NOVEL WEB Anomalous data points
The next six days featured twenty three matches for Amy, eighteen actual conversations and eleven instances of me having to let down someone gently after them inviting me on a date. I felt awful doing it each time, both because they were clearly interested in Amy and because I was increasingly jealous of all the romantic attention Amy, who wasn’t even real, was getting. The only solace in rejecting them was that talking to eighteen girls at once was far too overwhelming for my anxious brain to handle and a huge time sink. Being down to fewer to handle was quite the relief.
The ones I was still chatting to, featured the following: Beth who is a bit of a gamer/nerd but very cute and wildly sporadic in her replies, which was, I suspected, the only reason the conversation hadn’t led to ‘let’s go on a date’ territory yet. Katie, who was bubbly and fun but not really a personality match for me or Amy, but who was very easy to talk to and thus I was happy just chatting with her. Ruby, who was goth and confident in a way that was hot and confused every last one of my male sensibilities, she also said she was bi, but talked about men in a way that made me think she didn’t date many, and that the ones she did date were nothing like how I presented myself. Finally, there was Penny, who I had been messaging like a best friend, except that actually, I messaged my best friends way less than this and I never flirted with them either. In fact, I never flirted with anyone like this. I wasn’t being much more flirty than I’d usually try to be, it was the nature of the flirting. This felt easy and comfortable, it was fun and I felt like I was opening up a little and being more honest and vulnerable than I ever had before, in the way that I imagine healthy people in relationships do.
There were three things that made the conversation with Penny difficult though. The first was that the more Penny seemed to like Amy, the more I felt guilty for not being her. The fact that I actually knew and had slept with Penny in real life, made it all so much worse. The second was that as I opened up more, I had to be more careful about what I revealed about myself, so that I didn’t give the game away. That did mean that Amy was an increasingly fleshed out person, with increasingly many similarities to me, just without as much shame or masculine bullshit and bravado. The final and most troubling thing was that unlike every other lesbian things had been going well with, she’d not asked me on a date yet. Which, given that I felt we’d talked more and connected more than I had with anyone else, meant I was probably missing something. All the evidence suggested that by now she should have asked me out and that I would have to feel awful and turn her down.
I took an hour and trawled through all the messages we’d sent, looking for any clues. Cute and friendly, nothing obviously missing. Flirty and kinda hot, no clues here. Honestly just fascinating to hear about her work, but nothing I could tell was off. There must be something given how much we’d talked? And nope, I’d just reached the start of the conversation. Her saying that she loved a good romance novel and that she was incapable of listening to music in a car without singing and dancing.
That at least presented an easy way to ask, or prompt her to tell me if there was anything I was missing.
Amy: Afternoon cutie! I just realised, and definitely have not been re-reading our conversation, that when we first texted you only told me two of the three most important things about you, and a girl can’t help but be curious
I learned kinda early on that the Amy who came naturally to me was openly a bit of a dork and that this vibe apparently worked for lesbians at large. Besides, for me to test accurately I had to be/act as a compelling lesbian and that was only going to happen if I acted as the one who felt natural to me. Regardless, now I just had to wait and see what she said and hope it at least put my curiosity to rest. Maybe it would be something that meant we couldn’t date, which would save me having to fabricate a reason. That would be much better and easier and- and has caused a huge lump in my throat and has not made me cry, nope, not crying, just blinking really hard, for fun.
Right, on to distracting and more important things, I need to stop by the shops and pick up the drinks that I would owe Ben for him having crushed me in the bet. One crate of semi-drinkable beer, one bottle of ‘just-above-supermarkets-own’ brand vodka, enough mixer to not taste the vodka, zero thoughts about penny, no checks of my phone because I’m fine and maybe some snacks because drunk me is always hungry. All sorted, now over to Ben’s for enough drinks to tolerate clubbing.
Ben greeted me at the door and got halfway towards a fist bump before seeing all the drinks I was carrying. “Wait, bro? Why’ve you got drinks?”
“Umm… the bet? Like we agreed? I lost so I got us drinks, duh” Had he forgotten?
“Well, no, I lost the bet so I got drinks?” Huh, I guess our rules did mean we could both win or both lose, but how? Any even slightly competent dating profile seems like it’d have at least one lesbian’s interest piqued enough to consider a date. I was gonna have to see what the idiot thought passed for a convincing woman.
“You gonna let me in so we can work out who actually owes who drinks? Cause it could be both of us which at worst just means we’ll both be drunk later.”
Once in his living room/kitchen and with a coffee table in front of us stacked high with booze and a beer each in hand we returned to the question of the hour. “Okay, so I definitely lost the bet because I got asked on eleven dates this week, it’s honestly been unreal.”
“Shit, eleven? And asked on? I didn’t even get to one, barely more than a few conversations.”
“Well come on then, show me the profile you made, I’ll tell you what you did wrong.” He passed his phone with the app open and…. Oh. This was a guys profile, this was just his normal profile, what lesbians did he expect to find with this? “Isn’t it obvious, this is just your normal profile? You must have known this wouldn’t work.”
“Nah, I edited it a little, but gay guys apparently just didn’t buy it, no matter what I put in the bio. Plus I didn’t want to fabricate too much, that felt like stereotyping or appropriation of queer culture, or something and made me kinda uncomfortable.” Most of his sentence was lost on me, my brain had entirely stalled.
“G-gay guys? But, we said, oh, oh…” We just agreed to try queer dating apps, and I just assumed lesbians. That had just felt like the obvious choice to me, I didn’t even consider pretending to be a gay man, I wanted to match and talk to people I was attracted to after all. That’s what any straight guy would have done, was Ben not as straight as he thought? I don’t know how else he’d have concluded that I meant ‘pretend to be a gay man’, without checking with me first. It’d be rude to just ask him though, although I could give him a leading question and the opportunity to tell me though.
“So, uh, how did you find pretending to be a gay guy?”
“Honestly it was super weird, I felt uncomfortable the whole time and just had no idea how to behave, it’s just not me you know.” Huh, but I’d found acting as a lesbian kinda easy, so either I was better at acting than I thought, or maybe he was repressing stuff that made the acting uncomfortable for him. “Based on your success you found it easy then? You sure you’re completely straight bro? Obviously cool if you’re not, don't worry.”
“Well yeah, I know I’m not into guys, because I didn’t make a profile for a gay man, I made one for a lesbian like I thought we agreed. You’re the one who misinterpreted everything and tried to date guys, unprompted.” Why did he look so shocked? Oh right, he just realised he could have been texting girls and having fun all week, like I had.
“So, just to clarify, you got asked out on eleven dates, by lesbians, who thought you were a girl? Bullshit.” What was hard to believe here?
“That’s what I said, although technically one was a kinda femme enby. Look, here’s my profile.”
“Okay, to be fair, I’d be convinced. And you were texting these girls, being a girl, all week?”
“Yeah, it was honestly really fun, apparently gay girls had a real thing for me and are way more chatty than straight girls, that’s kinda why I lost the bet.” I just don’t know why he was still looking confused.
“And you enjoyed yourself too, right. Urgh, I’ve not had enough drinks for this, at least we’ve got extra.” He sighed, loudly. “And you do know I’m gonna be calling you Amy all evening now right?”
“I’m pretty sure I’ll manage.”
“Of course you will. I’m not even gonna pretend to be surprised.” I’d lost the bet, but it still felt slightly like I’d won somehow.
