14. Animal Instinct
This train filled with new guys seemed to never stop coming. Never ending cycle of meeting someone new, opening up, talking to him late at night, having two hours phone calls and acting like we've known each other for years. Then suddenly watching as he drifts away and I need to forget it all ever happened. It's not him, it's me - it's not me, it's him. Then once more someone else takes his place for another week or two, and on, and on, and on. Like snake eating its own tail.
Then I need to hear or to say the occasional: I'm really sorry, you're a great guy, and as I was into you at the beginning, with time or a new, more interesting match on Tinder I've changed my mind and I don't feel it anymore. As it happens, one or even a few good first dates do not guarantee that you fully clicked with someone. Or it doesn't guarantee that from this click something serious will explode. At first it may seem like it, but then with time you or him can see the incompatibility and the search must go on. Sometimes the big creator and destroyer of new relationships, Tinder, gets in the way, not sure what's worse.
Then I'm finally fed up with wasting my time and decide to take another break and focus on myself, but this process inevitably leads to boredom and curiosity: What if this time it will work? However, makes no difference what I do, in the end it never does, and it's a matter of time when it falls apart with yet another special guy and one of us has to finish it for good. It's all quite exhausting, to be honest. Kinda like my own version of Groundhog day. Still, I do prefer to be on the winning side. Makes a smaller damage to me.
Autumn came, the anniversary of my freedom was coming closer. By that time the Russian became a fungus that was pretty hard to get rid of the walls of my mind - small thing, seemingly harmless, but constantly being there, at the back of my head. And Mattias popping up there as well, whenever it didn't work out with another guy. Well, if you didn't figure it out already, even with my breaks, once more I have a few new stories to write here, to describe who was coming after these two, who I was trying to replace them with. Let's see, shall we?
The star of this story is William, probably the most normal guy ever (if not “vanilla” should have been the adjective here) with a beautiful voice and smile. Faceless and nameless on Tinder - I should have known best it could mean one of few not very nice things, but I've decided to ignore it and talk to him, especially that quite soon after we started talking, he wanted to show me to whom I'm talking to. Quite handsome in my opinion, but also he was another guy that was born into a rich family owning some big business.
What was he like? Sometimes he was visiting the church, he had mostly straight friends that didn't know about him, just as his family wasn't aware of his gay-ness, or bi-ness, not sure what was it. Here we go again, I thought to myself. He was smart, we could talk for hours, even though we just started getting to know each other, when he left Warsaw for a weekend, he made sure I knew everything what he's doing and where. When he got back, we met at last.
The date went great, he was laughing at my jokes, we shared some intimate stories, when it ended he even texted me to let him know when I will get home safely - such a cute little que saying I enjoyed the date, let's continue talking. It seemed that it really clicked. We still talked for a week or so, but - as always there must be a but. Unfortunately the next weekend he went to his hometown to see all of his friends, some kind of reunion. At first he was sending me pictures of his family and home, it was going perfectly normal. The first evening he went to see his friends and that's when it ended. The next day he just stopped texting me. Just like that. And when I did text him, he seemed a bit reluctant. So just like that, days after our date, not right after it, when most of the people know if it's going to survive, something's changed. Quite unusually, or maybe not.
You see, I've read somewhere that men know five minutes after meeting someone, if they're interested in this person. It's really that simple. But them being interested doesn't necessarily mean it's going to work, as you get to know each other and see what a good match you two can make, most probably one or both of you realises it's not it. Still, it's really that fast for guys to know if they’re attracted to someone or not. So, naively I thought this first date and the fact we were still talking just as before it, meant it’s going in the right direction.
I was wrong. That weekend I knew something’s off, but didn’t want to say anything. When he got back I asked if he wants to meet again and he said yes, we could meet again but... only for a “friendly beer”. I didn’t respond immediately and he kept going on with the details - when he’s free, knowing that my birthday is coming and when I will be busy, so he proposed a certain date. I replied honestly - that I’m confused as I do not know what happened or what did I do wrong, but I’m grateful for his honesty.
He kept calling me "KubuĊ" during this conversation and said I didn’t do anything wrong, said something like: If you don’t feel it, then you don’t feel it. But, if I’m not offended or anything, and still would like to meet with him and continue as friends, then let's do it. I refused and had no other choice, but to see it as ending, as he grew on me in a way, and I wouldn't be able to see him only as a friend after having the pink filter on my eyes. So that was it.
I had a theory that he had a girlfriend or a boyfriend and was only looking for sex, as a few times he made some obvious jokes about going to his place and bed instead of my favourite bar for a normal date. His secretive profile on Tinder would suggest he’s hiding something, something private, as he didn’t have a job that could be ruined by a simple profile on Tinder. Usually, if you can see a faceless and nameless profile on Tinder, it means one thing - unhappy person in a relationship with someone, who's not so much into having an open relationship.
And as he saw that what we had wasn’t going to be just a casual hook up, but it was moving in quite a different direction - well, it was obvious he had to end it. So that was my pick, after someone suggested it to me, making fun of me talking to a headless guy on Tinder. Sounds better than "he just didn't want me", so I prefer to stick with this version, if you don't mind. One problem was, I knew soon he will become my neighbour. Not door to door, but he was planning to move into my area. But surprisingly, since November I didn't see him even once. Just like I've never bumped accidentally into Mattias, even though he lives three tram stops away and daily visits the park in front of my building.
Life is not like the movies - when it's over, it's really over. We do not bump into them randomly somewhere at the bar or on the street, few months later. They just cease to exist from our orbit. There is no begging, no fighting for it, no bargaining - if one of the members wants to end it, the other one only gets sad and agrees to it all, or pretends he was also thinking about ending it, then quietly cries into the pillow at night. It's very easy to give up nowadays, when there are so many other options on the horizon. But then it all gets just a tiny bit meaningless, don't you think?
I believe deep down we all know the truth, when it died. When something's off, when they change their attitude towards us, when the end is near. To quote Rue from Euphoria: You know when you're with someone and things just aren't right? But you're afraid to ask, because the answer might be worse than the feeling right now. Or maybe you don't, if you're not a Scorpio, but a blind fool who can't read the obvious signs.
Maybe not everyone has this amazing curse/gift of the animal instinct and intuition, that the (un)lucky owners love to ignore. I sound bitter now, but that's only because of the recent events that I hope I will be able to describe in the next few posts. William's story is long gone in my head now, just like the stories of the Russian and Belarusian, even Mattias. The cycle keeps repeating itself, or maybe not completely by itself, more like with my silly help pushing the big wheel.