The Parting Gift

"No, that's not what happened at all."

"Oh. (I paused.) Well, I just thought I would call since I finally have some free time. If you're not comfortable with this conversation then we can end it right now."

"No, that's OK. You seemed like a nice guy, and you sounded like you had your life together pretty well, so I'm fine continuing."

"Why thank you," I replied with oozing sarcasm that went unacknowledged.

Frankly, I was amazed that she was "fine" with this. I had apparently flaunted some conventions in which she seemed to invest a significant degree of importance. As for me, I hate this kind of shit. However, the sheer oddness of the situation compelled me to continue. (In retrospect, this turned out to be the work of bored desperation.)

I explained that I had not been dating much of late, and was perhaps a bit rusty, which was true. She replied by saying that she has been dating quite a bit over the past two years. She then added that the last two guys she had dated "ended up being gay", and "suspected" that a third was as well.

Now I was intrigued, if not a bit afraid! Maybe she was forcing these guys out of the closet by crawling all over them. Probably not. In fact, this was beginning to sound more like something that would test my patience beyond its limits, rather than something that would result in romance, or even base lust. I was about to pull the plug, but then considered the alternative. I've never been a big fan of strippers, but the thought of sitting around the apartment playing with myself on a Saturday night, while my roommates got wasted and shoved their faces between the silicone-swollen jugs of some hired temptress, was even less appealing than a crash course in dating etiquette.

So I assured her that I was not gay – and asked her out for the coming Saturday night.

"You mean for a date? Like for dinner?" she asked.

"Yeah, sure," I responded. "A date." This was a crucial error. As I realized later, her clarifying question, which at first sounded like more idiot paddy cake, was actually for purposes of classification. Now this exercise had a name, a form, and of course, more rules to be followed - rules of which I was also ignorant.

She suggested a restaurant just east of my neighborhood, in Boys Town (a predominantly gay neighborhhod), and told me that she would call me on Saturday afternoon to work out the details. In the meantime, I would have to make the reservations. After some additional small talk, we ended the call with some good old-fashioned, manufactured enthusiasm.

Now, let's review. I now had a date with a girl who:

• I had only called when it was clear that my intoxicated performance on Saturday had cost me the true object of my affections, desires or whatever
• Takes her social cues and derives behavioral affirmation from add-on telephone services commercials
• Had "outted" two homosexuals in the past three months
• Was expecting a lot more effort from me than I was planning on putting forth

• Actually did come from one of those horse shit I-57 exit towns.

Rocking in the chair, playing Saturday's possible scenarios out in my head, I began to wonder what the hell I had gotten myself into. In the back of my mind, the seeds of doubt began to germinate.

# # # # #

Saturday. Ten after four. I thought I was in the clear. We had agreed upon a four o'clock call, and here she had missed it. My seeds of second thought, nourished over the course of the week by copious amounts of skepticism from my friends and colleagues about both my motives and her mental health, had sprouted and blossomed into full-fledged dread.

My day had been glorious up to that point. I had started by biking down to this cozy little patisserie on Broadway for a breakfast baguette and a few sweet rolls. Then it was over to the bookstore for my allotment of May magazines: Q, Harpers, Astronomy, and that week's New Yorker. From there, I went down to the lake to consume my varied booty and bathe in the strengthening spring sun. It was almost as if I was spoiling myself early to counteract the coming "unpleasantness."

I had cut it close on the way home, but I arrived at the apartment a good 10 minutes before four. I was feeling very uneasy, as if in a physician's waiting room, awaiting a stool extraction. But no call had come. Maybe she had also, upon reflection, identified certain inconsistencies in our respective thought patterns that did not portend a smooth date. Maybe she knew intuitively to end this ridiculous charade before it would begin. Maybe...

The phone was ringing.

"Hello."

"Hi, Mike?"

"Yeah, this is Mike." Of course I knew who it was, but I just couldn't acknowledge it immediately - not to her or myself. Procrastination in the very face of climax!

"Hi. It's Denise. How's it going?"

Ugh. From here we plodded along through each of our days. I described the above routine; she dribbled on about how the guy staying with her had somehow ruined her French doors while moving out by pulling them the wrong way. "One of them was already open, so it wasn't like he didn't know what way they went," she said, driving the spike of banality squarely through the crown of my skull and into my mushy gray cerebral soup.

"What's wrong?" she asked suddenly.

I was tempted to come out with the truth, but I was a bit caught off guard, and instead replied "Nothing, I am just a little overwhelmed, I mean, with this guy, and your doors and everything. It just sounds like you've had a pretty shi- uh, bad day."

"Yeah, it's been kinda rough," she confirmed.

My despondence was becoming crippling. I had to do something fast.

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