Worst. Date. EVER. (Part 2)

So of course, the guy calls me. The phone starts ringing off the hook as soon as I walk in the door at 2AM.

"When can I see you?"

Luckily, at this point I am slightly more sober, and have explained the dilemma to my buddy while she drove us home. I defnitely want to avoid the gratuitous "she dumped me, so now I'm gonna ruin her life" scenarios. We decided that proceed with caution was the right approach.

We set a date for lunch on Friday. He has a short day at work, and I have no afternoon classes that day. (Plus, I had a standing occasion at Sudwerk, the Friday hang-out for most of my friends, and a built-in excuse to keep the lunch from turning into dinner if things went south.)

"I always wanted to see you again," said Needy Guy. "I figured that if you saw how much I had changed...you'd like the new me better than the guy I used to me."

HUH?

I tried to disabuse him of this notion, but of course I felt guilty, because the looks had definitely gotten his foot back in the door.

"I always was attracted to you before!" I protested. Hey, it was the truth. It wasn't his looks I had a problem with, it was the whining and manipulation. Oh well.

Friday came quicker than I thought it would. Mainly because by that time, I realized that this was the same guy, and I was making a huge mistake twice, and actually being really cavalier about his feelings.

I drive up to Sweet Tomatoes, and he is waiting in the parking lot. His once-crisp white shirt is soaked with sweat.

The story I get is that his "vintage" Porche was towed, and he needs to go to the DMV to "straighten things out, and will I take him?"

He's been at Sweet Tomatoes most of the afternoon waiting for me to get there.

Faintly, the strains of Psycho start to swell in my brain, but hey, he's stranded. I take him to the DMV, and even wait in line with him (and no, I didn't get lunch.) We take care of the situation, and I start trying to get away. "Ok well, I have a thing that starts at 4:30."

"Well, at least let me buy you gas."

Hell, I'm a starving college student. Twist my arm.

So we end up inside an Arco, and he gets a bottled water, and I get a cherry slurpee (it was the first thing I saw) and he starts lecturing me about how unhealthy all that sugar and red dye are for you. At the counter, I see these HUGE cookies. They're literally the size of Frisbees, and so to distract him I say something along the lines of, "Hey- check out the frisbee cookies!"

"I'll buy you one!"

"No thanks, I don't really want one, I was just commenting that they're kinda big."

"I'll totally get you one, it's OK."

"Seriously- I don't want one. Don't buy it, I won't eat it."

He buys the goddamn cookie anyway, then hops into my car and hands it to me like it's a medal.

So, I am irritated.....rEALLY pissed, actually, as I am starving and have been trapped in a DMV for several hours with this guy who I am totally incompatible with. There is no way I am eating the cookie. At this point, I just want to make it out alive. I chuck the cookie into the back seat without thanking him and start off down the street.

"I'll take you home...where do you live?"

While I am driving, he is trying to grasp my non-driving hand- the hand holding the ICEE. I use it as an excuse. "Sorry- I need to hold onto my drink!"

So he takes my drink away, puts it between his legs like they are a drink holder, and starts petting my hand and nibbling on my fingers while I am desperately trying to steer with my free hand and to extract coherent directions from him to drive him home.

"Uh...turn here?!" I asked, frantically weaving through traffic.

That's when he turned my hand palm up and BIT me really hard.

I screamed "OW!!!SHIT!!!" and slammed on the brakes, and red slush exploded out of my slurpee cup and went ALL over him. Jeans, white shirt his hair, and all over the passenger side window.

If you ever need to distract a man, pouring a 40 ounce cup of ice into his lap is definitely an option. "My new JEANS, goddamn it!" he snarled, trying to soak the red stuff of with inadequate napkins, while I tried desperately not to laugh.

We finally got to his house, and apparrently, hope does spring eternal- he had the gall to ask me if I wanted to come in and "help him out of his wet things." It took about 10 minutes of abject lying to get him out of my car.

Back at Sudwerk, all my favorite drunks really did enjoy that cookie.