Page 3 of Knocked Up By The Mountain Man

Before I knew it, I was offering to take her down to this very same diner and buy her a cup of coffee. A cup of coffee turned into a couple of beers at the bar down the road, and a couple of beers at the bar down the road turned into coming back to my place up in the mountains, my cabin, where not a single woman other than her has ever stepped foot.

You can figure what happened next.

I don't know what came over me. Maybe it was just loneliness. Maybe it was feeling touch-starved and isolated. I didn't think that being isolated bothered me until she looked at me like I was some kind of fucking hero when I pulled over and offered my help.

Apparently, feeling like a fucking hero does things to me, and it makes me make bad decisions.

Ever since I met that woman, I've been unable to forget her, and it's like she reminded me of something missing in my life.

Trouble is, if my friends would just leave me alone about it, I would forget again. I would get used to the solitude again and go back to the way things were before I met her. But my friends won't let up. They tried to find her and track her down after they found out I'd hooked up with her, but no such luck. She was an out-of-towner.

This was clear based on her rental vehicle and her lack of preparedness for the mountainous terrain in Wildwood.

She was just a visitor passing through. She left the very next day, never to be found again.

When my friends couldn't locate this mysterious Alyssa From Out Of Town, they decided maybe I just needed to start dating again.

A little bit of companionship, a little bit of sex, and all of my moodiness would disappear. That was their theory, anyway, and that's how I ended up sitting across from this woman on a Friday afternoon.

“Look, Carla,” I begin. “You're great.”

She sighs.

“Here we go,” she says, her demeanor breaking from her previously sunny personality and turning flat.

“Here we go?” I ask.

“You're rejecting me,” she says. “Don't worry, it's not like it's a surprise to me. I don't know why my cousin had the idea to fix us up in the first place. I mean, we're clearly not each other's types.”

She peers at me.

“Sorry,” she continues shyly. “I don't mean that in an offensive way.”

“It's not offensive,” I say quickly. “It's just obvious. We're not a match.”

“Exactly,” she says. Then she looks down into her mug. “The thing is, I don't know what I'm doing wrong. I've been on so many dates. I dress up and look the part. I try to crack jokes and ask the men about their lives and be overall pleasant to be with. Yet I can't get a second date. I don't know what the deal is.”

I tilt my head.

“Why are you in a hurry to meet a guy?” I ask.

She smiles grimly.

“Jack, since we're definitely not going to have a second date, I'll level with you. I'm trying to meet a guy because I want to have a baby. I'm about to turn forty. I have a low egg count and endometriosis. The cards are stacked against me. I wouldn't say I have a ‘biological clock’ so much as a biological ticking time bomb in my uterus.”

I shudder, and she wrinkles her nose.

“Sorry,” she says. “Was that TMI? Talking about endometriosis and my uterus?”

“No,” I say. “That stuff doesn't bother me. Just the fact that you want kids. That you want to have a baby.”

I say the last word like I’m describing an unwanted garden pest.

“You don't want kids?” Carla asks, raising a brow.

“Hell no,” I say. “Definitely not. I like a quiet life. That's what I've been trying to tell Adam and the guys. I don't need to be fixed up on these blind dates. I don't need a woman…and I definitely don't need a baby depending on me and interrupting my routines and peace and quiet.”

“We are definitely not a match,” she says with a slow nod.