Intentions
For reasons that aren’t so clear to me now, I made a point of not calling it a date. It was definitely not a date.
But we did have dinner together, and had gone to see a movie, and were now sitting on opposite ends of my couch, just far apart to be a little tentative and awkward, talking late enough into the night to suggest perhaps a hint of interest, or at least, that she wasn’t completely put off by me. And to my surprise she revealed herself to be warm and funny and intriguingly open about all sorts of things: her work, friends, family, herself even. It was kind of shocking, to be honest, the degree of openness she displayed and the kind of conversations we managed to have, despite not really knowing each other at all.
She spoke easily and at length about her brother’s upcoming wedding, the difficult politics of her complex family relationships, and her anxieties over having to give the best (wo)man’s toast in front of everybody. Just wing it, I suggested. Come up with a couple ideas beforehand and say what comes to mind about them when the time comes. She couldn’t do that, she insisted, she’s just not that kind of person, she hates public speaking and standing up in front of crowds and being the center of attention and all that. She had to thoroughly script and compose a written document. No really, I argued, you should just say what you feel at the moment, funny, sad, poignant, whatever. You’re his sister, I said, nobody will judge you for being honest.
As I walked her to her car, in a supremely awkward moment I told her (and the memory is very clear, as I had spent the previous ten minutes trying to think of the most delicate, neutral, connotation-free way to deliver this, because as far as I knew, I was in her eyes just that bizarre guy from league whose attentions she was curiously humoring) that I didn’t want to use any loaded terms to describe the evening, but it would be nice if we could do this sort of thing again, sometime. She agreed, and with that, she drove off.
I then walked back upstairs and immediately asked my sister if I had just gone on a date or not, and if I was stupid for being so specific about not calling it one. Did I just completely blow it? I think I like her, I said. God, I hope this wasn’t a terrible, stupid idea.
She left for the wedding a couple days later, but not before I suggested some vague, nebulous plan about doing something after her return. I again scrupulously avoided using the d-word, or describing what I had planned at all, largely because I had no idea yet what I wanted to do, only that it was suddenly very important for me to have something to look forward to, after her trip. That and I impatiently wanted to see if she really wanted to hang out again. She said ‘okay’, which melted my brain for all its ambiguity, until I came to learn that ‘okay’ meant ‘yes’ with her.
Later that weekend, I made a trip out to watch some local club teams play at a tournament in suburban Milwaukee. Susan was still her teammate on Tuna at the time and had filled my ear all summer about the team and their progress and how excited she was to play her first tournament with them. I was nominally eager to jump back into my role of documenting the local ultimate scene but had found my excitement tempered as the day drew closer. To be honest, my thoughts were elsewhere most of the time, and while I went with the intent to shoot my usually broad event coverage I soon abandoned any pretense of being anything other than a fan when I handed my camera off to Jennie and made myself at home in Susan’s chair. I cheered and helped relay calls, tried to make myself useful and in general probably befuddled more than a few girls who had no idea why I, this random guy, was there in the first place.
On the ride home, I carpooled with a guy named Theo, a former local who flew in for the weekend to pick up with a team. We had virtually nothing in common and knew nothing about each other save for the all the frisbee friends we shared, so of course the conversation instantly turned to girls.
Theo had recently met a girl out east through his summer league and was on the very early stages of pursuing something with her. The guy was clearly smitten with his newfound romantic interest and spoke of her in the most endearingly glowing terms, while at the same time acknowledging the day-to-day tentativeness of his situation. “She’s pretty fucking awesome,” he told me. “Probably the coolest frisbee girl I’ve ever met.”
Asked if I was seeing anybody, I smiled and told him that I too had recently met somebody through summer league and had gone on a ill-defined evening activity with her just days ago, though it was unclear to me if she thought of it as a date, nor was I sure if there was to be a second get-together, our casual plans notwithstanding. I don’t know, I said, it was all very vague to me. She’s very hard to read, and with her being out of town for a week, I didn’t know what to think at that point. I think I really like her, I said, but I don’t know if she’s all that interested.
It was at that moment that my phone beeped, and I checked to see who it was. I stared at the message for a moment, and then laughed. You won’t believe who just texted me, I told him. “Her?” He asked. Yeah, I said. From her brother’s wedding. She just gave her speech. She cried, but so did everybody else, she says.
“She’s texting you from a wedding? One she’s serving in?” He laughed. “David, that’s awesome, seriously. You have nothing to worry about.”