Page 4 of The Perfect Blend
“What do I need?” I asked suspiciously.
“You need to get back out there, to go on a date.” Before I could interrupt and voice my objections, she’d flung up a hand to stop me. “Now, now, hear me out! I’m not talking about romance, or feelings, or any of that stuff. I’m saying that the reason you’re so attracted to this random man is because you’ve basically starved yourself from evenlookingin the direction of a guy since Pete. It’s been a year. You can afford to think someone’s hot without worrying that poor decisions are going to ruin your life.”
I pursed my lips and looked at the fire while I took that in. Zoe was a longtime counterweight to my pessimistic and concerned family. Since I’d left my scumbag ex, they’d been petrified that I’d choose another no good guy and upend my life, again, like I had with Pete and the others before him. Zoe thought they were overreacting, but knew I had my own deep-seated concerns on the issue.
“Besides,” she continued, jumping on the fact that I hadn’t immediately thrown out the idea. “You’ve already been thinking R rated thoughts about this guy, what’s one more? You deserve to have fun and go on a date with an attractive guy. Weirdly hot supermarket man will be forgotten in no time once you have a little flirt with someone on an actual date.”
“I haven’t been thinkingR ratedthoughts about him,” I rebuffed. At least not yet I hadn’t. But Zoe just looked at me expectantly and waggled her eyebrows at me. I rolled my eyes.
“I’ll think about it,” I said, before changing the subject. “Let’s go put the pizzas in, I’m starving.”
The pizzas saved me from starvation, but not from the enthusiastic persuasion of Zoe. Another bottle of wine later and we were huddled up together, swiping on a dating app. Creating my profile had been easy - I’d left it all up to Zoe - and after drinking some more wine and having dessert, we’d come back to the sofa to judge the matches together. It felt less like the beginning of a terrible decision and more like a light, fun game.
“No way!” Gasped Zoe at one of the options presented to us, “Is that Tony Roberts? Wow, I haven’t seen him in years. I wonder what he’s been up to?”
I flicked through the pictures on the profile, all shirtless gym pics.
“Dedicating himself to bodybuilding, apparently.”
“He looks good!” Drawled Zoe.
I scrolled down to his bio and looked at her sceptically.
Gym. Train. Protein. Repeat. No time wasters, need a girl who can keep up.
“You sure about that?” I asked and swiped him left into the rejection pile.
“Okay, fine,” Zoe conceded. “What about this one though? I don’t recognise him, which is a good sign, I think.”
Hugh, 28, did look good. Tan complexion and sandy hair styled nicely, good photos of him on a beach smiling. One dog picture, not too excessive. In short, handsome enough. I always found it hard to figure out if I’d actually be attracted to someone just by looking at their photos, though.
Zoe took the phone and scrolled to his bio.
“Oh look, he has a personality. He says he works in Manchester but prefers the countryside, loves taking his dog on walks and finding new pubs and coffee shops on the way.”
“It’s hardly original,” I said, screwing up my face a little.
“Oh, don’t be uptight, it's hard to be genuine on these things!” Zoe said, flapping her hand at me. “It’s not too different from yours. Come on, he’s good looking!”
I looked at him again and could imagine feeling butterflies in person. “Fine, fine,” I said, and she swiped right on him. Immediately a graphic came up on the screen, cheerily announcing that we’d matched.
Zoe let out an excited little shriek, and I snorted. Despite my porcine noise of derision, I got that small buzz you get from knowing someone found you attractive. Zoe went to message him.
“What, straight away?” I asked with a slight panic.
“Why not? Don’t bottle it now.”
“Won’t I look desperate?”
“No, you’ll look assertive. It’s sexy.” She passed the phone back to me as I rolled my eyes. What should I say? I wrote a bit, deleted it, and repeated this cycle a few times before groaning and lowering the phone.
“I hate this.”
The phone beeped, and I glanced down. He’d messaged first! He immediately gained points for saving me the struggle of coming up with an opening line.
Hey! Hope you’re having a great evening. Hate messaging on here, want to meet somewhere to see if we click in person?
“Nice, nice,” said Zoe approvingly. “Hey, why don’t you try that new tapas place that just opened in town? I had a reservation there for tomorrow but my friend Gracie - you remember her - who was supposed to be coming up to visit, got sick and had to cancel. Take it for your date!”
