A retelling, with permission and differences, of C.D. Rudd's classic webcomic SailorSun.org.

Billy Jones, a film student and extra, deals with having been exposed —if that's the word— to some sort of special effect.

The walk from the bank to the restaurant turned surreal when I realized that every guy we met coming toward us looked at nothing but my chest. I wasn’t even showing cleavage, still wearing my pullover t-shirt. Oh. No bra. I could feel them there, out there. I must be jiggling like two sumo wrestlers trying to can-can.

I felt like my face was hot enough to fry an egg, but you know what? It was also kind of exciting. I could even see their eyes bounce. I didn’t really know what to think about it.

Chad walked on my left side, nearer the street, and I vaguely realized that this was some etiquette thing he’d probably been taught, much as my Dad had taught me.

He asked me something as I wasted another glare on some meathead staring at my—my breasts. None of them yet had looked me in the face. I realized Chad was waiting for a reply and turned my face toward him to meet his eyes. Wonder of wonders, he was actually looking somewhere besides what everyone else seemed to find so fascinating. Maybe he really was a gentleman.

That thought distracted me in an odd way. “Huh?” I said intelligently.

He laughed. “What’s your name?” he asked again, grinning.

“Billy,” I said. It came out wrong. High pitched and cutesy. Gah! I frowned.

“Billie’s a good name,” he assured me. “Don’t you like it?” He seemed amused.

“Oh!” I said, thinking of something else. “I’m going to have to change it!”

“Um?” he said. “For professional reasons?”

I nodded. “Sort of, yeah, I guess so. One of my professors said that when I join SAG, they’ll suggest I do. W-w-w…. Billy Jones is… already taken. He looked it up, and… most of the variations in spelling, or whatever, are taken too.” He’d said that about William Jones, but I didn’t want to claim the name that was actually on my ID.

He nodded. “I had the same problem. My first name is Michael.” He grinned. “So I’m getting used to going by a version of my middle name. Chad.”

I smiled at his predicament. The same professor had told us that Michael J. Fox had had the same problem, adding a middle initial that wasn’t really his to distinguish his name from several other similar ones.

“I don’t think I want to use my middle name,” I said.

“What is it? Maybe you can use a version of it?”

“It’s Hallelujah.” I blushed again.

He almost missed a step, waving his foot in the air for half a beat before coming down on it a little too flat-footed. I heard someone giggle and realized it was me.

He didn’t laugh, but he did quirk an eyebrow at me. “Hallie Jones?” he suggested. “I like it.”

I put my hand out and waggled it, making a face. He laughed, and I heard another giggle. Damn it.

We reached the restaurant and paused on the sidewalk to look at the menus posted in the window. Then we went inside, and a skinny Asian kid asked if we wanted a booth or a table. Chad looked at me. “B-booth,” I said, I’m not sure why. We sat on the red vinyl on opposite sides of the table while the waiter brought us menus, hot tea, plum sauce and Chinese mustard in little dishes, and a bowl of crispy noodles.

They did have some peppery dishes at Northern, so I ordered the Crispy Spicy Chicken with brown rice and a shared side of sautéed bok choy instead of soup and egg roll. Chad ordered the same chicken dish. I’d forgotten the portion sizes at Northern, and when the food came, it all looked enormous.

We’d already been in an argument about who was going to pay for the food. Chad insisted that he had invited me so he would pay. I was just as insistent that it was not a date (!!!), so I would pay for my own food.

When the server put the platters down in front of us, I pointed out my clincher. “See? Too much food. We shouldn’t have ordered the bok choy. I’ll have to take half of this home, and it’s a cardinal rule that on a date, you don’t take a doggie bag for food you didn’t pay for.”

I’d had this exact same argument with a girl I was dating once, except it was steak and an onion blossom instead of bok choy. Wait! This was a date? Had I just said that?

“There’s no such rule!” he scoffed. There was that giggle again. We were both enjoying the argument way too much. What the hell was the matter with me, and when did I start giggling? Don’t answer that.

We talked about school. Turned out, we did have a class together—fortunately, it was a lecture class in History of Theater with a hundred other students to explain why we hadn’t seen each other. I found myself thinking that I ought to have noticed him, tall, good-looking with a killer smile, then I did a mental double-take.

“What’s wrong?” he asked.

I waved a hand in front of my face. “Spicier than I remember it being,” I said. It was, too. Oildale may be a hicktown in the middle of a desert, but it has like thirty Chinese restaurants and a Hispanic population that loves spicy food, too. My tastes seemed to have changed along with… with everything else.

I sipped hot tea, and Chad signaled the waiter to bring us water (in California, you have to ask for it). Now I had a good excuse for my face being so red.

Chad was still being a gentleman, keeping his eyes looking into mine. His were blue with laugh lines around them. Mine had been hazel green (Mom called it), appropriate for a redhead. I still had red-blond hair, so I probably still had my green eyes. I hadn’t seen a mirror yet, had I? How could I not remember?

When the water came, I realized we had just been staring at each other, not saying anything. The waiter put down the glasses, full of those flat ice cubes you get in restaurants. I grabbed the glass and took a big gulp, though the burn on my tongue had mostly gone away. Really, I was trying to distract myself….

Of course, right at that moment, Chad chose to lean forward, his blue eyes sparkling and crinkling. He asked, “So, what are you doing Saturday night?”