But it feels like I've been here before...

I'm sitting across from him in a little restaurant on Fairfax, strips of tribal themed fabric hanging above our heads next to oversized, royal-hued umbrellas dangling by their handles from the ceiling.

Is this it, is this the moment?

I'm telling him of my weekend, of the PUA I met, though I don't term him that. I simply call him a "player" because it's an easier translate and involves less explaining. I keep my worlds separate, or at least I try to.

I was mildly proud of how I worked with that man on Saturday. Things went well that evening, with me staying in control, monitoring and adjusting according to instinct and experience.

I tried to relay that to him without making it sound like some sort of horrible manipulation, tried to express my amusement and delight, about how, at the bar, several men continued to text me, with me stopping and replying to them, with the PUA sitting there, me apologizing but not stopping, until he finally took my phone away from me and silenced it, a move that made me wet and desirous. I was waiting to see what he would do, how long he would allow me to stop conversation in order to maintain other guys. And he handled it well.

GV8 just looked at me, "That was so rude. If a girl did that to me, I'd just walk away."

I blinked, "I would never do that to you."

We shifted into the topic of respect, of how important it is to both of us in our own ways.

He made me feel bad about the games. He made me question my methods, made me wonder what I was doing, if it was right, and how acting in that way when I was out with that man on Saturday was truly disrespectful.

But it was part of the game. It's always part of the game. When you enter into a situation where you are dealing with a man who likes to play, social rules change slightly. You shift mindsets. You know what you want, and you take steps to achieve your goals. I wanted the PUA, I wanted to fuck him. I knew that if I wanted to, we could have skipped dinner and the bar and gone straight to boning. But I wanted that build-up, that teasing, taunting, tormenting, flirting, prove-it-to-me interaction.

So I acted in a certain way.

If I had been thinking long term, I would not have slept with him. But I didn't have the energy to care.

Is this the moment?

Is this when I look at him and know that there are parts of me that he'll never understand, that he'll look down on because playing games is not his style? That there will always be this disconnect between us, because I'll never be able to be fully open with him for fear that he'll look down on me?

He thinks that if you're female, you don't need to play games. He says to me, "You've got the pussy. You don't have to try."

In his world, girls have the sexual control. That they can snap their fingers and summon whatever man they want to their side.

This isn't true. Contrary to popular belief, no matter how hot a girl is, they can't get every man that they want.

You have to work with it. It's not just about the body, but the mind.

It takes energy and experience. Some guys think that all girls have control, but if they stopped and looked around them, they would find they've completely forgotten about so much of the female population that doesn't fall under the attractive ideals. You're surrounded by women- how many of those do you actually acknowledge? How many of those are female to you, and how many of them do you count as sexual beings? How many of them fall into the "little sister" category, or the "friend of my little sister" category. You know: nice and adorable, but you're not close and you look at them like some sort of furniture that can get annoying when they become too loud.

I see this often.

If you want particular results, and you're a female, you have to work on it. You have to learn what you like, what you want, and the best ways to achieve that. Experience stacks up with each man you deal with, on whatever level you interact, and you have to learn what meaning is behind the words they say. Body language, sexuality, hints, tones, how to challenge, how to present yourself as desirable. These are things that you have to learn.

You make yourself better. You make yourself more than you were.

When I was out last weekend, I decided to spend the entire weekend playing. Being on my game and seeing what I could do, if I could make it last for several days, something I've never tried before because I've rarely been in situations that allow for that behavior.

I was flooded with attention, with phone numbers, with people walking after me, walking up to me, trying to start conversations, trying to flirt, interacting, complimenting, etc. so I ended up having my pick of the males.

But then, when I'm done, I turn it off. I fade, become unnoticable, withdraw into myself.

Because I pay attention. Because I have been doing this for so many years and I know it so very well.

On the standard looks scale, I'm a 6. Average face, average body.

But it is my knowledge, my experience, my attitude, that allows me access to the men I would consider 9s and 10s, that get me into places that I would not be normally allowed to access, that cause men to chase me down, to try to take me out to dinner, out for drinks, etc. I'm used to always getting my way because I'm good at figuring out how to get what I want, and then executing the procedure.

I know how to make myself the most desirable woman in the room. I know how to work a room in its entirety. I know how to pick out the most alpha male, speak to him, and determine exactly what I have to do to get him in my bed, or into my life should I choose to do the extended game (I usually don't have a desire to expend that much effort, really).

I know how to give great head, have good sex, how to flirt with or without sexuality oozing from every word. I know how to get to the head of almost any line, should I choose. I can access most areas, get favors without asking. I can cajole and plead quite charmingly, or switch into bitch/ice princess mode should there be a need.

But there's always room for improvement, and I do so want to improve.

Somehow GV8 made me feel bad about this. Like I was doing something wrong. I snagged him, maintained him, with minimal game playing because I knew the only thing I had to do to get him was to be myself (scarcity functioning there) and be a little distant.

Now he's my main lover. He's my Saturday night.

He wants me for my intelligence, my humor, my sexuality. My body is his type, curvy and pale.

He doesn't understand games on the part of females.

He's not like SFPlayboy who I can call and instantly launch into a, "Oh my god, you should've seen this guy I boned. I picked him up at..." and go into the story and the games behind it with him laughing and sharing his own weekend's hijinks.

It saddens me. The disconnect grows.

I'm looking across the table at him and I give up that conversation, let a tangent take over, and I don't bring it back.

This is it. This is one of those moments where you know that the depth of your relationship can go no further, that there are parts of yourself that you will have to withhold because there's no way he could understand or respect you for your choices, even if those choices, your attitudes and ways of handling situations, are what attracted him to you in the first place.

Just another guy.

Not the one.

But you already knew that.