By MadameA  Photo: shotgun.sister's photostream

“Just try it! You can’t know until you’ve tried it!” my friend Kim urged, years ago. We were in high school, drunkenly discussing sexuality with a few other friends. Kim wanted to kiss me. I didn’t want to offend her, but I didn’t want to swap spit with her either.

I just wasn’t attracted to women. Kim nodded and sighed. “You’re the straightest girl I know.” Everyone agreed; on the Kinsey scale, I was a big, fat, boy-crazy zero.

Then I fell in lust with a girl. I know; Shane from The L Word isn’t real, but my attraction to her is. The actress who plays Shane (Katherine Moennig) is stunning. But I want the character, not the artist. Shane’s beauty might be feminine, but she carries herself like a man. Shane can pin a woman up against a bathroom wall, go down on her and then lose interest, all in the space of an evening. She’s a seasoned player and it’s her indifference that makes women hot for her.

But was I hot for Shane because she reminded me of a guy, or did I want her because I wanted women? I needed to address my sudden sexual confusion, so I did what any potentially bi-curious straight girl would do: I went to a lesbian bar.

Kim agreed to be my wing-woman (our friendship survived as a direct result of my refusal to kiss her). Her gay roommate, Mike – a sculpted, half-black make-up artist – tagged along.

The Metropolitan Club in trendy Williamsburg, Brooklyn attracts women with varying degrees of femininity. I’d expected the plaid-clad, buzz cut butch girls and wasn’t totally shocked by the raccoon-eyed hipster chicks but I was perplexed by the utterly femme girls that were there. They wore make-up, dressed in fitted clothing, walked in heels and carried It bags. They looked a lot like me.

My boyfriend and I are often mistaken for brother and sister, but the thought of kissing a girl who looked and dressed like me nearly made me regurgitate the cheap white wine I was drinking. I surveyed the dimly lit, vagina-red room again. Wasn’t there anyone here who could turn me on the way Shane did?

As if to answer my question, a woman across the room snuck a glance at me and quickly turned away. I noticed the glint of her nose ring. Her lightweight, navy sweater clung to perky breasts and relaxed jeans hung from her hips to her Topsiders. She pulled off her black knit cap to reveal a stylish, short haircut. She was treading that fine line between overtly femme and outright butch. I would have checked her out even if I hadn’t been on a sex-ploration. Yep, she was that cute.

Our eyes met a few times throughout the rest of the evening and I resolved to make her acquaintance. As I composed myself in the bathroom, wondering if guys felt this same flustered distress every time they approached women, the object of my attraction walked in. She was chatting on her cell phone and I eavesdropped while I peed. Her voice was higher than I expected and she was clearly talking to her girlfriend. My heart sank, but not because she was unavailable. While she boasted the same androgynous hotness I’d found in Shane, the combination of florescent bathroom lighting and her coos on the phone affirmed that she was, in fact, a female. It hit me that I wanted Shane because she reminded me of men, not because I was hot for women.

Kim raised an eyebrow as she saw us leave the bathroom within seconds of each other. I shook my head despondently. Kim smiled knowingly.

“I told you before – you’re the straightest girl I know.”