Mr. Unavailable #127: The Strawberry Fields Fairy

See Fro-Yo Guy for the background on this one.

When I got to work on Monday—lunch-date day—I realized I had a meeting at 1:30.

I texted #127: Oops. I have a meeting today at 1:30. Can you do lunch at noon? Sorry about that.
He texted back: NP.

I got to the Pret a Manger on Maiden Lane early and he was running a little late, so in the time I sat waiting for him, I became inexplicably nervous.

When he got there, he was appropriately apologetic for his lateness and I was still, and strangely, incredibly nervous. The stress level in my office was on high and there were meetings, and meetings made me anxious, but I still couldn’t account for my severe case of nerves. We got some sandwiches and drinks from the display cases and went up to the registers. I made sure he was a little ahead of me. It was the moment of truth. Would he pay or wouldn’t he? Was this a date or was this not a date?

He sidled up to one register and began to pay for his sandwich. The register to his left opened up and I went up and put my purchasable goods down. His cash was in his hand. I was slow to retrieve my wallet from my smallish purse, fishing around in it as if I was having trouble locating it. From out of the corner of my eye, I saw his cash go back into his wallet and his wallet go into his back pocket.

On the bright side, I was no longer nervous. On the dark side, I now had to talk myself out of being angry and, resultantly, disconnected: “It’s OK. It is just a quick lunch during work, it’s more like a meet-and-greet, not really a REAL lunch-lunch.”

We sat down and filled each other in on who we were. We covered the basics—family, siblings, where we were from, what we were like in high school. I was vaguely checked out due to the other conversation I was having with myself in my head.

I decided to be strategic about what I told him, so I informed him that I was heading to Boston to see my nephew that weekend and then going back to the Boston area the next weekend for my family reunion. It was my attempt to clue him in on my availability for the next couple of weeks so that he might take it upon himself to work around it.

So far, he wasn’t appearing very clued in.

“Should we go to Strawberry Fields?” he asked after we were done eating.

“Let’s go,” I said. Little did he know, it was like a second chance for him.

When we walked up to the frozen yogurt store, a tiny brunette girl who worked there was standing outside with a tray of samples.

“Would you like to try some?” she asked.

“Sure,” we said, trying some.

“We were going to come in here anyway,” #127 said.

“Are you two married?” she asked. I just smiled and looked at him. I was going to enjoy this.

“No, we’re not,” he said.

“Are you dating?”

“We’re just friends,” he said.

“You two should get together. Because you both have really pretty eyes. You’d have cute kids.”

I could think of a better reason for us getting together—like him springing for lunch—but that hadn’t happened. We looked at each others’ eye. His were a bright pale blue. I had to admit, they were pretty. We both nodded in tacit agreement that we both did, indeed, have pretty eyes.

“You should buy her her frozen yogurt,” she said to him. “Women like that. We like to be treated. It impresses us. It’ll impress her.”

Somewhere, there was a god.

“Well, OK,” he said, as if that hadn’t actually been a forgone conclusion.

We self-served our fro-yos, he paid, I said “thank you” and then we walked down toward the seaport. There was a marked uptick in mood on my side of things, which helped power our continued get-to-know-you conversation, and then, finally, he said, “Maybe one day we could take the ferry from here over to Williamsburg and I could show you around.”

“That sounds great,” I said. And then—maybe because I was already becoming familiar with his passiveness or maybe because a huge dose of sugar had just hit my bloodstream—I asked, “When?”

Insert awkward pause. “I don’t know, I can’t tomorrow or the next day,” he said.

“And I’m gone this weekend,” I said, trying to sound a little less available.

“Well, soon,” he said.

“Yeah,” I agreed.

And then he walked me back to my building and we hugged good-bye.

Signs of Hope: He—eventually—paid for something. And he suggested a tentative next—I hesitate to say “date”—get-together.

Red Flags: He didn’t pay for lunch, he had to be prompted to pay for frozen yogurt and he didn’t set a date for our next…date? Get-together? Friendly guided tour?

Turning Point: When the little frozen yogurt fairy appeared and said, “You should buy her her frozen yogurt.”

Diagnosis: For him: He’s seeming a tad unavailable.
For me: Why do I keep hoping that these guys will suddenly show signs of availability? Why? Why?