Chapter 14: Pretty Girl Problem

"Drink, drink with me!" Iris insisted, as she noticed Arthur turn his attention to his cellphone.

They were already at the teacher’s apartment, and after drinking some water, the busty woman was somehow back to drinking alcohol.

At least now her face was lit up with a big smile.

"I’m sorry, it’s just that Rachel was messaging me. And when I take too long to respond, she messages again."

"Oh!" Iris covered her open mouth with her left hand, her eyes sparkling with surprise and curiosity. "Tell me more!"

"There is not much to tell," Arthur said, showing her the messages without hesitation.

From what he could tell, Rachel was quite talkative. Which wasn’t a bad thing per se, but their personalities simply didn’t mesh well.

Or at least Arthur couldn’t imagine himself ever being in a long-term relationship with her.

"I’m just not sure how to stop talking with her..." Arthur admitted.

"Already breaking hearts, I see..." Iris teased. Then she snapped the cellphone out of his hand to take a look at the messages.

She could tell Arthur was trying to be as nice as possible, but sometimes that was the problem. Especially because a lot of women are so used to doing the rejecting that they don’t even realize the most obvious hint that a man isn’t interested.

"If you want, I can help you with that," Iris said.

"You can help me with what, exactly?"

"Rejection, dummy." She poked his forehead with her index finger, leaning forward on the couch. The motion was innocent, but the way her massive tits swayed under the loose t-shirt she’d changed into once they arrived at her apartment made Arthur immediately avert his eyes. "Believe it or not, I have some experience in the field."

"I never would have guessed," Arthur deadpanned.

"Listen, you are what we call too nice." She held up a finger. "See, women are experts at rejection. We’ve been doing it since we were thirteen and the first boy in class told us he liked our handwriting. By the time we’re adults, we have a whole arsenal of ways to tell a man no without ever saying the word."

"An arsenal," Arthur repeated flatly.

"Exactly. So let me give you a crash course on rejection." She smiled, liking the chance to act like a teacher. "The softest levels are light ghosting, mixed with ’Oh, I’m really busy lately.’ But there are a thousand other ways; the gist is creating some excuse for why you can’t date at the moment, so the person doesn’t feel like it’s about her."

Iris quickly added that the problem was that very often this approach could fail. Besides, other variations she would consider on the same level would be the friendzone, or other excuses.

"The second level is one-word answers, or just completely ignoring the person. Even though there are men who say they’d rather have a direct rejection than that."

"Yes, completely ignoring someone sounds cruel," Arthur commented.

"It’s normal. I would never do it to someone I’ve known for long, but you don’t really owe an explanation to a person you’ve known for what, a week? The two of you haven’t even gone on a date."

"Okay, but I still don’t want to do it."

"Then there are levels three and four: a nice message trying to be as polite and gentle as possible while making clear you’re not interested — or just telling the person to fuck off."

"Just like you did on Sunday?" Arthur commented with a silly smile.

"Bring Sunday up again and I’m going to kill you," Iris replied, giving him a scary look. "So, do you want me to reject this girl for you? I was the one who forced you to talk to her, so I feel kind of responsible."

Arthur pondered it for a few seconds before giving Iris the green light. He felt like she would be better at finding the right words than he would.

"Done!" Iris tossed the phone back to him with a satisfied smile.

Then she stretched her arms above her head with a satisfied groan. Her t-shirt rode up slightly, and the stretch pulled the fabric tight across her chest.

Arthur forced his eyes away from her chest and onto the smartphone.

The message read:

"Hey Rachel, I’ve appreciated chatting with you, but I want to be honest. I’m not feeling a romantic connection here, and I don’t want to waste your time. I hope you find someone great!"

The message showed as delivered, then read. The typing indicator appeared for a moment, then disappeared.

Nothing ever came, so Arthur left the phone on the table, leaving that problem behind.

"Thank you for the lesson," the boy said.

"No problem. You can always count on me, stud," she said with a smile. "I told you, once you start college life, there will be girls throwing themselves at you every day."

"Rachel wasn’t throwing herself at me," Arthur argued.

Iris rolled her eyes and kicked him in the nuts under the table.

"Don’t play stupid with me. You know she was."

"Fuck..." Arthur slowly collapsed to the ground, the pain of a kick to the nuts being no joke. "You could’ve been a little less brutal."

"This is going to be your punishment every time you don’t act confident," Iris said in a rough voice. "So puff out your chest and act like the stud you are."

Her expression softened.

"Now, let’s play Mario Kart. I’ll smash you this time."

Arthur slowly got back up, the pain still coursing through his body. Iris clearly didn’t pull any punches. She probably worked out quite a lot, judging by her perfect body and the slightly toned stomach he had only caught glimpses of.

"If you manage to keep your eyes open this time, it’ll already be a win," Arthur teased her back.