A Groovy Kind of Love

We are all familiar with the sequence. Boy meets girl, girl meets boy. There is an attraction, they date. And perhaps they live happily ever after or else they split up and the cycle begins all over again. After an appropriate interval where broken hearts/wounded feelings mended with the help of copious amounts of ice cream eating of course!

That is exactly how things started out with Wookie.

We met last December at one of the comedy nights where I managed to make a complete tit of myself. Shockingly, that didn’t put him right off and over the next few weeks there was more talking (mostly on my part) and subtle flirting continued. He finally made his move one night as we walked home post comedy which resulted in a most lovely snogging session. The lad didn’t have much chat, but it turns out he had a talented tongue regardless. We made plans to meet on New Year’s Eve after he was done work, but thanks to a longer than usual shift (him), a dead phone battery (me) and general New Year’s Eve madness, that didn’t pan out. Feeling guilty about the whole fiasco, he contacted me the next morning and we made plans to meet up after I was back from Berlin. He suggested going to the Stand, which was actually quite nice; we both liked comedy and I’d never been there before. It was a perfect evening. Lots of laughs thanks to the stellar line up, an equal amount of private jokes between us two; meeting up with fellow comedy lovers and heading out to a pub post show and of course, more of that talented tongue. So when he called to set up another date for that Sunday, of course, I was more than happy.

And that’s where it all went so very wrong.

For starters, he showed up more than 20 minutes late. There was no explanatory text/phone message to give me a heads up and no apology when he finally did get there. Fortunately, I had a book with me and so I didn’t really notice the passage of time. I did however notice a couple of sympathetic glances from the serving staff who, no doubt have seen their share of poor stood up folk. Seated at the table, he was far more interested in focusing on his phone rather on me. I got staccato responses to my questions and no eye contact. At one point I even stopped talking mid sentence and started counting silently to see how long it would take him to notice the silence: I got to 11. To add insult to injury, he mentioned that he intended to head over to his parents place that evening and had a train to catch in an hour. I took that as a not to subtle request to eat faster so that he could get out of there. Upset and rather frustrated by the total opposite of our previous date and the entire sham of an afternoon, I choked down my meal as quickly as possible. We parted at the street corner and I walked back to my flat in a rage.

Not even a half hour later, he pops up on Facebook chat; GoodNews! My parents are here, so I’m getting a lift down to their place. Wonderful, I responded. And then, because I had nothing to lose and I was still hopping mad I added, Let’s just hope you’re better company for them than you were for me today. Nothing for a while, then I got a Whatever do you mean? which, Reader, was JUST the opening I had been looking for. I spewed out all of my rage and frustrations on to that chat message, holding nothing back. For the next hour or so, we chatted back and forth furiously, both attacking and defending. He claimed he was nervous. I said I was too. He said I was forceful, I said he was confusing. He said I didn’t know anything about football, I said that wasn’t even a reasonable statement. And so it went on until we were both out of steam. Look, let’s just forget about the whole thing and move on with our lives, was my final comment. He agreed, we both signed off and I imagined that I would never hear from him again and perhaps see him only occasionally at comedy events where there were enough other people around for us not to have to converse.

How wrong I was!

We ended up chatting online the next day. And the day after, and the day after that as well. In fact, since that fateful “date” not a single day went by without us chatting online or trading a barrage of text messages. We met at comedy. We met outside of comedy. By then, I had started to plan the fundraiser night and he ended up helping me out in little ways; introducing me to his sister who agreed to come photograph the event, running errands to pick up raffle prizes from around the city and sometimes just listening to me rant about various things that were driving me insane. We talked about everything. With other people he was shy to the point of playing mute. Yet, with each other we were never at a loss for words. I told him about the entire fiasco with Beans and he told me about the girl he’d been crushing on for the past six months. We plotted over ways to get her to realise his existence. He declared that I’d gone long enough without football in my life, and I became Padwan to his Jedi Master. And that is how it has been for these past five months.

Sometimes, the memory of those kisses return. But there is no lingering on a “what if.” I know that this is the better way. Had we not had that disaster date, there may have been a few more meetings, a few more kisses, perhaps even sex. But that is where it would have ended. I am sure of it. I do not want a long term relationship right now and he is not ready for one either. A long term friendship however, we can both handle just fine. Our friends joke about us being a couple and yes, it does seem so; all the hallmarks of a relationship just minus the physical intimacy. And yes, there is love: a lot of it in fact. Somehow, Wookie has managed to make me open up again and trust in love again. Perhaps the next time, I will be ready to go that one step further. But for now, I am happy with this kind of love. And when alls said and done, he is so handy when it comes to the changing of the light bulbs!