Just hold a pillow over my face already

It was a peaceful Saturday morning. I'd gotten up at 11 and I was feeling terribly pleased with myself. Punky, LovesHerDog and I had watched 'The Motorcycle Diaries' the night before and I had discovered the considerable charms of Gael Garcia Bernal, and I went to sleep and dreamt of saving slugs so I could save the world. I turned on my handphone and I got a message from The Boy. Aw, bless. Birds were chirping, rice was burning on the stove. All was right with the Slinky universe.

Then I got another message asking me out for dinner. From her.

Slinky's dad's friend's wife. Let's call her The Smotherer.

My little bubble of peace and contentment shattered like glass meeting a sledgehammer.

When animals are faced with mortal danger, evolution has taught them that either of two options will increase their chances of survival : flight or fight.

I dropped my phone and was halfway out of the door before I overrode my primal brain and thought "Wait, she doesn't know I read that. I can just....ignore it. Yes, ignore it, I can do that." So reassured, Slinky nervously settled down to read about chromosomes and Mendelian inheritance and slowly built up that little bubble of peace and contentment again.

It was going well enough so that when my phone rang and I saw that it wasn't a listed number, I thought "Yay, it's The Boy!" and picked up with joy in my heart. But I had been well and truly suckered. God sat back in his vast glimmering throne in Heaven and said "Hah, got you!" For it was the voice of The Smotherer. [dum dum dum DUM]

"Helloooooooo, did you get my message?" Iamagine an unconsionably hearty voice with just the wrong amount of shrill, and the words spoken with the perfect hint of nagging and concern to set your teeth on edge. I started pacing up and down the living room in a curbed and futile simulacrum of frantic but hopeless flight.

Trapped like a rabbit in a snare.

"Oh, hello Auntie Smotherer, no, I hadn't checked my messages yet," Slinky lied frantically in a futile attempt at a reprieve of sorts as her eyes darted around the room for a means of escape which was not there.

"Did you just get up? You sound tired!" she says with an edge of accusation underlying the concern.

"No, no, I was just studying."

"Oh, well, I'm calling because I didn't get an answer from you!" (oooh, guilt trip. Sneaky.) "Anyway, are you free for dinner tomorrow?" I opened my mouth to lie my bony Chinese ass off but she was too quick and forestalled any objections I might have had with a diabolical pre-empt. Evil hell demons can do that you know, read your mind and then trap you. "If you're not free tomorrow, then any time next week, or the week after that, we're free. So just let me know!" All said in a cheery voice barely masking the triumph she felt. I'm sure she was smiling a sweet hellsmile as she said it too.

I gave in, defeated, and figured that maybe if I sacrificed myself tomorrow I might buy myself a few precious weeks of freedom.

"Wonderful! I'll pick you up at around 5 or 5:30 tomorrow! How's class?"

"Fine," I mutter, trying to breathe normally.

"And your schoolwork?"

"Fine," I say again, feeling like I'm twelve.

"Good! Well, tell you what, I'll let you get back to your books and we'll catch up tomorrow, okay? I'll see you then! Bye!"

I had to restrain the urge to throw myself on my favorite sofa and scream.

The first week I got here The Smotherer called me every single day to 'check on how I was doing' and to offer to fetch me around. Every. Single. Day.

Now, I'm the independent sort, and to top it off, I'm the stupidly proud and stubborn sort, so I like to figure things out myself, even if it takes me twice as long as it would have if I hadn't been to pigheaded to take advice. And as most of my nearest and dearest will know, I'm prickly about having my own space, and I get really cranky when people don't leave me the hell alone enough. So when she offered every day to fetch me around, I declined politely, figuring that the best way to learn how this stupid bus system worked was to get lost a bunch of times and trudge around resentfully in the middle of whoop whoop for a couple of hours so it never would have to happen again. When she offered to take me shopping and fetch me there and back I declined politely as well, because I'm broke as all hell and I figured I would find what was most suitable for my laughable budget myself instead of being dragged someplace she thought as the most appropriate and being forced, out of sheer decorum alone, to buy something which was too expensive for me. When I didn't answer her multitudinous messages and calls because I was working out the whole service provider issue and so I just didn't see them, she apparently contacted my dear old dad and voiced her opinion that I might not be all right and wrangled my address from him. When she turned up completely unannounced at the apartment where I was staying, thereby scaring the crap out of me since I wasn't expecting any damned visitors, I was gracious and offered her a drink and listened politely to her suggestions that I should lock all my doors all the time even if I was in the apartment because evidently, crazy people like her could break in at any time. When she invited me for dinner at her house for the fourth time in five days I went, thinking I would be able to show face and then be left alone, and had to meet Grandma and Grandpa Smotherer (who, luckily, were quite nice, but told me I needed to go to church and BELIEVE). I sat there feeling awkward and cranky and out of place amongst the entire Smotherer clan, and fled as soon as was polite. And then she called me again two days after that, inviting me for a repeat performance.

I understand that she's trying to be nice. I understand that she's trying to help me acclimatize to a place that, even after six weeks, still feels bewilderingly alien.

But I hate feeling obliged to go out and show face because she is my father's friend's wife. I hate feeling like I need to be grateful and appreciative of company and gestures which I've neither wanted nor invited. I don't like being smothered, it makes me antsy and crabby and as nervy as a horse in a glue factory. The simple fact is, I don't like her. I want to edge away and I feel my personality curling up on itself when I talk to her. Save for the fact that perhaps living here has had some sort of ameliorative effect on her, she is exactly the type of person who will ask your mother at Chinese New Year why you're not married even though you are so old already, and express concern at your future prospects. I don't want to be her empty nest project. I hate being mothered. It's alien and suffocating and makes me want to run in circles and scream.

I wonder if LovesHerDog will mind if I move house within the next 24 hours. I'm going for a Djarum.