Mr. Unavailable #98: The Calm Before the Storm

See From Russia, With No Love, More of the (Exact) Same and Sanity Takes a Turn for the background on this one.

What Happened: Mr. Unavailable #98 and I had become friends. To recap: We’d gone for a midnight snack one Saturday night and he’d admitted he only went for crazy women and had pretty much taken a vow of celibacy. After that, he became a safe fill-in for dateless Saturday nights. The Saturday before he went on a three-week trip to his motherland, I was on my way back from Boston on the Chinatown bus and knew I was headed for a lonely Saturday night, so I texted him:

Me: Midnight snack? On Chinatown bus from Boston.

#98: K

Me: Will u be awake?

#98: I ll be glad to be awake for you

It turned out he was awake but not for me—he had to be awake to give emergency anesthesia to someone else. So I didn't see him. And then he went to Russia.

Four weeks later, my neighborhood became part of Hurricane Irene’s Evacuation Zone C. With potential disaster upon us, I was feeling neighborly, so I called him.

“Are you excited for the hurricane?” I asked.

“No, Mama. Want to meet for coffee? I buy you coffee,” he said.

We met on the corner in front of The Bean. It was Saturday around noon. We sat on the benches talking about his trip and counting down the minutes until the subway closed and the rain began.

“I have to go to the hardware store to get supplies for my hurricane projects,” I said. While everyone else had rushed the grocery stores for food and the hardware stores for emergency supplies, I’d developed a list of things to do in the event of days of boredom: organize my receipts, go through my pile of magazines, do a facemask—or three—whiten my teeth a couple of times and hang Chinese lanterns from my bedroom ceiling. The string was for the latter.

“I go with you to hardware store,” he said. At Ace, he provided moral support for my purchase. Outside, the rain that had started as a drizzle had become a pour. I told #98 that Zoe and I were making camp later and that he should come over and camp out with us. He said OK and then we went our separate ways.

A few hours later, I was in the midst or organizing my receipts (Hurricane Project #3) and Zoe was in the midst of concocting a chef’s salad (Hurricane Project #1) when the wind began hammering against the windows. I texted #98 to check in.

Me: How u doing?

#98: Terrible

Me: Why? Want to come over?

#98: Will you feed me

Me: Yes. We have food. We are making a camp. Want to camp? Jo is making sandwiches

#98: Can I come in a couple of minutes

Me: Yes of course. We are going to start watching movies in a little while. We are in our pajamas so feel free to dress down.

When he walked in about an hour later, we’d pulled out the sofa-bed and were laying around in our granny pajamas eating sandwiches.

“Here, sit here,” I said, patting the bed between me and Zoe.

“Want a sandwich?” Zoe asked. She gave him one of her melted cheese-and-British surprise sandwiches.

“This is a tiny sandwich. Five of these are a real sandwich,” he said. I may have forgotten to mention, playing the curmudgeon was part of his shtick, so this complaint—and every one that came before and went after—went ignored.

Then he ate the sandwich. “I’m still hungry,” he said.

“We have ice cream…crackers…cheese…grapes…” We offered him everything. Because we were prepared to cater to the curmudgeon's demands, he politely declined.

The curmudgeon went away for a little while but then reappeared with Hurricane Project #5: Watching a movie.

“This movie so slow,” he said about 20 minutes into it.

“It’s lit terribly,” Zoe agreed.

“Do you guys want to put something else on?” I asked.

They both shook their heads.

A few minutes later, #98 said he had to go.

“Thank you so much, ladies, for the hospitality,” he said.

“Call us later if you get scared,” I said.

After he left, Zoe said, “You should have seen the look on his face when he walked in. He didn’t know what to make of it. He thought he was going to get lucky. And the way he looked at you…he definitely wants to know.”

Signs of Hope: He wants to know.

Red Flags: It seems he’s wanted to know for a while now but has never done anything about it.

Turning Point: When he came over to hang out. Having Zoe there as chaperone would have been the only time it would have ever been safe for him to come over.

Diagnosis: For Him: Still unavailable.
For Me: I think I’d be afraid to be available to him.

Mr. Unavailable #127: Last Call

See Fro-Yo Guy and The Strawberry Fields Fairy for the background on this one.

Five days after lunch with #127, I was heading back to New York City from Boston on the Chinatown bus when #127 texted me.

#127: How are your fro-yo levels?

Me: Low. It’s been three days.

#127: Wow. That’s a while. Been a couple for me too. Might hafta hit handles.

Me: Yeah, that’s totally understandable. It’s a Saturday night. Lots of people are doing it. It’s not like you have a problem or anything.

#127: Exactly. EVERYONE is doing it. I just DJ’d all day in the heat. Gonna shower and then might get my fro-yo levels straighten out. If you’re free let me know if you’d wanna join me.

Me: Wow. DJ. I had no idea. I’d love to join you for some Handles but I’m on the Chinatown bus heading back from Boston. Won’t be back until late.

#127: OHHHH YEAH, I forgot you were in Boston. How’d it go?

Me: It was really good.

#127: When’s your bus getting in?

Let’s stop there for a moment. When I read his question, my hopes shot up. Any girl’s would. But here’s the thing: My bus wasn’t getting in until midnight. He’d just set himself up. If he didn’t offer to meet me, he’d look lame. There was no way around it. I'd already said I was getting in late. And if he did offer to meet me, he was looking more available than I sensed he probably wanted to look.

Me: My bus gets in at midnight.

Fifteen minutes went by before he responded.

#127: You should try to go straight to handles for last call. Think it’s 1230am on sat.

Ouch! A recommendation? When I got home, I did make a last call, but it wasn’t to 16 Handles. I called #98 and we went for a midnight snack.

A week later, I decided to go to Strawberry Fields for frozen yogurt after lunch. When I walked in, #127 was there. I was wearing a maroon velveteen dress, so I look pretty saucy, which he appeared to appreciate. We got our frozen yogurts—separately—and then, even though he’d just said he’d been on a two-hour lunch break, he offered to walk with me down toward the seaport. As we talked, I felt like I was making up more my previous over-availability. Not once did I ask, “When?” And, naturally, he wasn’t going to offer up a when.

He walked me back to my office building and we hugged good-bye, saying we should do this again soon.

Signs of Hope: He did seem happy to see me when we ran into each other.

Red Flags: A week after I ran into him, I still hadn’t heard from him.

Turning Point: It was more of a gradual fade-out than a turning point. As more time passed and I still hadn't hear from him, his unavailability was sealed.

Diagnosis: For him: I wonder if the whole two weeks that we were communicating, he was encumbered in another relationship of some kind. Or maybe I'm giving him too much credit.
For me: Wow, that one didn't linger. Maybe that means the unavailable encounters are getting shorter, making room for the available encounters. Or maybe I'm giving the universe too much credit.

Postscript: On Oct. 21, two and a half months after we’d run into each other, I received a text from #127: Hey Tara. It’s [#127]. Long time no see. How’s it going? Still eating lots of fro-yo?


My guess is that he was recently unencumbered. I, however, was just becoming encumbered with #133. I happened to be with Kevin when I got his text. “Should I bother?”


Kevin just shook his head, “Uh, no.”