I feel I should preface this with a slight disclaimer that I a) do not go out to bars with the intention of meeting the perfect guy for me, and b) I do not expect to meet a guy at the cafe either. That these things will happen seems likely, since both places are festering with lonely, available guys; and finally c) I'm in no rush to be relationshipped again.
The first time I met him I was drunk. I was mad. I was manic. I had been out all night and arrived at work that morning with no sleep and booze on my breath. It was one of the stupidest things I had ever done. That day the marathon passed by the cafe, my boss was already waiting for me at six a.m. and I had stopped drinking at 5:30 a.m. To say that I was fucked was just putting it lightly. But somehow, my boss did not catch on that I was drunk.
He arrived at an hour before the marathon passed through to do his homework and without his foreknowledge, to laugh at my many hilarious comments which I delivered because he was there. His presence made my shift palatable. His stoic focus on his homework was strange and intriguing. Here were twenty thousand people running by, another few hundred spectators ringing cow bells, yelling and clapping and he was not distracted at all by them. He was distracted by me. But not by them.
After that, it has been a desperate climb on the the sill, my fingers barely able to hold on, his presence is so far and few between and unpredictable and his demeanor toward me different, as if that day had never happened. I adore him but I think there is no way he could love a girl like me. I imagine so many scenarios, but I can't imagine how it will ever get off the ground.
He suits me most as a physical being. His personality is strangled and muffled and too quiet for me, I suspect.
As for the other one, he suits me most personality wise, but his physical being is not my ideal. And yet, where others have failed in this department, he has somehow snuck in with such vitality that it doesn't matter to me at all.
He is a regular everywhere. I have often seen him, noticed him, drank with him. Not long ago, I began to look forward to his visits. I sought him out at the bar. And what I found there was better than I could have imagined. He sat with me a long time after he'd paid his tab and I tried maybe too hard to play it cool. When he finally left the entire bar had invented that he had a crush on me and I was too mean to notice. I countered, it doesn't matter that you think he likes me, because I already like him.
The next time I saw him I surprised him with these revelations and we managed to clumsily meet somewhere in the middle, between chin and nose. He was tender and sweet and loud and wonderful and we spent the morning laying in a bed he made from a box with instructions. And now he says he will call me to discuss a date. Except he hasn't called at all.
I realize that I was not even on his radar a week ago. In fact, his presence on mine was a surprise to me as well. He's the kind of guy I usually avoid because I know his type. I've dated his type. I'm not interested in being that girl who's with That Guy. You know, the loud crazy guy at the bar who buys everyone shots... And yet, he expressed great admiration for someone who'd read the seven volumes of Proust. He actually knew that there were seven volumes. He'd actually tried to read them and only made it through the first two. So I must relent my stereotypes, I must let down my notions and admit that he may not be That Guy.
The fact that he's a know-it-all only makes him all the more enticing.
So I snuck into his life and into his bed with the element of surprise on my side, and I wonder if he's thinking too hard about it all instead of just getting to know me.
It's exciting to have some prospects. I imagined that it would be a slow road in this area, that my heart would be too cold to even let someone near me. I've been accused of doing this all too soon, of setting myself up to be hurt again, but in the end, I know myself better than anyone does. I know that I wouldn't even bat an eye if they weren't something worth seeing. I also know at the end of the day an empty bed awaits me in my apartment by the lake and it doesn't make me yearn for anything but sleep.
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