Dating Pool

[natalie_langer]

It had been another long, chaotic evening at work. The advantage of working the twelve hour shift meant Natalie only had to do it three times a week. The downside was twelve hours of never-ending stress. She had also, in a moment of impaired judgement, scheduled a blind date for two hours after the end of said shift.

Did people still call it a blind date? There had been pictures exchanged over texts, after all. Natalie chose neutral ground, a bar she had passed several times on her way home, but never entered. It was busy enough to provide distraction if small talk fell through. Ever the pessimist.

She shrugged off her black jacket and ran her fingers through her thick, dark curls to plump them up. After a brief scan, the nurse spotted a row of empty seats at the bar. No solitary male looking up at the door every few minutes. Natalie had gotten there first. The brunette ordered one of the local craft brews and settled in for the waiting game. She'd fire off a casual, questioning text after she finished the beer.

And she would try valiantly not to be the one lonely person with her eyes fixed on the entrance.

Comments

[ball_is_life]

I’m wearing a collar. Why am I wearing a collar?

Elijah stretched his neck and tugged at it. The left lapel kept curling up. No matter how much he messed with the material, it wouldn’t lie flat. Plus, he couldn’t figure out the tucking situation. Was he supposed to tuck in a button-down shirt if he wore it with jeans or let the tail hang out? Did the answer change if he didn’t own a belt?

Elijah left the apartment with the shirt arranged somewhere in between. Now, thinking about it, he realized it looked like he’d run out of a bathroom in a hurry. He would have felt better off in his regular clothes, but something told him a sweatshirt with the sleeves cut off wasn’t cool.

As he approached the bar, he did a mental run-down of what he knew about the girl, who was first cousins with his friend Shawn’s girlfriend. Her name was Shan-na, not Shan-non. She had brown hair, worked in a salon, and liked the Philadelphia Eagles, which would have been a dealbreaker if he wasn’t so hard up. It had been something like five months since his last hook-up. He was starting to see spots.

He rubbed the back of his head and searched the room for a girl matching the description. Maybe the one at the bar. A little edgier than he was expecting, but he liked a girl with a sense of style.

“Hey.” He rolled up next to her and unwrapped his scarf, which still had the price tag on it. $15 at TJ Maxx. “Sorry I’m late, I couldn’t figure out where to park.”

[natalie_langer]

She had been mentally debating whether a simple question mark was casual-cool enough when the man took the stool next to hers. Natalie clicked the lock button on her phone and set it on the bar.

The brunette raised her eyebrows when she looked up. "Uh...it's cool. I was lazy and opted for valet, so." She gave a shrug.

Okay, so either she had mixed up dates, which was entirely possible, or dude was looking for a different girl. Either way, she had been getting bored and this had the potential for interesting.

"Your pictures really don't do you justice." Natalie downed the rest of her beer and flagged the bartender for another.

[ball_is_life]

That gave him pause. “Oh yeah? Huh.” He smiled as he took off his coat, feeling pretty damn good about himself. She must have Facebook stalked him. Come to think of it, why hadn’t he done that? He could have avoided the whole ‘new-kid-in-the-school-cafeteria’ feeling at the front door. He was glad his wore cologne.

That was part choice and part occupational necessity. Some of the dives he’d gone into lately reeked. One had slime. No amount of baking soda or detergent got dead-rot out of coveralls.

But she was alive and that was good company, so he brushed off thoughts of work and sat down.

“I like your hair,” he said and ordered himself a Sam Adams. “Ah shit. I shouldn’t have brought up hair. That’s the last thing you want to talk about. Um…” He steepled his fingers under his chin. “How’s Cedric? Still puking in your shoes?”

[natalie_langer]

She automatically brought her fingers up to her hair. It was usually pulled back into a hasty ponytail, so it felt odd to have it down. "It's not the worst thing to talk about," Natalie offered. "Just...kind of random."

The nurse discreetly wiped her mouth with the back of her hand. While she had experienced a patient who projectile vomited on her that past week, she highly doubted he had been named Cedric.

"Okay, I have a confession to make." Natalie looked at her seatmate, her expression a mixture of humor and pity. "I'm waiting for a guy named Ken. He's 5'9 but swears he looks taller in person. My name is Natalie. I'm guessing I'm not your hair-fearing, Cedric-hating date. Sorry."

[ball_is_life]

“Ohhhh!” He balled a fist at his mouth. “Shoot. My bad. I’m looking for a girl named Shanna.” He drummed on the surface of the bar and craned his neck. The other customers consisted of a blonde, a redhead, a couple of black girls, and a whole lot of dudes. “And she is not here. Great.” Suddenly grateful for the beer on tap, he took a couple of gulps out of his pint glass. Should he check his phone? It hadn’t buzzed; he knew that because it was in his pocket.

“But Ken might be. Should I move…?”

[natalie_langer]

"Hey, like I said, it's cool. And he's over fifteen minutes late and I haven't even gotten a text. Dick move, in my book." Natalie shrugged.

"So, I'm not Shanna. What's your name?"

The nurse felt a sense of relief settle in. She hadn't really been too keen on Ken, but felt obligated to see in through in her usual stubborn fashion.

[ball_is_life]

“Elijah.” He gave her a little two-finger wave. “And that is a dick move.” He didn’t get people. He hadn’t dated before technology became the it-thing, but he guessed it was harder to stand somebody up back in the day when men picked women up in their cars. Back when they’d already looked each other in the eye before agreeing to spend a couple of hours together. Now it was all text messages and meeting up in public.

“If it makes you feel any better, he’s got a dumb name,” he said. “It’s creepy. Ken.” He sat up straighter. “Kenneth. He sounds like an investment banker, or a guy who seems legit but later he’s going to ask you to piss on him.”

Elijah took his wallet and phone out of his pants and set them alongside his drink.

“I once fooled around with this girl named Tiki.”

[natalie_langer]

"Oh," she faux-mused, "I usually save that for the second date. I'm old-fashioned that way."

Natalie toyed with the edges of her cocktail napkin. She was exhausted to the point where almost nothing coming out of her mouth could be taken seriously.

"Tiki. As in, bar? I guess that's better than puking Cedric. Please tell me you were referring to a cat, or something." The brunette slyly -- or maybe not so slyly, she was already tilting toward tipsy -- checked him out while waiting for an answer.

[ball_is_life]

He laughed at her joke and sipped his beer.

“It’s a dog,” he said, putting a square napkin under the glass. “A fluffy one with a fucked up face. Shanna sent me a picture of it.” He scrolled through an uneventful text conversation and showed Natalie a fuzzy picture of a particularly weird-looking, brown Pekingese.

“That’s gotta be genetic, right?”

He gave it another look.

“Uh oh. What if that’s Shanna?”

[natalie_langer]

"Then I'm incredibly flattered you mistook me for her," she replied dryly.

"You know, if you're my placeholder for this date, we should probably do this properly. Which means we have to ask some boring questions that we've been taught by society are important." Natalie cleared her throat and straightened in her seat.

"A, what do you do? B, do you have a good relationship with your family? And C...did you know you still have the tag on your scarf?" The brunette smiled and took a long sip of her drink.

[ball_is_life]

“I do?” Elijah looked down at the wadded mass of fabric. There it was. “That’s embarrassing.” He tugged until the plastic broke and stuffed the tag in his pants pocket. “I guess you had to find out sometime. I’m a Maxx-onista.”

He emptied the rest of his beer. “B, my family’s crazy. I mean they’re loud, outlandish… “real”,” he hooked his fingers, “Whatever you want to call it. But they’re cool.” He prepared the pat answer for his job. “And A, I’m an exterminator. I’m gonna give you a second to process that before I ask you the same thing.”

[natalie_langer]

Natalie nodded slowly, taking in his answers. "Not bad. I think you'll do well on the written. Extra points for being able to spot a bargain." She motioned toward the scarf with her bottle.

"I am a nurse. ER, specifically. And no, before you ask, I don't know what that weird spot is." The brunette spun a little on her stool. "But exterminator is good, too. You provide a much needed service."

She waited a beat before continuing. "You mean like bugs and rodents, right? Not code word for assassin, or...?"

[ball_is_life]

“Nah, just pests. Really weird pests,” he mumbled.

He wanted to tell her how much he loved cooking, that he was good at it, but then she would ask why he stopped. He wasn’t a liar. He would tell anybody who directly asked. It was a pretty idiotic crime in the scheme of things. Elijah preferred to get a little further along before revealing what a dumb motherfucker he was.

One day, if he saved enough dough, he could open his own restaurant and then there wouldn’t be any more background checks. But today he hunted ghosts, and he couldn’t disclose that thanks to a non-disclosure agreement and the extreme odds of her laughing.

“Nursing. That’s cool, though. You must be an adrenaline junkie to do around here. Where I’m from, they call that job security,” he said, making an imaginary marquee in the air. “You probably look cute in scrubs.”

[natalie_langer]

"Adrenaline junkie. That's pretty apt." Natalie shrugged. She could expound further on that, but why freak the boy out? She tended to use her collection of work horror stories to end bad conversations, and this one...wasn't.

The brunette smiled knowingly. "It's funny you mention that. I always have my scrubs under my clothes. You never know when you're gonna need them. Like a superhero."

She scanned the bar. "Like, dude sitting four seats down. Scarfing down those pretzels without chewing. He's a choke risk. Pool table? Blunt force trauma. This bar is actually a death trap, which makes you incredibly lucky to be here with me."

[ball_is_life]

Elijah followed her directional cues, his face breaking into a slow smile at the end. “I think you missed a couple. Like that girl over there, doing shots. Stomach pump. And my man holding up the wall on the way to the bathroom.... concussion. Misses the urinal and slips in his piss.

“Then there’s this guy right here.” He patted his own chest.

[natalie_langer]

She laughed into her beer. "You have a good eye."

Natalie looked at him appraisingly. "And what exactly are you at risk for?"

[ball_is_life]

Thankfully the bartender had brought him a second draft. Elijah drank the top third. "Heart trouble," he confessed. "It's already in pretty bad shape, thanks to Shanna. It might break if I can't get your number."

He squinted at her from his left eye, gauging her reaction.

"That was bad, though, right?" He cracked up.

[natalie_langer]

"Oh, wow. That was really, really bad." Natalie tilted her head, pretending to mull it over. "But maybe so bad that it's good? Like Troll 2."

She grabbed a dry napkin and rummaged through her bag for a pen. The brunette found one with a logo for a blood pressure medication emblazoned on it.

"I'm going to do this the old-fashioned way." When she was finished jotting down her number, she slid it across the bar to Elijah.

[ball_is_life]

He took it and perked up. "And I was worried it would just say 'Nah, Son' with a cute little smiley face." Elijah ripped the napkin in half and stole her pen, taking a moment to read the name of the drug before writing.

"This here," he folded the square and slid it under his index finger, "Is not only my number, but a movie recommendation that will change your life. Nail Gun Massacre. Good luck finding it. I hope you have a VCR."

He folded her number and tucked it into his wallet.

Elijah felt a cold draft on the back of his neck. He looked around and spotted a girl with brown, curly hair and a pair of Philadelphia Eagles gloves coming into the bar already wearing a look of 'no-fucks-to-give' defiance over her tardiness. "Ah shit," he mumbled and turned around to Natalie with wide eyes. "What do I do? Do I hide?"

[natalie_langer]

The corners of her mouth twitched. "Wow. Like looking into a mirror." Natalie pushed her empty glass away.

She took the piece of paper and tucked it away in her bag before standing up and putting on her jacket. "I think it's time for a French exit. Maybe she won't even notice you. Ooh, maybe Ken is here and she'll hit it off with him."

Natalie held out her arm to Elijah.

[ball_is_life]

Elijah frowned. “What’s a French exit?” He wrapped his scarf around his neck haphazardly and put on his coat. “Just a sec, gotta get the bill.” He drummed on the counter and leaned over it, belatedly realizing the bartender was not coming back anytime soon. “Uh...” He pulled out his wallet, took out some cash, and stared dumbfounded at the drinks they had ordered. What was that, like thirty bucks?

In the spirit of estimation, he dropped more cash that was probably necessary and took her arm. “Okay, let’s bounce.”

The hairdresser was on her tiptoes looking around, only now considering that being late without a text might not have been in her best interest. Her eyes locked on Elijah for a minute, but kept going once she noticed the other girl. Not her date, then.

He cruised past her and into the cold air.

[natalie_langer]

"Right. Money in exchange for goods and services. Almost forgot about that part." Natalie's brain was definitely running on overtime tonight.

Once they were enveloped in the chilly safety of the outdoors, she turned to Elijah. "Technically, it's when you leave early without saying goodbye. I modified it a little for Shanna."

[ball_is_life]

“Oh, so like,” he made a connection, “When I’m at my grandma’s house for Thanksgiving and I don’t want to spend forty-five minutes saying goodbye to everybody, so I just raise my hand and walk out the door. Got it.”
He nodded. Nearby a car arrived for another patron, the valet stepping out and trading keys for cash. Elijah wondered if his car was still parked where he left it or if it had been towed.

He reached out and touched the front of her coat. “So you should text me. Or I’ll text you.”

[natalie_langer]

The brunette had to look up at him. Now that they were both standing, the height difference was evident. She broke into a smile. "Exactly. And now you're ready to go out into the world."

Natalie patted her bag. "Don't worry, I have your number. And I, unlike some people --," she shot a dark look toward the bar's entrance, "am not an asshole, so I'll actually use it."

[ball_is_life]

“Good. You should definitely do that.” Still looking at her, Elijah backed toward the curb, which came up faster than he was expecting. He checked his balance. “Alllllright. On that note, I’m out of here before I embarrass myself. Catch you later, Nurse Natalie.” He gave her a salute and crossed the street, turning back once to wave before stuffing his cold hands in his coat pockets.