REBEKKAH: Well, can you blame me? Look at you, you don’t even know what is going on and you’re freaking out.

SAM: Well maybe I wouldn’t if I did know!

REBEKKAH: But it’s none of your business!

SAM: Yes it is. Because you are sixteen and I am your father and there is no one else, no one else whose business it could be. Maybe this conversation would be easier on you if it was your mom, but that’s not an option. Lord knows it’d be easier on me.

REBEKKAH: What if I was a boy? Would it be easier on you then?

SAM: It’d be different.

REBEKKAH: Would you teach me all the tricks? Encourage me? Tell me to “buck up, kiddo, you’ll be having sex before you know it!”

SAM: You will be having sex before you know it. So why rush things? You’re right, it isn’t fair, the expectations that we put on women. Girls. We have to teach you to protect yourselves and we don’t think we have to bother teaching anything like that to boys. We don’t think of them as needing protection in the same way, so instead we teach them how to achieve and we don’t think about how the ways they’ll be achieving are what make girls need protection. If I had a son, I’d like to think I’d teach him how he can protect women, too. Or at least not be a threat.

REBEKKAH: What about a son-in-law?

SAM: Do not bring up marriage, young lady, don’t you dare!

REBEKKAH: I mean, like, if I did have a boyfriend.

SAM: It wouldn’t be someone I knew as well as you.

REBEKKAH: How well do you really know me?

SAM: I think I know you well enough. But much as I trust you as a judge of character… I’d still want to meet him.

REBEKKAH: And what would you say to him?

SAM: I’d tell him what a wonderful, precious jewel you are, and what happen to him if he breaks you.

REBEKKAH: So… you’d threaten him. That’s nice.

SAM: Did I say that? No, I’d just… Quietly inform him of what it would do to him if you actuallly were that person.

REBEKKAH: Aw. You would make completely empty threats. That’s so sweet of you. I’m not having sex, by the way. Like you said, those are for practice. And ‘cause they make me feel… I don’t know.

SAM: I know. I know. You were lying. Told you I knew you well enough.