Getting to Third Date (11 page)

Tyler came to pick up my column in the dorm. He was becoming such a fixture, I was getting teased about my “boyfriend.” I tried to leave everything a mystery on that front—the last thing either of us wanted was for anyone to get curious about why he was coming over so often.

He sat down and watched me blog for a while. “You're good at this.”

“It's not hard to give advice, it's only hard to take it.” I sensed there was something on his mind and he didn't know how to approach it. But I wasn't in the mood to make things easy for him.

Finally, after he'd spent several minutes fiddling with my desk lamp so that the shade was now crooked, he said, “I'm having second thoughts about this third date of yours.”

Hallelujah!
But I was cautious. Maybe he didn't mean what I hoped he meant. “You not only want to pick him, you want me to marry him, just to see if it really can work out?”

“No.” He knocked over the lamp and quickly set it upright. “Not exactly. It's just…After class, I was thinking…”

Color me foolish, but I was hoping he'd tell me to forget it. That two third dates were enough. That even if the students on campus didn't care about my safety, he did.

What can I say? Hope sprang eternal, until he said, “I think we should double-date for the next one.”

“Double-date?” I parroted what he said, but it was so far from what I had expected that it took a minute to process. Double-date? Me and…some guy. Tyler and…some girl? Was he kidding?

“It would be perfect. You'll be safe from any guy who isn't so great at hearing no. Plus, it will keep the cover—you won't report it as a double date, so we'll throw off anyone who's suspicious.”

“I guess.” I was trying to imagine whether a double date with Tyler would be better than going out alone with a guy I hadn't wanted to see again in the first place. Or much worse. I was coming down on the side of much worse.

He still seemed a little nervous. I wondered what else he wanted. After a while he said casually, “Do you think Sophia would be a good fourth? That way you'll have two friends to back you up.”

And he'd have his date with Sophia without having to put himself on the line. Sweet. For him. “I don't know. You'll have to ask her.”

“Okay. If she doesn't want to, I can ask someone else.” I was a little touched that he wanted to protect me enough to go through with the suggestion even if Sophia turned him down. And a little peeved that he wanted to use a double date to get me to get Sophia to date him. I definitely wasn't going to do his work for him.

To my semi-chagrin, Sophia came back early from the party she'd been at—evidently her hottie du jour had a game the next day and was under coach's orders to avoid alcohol and late-night fun. She didn't seem all that upset when Tyler asked her about double-dating—with heavy emphasis on protecting me from an unknown guy, of course.

She immediately agreed. “Ever since Professor Golding's challenge, I've been meaning to try dating someone I wouldn't normally date,” she confessed to us both. “This sounds like it will be a good place to start.”

“Then all we need is the guy for my half of the double date.” I couldn't help but be pleased to hear she only considered him a start. But still, they were dating each other, and I was stuck with—who was I stuck with?

Of course, I wasn't so pleased at the third—and thankfully final—date that Tyler picked out for me (I'd tried to convince him that I could choose, but he wasn't about to let that happen).

His fickle finger of fate had fallen on Space Cadet, otherwise known as Stephen. A nice guy who liked robots. And wasn't too sure about girls…not that he was gay. Just not sure that he wanted to spend the time away from his robots that a girlfriend would require.

We'd met at the university museum, which was exhibiting video games dating back to Pong. (Who'd want to spend hours batting a ball of light around a black screen? All the geeks who jammed the exhibit.) I was there doing extra credit for a class, he was there because…well, he wanted to be. He'd earned solid scores in listening as the museum docent gave a spiel on every game exhibited. All fifty.

Unfortunately, he dressed like he'd just pulled the clothes out of his dryer, where they'd been sitting for a week. And he lost ten points on the talking front, since aside from one five-minute gush about how much the game Frogger had meant to him as a kid, he stuck to hello, yes, and no.

I guess it's obvious that his buzz factor was low—but don't blame me, the guy not only didn't have a car, he didn't have a driver's license. He didn't see the need, since he intended to invent a car that drove itself. O-kay.

I'm not exactly sure why I hung out with him the first time. Maybe because I didn't want to look like a loser next to Sophia, who sometimes had more than one guy to keep her occupied on a Saturday evening. But the second date with Stephen was pure pity. He asked me to a talk on robotics by some famous guy I'd never heard of before. On the plus side, he bought ice-cream cones after the talk and walked me to the dorm, but he didn't even try for a kiss.

I was happy about the double date idea, even though I didn't have any worries about Stephen in the “just say no” department. He had very limited interests and he was polite to a fault. I think the first time he'd asked me out, he'd been as surprised as I was that he'd even asked.

With Tyler and Sophia around, there would be actual conversation about a subject that interested me. And Tyler liked computer games, so Stephen would have someone who would understand what he was talking about too.

The only problem was how to ask him out. We didn't have any classes together. We had met in line at the museum, waiting for the tour to begin. I didn't have his cell number—and yes, he did have a cell phone. I guess the gadget thing convinced him it was worthwhile, even if he did mostly use it to send pictures of his robots in progress back to his parents.

And e-mail just didn't feel right. What if he said no? It would be bad enough to be rejected for a third date by Stephen, but even worse if it happened in a one-word—no—e-mail.

I decided to stake out the student union because I knew Stephen liked the convenience store there. He spent so much time in his lab with his robots that he often forgot to eat during regular dining hall hours and needed to run out to get a big bag of chips and some cupcakes to sustain his late-night work.

While I was busy stalking Stephen, I'd forgotten to watch my back. So I nearly jumped to the ceiling when someone came up behind me and said, “Hi, Katelyn.”

I turned around, half expecting that Stephen had read my mind and come up to me instead of my having to find him. Sometimes life really is that whacked. But not tonight. It was Richie. The guy who had had a crush on me in high school.

“Hi, Richie.” I hoped I didn't sound as unenthusiastic as I felt. I was stressing big-time over Stephen and the whole double-dating thing. I just didn't have the energy to put a fake happy smile on.

“I'm glad I ran into you.” He didn't seem to mind that I didn't feel the same way. But then, he probably had gotten used to that in high school. “I'm in the play this weekend, and I was thinking you might want to come see it and then go get something to eat after?”

Great. Just what I needed. He'd finally found the nerve to ask me out, and I'd been too busy stressing to stop him before the words were out there.

Now here they were, hanging between us like a big sticky spiderweb of complications. So now what? Did I give yet another excuse? I could always tell him I had plans; it would be true as soon as I ran into Stephen.

Or did I rip the Band-Aid off, no matter how much it would hurt him?

Professor Golding's assignment tempted me for a moment. What if I just gave in and agreed to date him? Once. One little date. What could it hurt? I knew the answer to that—him. Richie deserved better than that. He was a great guy, but he was not for me and I didn't need even one date to know that. I'd known him since childhood.

I'm just not interested in you that way.
I thought about how to soften those words. Like it was possible. I remember when David said them to me when he asked me to the prom. “Will you go to the prom with me, Katelyn? Please. Just friends.”

Since I was his best friend—yeah, right—he went on to explain his dilemma. “I tried to explain to Celine that I just don't feel the same way about her as she does about me, but she doesn't get it. She thinks that just because we were an item for a nanosecond, I can't be telling the truth when I say there's nothing. And I mean nothing—no spark. I like her well enough, but like a sister. Like you. You know what I mean?”

What could I say? I did know what he meant. Man, did that hurt. And yes, I did go to the prom with David, and I sat at the table while he danced with several cute girls who, apparently, did spark with him.

Not only that, but I wished him well when he went home with one of those girls. Like a good best friend, he dropped me off at home before they went out to…whatever. That was us, very good friends. But I'm doing my best to graduate from best-friend status just like I've graduated from high school.

If only Richie had gone to a West Coast university like David, and wasn't standing in front of me, looking so completely breakable. I think he might even have been holding his breath, waiting for the answer I wasn't sure how to give.

“I don't feel that way about you. I like you as a friend. But there's no spark.” Apparently, I'd decided on the Band-Aid method. Rip, rip, rip.

Richie stood there for a minute, a big, very fake smile growing on his face. Since he was a relatively good actor, I had no illusions about how much my rejection had hurt him. And then he said stiffly, “I understand, I just had to ask. Mother Hubbard said—”

“Mother Hubbard?! I didn't mean—I mean, she didn't mean—” Oh, crappinetta. I'd actually told this guy to come up and get the skin and hair ripped off his ego? Or, at least my know-it-all persona had.

After a minute of silently staring at each other in horror at how things had gotten way awkward way fast, I finally squeaked out, “Mother Hubbard doesn't always know what she's talking about. Or haven't you heard the vocal opinions of the rest of the campus?”

“I just hoped—” And by the look in his eyes, he was still holding on to a crumb of hope.

So I interrupted him. “I know.” I don't know what turned me into confessing Katelyn, but I said, “I've been there. Do you know I had the biggest crush on David all four years of high school? He never looked at me as more than a friend.”

Richie looked surprised. “He took you to the prom, didn't he?”

“And danced half the night with Patty Holloway. In fact”—I'd never confessed this to anyone, not even my mom when she asked why I was so cranky after prom—“He went out with her afterward, too.”

“Ouch.” It was a miracle. My confession made his smile dim, but now it was a more genuine smile instead of a “I'll die before I let her see how hurt I am” grin. I remembered that was what I always liked about Richie. He really liked people and took them as they were. It wasn't his fault he'd had the bad fortune to crush on me. Or mine, either—neither one of us could control our pheromones after all.

I shrugged. “You're a really nice guy. There's somebody out there for you, I'm sure. Me? I'm not so sure. I went from lusting after David to wanting a junior who suggested we double-date—with other people!”

“Double ouch.” He grinned for real—but I knew it was because he shared my pain, and was just acknowledging that life was like that. “Hey, if you find a girl for me, let me know.”

“Only if you promise to do the same for me.”

He went for the joke, and I'll always love him a little bit for it. “So you're into girls, too?”

I couldn't help laughing. What can I say? It was better than crying. “Funny guy. I meant if you find a guy for me, point him out.”

He nodded and with a look of surprise, started fishing in his shirt pocket.

“Don't tell me you have a guy in there?” Lame, I know. But besides having to deal with letting Richie down easily, I also had one eye peeled to catch Stephen if he should come in for a munchie run.

He pulled out tickets. “Nope, just tickets to our production of
A Midsummer Night's Dream.

I waved my hands, refusing the tickets. “No, I—”

He smiled. “I think you should go—especially if your crush really suggested you double-date with other people. The plot is a little closer to your life right now than you probably remember from high school when Mr. Jamison taught it to us.”

“Right.” Like I understood it in high school. That was one confusing play. And the names were even more confusing. Hermia? Puck?

“Seriously,” he said, and I could tell he meant it. “We have trouble filling the seats. They give us these tickets to give out to our friends so we'll have an audience to play to.”

“So you were asking me out in desperation for an audience?” I joked without thinking.

The last little shreds of hope showed themselves in his face. “After was where I thought we could make it special.” He recovered, though, and added, “Besides, I wanted to impress you with my skill at handling my little part in the play.”

“If you put it that way. How can I refuse?” Awkward, I know. But what could I do? Since he wasn't going to leave until I took the tickets, I reached for them. “Thanks.”

He held on to them for a minute and looked right into my eyes. It was way weird, because I thought I saw him deliberately crush out the last hope that I'd ever feel about him the way he felt about me. Freaky. “I also think you should take that junior guy with you.”

“I don't know if I'm as brave as you.” To be honest, until that very second when I'd watched him conquer his crush, I had only intended to drop the tickets on a chair in the student union lounge for someone else to use.