My Dinner With Marty

Marty was supposed to come over for dinner last night at 7:30. It was our first actual meeting. At about 6 or so I was boiling the pasta noodles that I was going to stuff for our dinner. Right then the phone rang and the first thing I thought of was that it was Marty cancelling. My mind had not concocted a reason for his cancelling; I just figured that he was. Well, it turned out to be Justin calling, a guy I had a drink with last Friday. We talked for a few minutes as I kept an eye on the noodles bubbling in the pot. Finally he asked me if I would like to go out this weekend for a drink and dinner. I told him that I appreciated his interest but that I was going to concentrate on one particular other guy. Justin came back with a kind of hostile, snide “Oh really?” I said I was sorry but yes, that was my thinking. There was about five seconds of quiet and then he huffed something like, “Okay, then forget it.” He then hung up. For a few seconds I was hurt. That quickly turned into a kind of disbelief feeling. I might have mumbled an “Oh wow.” It was that kind of feeling. I guess that’s the last of Justine. Unfortunately I will probably see him at the fitness center. I hope he won’t be rude.

About an hour and a half after Justine’s call Marty knocked on my door. I pulled it open and there he was, with a bottle of red wine in his hand. I gave him a quick hung and told him to come in. I said that he looked just like the guy in the photos, and so he was exactly what I expected. Marty told me the same thing except that I was taller than he expected. It turned out we were nearly the same height.

I had purchased a bottle of wine but Marty’s wine was better so I opened his bottle. I poured a couple of glasses and we sat on the sofa to talk. He was very funny. He confessed that he had not been so nervous since he went out with some girl in junior high. He then smiled and calmly, humorously stated that on that occasion he had vomited. I broke up laughing and almost spilled my wine.

My stuffed pasta noodles were a little more chewy than I wanted, but otherwise the dinner wasn’t too bad, if I do say so myself. Marty told me that the dinner was to his liking. I said that I thought it was okay, but nothing great. With a twinkle in his eye, Marty firmly stated something like, “Katie, this is really a very good dinner.” For a devout microwaver, Marty made me feel pretty good about my limited kitchen abilities.

Afterwards we went for a walk around my neighborhood in the cool evening. As we slowly strolled along, we talked about all kinds of things. Some of it was kind of philosophical. I remember Marty saying that he could not believe that high school was twenty years ago. He shook his head and said that it seems like it was yesterday. I stated that I sometimes get nostalgic for childhood.

We were nearing the end of our walk when Marty casually asked me if he could kiss me. I had nervously wondered if he wanted too, and if he would. We stopped and I stepped close to him and said that he could kiss me several times if he wanted to. He apparently wanted to.

He said goodnight about 11 or so. It was a great evening.