Sister Act

Gillian Anderson as Stella Gibson in The Fall (BBC 2)

I have always been accused to be too straightforward with men.
And I can’t deny it.
I sincerely don’t understand why, if I like someone, I should wait ages before announcing it to him.
I basically live following Don Drapers’s principle: I’m living like there is no tomorrow, because there isn’t one. 

In a couple of occasions, I made love declarations and/or indecent proposals after few hours I met the object of my desire.

This approach isn’t always working, I admit it.
As per the First Rule of the non-written Law of Seduction, men prefer hunting instead of being hunted. And as boring as this could sound (at least to my ears), and regardless of the fact that we are now in 2013, it looks like this is still - and quite sadly will always be - the case.
Most women are horrified too by this approach. I envy them. I wish I could feel the same way. I wish I could be like them.
In movies too, it is not that frequent to come across female characters who clearly express their desires.
In this sense, TV series have always been ahead: I mean, even if it is not one of my favourite series, it is a fact that, before Sex and the City, nobody had the guts of talking in such realistic way of what sex/love/relationship really mean for women.
Last week-end, I’ve seen a new TV series (5 episodes in total, the last episode still to be broadcast) called The Fall. 

Set in contemporary Belfast, The Fall follows in parallel the life of a serial killer, Paul Spector, and the one of the Detective Superintendent who’s trying to track him down, Stella Gibson. Played by American actress Gillian Anderson, Stella is one of the most refreshing characters I’ve ever seen on screen. Stella is forty-something, independent, self-confident, ironic, single, a bit tough and diffident (almost glacial, sometimes), and more than straightforward towards men.

In one scene, she did something that really thrilled me, and made me feel like a novice compared to her: at a crime scene on the street, at night, Stella noticed a good looking police-man, detective sergeant James Olson. Stella asks the colleague who’s in the car with her, to be introduced to the man. A second afterwards the presentation, she said to Olson, who looks at her in disbelief: "I’m staying in this hotel, room n° 203". 

The following scene shows, of course, the door of room n° 203. 
Somebody is knocking at it. Useless to say, it is James Olson. The door opens, Stella looks at him. 

"I wasn’t sure what you meant when you gave me your room number", the man begins.
Stella moves the sign Do not disturb from the inside handle to the outside handle.
"This is what I meant", she answers, bringing the man into the room.
Wow! I was so admired. And what a relief!
At least on screen, I have a sister who acts like me.