Before I got home from our first date, he had sent me three messages. The first was his phone number, which he told me to expect. The last said, “I really like you. You are more beautiful than I expected….”
We met for tea on a bitterly cold Wednesday night and sat in the comfy chairs facing each other by a drafty south-facing window in the back of the room. When he walked in the door, I got up from my seat, shook his hand in both of mine and said, “It is a pleasure to meet you.”
We ordered the same berry tea and two muffins to split and share. When he signed his name on the tablet to pay for our order, I noticed that he was left-handed.
“I’m left-handed too!” I said as I leaned in to bump up against his shoulder. Somehow, I was not surprised. We had already determined that we had many things in common.
We talked and laughed until the barista kicked us out at closing time. We stood on the sidewalk in front of the coffee shop and said goodbye. He said we should exchange numbers and meet for a meal. I agreed and gave him a sideways hug — a habit I find hard to overcome — and then I walked away toward my car with a smile spread across my face.
We had exchanged what seemed like a hundred messages on the dating app before we met. He quizzed me one night while I was lying in bed with Melvin. Ten questions. The first was, “Peanut butter or jelly?” I said peanut butter gives me a headache so almond butter with no sugars.
“Well the correct answer is natural peanut butter. Good try though,” he wrote.
I said, “Am I supposed to say my preference or guess yours?”
“Yours,” he wrote.
Then how could I get it wrong, I wondered.
I answered the remaining questions, each time picking the same answer he would have chosen. “You’re good at this,” he said, and accused me of getting the test beforehand. I even knew the answer to the bonus question: Why was 6 afraid of 7?
He calculated my score, pausing to ask if I were nervous, and then announced that I got 69%. “You missed the cut!” he wrote. I protested, so he checked his numbers and said his calculator must have been wrong.
After we each got home from our tea and muffins date, we texted each other until it was time to go to sleep. We made plans to have dinner together on Monday night after his ice fishing weekend with his buddies and my trip to see Oprah in the city. His last message nearly brought me to tears that night and every time I have reread it since.
“Wendi, you were the best part of my day and I know already you will be the best part of my day on Monday. I expected a great evening but it surpassed my expectations. …thank you for being you.”
Between our first and third dates, he texted me every day, multiple times a day. He texted “Good morning sunshine!” and every night he asked, “What was the best part of your day?” I wanted to say that he was one of the best parts of my day, but fear stopped me so I picked something else.
On our third date, instead of going out, he made me dinner at his place and we kissed until the morning.
Then, abruptly it seemed, the messages nearly stopped. Good morning never included sunshine. There was no lunchtime thinking of you or good night sweets. I didn’t know why, and I was afraid to ask.
I tried to stay in touch, but it felt forced. Wrong. Uncomfortable. When I texted and said I was going out with friends after work, he said it was fine if I wanted to see other people. “We’ve only known each other for six days, Wendi,” he wrote. My name felt like a slap in the face. We had known each other more than six days, but I didn’t correct him. “Don’t feel bad if you want to date other people. It’s called dating.”
“I’m going out with friends,” I wrote, and my heart broke when I clicked Send.
Every morning on my way to work, I thanked God for the three wonderful dates we had had. I prayed that God would give him every thing he wanted in a relationship and every thing I wanted for myself: love, passion, connection, understanding, thoughtfulness, support, great kisses and long-lasting hugs. I cried and exhaled and told God I believed that deep, lasting love was coming for me. I named it and I claimed it.
At the end of the week, I broke down and told him I missed our chats.
“Really” he answered. It was either a question or a statement, and it knocked the wind out of me.
He said I had sent him a message that felt like a dismissal. I wrote, “Thank you for your time.” I meant, “Thank you for spending quality time with me,” but I said it wrong. It was my mistake.
“Seemed like you were saying thanks for the effort but this is not going to work,” he wrote.
“Why didn’t you ask me about it?”
“It caught me off guard and I didn’t want to question it,” he answered.
“But that’s not at all what I meant. I am sorry it came off that way.”
A door opened and we went in. We chatted a little bit about our last night together. He invited me to come back. I said I would love to.
That was last night. There was still no good night sweets at the end of the day or good morning beautiful today, but I hope there will be. And if for any reason I never receive another message from him that makes my heart sing, I can reread the ones that I have already saved there.
Being Wendi 