Or was it really just me feeling that wasn’t all that was happening here between us?
Again?
I shut my eyes as I gathered my composure. Taking a breath, I blinked my eyes back open. “Thanks.”
Josh—my best friend’s brother, who I felt like I was millimeters away from kissing in my bedroom in the apartment we shared—smiled, looking around the room one more time before he turned around and walked right back out the door to the living room.
“Night.”
eleven
“Areyou sure this is the place you wanted to go?” I yelled over the loud music playing through the speakers.
When I had thought of the “holiday bar,” as Jackson had described it over the phone—which made me feel like maybe this guy might not be another obnoxious dud (positive thinking going out into the world and all that)—this place on the corner of a street I was unsure I’d ever traveled to before in daylight wasn’t it.
Though the place had old garland and slightly withered red ribbons—which were fading to something closer to pink—decorating the bar, the music was anything but the holiday-themed drinks date number two, Jackson, had promised. In fact, the only way to describe this bar in particular was a dive.
I wasn’t picky or anything, but for some reason, I was thinking back to my first date—no,practicedate with Josh and the Jingle Bell Martini on the menu. The more I thought about it, the more it didn’t actually sound that bad.
In fact, I was pretty sure I would love one right now.
“Yeah, this place is great!” Jackson yelled back, unperturbed that he had to. “Plus, like I said, the drinks are dirt cheap!”
“I thought you said that it was a holiday place?”
“I’m sure they have something!” He pushed us through the thick crowd of people stuffed inside the building until we reached the front, where bartenders were pouring over lines of tequila shots with lime.
At a house party, I wouldn’t think twice about it, and yet I was still looking for any sign of Christmas cheer here other than Jackson's red striped flannel he wore open with a black tee shirt peeking out from underneath.
All I managed to see was Christmas depression, which, honestly, was starting to match my mood as of late.
Over the past two weeks, I had gone on five dates. Five. After the first douche canoe, I’d made sure that I wasn’t going to let myself get stuck in a possible three-course meal.
My last date (or was it two dates ago? I was already getting them mixed up.) had been polite, but talked about his mom. A lot. For our date, we painted mugs at a paint-and-create studio. It was his idea, which I loved, and I was still excited to pick up my final creation whenever they called. But by the end, I had known his mom’s favorite color, holiday, astrological sign, and health history—where he was still concerned about how she always managed to get the flu each year, no matter what she did, even with all the herbal, holistic stuff she tried, except for quarantining herself away from humanity.
Another date had taken a scheduled phone call halfway through the date and then seemed shocked when I ate half the soft pretzel he’d ordered for us. After nearly a half hour of waiting for him to return to the table, I wanted to sneak out the door and leave, but he was blocking the exit as he chortled with whoever he was talking with, who clearly had more interesting things to discuss than I did by that point.
Another date had been shocked that I was freelancing at the moment though he’d seemed ok with it.
“So, you’re unemployed,” he corrected.
“Not completely.” Though … kinda.
I’d had a two-day break before getting another one-off job of writing copy for a website selling bespoke lingerie, which was actually pretty fun after the owner said to give it a sweet and spicy tone.
Oddly enough, after posting on my newsletter about date number two, I had been accumulating more followers on my platform than I could’ve ever expected. Lots of people related to the bad or simply sub-optimal dates and were all too happy to add their own jokes. A few people started to question just how real my experiences in the newsletter were, but were hooked nonetheless.
I had readers!
I might not have had a job still, and I felt like I was relying on Josh staying with us to split the rent three ways now more than ever, but I had actual people reading my writing, and for some reason, my heart hammered with excitement every time I got a notification for another one.
I hadn’t given up on the job search either amongst all of this. On the contrary, I’d also sent over twenty job applications. I heard back from one, who informed me that the pay was barely enough to cover my MetroCard for the month, let alone rent and groceries, and there were also no benefits, but they were looking for someone with a master’s degree and a flexible schedule, so I’d be a great fit!
I was beginning to feel that the only place I was a great fit was akin to a trash shoot.
Or a dive bar.
“What do you want?”
