Mmmmhmm.

• Hitch:

  On the one hand, it is very difficult for a man to even speak to someone who looks like you. But on the other hand, should that be your problem?

• Sara:

  So life's kind of hard all around.

• Hitch:

  Not if you pay attention. You're sending all the right signals: no earrings, heels under two inches, your hair is pulled back, you're wearing reading glasses with no book, drinking a Grey Goose martini which means you had a hell of a week and a beer just wouldn't do it. If that wasn't clear enough there's always the "fuck off" that you have stamped on your forehead. Because who's going to believe there's a man out there that can sit by a woman he doesn't know and genuinely be interested in who she is, what she does, without his own agenda?

• Sara:

  Yeah, I wouldn't even know what that would look like. So what would a guy like that say?

• Hitch:

  Well, he'd say, "My name is Alex Hitchens and I'm a consultant." But she wouldn't be interested in that because she'd be counting the seconds until he left.

• Sara:

  Thinking he was like every other guy.

• Hitch:

  Which, life experience has taught her, is a virtual certainty. But then he'd ask her name and what she did for a living and she might blow him off. Or she might say...

• Sara:

  I'm Sara Melas. I run the gossip column at the Standard. And then he'd ask all these penetrating questions about it because he was sincerely, if atypically, interested.

• Hitch:

  No...

• Sara:

  No?

• Hitch:

  He'd be interested. But he'd see that there was no way he could possibly make her realize that he was for real.

• Sara:

  Well.. he could be funny and charming and refreshingly original.

• Hitch:

  Wouldn't help.

• Sara:

  Don't you hate it when that happens?

• Hitch:

  Not really. They'd both probably go on to lead the lives they were headed toward and my guess is they'd do just fine.