not really meet cute anymore

So many of you clamoring for part two! Far be it from me to make you wait any longer.

From October 10, 2006

...somewhere close to the beginning but kind of in the middle...

This is where part two of the story of how Fred and I began should go. And so far, I've started and scrapped four versions of it.

The first part was funny. Strange. Fated lovers passing on a street corner. This next part? It's pretty much by the book. That's not to say it's not the best story I know. I'm just not sure it's the story you want to read. I struggle with how much to tell you. The details are important to me. They're probably boring to you. I also don't want it to read like this:

We emailed. We laughed. We went for dinner, but it was not a date. We talked a lot. We emailed some more. We went on a date. The end. 

But that's how it went.

Oh, sure. I was beyond high-maintenance, and probably drove the guy nuts. That first night, that wasn't a date? I can't count how many times I changed the restaurant. On our first real date? I made him drive around for 45 minutes so I could figure out where I wanted to eat. And then there was the ex-boyfriend issue, who arrived in town the night of my first date with Fred. Ha.

There was also a play I was in, which required me to rehearse pretty much every night of the week in October. And that kid who thought he would make it his job to pursue me with all of his twenty-year-old wiles the night the show closed. Sweet kid. No chance, but sweet.

So I'll just tell you how nervous I was when Fred and I first went to dinner on our non-date. I was incredibly nervous. And how wonderful and relaxed he was, and how much he made me laugh. And how I made him a map of Brooklyn with sugar packets and he told me about growing up on Podunk Road. And how neither of us wanted the night to end, and would have talked all night if we could have. But instead, slowly walked to our cars in the parking lot, promising to spend another night hanging out.

And how I think I fell in love with him a teeny, tiny bit that night.

It was the best date we didn't have.