Following a busy summer (during which I spent nearly a month in Europe), and the return to school (where I spend countless hours studying), I’ve been hesitant to return to the dating-sphere.
It doesn’t help Creepertown has been quiet recently—too quiet. It’s the kind of quiet that suggests someone is about to be hit by a car but not die and come back to kill all of your friends during the summer.
When I finally decided to update my Creepertown blog and check my inbox last week, I was surprised to find several messages waiting.
More than a couple warranted no attention whatsoever—one line with inviting inappropriate contact with strangers in dark, secluded locations just isn’t my thing. Apparently it is for some people, or these guys wouldn’t think anyone would respond to those suggestions… right?
Honestly, I have to wonder about the people who meet these guys. It just seems incredibly creepy. Or, at the very least, incredibly unsafe.
Late one night I received a message asking what I was doing up so late. When I saw it the next afternoon, I replied I’d been journaling. After a few messages back and forth, including the exchange of phone numbers, the sender, Brian, said that he’d like to meet me that evening “if I didn’t mind.”
He ended up calling while I was on the phone with my brother, but he left a voicemail reiterating he’d really like to meet me that evening. It bothers me when I call people, leave them a voicemail and they respond by text so I called him back to respond.
I already had a date that evening so I told him the truth.
Following my date, I’d be at the coffee shop for a NaNoWriMo writers group and he was welcome to come join the writers and enjoy a cup of coffee.
His response was that I should skip the writers group and come hang out with him at his place. We could “hang out, sit on the couch, talk, watch TV… you know, see how it goes, see what happens”.
Wait, what? Isn’t that code for something? Something I really don’t want?
I told him I wasn’t really comfortable meeting a stranger… at his house… in the middle of the night.
His response was confusion.
My reactive response was greater confusion.
Why, in all that is sane and safe, would he think I would want to meet a complete stranger from the Internet, alone, at his house, in the middle of the night? This question—which really shouldn’t be answered—is what screamed through my thoughts every time he spoke.
“It will be fine. Just come over and we can, you know, get to know each other. Talk?”
He wasn’t giving up.
“I just really don’t think that’s a very good idea. I’m not really comfortable meeting alone somewhere. As I said previously, I’ll be at the coffee shop later and you’re more than welcome to join me there.”
I hoped my response would come across as respectful… but that tiny voice in my head was screaming “Stranger danger!”
“Well I really want to have an adventure tonight. It sounds like you don’t. It sounds like you want a boring night.” He was clearly after something I wasn’t. Clearly.
I told him I’d be at the coffee shop and I wasn’t going to his house. He said he’d text me.
A few hours later, cozy and writing at the coffee shop, I received a phone call from Brian asking how my date went. I was confused. I’d made it abundantly clear I wasn’t going to be meeting a stranger in some secluded location (or anywhere) to “talk.”
Did you know that meeting people—dates if you will—at a coffee shop is, and I quote, “awkward”? Apparently the presences of witnesses, I mean people, make some people very uncomfortable.
I don’t know why the conversation continued, but I really thought the suggestion he come to my place—where I implied my roommate would be hanging out naked on the couch—would show him how weird his suggestion was.
It didn’t.
He insisted he wanted it to be “just us.”
As that wasn’t going to happen, it didn’t take long for to say goodnight.
Imagine my surprise when he texted me the following evening, again suggesting that we
hang out.
I called him to tell him one, my feelings on the situation had not changed, and if we were to meet it would need to be in public (to which he responded “That’s stupid. If I wanted to meet someone at a coffee shop, I’d go to a coffee shop and approach someone”) and two, I was going to be out of town all weekend so that wasn’t going to happen any time soon.
He wasn’t pleased.
“I’m not waiting three days. If we are going to meet, it’s going to be just us and it’s going to be tonight.” His voice dripped with irritation and lunacy.
“That’s not gonna happen. Ever.”
I was done.
“Then it’s over. It’s all over.”
He hung up. I laughed.
Pro tip, everyone: Don’t meet strangers off the Internet who insist on meeting alone, in creepy places (like their house) to “talk.” It’s probably not the kind of talking you think it is.
*name not changed to protect the people who might date him
