"You're looking for a guy under sixty to kiss at midnight."
Melanie shrugs. “Less than sixty, yes. A boy? Maybe not." She gives me a look.
"What?"
"I've kind of been doing the girl thing."
"What?!" A scream comes out. "Sorry. Since when?"
“Since right after Thanksgiving. There was a girl and we met in film theory class and we were friends and we went out one night and it just happened."
I look at the new haircut, the nose ring, the hairy armpits. Everything makes sense. "So are you a lesbian now?"
“I'd rather not label it,” she says, somewhat sanctimoniously, which implies that I need to label everything. She's the one constantly branding herself: Mel, Mel 2.0. Punk rock librarian. I ask him the name of his girlfriend. She tells me that they don't like to define it that way, but her
