I'm not an animal or half animal or whatever it is shifters are calling themselves these days. It's all so PC and civilized. Only really it isn't, is it? Civilized, I mean. Ever since the first shifters came out a handful of years ago, civilization has gone to the dogs. Literally.

I don't know if it's gone to the pigs, though. I've never heard of a pig shifter, anyway. That would kind of suck, wouldn't it? Being a shifter and discovering your other half was a pig. Or a rat or some shit like that. I bet pig shifters wouldn't get groupies and shit the way the wolf shifters do. Or the big cats. They get all the press and all the chicks, from what I've seen.

Which doesn't bother me, as I'm not into chicks. I like boys. Men. I like them tall and slender and blond. That's my type. I like them well-read and erudite. I like them to have a little knowledge of art, of culture. I like them refined and civilized and fully in charge of their bodily functions. Mind over matter and all that jazz.

Shifter just aren't for me. Still, shifters or not, men are pigs. It's an unfortunate fact. Some of us, however, are self-aware and try to be better than that. Which was why Donald and I were at the museum to start with. The fact that all men are pigs is why I am now at the museum on my own.

Donald found one of the security guards far more appealing than the art and he and the witless stud found a less than private corner to fornicate in. Too bad their quickie wasn't quite quick enough, as I turned a corner and came upon them doing the beast with two backs. I would have preferred to have discovered an actual pig in shit.

Donald, at least, had the good grace to be both embarrassed and extremely apologetic. I did not, however, accept his apology. Actually, I did accept it, but I also returned his key and told him to lose my phone number before stalking off to the see the rest of the exhibit on my own.

I have to admit, I haven't taken much of it in, my mind just isn't into it anymore, but I refuse to give him the satisfaction of chasing me away from this place that I love. I shall enjoy my civilization on my own.

A man rounds the corner just as I do and we collide. We hit hard enough in fact that I'm on my ass, looking up at him. Why I'm the only one who wound up on the floor when we rammed into each other becomes immediately apparent as I stare up at him: he is a behemoth.

Tall, dark, and built -- I believe the expression is like a brick shithouse, but I've never really gotten that. Why the hell would you want to compare a stud like him to a shithouse, brick or otherwise? It kind of brings the whole thing back to pigs, doesn't it? And how all men are.

So, Mr. Shithouse gives me this shit-eating grin and holds his hand out to me. I know I'm supposed to take it, but I decide I'd rather do the nose in the air, haughty thing, which I can promise you is a very impressive thing to manage when I'm on the floor and he's six-four if he's a foot.

Of course, by the time I've hauled myself off the floor, tripped slightly, and spent several moments trying to get the dirt off my clothes, I'm feeling less than entirely dignified and his smile has grown wider.

"Oops?" he says.

Oops. With a question mark no less, like he's not sure if our collision and my subsequent close encounter with the ground was the desired result or not.

"Indeed," I offer in my haughtiest tones. I look him up and down. It's supposed to be intimidating, but he's not intimidated. I, however, am.

At five-eleven, I'm no shrimp, but I did mention that he's a behemoth, right? Yes, I'm repeating myself, but it bears repeating. He's a behemoth, and he's a stud.

As if my looking him up and down is a signal, he looks me up and down, too, and I swear it's like a touch, like I've been hit with a high voltage wire or something. I can feel it all through me.

"You want to have a coffee at the caf?" he asks. He makes coffee sound like anything but.

I have mentioned he's not my type, right? I like them tall enough, but slender, pale, blond, and terribly civilized.

This guy is tall, all right, but that's all he has in common with my ideal man. There are all those big muscles and the dark hair, the swarthy, tanned skin. The five o'clock shadow, even though it's not much past one in the afternoon, and the hairy chest peeking out of the top of his very tight t-shirt.

So not my type. So the opposite of my type. I mean really, can you see me with him?

I sniff and shake my head: absolutely not. Then the words, "I have one of those fancy new machines at my place," come out of my mouth.