11/29/2011

The Last Frontier

Story Sent in by Tricia:

Chris and I had been together for just over a year. On our first date, he had taken me bowling, and we had such a good time that I would always ask him, every few weeks or so, if he wanted to go bowling again.

He'd always say, "Sure," but we never ended up doing it for some reason or another. Finally, he agreed to come with me, and we made plans to do it for a Friday night.

Up until this point, I had no idea that anything was wrong in our relationship. He hadn't breathed a word to me that there was any sort of problem, and sure hadn't acted like anything was amiss.

That night, he drove me to the bowling alley parking lot. I stepped out of the car once we had parked. Then, he threw the car into reverse, flew out of the parking spot, almost hit three guys walking together, then jetted forward and took off, leaving me there.

I called him immediately. "What's wrong? Is everything okay?"

"Yeah," he replied, cool as paint, "What's up?"

"Uh... you coming back here? What's wrong with you?"

A pause, then, "Yeah. I had to go. Talk to you later." He hung up. My additional calls went to his voicemail.

I called a friend who picked me up and dropped me off at Chris's place. I wanted to work things out and see what the issue was.

When I arrived there, his apartment door was locked. I knocked, called, and even slipped a note under the door. We had been with each other for about a year, and this was very distressing to me. He had never acted like this before. I finally left him a last message on his voicemail, telling him that I assumed that he needed space, and that he should call me whenever he wanted to. Also, he had a few of my things in his apartment, so if this was his way of ending things, then I at least wanted them back.

I didn't hear from him, and a little over a week later, when I went back to visit his apartment, his name was off the door.

I called him one more time and left a voicemail, asking him to drop off my things. No response. It wasn't anything irreplaceable, but still.

Two years later, nearly to the day, I received a large, heavy package in the mail. It was postmarked from Alaska. It had most of my stuff, and a blank piece of paper. A note? I'll probably never know.

10 comments:

  1. That is one hell of a mystery you've got yourself there. My guess would be that he was actually a secret government agent called away abruptly - his belongings would have been packed by movers and depending on the nature of his assignment he may not have had access to them for some time which would explain why you did not get them back until much later.

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  2. Something similar happened to me. We communicated mostly through IM, and he just stopped showing up online. I called, and the phone was disconnected. I drove by his apartment, and he had moved out. I went to his job, and they said he had quit about two weeks before he disappeared on me.

    I still have no idea what happened.

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  3. Yay, a mystery! These are my absolute favourite stories! Let's face it, though. Guys don't skip town and move to Alaska for trivial stuff. Sounds like he was involved in something illegal and saw someone at the bowling alley who was either going to kill him or turn him in. Probably someone who worked there or at least hung out there, as he was definitely avoiding the place.

    On another note, how the heck can you be with someone for a year and not develop even a single mutual acquaintence who you could ask about something like this?

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  4. He didn't like the way you acted after you beat his score on that first date. Always being asked to go again so you could throw it on his face clearly made him have a nervous breakdown.

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  5. He probably just didn't like the direction his life was going, and didn't want to be stuck married to OP (no offense, I'm sure you're a lovely person), in a town he didn't like, etc. He probably saw the myriad of reality TV shows on Discovery Channel that romanticize Alaska (there seem to be about a dozen at least), and thought, "hey, why not just drop everything holding me back, and seek my fortune out there like those guys!"

    Is it abrupt and crazy? Probably... but if it wasn't, would it be on this site?

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  6. Or maybe the time he left OP in the parking lot was their 2nd date and the stuff she left at his apartment was a year's worth of freaky stalker offerings that were actually returned by the police. Or maybe I've been reading this blog too long...

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  7. Some people are like this - shady, impulsive, irrational and crazy. It's likely not even Chris could give a straight answer as to what happened - but we need a rebuttal story.

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  8. If you've still got the piece of paper, try sticking it on the radiator. Could be invisible ink - most things people use are heat-activated.

    If it's UV pen, you can usually see it if you hold it at a bit of an angle in the sun (and prolly need a UV light to read it properly)

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  9. he was probably too chicken to call it off suddenly

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  10. Yeah, she just skipped over the part about him paying her bills and her verbally abusing him relentlessly in the car until he snapped and just took off. She had no idea it was coming because up till that point,he just took it. I know way too many women like that and how they treat men. And I AM a woman. These women are always completely clueless about what went wrong.

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