On Wednesdays, Amanda Chatel will be sharing stories about her strange, fascinating and sometimes wonderful dating life. If it makes you want to date, check out TheGloss dating page.
It was a Sunday when the texts started coming in at a rapid pace. I remember it was a Sunday because I was hungover and watching The Unbearable Lightness of Being for the 50th time. I was in need of a good cry, and that movie always does it for me.
The first text came about 1pm and simply said: ?It?s never going to happen, why can?t you understand?? Although this particular person was not plugged into my phone, I recognized the number immediately because the last three digits were quite appropriate for this person: 666. I ignored it and assumed it was a misfire of a text. After a few minutes, he sent another one that again said I needed to leave the past in the past or something to that effect, and that ?our love needed to be left in the winter.? I?m still trying to figure out exactly what that meant.
When the next text came in accusing me of trying to break up his marriage, I was done ignoring him. I picked up the phone to see exactly what the hell his problem was. Before I could ask if he had forgotten to take his medication, he just screamed into the phone ?It?s never going to happen, Amanda! You need to stop trying to make it happen.? To be clear, I wasn?t trying to make anything happen. I was simply sitting on the couch and unless I had a split personality, I wasn?t trying to end anyone?s marriage. I hadn?t even been on a date in a couple months.
To backtrack, the person (we?ll call him Danny) behind the texting was someone I had briefly dated in college. When I say brief, I mean it was all of three dates and sex once after my birthday party. I knew his reputation and wasn?t interested in being one of the many girls who vied for his attention.
When I moved to New York City, he got in touch with me. He had already been here for a couple years and we thought it would be fun to get drinks and catch up. We never had anything in common except for the fact that we knew some of the same people, so there were a lot of awkward moments during the evening. However, the most awkward moment came the following morning when I got a text from a friend telling me that Danny was engaged, and did I know this information. Of course, I did not.
As the grapevine works, she had heard that Danny was trying to get in touch with me and since we all knew what a shit he was, she felt it her duty to get to me before he did. Well, she was too late and after a night of fooling around in the stairwell of my apartment building before sending him home, I felt horrible. I was, for the first time in my life, the other woman.
I immediately called Danny to confront him and when he didn?t pick up, I frantically texted him to tell him to never contact me again. But he did; and he did so for a long time. Even after he was married he would text or email me to tell me that I was ?the one who got away.? Sometimes he?d send photos of his left hand without his wedding band on, or even worse, pictures of himself in the nude. Why any man would think a woman would want something like that popping up on her phone mid-brunch will probably remain one of life?s great mysteries.
Eventually his contact with me became less and less, and as it began to dwindle the few emails I did get contained more apologies than anything else. He would apologize for being so distant and tell me it was because his wife found all ?our? texts on his phone. As with 99% of his attempts at contacting me, I ignored him. If he caught me in a weird mood, I?d acknowledge him with a ?yep,? or ?okay,? but that was pretty much the extent. One day it all just stopped, and I figured Danny had gone on to mature and take his marriage seriously.
Then that Sunday happened and I was bombarded with texts in which he was, I think, putting an end to our imaginary relationship. When the texts finally, yet slowly came to an end later that day, my movie was over and I had moved on to organizing my apartment. The weird thing is that when it was all over, I couldn?t help but cry a bit. I was unsure if it was because I was overwhelmed by it all and that was just my initial reaction, or if I was disappointed that I couldn?t even keep an imaginary relationship going. It?s bad enough not being able to hold together real relationships, but when you can?t even keep a fake one going, then that really says something about you.
Sometimes crazy is charming and sometimes it requires a straight-jacket. Either way, get your own brand of crazy at TheGloss dating page.??
You can reach this post's author, Amanda Chatel, on twitter.lettuce recall zanesville ohio zanesville ohio light field camera world series game 1 exotic animals exotic animals
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