What in the world had just flown out of my mouth? The phone conversation went dead silent as my mind started to swirl. A date for a wedding? I didn’t have a date for this wedding. I could hear my parents breathing as I stood up from the couch, walking over to the measly living room window that overlooked the alleyway down below.
A date for the wedding.
Shit.
I’d just told my parents some nonexistent man was taking me to this wedding.
“Oh my gosh. I knew you were holding out on us. Why did you RSVP for only yourself if you had a date?” my mother asked.
“Because I only asked him to go with me a few days ago,” I said.
“What’s his name, princess? How long have the two of you been together?” my father asked.
“The two of you can bombard him with those questions at the wedding. But um… he’s about to pick me up soon so I have to go,” I said.
“Wait, you’re going on a date? And you didn’t tell me!?” my mother asked.
“I haven’t met this boy yet,” my father said.
“Well, I haven’t lived with you for six years, so you won’t meet him until the wedding,” I said. “I gotta go you guys. Love you.”
“Make sure you wear makeup!” my mother said.
“And don’t forget to wear things that flatter your hips,” my father said.
“Thanks. Yeah. Got it. Okay… bye guys.”
“Bye!”
I hung up the phone call as I stared mindlessly out the window. Great. Now I had to come up with a date to this wedding. Or I could show up alone and tell my parents he dumped me. That could work, too. But then my mother would start prowling around again at my cousin’s wedding for someone not related to us that I could dance with.
And that would be horrendously embarrassing.
I made my way back to the couch and crossed my legs. Mozart jumped into my lap and settled down, his tail wrapping around my wrist.
“I know you want me to pet you, just hang on,” I said.
I opened up my internet and did a quick Google search. ‘How to find a last-minute date to a wedding’. Surely the internet could help me in one of the many areas of my life I kept screwing up. I scrolled through the multiple blog entries and clicked through pages. I ignored the sponsored links as my eyes fluttered around the screen of my phone. And when I was about to close my internet and relegate myself to being broken up with by some nonexistent boyfriend, a window popped up on my phone.
“Date Night?”
I scrolled through the contents and read through all the advertisement material. I’d heard about this application before. I heard some of the women at work talking about it. From what I gathered from my eavesdropping sessions, it was a website that helped people hook up. It was popular because it made connections between people almost instantaneous. I wasn’t looking for someone to have sex with, but I was looking for someone instantaneous. A man to pop out of thin air, help me navigate this wedding, then go away.
And I was desperate enough to get curious.
I downloaded the application onto my phone and created a profile. I chose a picture of myself from my photo album on my phone, then went through the rigmarole of filling out the profile. It was all very basic. Name. Age. Height. Body type. Likes and dislikes. A small introductory paragraph that described me in a nutshell.
Me.
How would I describe me?
‘Hi, guys.’
No. That was wrong. So, I backspaced it and tried again.
‘Hello, gentleman.’
Yikes. Way too sultry. The last thing I had going for me was sultry.