marco. (san francisco, circa 2007.)
I was ridiculously attracted to Marco when we met for our first date in the spring of 2007. Twice as good-looking in person as in his photos, Marco was Chilean, with eyes and hair like black coffee and a large, self-deprecatory intellect that he enjoyed tossing around to great effect.
Our date went pretty well. Like I said, I was ridiculously attracted to him, so I admittedly overlooked a sign or two that maybe we weren’t the most stellar match ever made. (For example: he grew extremely agitated when recalling how some random dude once hit him for douche-ily throwing a newspaper on the ground. Yes, he was a litterbug. No, nobody likes litterbugs.)
At the end of the date, he hugged me goodnight. Pressed up against him, my face buried in the skin near his ear, I suddenly found my lips purposefully pressed to his neck. It was awkward and unplanned; I just couldn’t stop myself. I had to kiss his neck or I would collapse into a pool of want. Prompted by my weird impromptu neck-kiss, he kissed me back, full on the mouth, and I felt butterflies. They hadn’t visited in months, so I was extra-excited.
We had talked about hanging out again, and he said he would call. A few weeks went by, though, and I didn’t hear from him. Ignoring my “uh oh” instinct, I sent him a quick “hey, want to hang out again?” email. He did. We saw a movie; the beloved butterflies came back. We rolled around half-naked on my bed for a couple of hours, and I thought the night went exceptionally well. (Can you blame me?)
Five days later I was starting to freak when I hadn’t heard from him. Then, into my inbox popped this missive from Marco: “I enjoyed meeting you and hanging out with you, and think you are incredibly smart, but I am not sure if we should persue [sic] anything beyond friendship. I didn’t sense tons of chemistry, which is odd, because i think you are totally attractive and sweet, and you are definitely an interesting person.”
On what crazy planet did two hours of half-naked groping equal a lack of chemistry? Furthermore, ouch.
I didn’t reply, and haven’t seen or heard from Marco since.
