When I first saw her profile online my heart skipped a beat
She was cute.
Beautiful smile.
Playful eyes.
Quirky attitude.
As I perused her profile I became intrigued.
Crossing my fingers I wrote (it is as difficult as it
sounds) hoping that somehow my message would stand out and she’d reply.
And she did.
Of course…otherwise this would be a
very boring
very short
story
Robin – aka United to my friends because of her Church background
You see my friends are too lazy to remember names
At least until it gets serious
Like after marriage
And kids
Who start high school
We chat back and forth about our love for Jesus, people
and ice cream…
In time we arrange a date at Cold Stone Creamery
One just opened inside a Tim Hortons -or so the website
tells me.
Apparently sometimes the internet lies
Who knew?
By Cold Stone creamery they mean a freezer with pints of Cold
Stone ice cream.
Thanks internet.
So after promising to not kidnap/kill/perform other
nefarious deeds she gets in my car and we drive to Marble Slab Creamery instead.
We have a great time laughing and getting to know each other
Dropping her back at her car successfully unharmed
We hug goodbye and both agree to go out again.
We soon make plans for a second date…she had talked up her
Wii skills a lot on the first date so we met for lunch to be followed by an
epic wii battle.
Delightful desert
Captivating conversation
Flirtatious glances
And then we head back to my place for the challenge.
Matt vs. Robin
A series of three almost athletic events to find who, and
who alone, would be crowned.
Wii Champion!
The gruelling competition starts with an intense boxing
match.
Bobbing and weaving
punches thrown towards the screen.
Until at last she falls down with a thud…
Well just the video game version of her.
I don’t normally try to knock my dates out
I swear.
Next up Bowling
Falling behind after a few faulty frames
I step up my game
Strike after strike
Until my attention is drawn away again by her cute smile
My game goes down the gutter.
One a piece we come to the final round of competition.
A friendly game of Tennis.
Smashes back and forth
Volley
Return
Volley
Return
A close match
Peppered with trash talk as we split sets bringing it down
to the wire.
until with one final smash the ball flies past to close out
the game
Leaving me
the champion.
And I didn’t gloat one bit…
well maybe a little bit,
but she started it
Not only is she cute, fun, interesting
she’s good at video games and a good sport.
Maybe this could be headed somewhere.
A guy can hope.
Walking her to the door to say goodbye.
I began to lean in for a hug
Maybe a kiss on the cheek
The end to a perfect date
And that’s when it happened.
She stuck out her hand.
Shocked I stare at it
For what seems like an eternity
I’m sure a look of confusion crosses my face as I reach out
mine
And shake
Thanking me for a fun afternoon
Calling me friend
She releases my hand
Without a linger
Without any sense of interest
Maybe I should have let her win?
I thought the deal was sealed
I thought I was in
A handshake must not always close the deal
In dating it must mean something else
And with that – her name changed –
-Handshake United-
A date with so much promise
Comes crashing to the ground
With a simple handshake
The weird thing is you’d think after ending a date with a
handshake I’d never see her again.
Well you’d be wrong.
A couple of days later she phoned me up
invited me over as friends to play wii
I think she wanted a rematch.
Turns out she wanted something else...
her roommate was there and it seemed like she was trying to
hook me up with her.
I got two handshakes that night…
