badly written story

Yeah, the headline is right. I don't like this. And I can't get my picture into my profile because my brain is wearing prophylactics. I'm not very fat. I'm not sure this story elucidates it's plotline or it's details very clearly.

The Most Boring Girl In The World

I didn’t wake up to the phone ringing. I really only heard it ring one time. I knew it had been ringing when I got out of the shower, but I didn’t touch it. I assumed it was my brother calling. He must have made it back to Los Angeles with every intention of re-casting our loving crack home from a few years earlier. I couldn’t understand the message that was left on my machine, it just said “Collect call walla walla jail.”

I can’t remember the name of the girl I was going to see. She had told me something in her email. I knew it then, but it’s gone. She’d posted something on craigslist about meeting up for lunch. She had never tried some local favorite that she had always meant to try and that I had never tried even though I meant to. I sent her a picture. She sent me a picture. It was all very agreeable.

I had just broken up with a long term (2+ years) girlfriend and wanted something to do. Needed to make some announcement to myself that the end had indeed been met. We’d broken up at least a dozen times and gotten back together within a week every time. Well, it had been more than a week this time. And we hadn’t spoken. Not even e-mailed. It was over.

It never seems like a good idea to me to show up too early for anything. Especially if that anything involves a girl. I’m so obviously desperate there’s no reason to play it up. Unfortunately, after I’d parked my car I still had 15 minutes to kill. I went and sat down at a bus stop and watched people go by. I saw a brown-haired girl and avoided eye contact because she looked cute. I’m a winner like that. The thought flashed in my mind that it might be the girl I was meeting, but (even though her picture didn’t have these features) I had expected a moustache or, at least, a hair lip.

After a couple of minutes I decided it was better to be early and desperate than to be on time and sweating, so I got out of the sun and trudged the block over. There was a little bit of a line but the brown-haired girl from earlier was at the counter with an empty seat. She saw me, looked me over and I realized this was, after all, my date for lunch. I introduced myself, “Is you’re name…?”

She told me her name and the universe seemed loving and giving. She had the kind of name no one could forget once they hear it. She didn’t write it down in her email to me because everyone mispronounced it and besides, she had given me her nickname, at the very least. Oh, well, of course I understood. You wouldn’t want awkward introductions.

Have you seen the menu? Do you know what you’re ordering? We had both studied the menu intensely because, well, we didn’t have anything to say to each other just yet. Neither one of us was trying very hard but I wasn’t worried.

She ordered something and I ordered something. Neither one of us was thrilled with the other’s plate. Just as well, she announced. She had just gotten over mono. I wasn’t thrilled with that either but let it go. Good story? No, she didn’t want to tell.

We ate and dawdled. Talked easily. Conversation good enough to keep going but not opening too many doors. I told her I was a writer. A fallen film student and hope-to-be novelist. This brightened her up. She told me about how she had just gone to Europe to study… something. And she had stayed somewhere old. It might even be famous. I thought this would be a door to adventure. I pursued this line.

While she was in Europe, the first two weeks it rained so she didn’t get to do much. Then, one night she went to a club with her friend! They didn’t meet anyone, nobody bought them drinks, and they left. The next day she had a cold. She felt bad but kept about her studies. That was the reason she was there. But she was tired the whole time. She slept most of four weeks. Before she came back to America she went to a doctor. The doctor told her she had mono.

This is a general outline of the story. It went on much longer than this, filled in with colorful details of not doing anything. Which was a really great conversation. By the end I had my face in my hand and wasn’t saying anything. Poor girl. She could taste the disappointment. When we got up to pay, I got the whole check and reached out warmly to shake her hand. Yeah, we should totally do something again and stuff. Great.

I walked away, got in my car, and promptly forgot her name. She’s pretty, she’ll be okay, I guess. I will never call her again but someone will. About an hour after I got home my phone rang. My ex-girlfriend calling. No apologies, no re-ups accepted! I resolved to myself to stand strong before answering.

“You are the worst person in the world!” It turned out it was her calling from jail. She’d gotten a DUI the night before and thought I’d be the one to bail her out. I guess from her side of the phone they kept telling her I was rejecting the charges. So that’s what happens when the collect call meets the voicemail. Fascinating. Ah, well, certainly no reconciliations now. She had finally broken down and called her mother. If I remember correctly she threatened to send someone over to beat my ass. The final nail in the coffin was placed by the cops and hammered home by the most boring girl in the world. I took a nap and then went to a friend’s house to watch football.