It was that rock’n roll skinny tattooed pasty white skin no ass tight jeans look he had. I knew it. If he’d been wearing a suit and carrying a briefcase I wouldn’t have given him a second look. I was doomed never to be wealthy, that’s for sure. I was fated to end up with artistic minded men that had dreams of wealth and fame without the luck to get there. They may have the talent, they may play awesome lead guitar, or draw bold bright intricate comic stories, or sing like Joe Cocker in 1967, or write bloody violent short stories that smacked of Clive Barker and Neil Gaiman, but they were never quite going to reach that pinnacle.

But I liked believing the dream with them. I liked picturing myself on their arm walking into the Oscars, in a Vera Wang gown and Harry Winston diamonds. Or the other end of the spectrum, walking into Madison Square Garden wearing black leather and carrying their guitar case with an “all access” pass around my neck jutting out of my miniscule cleavage. I didn’t want to be preppie yuppie America with the Volvo, the 9-5 job and the house in the suburbs. I wanted an apartment in the city, a penthouse, and parties, famous, fun and witty people, and never have to cook meatloaf.  

Paul Simon wrote it best, “If you took all the girls I knew when I was single, and put them all together for one night, you know they’d never match my sweet imagination, and everything looks worse in black and white.”   My real life would always let me down compared to what my imagination could do with one skinny tattooed guy.

He worked in the mall at a bookstore. I would go in there just to see what his hair was doing that day, if it was moussed up or flattened down, or flyaway. If he had his goatee or he’d shaved it off. If he was wearing mascara or his big silver ring. Which retro 50’s button down shirt was he wearing, with his tattoos peeking out. I would try to make conversation in the few minutes I thought were allowed between shop employees and customers. “Like your tattoo” or “where’s the Shakespeare?”. I ended up buying CD’s and books just to have the three-line conversation at the check-out.  

I got off on the rush of adrenaline after I would spot him. The clammy hands, the butterflies in my stomach and the flush I could feel rising in my face.  I imagined conversations, dates, sex. Slowly, a plan started forming in my head. Something that I never thought I’d be able to really do.  A plan I felt needed to be discussed with three or four of my friends, to the nth detail, over and over and over again. I would write him a note and hand it to him and run away. I would ask him out on a date. I would lure him into my car and… I think my co-workers and friends were ready to strangle me by the third day of strategic discussions. 

I finally settled on just asking him out. I had moments of imagined rejection, as I was sure he was dating the tragically hip dressed girl that worked there too. She looked like a gypsy with  a 60’s shag haircut. I heard a few conversations that she had with him, she spoke like a valley girl, but I thought maybe she was more his style than the rumpled yet cute geek that was me.

Two weekend mornings in a row, I got up early, dressed in what I thought was hip, and slightly sexy, and actually put on make-up WITH mascara, to get to the bookstore before it got crowded. Both mornings, he wasn’t there. The disappointment I felt was akin to losing a winning lottery ticket. The highs and lows of my emotions over this man I had barely spoken to before was like being in 10^th grade again, the way my heart stopped every time a certain guy would walk by. Did he see me? Did he look at me? What was he thinking? Do you think he thinks of me? What do you think he thought I was thinking? God, I really didn’t need to be back there again. Having a crush makes you feel alive, and excited, and miserable. My friends said it’s better than not feeling anything. Sometimes I wonder.

Wednesday night I was back at the mall to meet friends for a movie. I cruised through the bookstore and spotted him there in the music section, not too busy. This was my moment. I wandered in and started looking at the DVD’s. He was busy, talking to a co-worker, a mousy middle aged woman, good, not the tragically hip gypsy. She gave me weird vibes.

I walked up to him and said hey, he remembered me and said hi back. I showed him my new tattoo that I kept telling myself I did NOT get just for him. He asked if it had hurt, I told him not really. I was babbling about endorphins kicking in and killing the pain. I felt like I was making an ass of myself. Customers came up to the desk, I walked away and began examining the DVD’s again.

Eddie Izzard, Dress To Kill was on sale. My videotape of the show was worn out from so much play, I considered buying the DVD. Then I began to notice that this person who floated my emotions did have a certain Eddie-ness about him. He wasn’t cross-dressing, and he didn’t really look like Eddie, but there was something, maybe in his manner, or his speaking voice. I loved his speaking voice, it was deep, and soft, and laid back. It made me feel safe. I could follow him around the store all day waiting for him to talk to people. I could imagine being curled up in his arms listening to him tell me how his day had been. Maybe I had transferred the crush I had on Eddie to this little man behind the counter telling a woman where she could find The Sound of Music. Where was Dr. Freud when I needed him?

I had a few wavering moments. Maybe I shouldn’t do this – it would freak him out and maybe I don’t really like him anyway, I like Eddie and he reminded me of Eddie, for whatever reason. The quintessential Eddie line came into my head “…don’t know what to DO! I wasn’t given instructions…” Of course a thousand other lines flew through my head, like they will do, and cause you to smile secretly , just enough so that other people think you are crazy and back slowly away from you.  

Would our first time in bed be mature, wise learned man ejaculation? Or would I be just anything with a pulse?

Would our first date involve hang gliding, snow boarding, or the Heimlich maneuver?

Does he have cats, do they drill? Does he think Star Wars is just full of British actors serving tea?

I stopped myself and relinquished the secret smile before someone saw me. I was having way too much fun for one person in the middle of a mall. But thinking all these things helped loosen me up so I could follow my plan.

Oh fuck it, I thought. Just do it. He was emptying a box, alone. I walked up to him and said, “So, are you available to go out some time?” with my best wide eyed doe caught in the headlights look.

He looked out toward the door. I think he thought I meant that we should go somewhere right now. “Go out?” he asked.

“Yeah”, I said, “do they ever let you out of this place? You know, like for a drink or something?”

“I don’t drink” he said.

Dammit…quick, think of something!!!

“Nothing? Coffee? Milk? Apple juice?”  The apple juice line got him, he smiled. The idea that I was asking him for a date was starting to sink in.

“Pineapple juice?” He asked impishly. Ooh I liked that, he got my joke. Most people don’t.

“Sure I know some places where you can get some kick-ass pineapple juice.”

I think he got a bit nervous. His hands jammed in his pockets, his eyes looked toward the floor, his shoulders shrugged. “Yeah…sure…why not?” he said, with a sort of grin.

I had conveniently written my home number on the back of one of my business cards, which I pulled out of my pocketbook, I handed him the card. “Well here’s my card, my home number’s on it.”  I may have said something like, call me when you’re free, I really don’t remember, my brain kind of went numb.

He scrutinized the card, my artistic insane boss had designed it, and it had a lot of crap on the front. He asked which number was the home number, I said it was on the back. He flipped the card over and looked at it.

I realized I still didn’t know his name, so I asked him what’s your name? Rich, he said. Then he gestured toward me, and I said “Amy” with my best smile. He smiled too. I thought my head was going to explode then and there.

I said, “well ok, I’ll talk to you soon then” and smiled again. And tried not to run like a mad thing out the door. I walked calmly, leaving him there to examine my card and get teased by his mousy co-worker.

I assumed that if he’d had a girlfriend, or a boyfriend, he would have told me. I like to assume people will be honest, give them the benefit of the doubt. I also had a nagging idea in my glass-half-empty way of thinking that he’d only said yes because he didn’t want to piss off a customer and maybe get fired.

My friends all seem to think he’s going to call. Why wouldn’t he call, they say. You’re cute, smart, funny, he’d be an idiot not to call you. Well yeah, but I’ve been cute, smart and funny most of my life and lots of guys have chosen not to call me.

So as I play date scenarios over and over again in my mind,  and I wait for the phone to ring, I think of a reddish-blond haired man with sparkling eyes and make-up talking about a treat sucking house or his school band, or the Trojan War, or Henry the 8^th.  It’s ok, I think.  Sometimes life is stranger than really weird shit.

---