Story Sent in by Marie:
Rob winced a bit as he shifted in his seat. We were at a restaurant on our very first date, and the fact that he seemed to be in pain was not lost on me. I asked him, "Everything okay?"
He replied, "Oomf, not really. See, I had an... a... well, a prostate exam earlier."
My turn to wince. "Ooh, ouch. You okay? Is it supposed to hurt that much?"
He shook his head. "Well, it wasn't pleasant, put it that way. We don't have to talk about it at dinner. I'll be all right."
Taking that to mean that he didn't want to talk about it, I left it alone and I asked him, "Tell me about your family."
He gave me a funny look and said, "Okay, well someone's not very sympathetic."
"What are you talking about?"
He shifted, winced, and said, "You could at least say, 'If I can get you anything, let me know.' You just went on like I wasn't sitting here in unimaginable pain."
My turn to shift due to discomfort. I said, "You said that we didn't have to talk about it and that you would be all right. Was that a lie?"
"No, but you could've been way more sympathetic."
I sighed. "Can I get you anything?"
He replied with a smile, "Well, I might ask you to make it up to me somehow."
"And how is that?"
He leaned in, shifted himself in his seat, and I noted that he didn't wince that time. "Well, I had an unpleasant... anal experience earlier, and I'd love to round out the day with a pleasant one."
Ugh, ugh, ugh, ugh, ugh, ugh, ugh! Was he serious? Was this a joke?
As if in answer to that, he said, "Do you know what I mean?" and winked.
I said, "I do. I can't really provide that, tonight–"
"Some other night, then?" he asked, "I'm around most of this week."
"I'm not," I replied, "The rest of my week... life... yeah, it just filled up."
He sighed and shrugged. "Your loss."
Somehow I doubted it. The rest of the date was civil, but any excitement had gone out of him. It had gone out of me, too, of course. After dinner, he gave me an awkward hug goodnight (which I didn't expect, otherwise I would've made some excuse to dodge it) and that was it.
7/15/2012
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You know, I keep reading these stories (and since I've only recently discovered this site, they're pretty fresh in my mind) where people stay through the date. Free dinner is not that important.
ReplyDeleteIf anyone should "make it up to [him] somehow" it should be his doctor. His date didn't make him get a prostate exam.
ReplyDeleteAlthough I doubt he actually had one, yet another 'If I try it enough someone's bound to say yes' scheme.