"I'm not f*cking with you!" Doug said, grinning from ear-to-ear.
That grin either meant that he was seriously not messing with me... or that he was about to pull off the most epic practical joke of all time. For those of you who do not know this Doug character I speak of, let me briefly describe him. Doug is loud and thoroughly enjoys playing pranks on people. He's the guy who would ask me, "Did you even brush your hair today? You look like crap" fulling knowing that I had spent hours perfecting my coif for the day. On the other hand, he was the first to split his lunch with me in the teacher's lounge when I was too tired to pack my own, always rooted for the under dog, and was one of the best dads around. Like I said before-- this was either going to be great... or a total disaster. I envisioned him posting my number in each of the boy's restrooms at the middle school and lavishing every minute of me retelling stories of pre-pubescent boys calling me "for a good time."
Doug had been trying to set me up with the cute PE teacher at the high school-- Todd Shaffer-- the entire school year. In the beginning of the year, I was single-- and casually dating two or three guys. Todd, on the other hand, was with his on-again/off-again girlfriend (I have conveniently nick-named her "The Stripper" for future reference, because it's not nice to use real names.) The timing was off. Then, towards the middle of the school year, when Todd was off-again, I was only dating one of those initial three guys (nick-named "The Rock Star.") Poor Doug just couldn't make it work out despite his best efforts. So, you can imagine his delight when the timing finally was right.
"Hey," Doug loudly whispered to me in the midst of an "all-important" all-staff training that spring, "are you still dating 'The Rock Star'?"
"No," I grinned, knowing where this was going (a week or so before, I had caught the cute PE teacher making eyes at me from across the commons area during parent-teacher conferences. I will admit, I, too, was looking... but I never got caught.. and, yes, I thought he was cute.) I said, "Things didn't work out with him."
"Give me your number!" Doug said, his face lit up like a little kid's on Christmas morning, "He's not dating 'The Stripper' anymore!"
I looked toward our mutual friend, whom I fully trusted, for a little back-up. After much discussion, I reluctantly scribbled down my number and handed it over to Doug. He proclaimed that he was going to find Todd that instant and give it to him. I literally ran out of the training before he had the chance to publicly humiliate me.
xxx
"You better not be f*cking with me," Todd said as Doug handed him the piece of paper with my number on it.
"I'm not f*cking with you! Call her!" Doug replied, "This is really her number!"
xxx
I look like crap. And I smell like wet dog. I am not going out on a first date looking like this............
Oh, what the hell?
I highly doubt this will turn into anything serious. And, if it does, he's going to have to see me looking a whole heck of a lot crappier than this.
"I'll meet you there in ten minutes," I said. I stood at the bathroom mirror looking at my reflection. My makeup had mostly worn off after a full day of work. My hair was flat and probably dirty. I had on jeans and a t-shirt, which was wet, as I had just gotten done giving Tucker a bath. He smelled great. Me-- not so much.
I figured I had nothing to lose. After-all, I had dated my fair share of losers. I was more than likely going on a date with yet another loser to add to my growing list.
I decided to at least change my shirt and wash my hands.
xxx
Todd says, "I decided to ask Kacie out for ice cream for our first date because it was low-pressure. If I didn't like her or she didn't like me or the date wasn't going well, it'd be easy to leave and it'd only cost me an ice cream... And who doesn't like ice cream?"
Needless to say, he didn't have high hopes for the date either...
xxx
Todd said that he would always ask his mom, "How do you know?"
She would reply, "You just know!"
And I was always told by others, "Love will find you when you least expect it."
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