Two Couples, One Bar, and An Ex

We were at Melrose last night, a first date. It was the second spot we stopped for drinks. There were five people left in the place: the server, me, my date, and another couple. 

The couple sat on the other side of the room from our table; the girl was facing me and the man was across from her. “ENTP? What’s your Myers Briggs?” I heard her ask the man. What a terrible-first-date kind of question lol, I thought. 

I noticed the girl’s date’s back and thought he looked like Aaron. Aaron and I dated for the whole spring season this year, he came to my friend’s parties, cooked me big suppers at his expensive apartment, and we went out for drinks and food all over the city. The sex was sub par — we both knew that early on, but we liked each other enough. 

I got shaky. I hadn’t seen him since he excused himself from being on my call list, “work has just gotten much busier since we started seeing each other.” I knew it was the lack of sex we had; I had told him he needed to fuck me more after we went out for supper on my birthday and at bedtime that night, he blew off turning me on (he didn’t even offer to go down on me). I wasn’t surprised it ended. He didn’t want to make time to make it better. If this was him, and this was the first time I was seeing him since then, and he was on a date simultaneously with me on my date, on a Wednesday (a work night), he must have found more time. Good for him!

I couldn’t confirm it was him until I saw past his back. It definitely looked like him: fade cut, button down shirt, a little tight by the lats and across his shoulders (they were extra broad). I made an excuse to go across the floor to look out the window on the other side of Melrose, just so I could turn and face this girl’s date. He was looking at her, hand on his drink and the left hand shoved into his lap. He held his gaze to her and I held mine to him. I gave it a solid six seconds so he had time to feel me looking. I knew it was him, and he definitely saw me, but he never looked at me. My date and I walked to the exit past their table.

Lawnwork in Gucci