Attraction - 3. Chapter 3 – WTF, Really?

Jenny offered to come up but I let her leave as she had to go to work early in the morning. Despite her warnings against over-analyzing I could not help taxing my brains about what she had told me. For the life of me I could not fathom why Cara would set me up with her brother. Hot shot indeed! He could have anybody he wants. Why would he need to come all the way here to find someone? And whoever would think he could like me?

I tried to calm myself with single malt without luck. After channel surfing on TV and pacing around for a bit, I decided to call Trevor up. He picked up on the third ring.

“I was expecting your call” were his opening words.

“Then you could have saved me the pain and called me yourself couldn’t you?”

“Fair point, but where’s the fun in that?” he laughed infuriatingly. “Tell me, what’s your crazy mind saying now?”

“That what you told Jenny was a joke? That there’s no way a guy like Kent could be interested in a guy like me?”

“Typical. And it was me who he hugged after the game.”

“That didn’t mean a thing.”

“Come on man! Get over yourself. Anyway, you can rant more in the morning. I only wanted you to know that Kent has asked me for your number and I’m giving it to him.”

“What the fuck? You can’t do that!” I exploded.

He cut me off.

“I can and from what ‘m hearing I will, unless you explicitly ask me not to.”

I was tongue tied.

“Great! I’m hanging up. Do yourself a favor, take a couple of shots of that McCallan you have and go to bed. It’s all good my friend. G’nite!”

He did not wait for my reply and hung up. Some friend! I did take his advice though. Trevor knew me well enough I thought as I started dozing after the second drink. Dangerous little voices were whispering hopeful songs in my ears. I let them pull me into la la land.

After I fell asleep my cell phone buzzed. There was a message. I read it as soon as I woke up and skipped my way to the bathroom like a little girl. And I’m not a morning person.

Under the shower I decided that Trevor was looking out for me so I shouldn’t be angry at him. In fact I should do something to thank both him and Cara for their kindness, may be send her some flowers. That should earn Trevor one special shag; my thank-you to them both. Pleased with my plan I finished my ablutions. It was my habit to check the weather forecast on phone before deciding on what to wear. Only that day, I kept getting side-tracked by the text message. Rereading it seemed to make me happy. In fact, all the way to work I wore a silly grin on my face. I even forgot to look for ‘the’ guy on train.

I sought out Trevor as soon as I reached office. He was at the coffee machine. He gave me a wary look which I answered with a reassuring smile.

“Someone looks chirpy” he mentioned.

“I received a text.”

“Thanks to me?”

“I know, it says so in the text.”

“What else does it say?”

“Nothing much, he just said he was happy to make my acquaintance and asked if it was OK to text.”

“And what did you say?”

That’s when it dawned on me that I hadn’t replied, stupid fuck that I was. Shot was my serenity as I desperately fished the phone out.

“Dude! He’d be thinking you’re not interested. What the hell?”

“I know, I know. Shit, poor guy, I knew I’d screw it up.” I kept typing stuff and deleting. “What do I say?”

“Why’re you acting this weird? Just behave as you would with any guy. Play it cool.”

Giving him a pained look I asked,

“Have you seen him?”

“I have, what’s the big deal?”

“Big deal? He’s Mr. Hot Shot.”

“Stop with this nonsense already. Just say that you saw his text now and that it’s OK. Put in a smiley. That’s it.”

That sounded about right and in the interest of time I did not analyze the consequences and just went ahead and sent the message. I hoped Trevor was leading me the right way. Then I recalled how many questions I had for him.

“So you need to fill me in here. I am not liking this secretive guy you have become.”

We took a seat in the lounge with our respective mugs of coffee.

“What does that mean?”

“Well you set me up without telling me!”

“Spare me the drama can you? It was Cara’s idea. I had no clue until the day of the game.”

“But why would Cara want me to date her brother? And more importantly why would her brother need me to date him? All he has to do is walk into a bar and he’d be beating them off with a stick.”

“May be he doesn’t want to beat them off with a stick.”

“Really?” it was a sincere question.

Trevor sighed and like the decent friend he was, tried to reason patiently.

“Listen up buddy. I don’t know much about Kent’s love life other than the fact that he hasn’t been seeing anyone. Cara wanted to change that. When I told her about the game and said you wanted to go, she asked me if you were single. I said yes, so she went ahead with the idea.”

That sounded reasonable but my concerns were not totally allayed.

“But why me?”

“Because she knows you’re my friend. And for whatever reason that means you’re eligible.”

“So you’re saying you had nothing to do with this thing?”

Trevor seemed a little thrown off by my question raising my suspicion.

“Alright” he relented, “he did ask me about you as we drove to the game.”

“What did you say?”

“Nothing, just how I know you and what kind of a guy you are?”

“And what kind is that?”

Trevor got up and I followed suit in panic. He’d surely not leave me hanging at this point.

“Jon. Chill!” he said in his cool voice. “If you’re interested, talk to him. Get to know him and let him get to know you. If not, let him off gently. That’s all that you need to do right now.”

I sighed realizing that it truly was supposed to be as simple. I would clearly like to see more of Kent. Not only because he was easy on the eyes, but because he came across as a genuine chap. Sensing that he had managed to calm me down a bit, Trevor squeezed my shoulder and moved on with a reassuring nod.

After spending a few more hours in a funk I decided that Hot Shot’s text had screwed up my daily routine, making it difficult for me to concentrate on work. That was not good for productivity. Thankfully I am not a slob on most days so my work-streams were on a healthy track. Slacking off one day would not cause much damage. No one commented if I came across less effective than usual in meetings.

Kent did text again saying he was glad to receive my text and ‘I’d like to get to know you  .’

He was being sweet and I wondered if I should put on my flirting hat and respond with something like, ‘Oh yeah? Exactly how well would you like to know me?’ For some reason I deemed that course to be pathetic and resorted to being my real stupid self.

It took me a while to draft the right reply – ‘I’d like that too. I’m just not sure what you might see in me to hold your interest.’

He responded immediately - ‘Ditto. Why not take it one step at a time? Meet me this Saturday? I’ll drive over.’

I understood that based on my next message, I could or could not be setting in motion a series of events that may or may not change my life forever. I stalled for time and tried to lose myself in work. It didn’t happen. Trevor noticed my distraction at lunch but avoided commenting. He was the kind of person who you could hang out with without talking. I was grateful for that.

Finally at around three ‘o’ clock I received another text, this one from Jenny, enquiring if I had gotten in touch with scrolling down the message had a pic of Charlie Sheen. Somehow that released the knot in my heart. Why was I making such a big deal out of it? I’m just saying yes to a date. It’s not a marriage proposal. Oh wait, so I ‘had’ made up my mind? Hitting my head with my palm I chuckled and sent the same message to both Kent and Jenny.

‘YES’

Oh! And I did send Cara those thank-you flowers.