Sorry In Advance, Mom is a recurring post where we talk about modern day love (lol) and the trials and tribulations of dating in your late 20’s. As most of our friends are well versed in the Defense Against the Dark Arts (aka Tinder), SIAM will often be guest written by some of our favorite people. This week’s post is by the beautiful and incomparable, Natasha Hugeback. Natasha is an advertising copywriter living and working in LA. You will never beat her in a rap battle and she once appeared on an MTV reality show and is therefore the most famous person we know. She shares our affinity for rotisserie chicken as well as our love/hate relationship with all things online dating related. You can find her on Instagram @hugeback.

His Name Was Greg

Dating in 2015 is the actual worst. I find myself making excuses for people, pretending to be interested and settling because 30 is on the horizon. However, sometimes something happens that’ll make you want to eat dog shit everyday for the rest of your life rather than go on a date with another person. The following is one of those happenings.

My dating patterns since I was dumped out of nowhere in March had pretty much been nonexistent. My insane work schedule and lack of decent men within a 5-mile radius was troubling, so I was aimlessly swiping for entertainment. Naturally, I was excited to get a couple matches. My ego was in better shape that I physically am and I went into the weekend feeling pretty good about myself.

It was a Sunday. My phone lit up with a notification from Hinge. His name was Greg* and he was a music composer.

Intrigued, I went with my go-to line: “Describe your perfect pizza.” While most of my matches reply with “labia” or “the only topping I need is you”, I was surprised when he went into detail and took time to craft and answer that was entertaining enough to get me to respond. He even asked what me what my perfect pizza would be. That never happens.

Is this my soulmate?

After a careful screening (AKA making sure he had a good taste in music and didn’t own a chain wallet) I gave him my number. You all know how this next part goes. The staring at your phone and waiting for a response. Texting until you fall asleep. Giggling at every witty comeback. We’ve all been there. And this happened for a few days. It wasn’t until I learned he was FROM Los Angeles that I became skeptical. Every guy I’ve dated from LA has turned out to be a weirdo in one way or another. Alas, I was blinded by clever conversation and his ability to pay for his own phone bill. We finally decided that Saturday was our day. I was finally going to meet Greg and all of my dating troubles would dissolve into thin air.

It was Saturday. I woke up with a hangover due to a bachelor party I attended the night before. Yes, bachelor party. No, I wasn’t a hired prostitute. It was for my gay BFF. Anyway, the last thing I wanted to do was get all gussied up and take a $30 Uber to meet my fate. So, I topped that and came up with a worse plan: I’ll just invite him over to my place for an old-fashioned Netflix and chill!

In my defense: After talking for almost a week, I felt comfortable enough asking him to hang at my place and eat pizza. While I was excited, I was fully prepared to friend-zone him. I told him I don’t kiss on the first date (but I shaved my legs just in case). I wore running pants and an oversized sweater just so I seemed super chill but also wanted him to think I actually run. Which I don’t.

However, after giving him my address and texting back and fourth about timing, he began to get really weird. I can’t explain it but something was off. Around 9pm, and no Greg, I texted him and made a joke asking him if he was done straightening his hair.

“I’m dry heaving. I ate too much. I drank too much. I need to make myself throw up to get the poison out.”

Part of me was beyond pissed, but the cleanly shaven part of me was wondering if this was a puke-and-rally situation. I coldly replied, “hope you feel better,” praying my passive aggressive tone came through loud and clear. The $78 worth of wine and large pizza I had ordered was going to be consumed by yours truly.

An Amy Shumer special and SNL episode later, I was a bottle and a half deep and on my third slice of pizza. I get a text.

“I’m coming over. I’m actually in Santa Monica.”

 

Now, let’s do a little bit of math.

9:11 PM – he’s sick

10:26 PM – I send him a picture of the pizza I am eating solo

11:18 PM – he’s in Santa Monica and he says he’s coming over?

To get from Hollywood to Santa Monica on a Saturday night isn’t a hop, skip and a jump. Clearly he had plans. Clearly he ditched me. Clearly I just consumed 2,000 calories for nothing. (Well, let’s not be too brash)

This is where my curious side got the best of me. The now two bottles of wine didn’t help.

 

“Yeah! Come over!”

I resume my Narcos binge (I know I’m not finished. Shut up.) and before I know it, I look at the clock and it’s 3am. So I text him.

“Ummmmmmmmmm. You said you were coming over 4 hours ago. 6 hours ago you were sick. You should probably just go home.”

He calls me. He’s clearly wasted, out of breath and said he was jumping fences to get to me. I wasn’t sure if I should be impressed or alarmed. An ex of mine wouldn’t even drive to hangout with me, let alone hop a fence. He shouted at complete strangers to give him a ride. He’s just funny. I thought nothing of it. God damn you, wine.

4AM he finally shows up. He’s drenched in sweat, 20+ pounds heavier than his photos and smells like straight up body odor. The love child of Judd Apatow and a lemur. He stumbles in my direction and we hug. Friend-zone 2015 started the second I laid eyes on him.

So, I’m laughing at myself because I knew this was going to happen. What person in their right mind invites a guy over, a guy they’ve never met, at 4 in the morning to hangout? I blame most of this on the wine and my Gemini tendencies. I could sleep easily knowing my taser was fully charged and my wall were paper thing so if I screamed, someone would hear me. I mean, YOLO.

I poured him a giant glass of water and gave him left over pizza, hoping he would turn into Prince Charming after his sweat evaporated and B.O. subsided.

SPOILER ALERT: he didn’t.

Throughout the night, he told me how pretty I was and tried to kiss me numerous times. It was unsettling at first, but then it turned into a fun game. He would lean in slowly and I would pull a Neo/Matrix move and laugh at him. Why didn’t I kick him out? I have no idea. The upside was that I think I burnt off at least a slice of pizza with all of my crazy escape moves.

He awkwardly took off his pants and stumbled to the kitchen to get more water. As his stretched out boxer briefs jiggled around my kitchen, I began to feel bad for him. His dating photo was clearly him in his prime and time was doing him dirty. I sternly let him know he was able to sleep over and if he touched me, he would die.

I slept like a baby that night – of course after I texted all my girlfriends a photo of me giving a thumbs up with him sleeping in the background and the caption “10/10 would not bang.”

The next morning I woke up to the sound of a can being cracked open. College? Is that you? I look at my phone and it’s 9:24. At the end of my bed was Greg. He admired my wall of posters and he pounded a Rolling Rock he found in my fridge.

“I’m really sorry about last night. I should have never come over.”

Breakthrough! Maybe his drunkenness was a fluke. Everyone does stupid stuff when they’re drunk, right? But why was he drinking a beer? Hair of the dog? I shook it off. He laid down next to me (non-sexually) and we actually got to talk. He got up to throw his beer away. I hear another can of beer open.

He comes back and we put start chatting again. He goes in for a kiss and I shove my face in a pillow. Here we go again. I sat up instantly.

“I told you I’m not kissing you.”

His face was riddled with confusion.

“Even after we hung out last night?”

This guy obviously doesn’t get it. I explained my last relationship and how it’s been a while since I’ve been on a proper date. (Not that this was even considered a date by any means, but just for context) He nodded in agreement and lifted his hand up for a high-five. Our hands met and he quickly held my hand and looked at my nail polish. He slowly moved my hand toward his penis. I pulled away, baffled that anyone would even find that acceptable.

“Don’t you want to know what I’m working with?”

 

I busted out laughing. “100% no. Absolutely not.” I slowly realized this guy was not right. I couldn’t kick him out. He knew where I lived. I had to let him down gently. Enter: the fake phone call.

“Oh! Work call. Have to take this.”

I ran to the other room.

“Hi! Yes. Of course. Meet when? I can do 1. Ok, sounds good. See you then!”

I let him know I have to go into work. He asks if I had time to grab food before. If you know me, I NEVER turn down a free meal. I had to say yes and I did. Also, part of me was hoping he would be normal. A girl can dream.

On our walk to food, I began to search where I could buy sage sticks to get the evil spirits out of my house. He tries to hold my hand. I stop dead in my tracks. He looked like I just killed his family pet.

“Are you embarrassed to be with me?”

I rolled my eyes and told him he was being stupid. Not only was I hangry, but he was getting on my last nerve.

We get to brunch and tries to get cutesy with me.

“We should order a bunch of stuff to share!”

Shattering his dreams, yet again, I order a salad – the fastest thing on the menu I could eat. Our mimosas come shortly after.

Things got awkward again when he asks if he can put his hand on the small of my back. My skin crawled off of my body. I nervously laughed and said no. I thought he would have got the hint by now. Then, he goes off on a tangent about how cool and pretty I am and how he can’t believe I’m single. I couldn’t handle it anymore.

“You know you pretty much face raped me last night trying to constantly kiss me. That wasn’t cool.”

His eyes welled up with tears and he began to cry. I was emoji wide-eyed and couldn’t believe what I was seeing. The waitress approached us to ask if we wanted refills but didn’t finish her sentence and awkwardly walked away once she saw what was happening. He blubbered.

“I just. If my sister told me that a guy did that to her I don’t know what I would do. She would feel terrible.”

 

 

I’m sitting there like NO SHIT. I was also sitting there like WTF. People were staring. I wanted to die. Our food wasn’t there yet. To lighten up the mood and survive brunch, I asked for him to tell me a story.

“Did I tell you my DUI story?”

I knew this wasn’t going to go well. Not only was his story longer than the wait for our food, but he told it in third person. He explained how he did a couple months in jail for a DUI. The Mexicans would do more pushups than the white people and he was with neo-Nazis who were planning an uprising. My eyes glazed over for most of it until, yet again, his eyes were filled with tears. He’s crying again.

“Sorry, I just don’t talk about this often.”

He chugs the rest of his 4^th mimosa as I sip on my second. He orders another and I shoot him a look. Not only did he have 3 beers before we even left my house, but now he’s chugging mimosas. RED FLAG.

“You know, I can not drink sometimes. Like, I don’t drink Monday’s. Or I can meet someone that will make me not drink.”

I awkwardly smile as I continue to check my phone. We sit in silence for a minute before he excuses himself to the bathroom. I flag the waitress down and ask for the check ASAP. Greg was gone for the length of a regular bathroom session, but he comes back and talks in between sniffles.

“Sorry, I was just in there for 10 minutes crying.”

I didn’t know how to react other than to pretend I didn’t hear what he said. And he wasn’t gone for 10 minutes. It was more like 3, max. Now he was milking it for attention. I plot my escape from this mistake of a day.

“Well, I’m running behind. We should head out.”

He pays for brunch (goal achieved) and we walk back to my house in complete silence. If you haven’t taken an 8-minute walk in silence with a stranger who’s constantly tried to kiss you for the last 10 hours, it feels like a lifetime.

Finally, we arrive. I wasn’t sure what to do, so I tried to get him on his way with using the least force possible.

 

“Alright, well, I’ll wait until your Uber arrives.”

He nods and begins to actually call people. I am not sure who, but after a couple of minutes I got a little impatient. I wanted him to leave so I could pretend to go into the office but instead disinfect my house and bleach my bedding. Maybe even burn it. I got tired of waiting.

“You know you don’t actually call an Uber?”

‪

He snaps.

“If you have to go, go! I’ll fucking call an Uber if you want me to fucking leave!”

I’ve got no time for this nonsense. I stand up and walk to my car without saying a word. If I opened my mouth, I was afraid of what I would say. I immediately texted my sister as I prepared to drive around my neighborhood for the next 15 minutes until he was gone.

“Please tell me you can talk to me right now.”

Almost instantly, I hear a knock on the passenger window. He followed me to my car. He gets into the front seat and extends his hand.

“It was nice meeting you, Natasha.”

I wish I saw my face at this moment in time. We dramatically shook hands and I watched as he walked past the trashcans and off into the sunset. I thought the nightmare was over. An hour later, I get a text.

“1 kiss to show a guy he means something to you goes a long way. Take care.”

 

I stared at my phone. I had a million things I wanted to say. I swallowed my rage.

“Understanding someone’s boundaries and wants/needs goes a lot further.”

 

He, dramatically, had to have the last word.

“Sorry I was so bad to you.”

Any person in their right mind out think back to the last 10 hours and go, “Wow. Ok. She’s been dodging my sexual advances, calling me bro and didn’t ask to go out again. Hm. She’s not into me. I’ll just be on my way.”

But no.

After I lit 7 different scented candles, Lysol’d the shit out of every surface and washed my sheets/blankets/every washable item in my room I had to try and forget what I had just been through. Eventually, I climbed into a bed of fresh sheets, feasted on a buffet of Taco Bell items and waited for my 10mg melatonin to kick in. I slept like a queen.

My alarm on my phone buzzes. I feverously pressed the sleep button until it stopped. After a deep breath, I sat up and looked at my phone. Without my glasses, I could see a million notifications. My nightmare had returned at 10:20 the night before.

U miss me

 

(Emoji cat cry laughing)

 

Hi

 

Babe

 

I miss u

 

Babe?

 

Umm

 

Ok

 

So we’re not cuddling ?

 

WHAT THE FUCK?!? I now realized I was dealing with a very sensitive, very unstable person. I told myself I would text back after a cup of coffee. After all, he had my address. I couldn’t tell him how I really felt without worrying he would be sitting on my stoop when I got home wielding a knife, hiding in the backseat of my car or peering into a window from across the street. In a last stitch effort to set Greg straight, I let him down as gently as I could.

“Sorry! I passed out early. After this weekend I realize I don’t think I’m ready to put myself out there. You’re cool and I had fun but I don’t think I can give you the attention you need. I’m also in a weird place with work and everything else. I hope you find what you’re looking for.”

 

To my delight, there was no response and hopefully there won’t be. It’s only been 11 hours, but I’m hopeful this chapter in our lives has closed.

Farewell, Greg.

I’ve never laughed so hard – at you, never felt closer to someone – only because you wouldn’t get out of my personal space and I’ve never regretted anything more in my life.

Ever.

*The name of this person has been changed because I’m secretly hoping someone goes on a date with him.