An Open Letter to the Guy I Went on Two Dates with and Blew Off

Girls are always accusing guys of being dicks for not calling them back after a few dates or a one-night stay in pound town. Girls do this too. I had my first foray in the age-old art of dropping off the face of the Earth after two dates with someone six months ago. I wasn’t interested in pursuing anything further with him, but I didn’t want to write something that sounded like a Human Resources woman informing him that he sucked at a job interview, so I just didn’t write back when he asked me out again over text. The guilt still haunts me. I imagine my spurn left him with chronic feelings of inadequacy and maybe a drug problem. I thought an open letter to him would be easier and less risky for me because, according to my fantasy, he lives in a gutter now and will never see this anyway.

Dear [Name Redacted],

How are you? I hope you’ve been well. I have your sock. I thought that would have been a funny thing to hand back to you on our third date, but we never got to that third date because the thought of seeing you again gave me a twinge of the ol’ diarrhea stomach (like butterflies but with poop). You can tell I’m not feeling it romantically between us because, first off, I never returned your text asking me out again, and secondly, in the previous sentence I revealed that I take number twos and when I’m full of dread, they’re not solid.

I know I should have just answered your simple text, “Hey, let me know what you’re up to this weekend? Last night was a blast!” But I couldn’t. To me it wasn’t that simple. If you had just written, “Last night was a blast,” I could have lied and said, “Yeah. A blast!” It was fun to have drinks with you, but when you put your hands under my blouse later in my living room and said, delightedly, “No bra!? Naked boobs?!”—I lost my boner. I wish I could be like what I imagine Angelina Jolie to be like in that situation. I’d have taken your hands in a sultry, condescending tone, “Honey, no,” then sit down all annoyed in my latex pantsuit, wave you out of my place as I call Billy Bob Thornton and say, “Can you get over here and bone me? No… he’s just leaving.”

Except for the boob thing, which made me feel like a perverted, lonely eighth grade algebra teacher who took home a student, you didn’t do anything wrong. I did. I shouldn’t have gone on that first date with you. The first time we met, for two seconds at a party, I already suspected I wouldn’t be attracted to you. I remember thinking, His head looks really, really heavy. You have a large head. Your face is very, very cute, but Irish guys have fooled me before with their sweet faces and skulls of osmium. If you had rested your head on my stomach it would have ruptured a kidney.

When I accidentally spilled my glass of wine on my shirt at the restaurant you were so sweet to run to your car and bring me your (clean) New York Rangers t-shirt* for me to wear. But I got scared when your eyes lit up and you said, “I’m going to get you to watch hockey with me on weekends.” It felt like a test to see what I would say as visions ran through your head of your ex-girlfriend screaming, “Can we just go to the fucking farmer’s market once like all the other couples? Who cares about the goddamn Rangers?” I could feel—the way men can sense when women are on the hunt for a husband—that you’re on the hunt for a specific type of girlfriend. Maybe a Jennifer Lawrence in Silver Linings Playbook type, minus the slight mental illness? But I’m never going to watch sports and drink beer with your family. In fact, I wish men didn’t have families.

You’re probably wondering why I made out with you in the parking lot. I don’t know. I guess because I couldn’t find my keys in my purse fast enough and the silence was awkward. Also, I think your head has a gravitational pull.

Anyway, here’s a bit of advice: Next time you take a girl out twice, if she isn’t bothering you the next day she doesn’t want to be asked out again. When I like someone, I send off one of my patented ‘fake texts’ the next morning. It goes a little something like this: ”Hey! I’m running like five minutes late but grab our table and order me a mimosa!” I’ll send that to a guy I like on Saturday afternoon followed up about three minutes later with an, “Oh, sorry! I meant to send that to my friend Margaret… her name is right above yours in my text threads. Lol. Have a great day!” Now you’ve heard from me. You know that I’m out at brunch not even thinking of you! (Even though I’m not out at brunch and I am thinking of you.)

I should have just cancelled the second date but I felt like that would be too dramatic—who cancels a date just because they don’t want to grow old with someone? Just relax and have some fucking ravioli, right? You don’t want to ask me out again if you ever get out of the gutter. I’m a neurotic loner. An over-thinking rebel. So long. I hope you find the girl of your dreams who wears your hockey jersey over her very nice naked boobs.

Love (not in that way),

Jen

*Hockey team changed to protect the identity of my date.

Previously - Dear Mattell, Here Is How to Make a Goth Doll

Jen's first book, I Can Barely Take Care of Myself, is a New York Times bestseller. Buy a copy for yourself and all your friends here. She's also on Twitter, follow her @JenKirkman.