No Second Date

Boston, MA: I want you inside me now

So, I met this girl on a dating website. We chatted via text for two weeks and finally decided to get dinner. Dinner was good and the date was actually going ok. First dates can be awkward and fun at the same time, which it was. I was still trying to see what she was like and vice versa.  So I thought…

After dinner we went back to her car to chit chat.  Then it happened… A slightly bigger girl, she jumped on top of me and then she told me she wanted to “get it on.” She went for the buckle on my pants and said “I want you inside me now.”

I think my response was “um… no.” I’m not stupid enough to raw dog it with some chick I’ve met once. 

The worst: Crazy chick wouldn’t leave me alone for weeks.

New York City: Sex and the (not so big) City

I was out with a girlfriend one night and we ended up at a club in the Meatpacking District. Not the kind of place I frequent, but it was the last stop of the night and we were buzzed enough that $17 vodka sodas were only mildly appalling. We were also buzzed enough to dance with strangers, which is exactly what I did when a 6’5” Indian guy approached me. We were dancing and chatting for a bit when I realized my friend was fading fast. I kindly told the guy it was nice meeting him, but I had to leave. He, in turn, asked for my number and I obliged. He was funny and cute, and anyone who likes to dance (whether they should or shouldn’t) is usually a good enough egg in my book. 

Fast forward three weeks later. I get a text from a number I don’t recognize and it turns out to be this guy asking me out. In my younger years when I had standards I would have told him to fuck off for waiting three weeks to contact me, but in these tough times we can’t be too principled. Plus, he was a funny texter and funny is half the battle. So, I agreed on a date. 

A few nights later, we met at a little hookah bar he suggested, which was perfect because I had just quit cigarettes and was craving something (anything!) to inhale. Right off the bat, things were great. He wasn’t as cute as I remembered (no surprise there) but definitely tall with a nice athletic build. We order wine and I can tell he knows a little bit about wine, which impresses me, and the conversation thereafter is pretty effortless. I learn he has a good job in finance but also goes out a lot, and working in the restaurant/nightlife industry this is a huge plus. I typically can’t date “9 to 5”ers due to our conflicting schedules, but I can tell homeboy here doesn’t mind heading out at midnight on the occasional Tuesday. In fact, he suggests a place for us to go later that “has a really good Wednesday night scene”.

Sold.

He suggests we go to his place, conveniently located around the corner, for a glass of wine first. I wouldn’t normally go to a guys place on the first date (okay, it’s been done) but seeing as we have a plan in place for later it seems less likely he’s trying to get laid. So we go. If I wasn’t already a little interested in him I was damn near enamored when I saw his place: a gorgeous 1 bedroom duplex with 2 full baths, a walk-in closet and an amazing view (basically my Manhattan dream). He had an adorable bulldog running around, a wine fridge (!) and a DJ booth set up loft-style overlooking his living room. I always kind of laughed about guys who make their living working “normal” jobs but “promote” or “DJ” on the side in an attempt to feel cool or get laid or both, but after some really tasty cabernet and an hour playing with his new mixer, I think it’s kind of cute. We kiss. And then we go back out. 

We arrive at the Wednesday hot spot with a pretty decent wine buzz and a lot of chemistry. After another cocktail, date tells me his best friend (we will call him Sam) is going to meet up. I think it’s soon but nonetheless a good sign he’s already introducing me to such a good friend and get a sense he wants to sort of show me off, which is flattering. Sam comes in a few minutes later and I immediately note that Sam is hot. Just incredibly attractive and immaculately dressed. We exchange pleasantries and the date leaves us to order more drinks and go to the bathroom, etc. which leaves Sam and I to chat. I’m subtly flirting which I realize is messed up seeing as I’m on a date with his friend, but when a guy is that hot it just happens.  

A few short minutes into our conversation, Sam starts looking at me funny. It’s making me uncomfortable (do I have something in my teeth?) but I just continue blabbing on until he stops me. 

“Wait a minute, I knew that I recognized you from somewhere. Did you used to live in Boston?”

“Yes. That’s so weird. Wait, how do I know you?”

“It’s Sam. I lived in Cambridge. We dated? You took me to that party for your work…”

Of course I did. Memories start flashing back of Boston, four years ago, and this guy (who was always cute but damn he aged well) and the few dates we went on. I recalled our first meeting at a bar in Cambridge and the said event for work I invited him too, but seeing as the courtship was brief and it was four years ago, that was about all I could recall. Of course at this very moment, date comes back and Sam heads to the bar, saying something in passing to date as he walks away. 

Date: “Wait a minute. You know Sam?”

Me: “Ha, small world, right? We dated briefly in Boston like years and years ago. Too funny. I didn’t even recognize him.”

Date: “You didn’t recognize him? He just told me you guys hooked up.”

Me: “Say what?”

Date: “He just walked passed me and said ‘dude, sorry but I’ve hooked up with your girl.’ I’m confused.”

Me: “We never hooked up.”

Which I was sure we hadn’t. Again, I am racking my brain, remembering those few dates but I’m adamant nothing ever really happened between us. The combination of the shock and the embarrassment and the booze has me all mixed up but pissed off that this asshole would a) say anything at all while I’m still there and b) lie to my date and tell him we hooked up when we never did. I realize I have to go, that this is all too much and too uncomfortable but instead of leaving gracefully and taking any form of a high road, I approach Sam. 

“Why the hell would you tell your friend we hooked up? I was actually having a really nice night with him until you started acting like a complete asshole. Look dude, I don’t know if you’re pissed off because I didn’t remember you or what but it was some time ago and in a completely different city so I’m sorry if it was all a little out of context for me, but that is no reason to make shit up. “

“I didn’t make it up. You don’t remember? The night of my birthday?”

Oh yeah.

His birthday.

It came back to me like it was last Friday.

“Oh.”

And with that, I grabbed my coat and bee-lined for the nearest taxi. 

I spent the cab ride home contemplating yet another romance gone wrong and asking myself how degenerate a person must be to not recognize someone they’ve slept with. But more than anything I wondered, “how the hell is it that I live in one of the biggest cities in the world and THIS happens?!” I got home and immediately stole a cigarette from my roommate. 

Date actually asked me out again. I declined. Can you imagine the best man’s speech at our wedding?

Los Angeles, CA: Pretty Girls

I met this guy at a coffee shop near his house. I lived 40 minutes away and asked if we could meet in the middle… but, alas, we met by his house. 

He was an actor. “Usually I send my reel to the people I go out with before I meet them so they can see how good I am,” He said to me.  Ok… he’s a d-bag, I think, but maybe he just slipped up. After an hour of him laughing at jokes I didn’t know I made (and I awkwardly pretended to know what was so funny) my patience was running low. 

When I said I was a musician, he said ”well, give me your cd and I’ll tell you if you’re good. Don’t you want to know what the world thinks of your music?” WTF!!!! Excuse me, but you are NOT the world and if you were I would kill myself and inception my way out of this life!

FINALLY, the  keeper says - ”I have friends that are girls but we can’t really stay friends  since they are obsessed with me.” I kid you not, that was a real quote. Why I stayed at that moment, I’ll never know.

“I notice that the girls I WANT to date are really hot, but they are dumb,” He shamelessly continues.  ”The girls who are interesting are the girls who are just pretty because they haven’t been handed things to them their whole life. I tell the girls I date that I am settling. I know I’m not the hottest guy ever; so, I should be honest with them about how they look.” 

The end of the lovely night was me saying ”Don’t call me” after he harassed the waitress and almost made me pay for my 1 decaf coffee while he had a whole meal!!

Then we got married…

HELLZNAH!!! I never saw him again after avoiding his calls for the next month…….. ew…..

Cambridge, MA: I am not completely opposed to the occasional nibble…

I went on a date with a guy who seemed really wonderful. He took me to a dive bar.

I like dives.

During my first drink he was mostly normal, asking about my week and other very normal things. (Note the normalcy).

He ordered me a second drink (thank you sir, very polite)

Then he started quizzing me and essentially harrassing me about what I was looking for in a relationship. Apparently “I don’t know” was not an acceptable answer, so he continued to harrass me. I proceeded to chug my gin drink.

Poor decision.

He realized I was about to walk out on him, and suddenly started being incredibly sweet, so I stupidly decided to stay for another drink. 

I thought perhaps the weird second drink outburst was a fluke and that he really was a normal guy, albeit one who recently escaped a serious relationship that he never intended to be serious. I thought I sort of understood his harrassment.

After our third drink, we walked outside so he could get on his bike and I could get on the bus. He went to kiss me goodnight, and I thought “Oh! A nice normal end to a weird date!”

We were in the middle of Harvard Square and not only did he kiss me goodnight, he essentially ate my face.  

Followed by a bite on the neck.

On our first date.

I am not completely opposed to the occasional nibble, but he bit me HARD. The first time we met. He left bite marks. Needless to say, I had lost interest. On my bus ride home (about ten minutes later), I got a text message asking if I “wanted company” that night. Um… no thank you bipolar vampire man. 

New York City: One Floor Down

About a year ago a few of my friends convinced me to join OkCupid. I thought, “Egh, what the hell?” At this point I had been messing around with someone who I knew nothing was going to materialize with - so, I thought I would try it out.

It took me a longtime to muster up enough courage to respond to a message. I ended up getting a message from a super cute guy who lived in my area.  One night we ended up chatting online…Only to find out he lived on my street, in my building, in the IDENTICAL room below mine!

So, at this point I suggested he meet me in the hallway to go for a drink (which he happily did) and we laughed about the odd circumstance.

One drink around the corner lead to another and another and before long I was back at his place (one floor below mine, in the same laid out room…which was weird because it wasn’t mine).

We ended up having a really awkward romp in the sack.

Cut to one week later when he caught me with my usual hook-up getting particularly randy in the hallway right in front of his door on my way up to my place.

God, I looked like a slut.

After that, I would continuously bump into him in the building.

Waterville, ME: Dirty Mouth?

I’ve told this story enough times to know that it suffices more or less skip to the punch line.

One night I was at an “Edward 40-hands” themed college party.  As a petite female freshman in college, I saw no reason why I shouldn’t consume (almost) 80 oz. of malt beverage in one evening.  As the night wore on, things got friendly with one particular fellow.

Long story short, we went back to his dorm, were making out, and I stopped to vomit into a plastic bag.  He was very nice, I believe I washed my face a bit, and he gave me a piece of Orbit gum to clean my obviously dirty mouth.  Within five minutes, he started making out with me again.  

The guy puts a lot of faith in Orbit gum. 

We proceeded to date for about 9 months.  

Boston, MA: I’m just so awesome

I met a guy at my old job who I thought checked maybe 3 out of 20 boxes on my checklist - so, you know, super-promising from the start. He was cute but kind of full of himself, seemed a bit snobbish. But whatever, you’re only young once.

I agreed to meet him for dinner.

He picks out a tiny restaurant. However, it’s a Saturday in the summer and he hadn’t made reservations. The host informs him it will be a wait of “2-3 hours.” I’m ready to move on because who waits 3 hours for dinner at place with no bar? Instead, he says that’s fine and leaves his name. I suggest grabbing a drink somewhere nearby but he quickly, mysteriously shoots down that idea, says he’s fine waiting out front of the restaurant.

For three hours.

At first, we try to make small talk but it becomes increasingly clear that he wants to talk about himself only. Actually, he wants to talk about bikes.

And bike lanes.

And bike politics.

And bike accidents.

And bike helmets.

And bike culture.

And bands that support biking (there is such a thing? What color ribbon sticker do you get for that?)

I try to seem engaged but after his fifth story of how he told off a motorist for not obeying hand signals, I’m having trouble feigning interest. Then he suddenly goes on a tangent about socialism, making very simplistic comments like “This world is just rich f-cking white men trying to keep us from uprising.” I realize by “rich white men” he probably means his father, and by “us,” he probably means “people who work part-time at a food co-op.” 

He’s embarrassingly loud, too, the kind of person who only speaks in caps lock: “I HAVE A LOT IN COMMON WITH HUNTER S. THOMPSON!”

I was weighing my options at this point. Stick it out? Leave? Light self on fire? Light him on fire? But right then, like some sort of sick, twisted divine intervention, the host says she’s had a cancellation and we’re welcome to sit now.

She fails to mention the table is the smallest booth in the history of dining, so that we have to sit side-to-side, shoulder-to-shoulder. Close enough that I can’t even use my left hand. Close enough that I can smell that he doesn’t wear deodorant, but he DOES have a tattoo of a bike on his inner bicep.

I would like to order a drink but Boy says, “No thank you” immediately to the offered drink menu, my only saving grace. Then he complains that the bread is cold and asks the server to warm it up for him.

Then Boy proceeds to order for me.

Yes. Order for me. In the 21st century, after ranting about how “men can be f-cking feminists too, you know?” Surprisingly, he shuts up when there is food in front of him, leaving me to concentrate on both my pasta and locating all available exits. We’re silent for an extremely long period of time. 

When we finish, he asks if I would like dessert, and I say no, thinking that I would rather stick my fork in my eyeball. As we signal the waiter for the check, I see another waiter kind of staring at us, holding two glasses of wine on his tray which I know come with our meal. 

He comes over and sets the wine on the table. I’m so thankful that booze is in my presence. 

I go to take a sip when Boy leans over to the waiter and says very loudly so everyone can hear, “NO THANK YOU! I AM A RECOVERING ALCOHOLIC!”

Everyone stares at us as he pays. We leave and I’m ready to say my goodbyes outside and go home, crawl into bed with a bottle of vodka and “Miss Congeniality” on TBS.

I’m ready to tell him that I don’t want to see him ever again but before I can, he says “WELL, I DON’T REALLY THINK THIS WORKED OUT. YOU’RE NOT MY TYPE. I ACTUALLY REALLY LIKE ASIAN WOMEN.”

Not only did I go on a date with a smelly pinko alcoholic, but he then proceeded to “turn me down” in front of, oh, I don’t know, hundreds of people. It made for the most eye-gougingly awful first date since Hannibal Lecter asked a bitch to dinner.

Pittsburgh, PA: Stage Five Clinger

The last summer I spent at home during my college years, I could be found every Wednesday night at an outdoor movie night most Pittsburghers refer to as Flagstaff.  On one such a Flagstaffian night, I met a girl who, for all intensive purposes of privacy, I’ll refer to as “Sally.”  As a lesbian, I am usually under the presumption that most girls I meet outside of any sort of gay club or gay night are straight.  I assumed the same thing about Sally.  She did, after all, come with a guy.  

During the course of the night, I was surprised to find that she was talking more to me than to her date.  Even more surprising is that she offered me a ride home after helping me down a bottle of wine, and that she basically inferred to her date that he should make his own way back after the movie ended — alone.

After everyone had left (and after the last vestiges of wine were consumed), I asked Sally if she would like to wait for awhile before driving.  She answered me by planting me with a kiss that literally knocked me backwards onto the ground — with her on top of me — and into a pile of what I thought at the time were daffodils, or some other like-minded weed.

We proceeded to leave the park grounds and go to her car, where we had sex.  After we had finished (and as we were putting our clothes back on), I found that I had a rash on the back of neck and between my shoulder blades.  Yep — the patch of weeds I had fallen into when Sally kissed me were not just any fauna, but poisoned ivy.

At that point, Sally decided to tell me that she had never had sex with a girl before, and she was so happy that she now had a girlfriend.  She then basically gave me the ultimatum of her crashing at my place, or crashing in her car.

We both woke up the next morning covered with poisoned ivy.  Thank God for that poisonous weed — it ended up being the deal-breaker for the most short-lived relationship I’ve had in my life.

Quincy, MA: Mr. Cooper

I am a news junkie for several reasons; I like to be informed, I work in politics, and possibly most importantly, the silver fox, Anderson Cooper.  There is something about the combination of his stunningly good looks, confident authoritative voice, and the way he can make a lying uber-conservative extremist shut up and look dumb.  Needless to say given the chance I would let him be my anchor.

So, a year ago when I met a gentleman that bore a striking resemblance to Mr. Cooper and had a chance to go on a date, well that was breaking news.

Mind you this was at a point in my life as a college student that I was putting myself out in the gay world, and let’s just say a relationship was not my primary motivation, but can you blame me? I was good looking, 22 years old, in great shape with very little time on my hands, and more hormones than I knew what to do with. 

So the date seemed like it was going very well and I happened to have my apartment all to myself  So, I invited - I just realized I do not even remember his real name - to come back to my place.  I am pretty sure my intentions were clear, I wanted to get a piece of my new favorite celebrity look-a-like.  Once the clothes started coming off the similarities between my Anderson and real Anderson continued. His body was amazing, six-pack does not cover the glory that was this man’s stomach.  So, without giving too detailed a report, we had a great time.  As we were putting our clothes back on my iPhone went off. I went to grab it, but I stopped my self and said “oh man I am addicted to my iPhone.” To which my my silver haired fantasy responded with “Oh ya, I got my daughter one of those she is addicted too… I think you two are the same age.”  

 I was able to contain myself until I brought him to the door, and showed him out.  The moment the door shut I laughed harder than I had in a long time. I’m pretty sure he heard me.  I was unable to respond to any of his messages without laughing and knew I would not be able to handle a second date.  Every time I turn on Anderson Cooper I get a smile on my face.

Newark, NJ: Too Much Weed

In high school, I waited tables at a local diner a few nights a week. Save for the other teens like me who were trying to make some extra cash for a cell phone or new kicks, there was a small group of employees who exemplified the cast of the Ryan Reynolds movie “Waiting;” slightly older, at community college, bad habits, no car. Jack was one of them.

I had recently gotten out of a relationship, and knowing I was leaving for college in the fall, I wasn’t looking for anything serious. Jack was nice enough — moderately attractive with at least a slight sense of humor, which was an improvement over many of the other employees at the diner. We had some mutual friends, even though he was a few years older than I was and grew up two towns over.

One night after closing the diner with Jack, he asked what I was up to later. Not wanting to say, “I am going home to do my math homework and get to bed early because I have high school in the morning,” I played it cool and said I would just be “hanging out.” He said he would “come hang out with me,” his tone implying he was inviting himself over. Against my better judgement, I told him to drop by.

We stood in my living room, my parents asleep not too far from us, making awkward small talk. He told me he was tired, and I told him it was okay if he went home, promising we could hang out sometime soon. He said not to worry about it, that he would find some energy, and he pounced.

We started hooking up on my living room couch, both of us still in our greasy diner clothes and reeking of french fry oil. Soon enough things were progressing to the next level, which I was prepared for — and he didn’t seem to be holding anything back, either.

As we were fooling around, he wasn’t able to get hard enough to have sex, but we kept trying. But after awhile he seemed to get uncomfortable and frustrated and he stopped me. I asked him what was wrong, and all he said was, “Sorry, I smoked too much weed.” He buttoned his pants back up and said, “see ya, kiddo” before he left, with me still sitting on the couch half-clothed in my parent’s house.

We never spoke of that night again, although we were coworkers for another eight months. After I left for college, I heard from a friend he was arrested for transporting weed across an international border and spent a year in jail. I guess he had too much weed.