Actual Miles by Lori Dorcik

I met Chris online. He contacted me on one of the free sites. So we text for a couple of days, then made plans to meet at a steakhouse after he got off work. I got there a few minutes early and received a text that says “Don’t judge” OH NO, what does that mean? A few minutes later dude rolls in driving a 1990 Honda Accord wagon with a door that won’t close all the way because it’s been wrecked! Ok I’m not judging…

He gets out with a beautiful bouquet of flowers but makes me carry it into the restaurant because he knows everyone will ask about them. So we walk in and he tells the hostess there are 17 of us… she about panicked, then she promptly sat us all the way in the back of the restaurant. So obviously he thinks he is a real funny guy and needs to be the center of attention. Great. He then sat down and proceeded to run his mouth for an hour and a half straight! First he tells me about his 4 kids from 3 different wives, his job, which he hates…, car salesman (obviously not very good at it!) and that he is a recovering alcoholic, hasn’t drank in 4 years but was drunk for 10 years straight and now there about 11 people on the planet that want him dead. REALLY? This is a first date! (Although I should thank him for letting me know upfront) This dude just didn’t know when to SHUT UP!

When he finally takes a breath, we decide to order appetizers. He doesn’t eat seafood and I can’t eat wheat so that left cheese fries or the artichoke dip, which I recommended, to which he replied “cheese fries it is!” This can’t get much worse… Or so I think.

The cheese fries come and while he is stuffing his face I take the opportunity to say “Do I look like my profile pics?” His reply to this was “Well you have a few miles on ya”. WHAT?!?! He then says “how old were they?” I told him they had all been taken in the last year and he replies “well it must not have been a good angle” Are you fucking kidding me? No one thinks I’m my age! Did this guy who only has one pic of himself, behind a counter, which I very quickly found out why, really just said that? I was speechless! He tried back pedalling out of the miles comment but it was no use.

I excused myself to use the rest room because through all of his rambling I had drank 6 glasses of water but more importantly I needed to text for help, immediately! As planned when I got back to the table, my best friend calls and says there is a road block and she needs a ride. I replied “well can you wait an hour, we haven’t ordered dinner yet” So my plan was, since I had endured this hellish experience, I was at least getting a meal out of it! Knowing I am 30 minutes away from her this gives me 30 minutes to order, eat and get the heck out of there! So she says yes, and he hears the whole thing, thankfully he doesn’t catch on it’s because of him.

I pick the quickest thing on the menu and while we wait, he starts to tell me how awesome his car is, that it is his project and what a great motor it has, and something about the wheels, and blah blah blah. It is the 13th one he has had in 2 years and then listed them all off for me. I realize HE doesn’t drink but I would turn into an alcoholic if I continued with this. All I could think was OMG Shut up!

The food comes, sadly mine was horrible and he only ate half of his because it inhibited his talking. He then decides we are getting cheesecake for dessert and there is a choice of chocolate or raspberry sauce, he and the waitress go back and forth, never asking me, because obviously as demonstrated earlier my opinion doesn’t count. I shoot her the “if this doesn’t end RIGHT NOW I’m taking the whole place out” stare and she promptly asks me to join in on the debate and my response was “RASPBERRY”. And by my tone they took me seriously because raspberry it was. So he goes to pay the tab and has to make a production of tipping the waitresses (because we were there so long we had 2). I start to walk out, and he walks me part of the way to my car and says “can I have a hug” Ok I give him the one handed pat on the back, hope to NEVER see you again hug, and the cherry on top is when he said “I don’t kiss on the first date.” Really?!?!

So on my way home, I get a text saying “I had a great time; I really enjoyed your company. I would love to see you again, have fun playing taxi” my reply was “thanks again for dinner, have a good night” I thought that would be enough hint but oh no, not for mister genius… He texts me again in the morning trying to explain the “miles” comment yet again, that by my pics he thought I would be more of a party girl, but that I am classy and sophisticated~ a real lady. I guess he thought I was a real moron! I text him back and told him I would lie, he shouldn’t use that line and honestly I couldn’t see us being anything more than friends. He thanked me for my honesty and tried to contact me once or twice more but I didn’t respond, and this time I think he got the hint!