He was a writer I’d met once at a party.
We added each other on facebook, as you do. As you did in 2015.
I moved to montreal and years passed and no conversations were ever had. I never thought about him. Nothing was kismet. He was just a writer among a group of writers I’d met once.
I loved meeting writers. I loved meeting talented writers, of which I wasn’t sure he was having seen virtually none of his writing. But I remember laughing. At the party, talking to him, even though I can’t picture it, even though I can’t really remember it at all, I remember laughing.
More years pass. I move back from Montreal. The Pandemic happens/is happening. Most days it feels like the world is very much on fire. Somehow we have survived until March 2022.
And then we matched on Hinge.
I thought he’d matched so we could be writer friends. I believe myself to be beautiful and sexy and brilliant and funny and lovable and desirable and all the positive things, but I thought he’d matched because we knew each other. I thought he’d matched just to say hi and chop it up about the apps.
But after a couple messages from him, I started to think that maybe he was actually just trying to shoot his shot.
Is this…you…shooting your shot? I asked.
And it was. He was shooting his shot, AND he wanted to be writer friends.
I should be clear though, the shot he was shooting was the exact one I was looking for. My Hinge profile (like all my other profiles) told viewers the following truth: I’m looking for men who want to lick pussy without expecting anything in return.
He was into it. He was up for it. I asked him why he hadn’t shot his shot that night at the party when we’d met years ago, or even literally anytime since then on facebook.
He said, I’m not a very forward person. My family crest is someone cowering. Which was creative enough to interest me. We were exchanging sexy pics and videos by day’s end. We bantered back and forth. We said sexy things to each other using wordplay (do you know how hard that is with average dudes?). I once told a man that if he was a fruit, he’d be a fine-apple and he responsded that I was a watermelon. No pun. No wordplay. He just called me a melon. The bar is not in hell, it is an illusion. Anyway, back to the writer who kept saying how much he loved my energy, how much he wanted this to happen.
He was ready to meet up asap. But it was March 2022 and I was leaving on a roadtrip (my first big anything since March 2020) in two weeks. I didn’t want to chance catching covid and blowing my trip so I told him it’d have to wait. We both expressed excitement and that was it.
A week later he texted at 1:18am: Hellooooo
In the morning, I responded: Lol at thinking I’d be awake after 10pm. He clicked HA HA on the text and I responded: So what number was I in the queue for late night texting.
To be honest, I texted it as a joke. I didn’t much care either way, I was just trying to keep the banter going because I enjoyed it (and because I knew my interest would increase the more we bantered back and forth). I thought he’d say something sassy. Instead, he said nothing. No response. And just like that, my interest flew out the window.
I went on my roadtrip. I drove up the gorgeous (though admittedly VERY windy—pronounced wine-d—Oregon and California coasts). I stayed in a fleabag motel the first night that I’ll never recover from. I was stressed. I persevered. I took a hundred photos and sang my little heart out. I’ll never be able to listen to “Fucked By A Country Boy” without thinking of driving down Malibu with all the windows and sunroof open.
At the end of 4 weeks, April 28th, I was leaving Las Vegas (obviously with Sheryl Crow singing backup) and he texted: Sup!
But the thing is I’m 40 years old. And I’m a fucking writer and I thought he was a fucking writer. And maybe it was to be funny or whatever but honestly I’m so tired of the tepid and inadequate way men behave. If you want me, even just to lick my pussy, be great, be phenomenal, be someone worth writing about.
I ignored his text. To be honest, I had already lost most of my interest when he hadn’t responded earlier in the month, when he hadn’t kept the vibes going, when he hadn’t displayed the appropriate mix of excitement and ability to communicate.
God I was so fucking bored of men who couldn’t get their shit together.
But then May drifted by and after that came June (as it does), and I had my surgery and I healed from my surgery. And then July came and my lifelong yearning for a male friend who’s smart and fun and/or a writing partner who makes me laugh (or at least makes me make myself laugh) began to really creep in.
And on Sunday, July 17th, I texted him: Heyyyyy how’s it going?
to be continued…