We stared at each other. He continued to regard me placidly, with a friendly albeit detached smile. Meanwhile, I was plotting my escape, polite social discourse be damned.
Usually, I didn’t agree to meeting face to face unless I’d spoken to the potential date on the phone first, ensuring we had some level of chemistry. But I’d made an exception for Derek, because he was supposed to be my perfect match.
But clearly the system didn’t factor in the degree to which a person is a loon.
Says the sweating woman who had astronomical—and therefore understandably annihilated—hopes. Look in the mirror, looney bird.
I was just about to make an excuse when he announced, “We should engage in small talk. How was your day?”
“Pardon me?”
Nuts. He’s completely nuts.
“Or if you don’t wish to discuss your day, we could talk about hobbies,” he offered cordially, gesturing to my lap. “Do you read for work or pleasure?”
Distracted by his rapid and bizarre subject change, I responded unthinkingly, “I usually read for fun.” I’m sure the look I gave him was one of complete bewilderment.
“Really? Does kidnapping and sexual torture sound like fun to you?”
My mouth fell open and I reared back in my seat.
This guy wasn’t a loon, he was completely insane.
I managed to sputter, “What are you suggesting?”
“The 120 Days of Sodom.” He tilted his chin toward my lap.
I flinched, a short, aggrieved, disbelieving laugh bursting from my lips. “Oh my God.” Then to the table I said, “You’re completely crazy.”
Derek frowned at me, as though I’d confused him. His eyes bounced between the table and me. “What?”
“You’re completely crazy,” I repeated, reaching behind me for my coat.
“I’m crazy?”
If he hadn’t just suggested four months of sodomy I might have found the concerned wrinkle between his eyebrows adorable. But, given the fact that sexual torture wasn’t far from his mind, I decided the wrinkle wasn’t adorable. It was distressing.
“Yes. You’re nuts. Don’t email me. Don’t call me. Pretend we never met.”
I was no longer sweating as I pulled on my jacket and grabbed my things. This was an odd quirk about my personality: put me in an innocuous situation where I need to be normal, and I’m bouncing off the walls. But send me into a dangerous or emergency situation, and I’m cool and focused.
Derek—or whatever his name was—started to stand so I held out my hand.
“Don’t. Don’t stand up. Don’t even look at me. And don’t think about following me either or I’ll call the police.” Lunatic.
Without another glance, I wove through the tables and out the door, anger, indignation, and frustration spurring my movements.
Wow.
WOW.
Wow.
The first thing I’d do upon arriving home would be reporting that freak to FindUrPartner.com.
The second thing I’d do is delete my profile. I’d been with David, my ex, for six years, and because we’d met in college, I’d missed out on the early years of Internet dating. No great loss. Clearly it wasn’t for me.
I’d had some terrible first dates since breaking up with David, but this one took the cake. It took all the cakes. In less than twenty minutes, my perfect match had irrevocably propelled himself to the top of my worst-date list.
Thanks, dating algorithms, for pairing me with a psycho.
I moved to retrieve my cell from my purse. I needed to call my friend Sandra immediately. I couldn’t wait until knit night to tell someone about this fiasco. But then my attention snagged on the spine of my book—the book I’d purchased in a rush so as to not seem prosaic for Derek—and I stopped short, gaping at the title and author.
It read, The 120 Days of Sodom, by Marquis de Sade.
2
Artificial Diamond (aka Synthetic Diamond, Cultured Diamond, or Cultivated Diamond)
A diamond created in a laboratory rather than by geological processes. While the term synthetic is associated by consumers with imitation products, artificial diamonds are made of the same material (pure carbon, crystallized in isotropic 3D form) and are, in fact, real diamonds.
Source: 16 C.F.R. Part 23: Federal Trade Commission
Roaring laughter, complete with heads thrown back, hands over stomachs, and tears rolling down faces. This was how my six knitting group friends reacted to the punchline of my date with Derek.
Elizabeth—my sarcastic with a heart of marshmallow ER physician from Iowa—held her face in her hands. A long rope of braided blonde hair fell over her shaking shoulders.
Sandra—my potty-mouthed psychiatrist from Texas—was sprawled backward on the sofa, her green eyes screwed shut as she clutched her abdomen. Silent hysterics apparently having momentarily paralyzed her.
Ashley—my silly, quick-witted ICU nurse from Tennessee—was bent to one side, her face planted into the couch at her left. She’d Skyped in from Green Valley, Tennessee, where she’d moved over the spring to be closer to her family. We’d placed a laptop on a chair to one side of the living room, close enough to the circle that we were all visible but far enough away so she could still see all of us.
Fiona—my graceful and wise retired CIA field agent from Baltimore—gazed at me with her dark, soulful eyes, an expression between sympathy and reluctant humor warring for dominance.
Kat—my poised, sweet, usually shy administrative assistant and woman of mystery from Boston—had folded her arms on the coffee table and hidden her face, but her giggle-snort gave her away.
Janie was the exception. My walking, talking encyclopedia of Amazonian adorableness—also from Iowa—wasn’t laughing. She looked perturbed.
But I was laughing.
How could I not? What other choice did I have?
Crying? Nah. I was finished with crying. Crying was my past, laughing was my present and foreseeable future. Unless it was crying induced by laughter or an allergy to cats. Because I’d recently decided I would be adopting cats. All the cats.
Forget men and romance. The answer to my aching loneliness would be all the cats.
“Tears. On my face.” Sandra waved her hands in front of her eyes and then wiped at the corners. “I’m wearing mascara, thank God, so you can all get the full effect.”
“What are you talking about?” Elizabeth, still in her ER scrubs, asked from Sandra’s left, nudging her with an elbow while snickering. “What full effect?”
“You can literally see how funny this story is by the black trails of mascara running down my face.” Sandra pointed to her cheeks, subduing an errant giggle. “Sodomy jokes. They get me every time.”