Building Friction (Part 6)

My first stop on my list of errands was to pop into the local Pet Barn and pick up a rat for Zoe. I hadn't stepped through the door and been there 5 seconds before Matt approached me. I'd been patronizing the same store for almost a year, and Matt was seemingly always working whenever I stopped in.

"Hey Chloe!" he greeted in his usual friendly manner. "Let me guess. One rat, preferably the ugliest that I can find?"

I laughed. Matt had my routine down. "Yeah. I forgot to pick one up yesterday, so Zoe's about ready to take off my right hand!"

I followed Matt over to the tanks holding the rats and waited patiently as he dug around in the pile of rodents, producing a fat brown and white specimen. "How's my girl been doing?" he asked as he scooped up the rat and placed it gently into a cardboard box.

"She finally got over that respiratory infection. Now she's gone from not wanting to touch a rat to acting like she's a starving maniac," I explained.

"Oh, I never knew you were a rat connoisseur," he chuckled softly, then handed over the box.

I suddenly felt a strong blush heat my face. "Me? When did I become your girl?"

"Oh, come on! You're always coming in when I'm working! I was finally accepting the fact that you were stalking me and deciding that I'm perfectly OK with that." He smiled warmly at me.

In reality, Matt pretty much covered all of the physical requirements that I usually set for a potential interest. He was tall, blonde and athletic in build. He was always friendly, but never aggressively so, putting me at ease within the first few weeks after meeting him, a rarity where anyone was concerned. I wouldn't mind admitting that he was perhaps correct in assuming I could be interested in him.

"Yeah, you're not conceited in the least!" I laughed nervously. I was suddenly hyper-aware of the other customers and employees in the store moving around. I shifted my weight nervously from foot to foot.

Matt laughed loudly, bringing attention to us. I began fidgeting even more. "Alright, I don't want to make you uncomfortable, Chloe." He started walking towards the registers and I trailed sheepishly behind him. He clicked in some numbers, then told me my total. As I was handing him my money, he spoke again. "I was just thinking that it might be nice to see you outside of this place sometime."

"Oh?" I almost dropped my change as he slipped it into my hand. "Like at night?" I instantly felt stupid for asking.

He laughed again, much softer this time. "Or during the day. Just not when I'm wearing a uniform and shiny plastic name tag." He smiled again. A dimple appeared in his right cheek. I fought the urge to lean over and trace it with my tongue.

I shook the image out of my head and tried to speak. "Well... my friend Sean is playing an open mic at the Good Bar tomorrow night. Are you free then? I could meet you there." I couldn't believe I was throwing out an invitation. Normally I made excuses and hightailed it away from men who showed any attraction to me. A bizarre habit for someone who wrote columns filled with romantic advice.

"That's on Main, right?" he asked. I nodded. "What time?"

"They usually start around nine, but he'll be on a list, so we're usually there for a couple of hours." This much was always true. Sean would play for 15 minutes and then we would sit around bullshitting and mocking the other performers for the remainder of the evening.

"Yeah, I'd like to do that," Matt was smiling again. We stood there, staring at each other in an odd silence until another customer walked up with a large bag of cat food.

"OK, then. Tomorrow night. The Good Bar. Around nine." I repeated all of the pertinent details as if I were reading a memo. I managed a timid smile. "I look forward to seeing you there."

"Same here," Matt said, ringing up Mr Cat Food, but keeping his gaze on me. After the unwelcomed attention from last night, I found myself appreciating the glance of this handsome guy I'd known for so long, yet obviously not paid enough mind. I walked out the door with a bounce to my step.

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After running the rest of my errands, returning home to slowly drop the frightened rat to its demise in Zoe's terrarium and then fixing and eating my own late lunch, I pulled up in front of my computer again and clicked open my messengers. I was in the middle of telling Sean that I wasn't going to be his only supporter tomorrow when another chat window popped up.

"I need some advice." the screen blinked at me. It was from a user named AntiDigital, someone who was not on my contact list.

"Who is this?" I typed in, then waited for a response.

"A reader."

"How did you get my contact information?"

"Through a friend."

"Well, you're going to need to give me more information than that."

"Stephanie. But she didn't want me to tell you that it was her. She said you'd get pissed."

I paused. This much was true. Steph had a habit of trying to fix me up online since she knew it was the one place that I could always be counted on to be. She also knew how it grated on my nerves when she did it.

"Fine," I started typing again. "What exactly did you need advice on?"

There was a drawn out pause, during which Sean's window kept pinging, asking me what was going on. I typed in "BRB" and waited in anticipation of this stranger's question.

"I'm finding myself attracted to a woman who is completely the opposite of what I normally look for. Not to sound shallow, but I tend to not pursue women who are any great mental challenge. A smart woman is too much grief in the long run. But there's this one now who I can't stop thinking about."

"Before you go on," I interrupted. "Can I ask if she has shown any interest in you? There's no point in chasing someone who isn't going to reciprocate."

"See, that's where I beg to differ with you. I think that some people just don't know what they really need, let alone what they really want."

"Is that so? I'd like to think that I'm pretty clear on exactly what I want and need."

"Yes. I've read your numerous lists. You're very good at making them."

The hairs on the back of my neck stood on end. "If you're going to mock me, then I'm not all that certain I care to offer you any advice."

"I didn't mean to offend you, Chloe. I just think it's one thing to make a list and another thing entirely to live by one."

"Alright. You've got exactly 5 seconds to get to the damn point before I block you."

"Fine, fine, fine. My question is this: How do I get this woman to let down her guard long enough to allow me inside?"

"Why should she let her guard down? Have you done anything to be trusted enough to that point?"

"No. In fact, I approached the situation aggressively and tried to trap her into opening up. Which backfired."

"What exactly did you do?"

"More or less, I was rude to her. I insulted her."

"Well, that's a great way to go about getting a woman to open up."

"I didn't set out for it to be that way. I was actually intimidated being around her and wasn't entirely sure how to act. And she certainly wasn't receptive to even the feigned manners that most people use when meeting new people."

Now I was cringing in my seat. I typed the next sentence in slowly, hitting each key with a great deal of deliberation.

"What's your name?" I posed.

The screen was blank for a long time. Finally the line came through.

"Does it really matter?"

"Yes. To me it does, yes."

"I'd really rather not say."

My heart was thudding heavily in my chest. I typed the next 5 letters out very slowly.

"Geoff?"

"Chloe."

I looked at my own name in disbelief, as if it was not my name but someone else's. Some other woman who was sitting in front of her computer, typing messages with a stranger. Only it wasn't another woman and it wasn't a stranger.

"Why are you doing this?" I entered the line without knowing if I wanted to know the answer.

"Because as much reason as I have to turn my back and despise you and everything you stand for, and as much as it pains me to admit this, I've spent the last 12 plus hours doing nothing but thinking about you."

"You were such an asshole!"

"Well, you weren't some party favor yourself."

"I didn't HAVE to be nice to you."

"I didn't have to be nice to you either."

"It didn't mean that you needed to be an asshole, though!"

"Look. Chloe. We could go round and round with this for days. Let me try and explain it in clearer terms. Remember when you were in school and there would be that little boy who would pull your hair and throw rocks at you during recess?"

"Yeah..."

"I'm sure you'd run home crying and your mother would comfort you by saying that that was his way of showing you that he liked you."

"OK..."

"Well, consider me a grown up version of that little boy."

I was shaking my head in disbelief when Sean's window began to ping again. It had been a long time since I had typed in the be right back message without any explanation. I typed in "Hold On," only to get "No, tell me what's up!" in response.

Geoff's window pinged again. "You still there?"

"Yes, hold on, one of my other friends won't leave me alone."

"Oh, well if you're preoccupied I can always let you go. I've got other things I should be doing."

"No, wait. Give me just a second." Sean's window kept pinging. "Dammit, Sean! One second!"

"I'll talk to you at some other point, Chloe. Have a nice night."

And with that, AntiDigital, aka Geoff, signed off.

I groaned loudly and buried my face in my hands before attempting to explain to Sean what had just happened. "How do you feel about that?" his screen blinked at me.

"I don't know." I replied. "I really don't know."