Getting to Third Date (10 page)

But then, after the column about my date with Hands-On Guy, there was one e-mail from Anonymously_Yours that made me stop and reread it, three times. Each time I got more creeped out.

Nothing major at first glance, but I finally realized what was creeping me out on the third read. How did this guy (or girl, I guess) know I liked strawberry milk? I didn't drink it in the dining hall. They only had chocolate.

In fact, I hadn't had strawberry milk since I'd come to campus. I'd asked my mom to send me a bottle of strawberry syrup because I couldn't find it in the stores around here—but she hadn't sent it yet because she's care package challenged.

No surprise, that. I'd learned that long ago when I went away to Girl Scout camp and came home to find three packages she'd meant to send me but hadn't (not to worry, the candy and cookies were still good—plus I didn't have to share, except with my little brother).

No worries. I'd figured I'd get a bottle from home when I went back for break. The way the dining hall made me pack on the pounds, I didn't need the extra calories, anyway. Which didn't tell me a thing about who knew of my strawberry milk craving.

I printed out the e-mail, thinking I'd ask Tyler if there was a way to find out who'd sent it. Maybe it was someone I knew. Or maybe it was some crazy stalker. Great. Just what I needed.

Professors always like to throw curveballs in class. I suppose it comes from being forced to teach the same material over and over again to—overall—people who just want the class to be about what grade they can skim off, not the actual knowledge. I mean, how often am I going to use calculus in my regular life?

Now, Professor Golding is luckier, I suppose, in that she has a naturally…sexy…subject. But she still likes to throw us curveballs every now and then.

“I've been following the Mother Hubbard columns closely these past three weeks, and I have to commend you, Tyler, for finding a new way to explore what makes a relationship blossom and what stops it.”

Tyler stood up. Modest he is not. “What I like about this campus is how everyone seems to be participating. I hear people talking about us everywhere I go.”

Right. And even some places he doesn't go. Like the ladies' rooms between classes. Part of me wants to stand up. Not a good idea, because I want to scream, “What about me? I have to live it!”

Professor Golding keeps going. “I think Mother Hubbard struck a blow on behalf of all women when she insisted that her date take no as an answer, even though he was more used to hearing yes. Rape is an ugly thing.”

Tyler turned red and stammered. “She wasn't—”

“Of course not. Because she got herself out of an uncomfortable situation before things could get out of hand.” Professor Golding beamed at the class, and Tyler sat back down and gave a little sigh at being out of the unexpected line of fire. “She trusted her instincts. And that's what we're going to talk about today. Instincts when it comes to love—or what may not be love at all.”

I spent about ten seconds feeling like I was the smartest girl in the world for trusting my own instincts, even though they had led me directly into humiliation. Then it suddenly dawned on me that this wasn't a throwaway comment for Professor Golding. No. This was part of the lesson plan. As I recalled from the syllabus, the topic was “When Love Goes Wrong: Rape, Incest, and Abuse.”

My timing was impeccable. Apparently, Mother Hubbard's ungodly journey into third dating is going to be used as a shining example. Oh, goody.

Professor Golding walked to the board and picked up the chalk. “We've already talked about what makes one person attractive to another. Anyone want to remind us?”

One guy—Joker Boy, I'd come to think of him—called out, “A shower.”

The class laughed. Even the professor smiled as she wrote “shower” down on the board.

“That's one thing—in our culture. Which is interesting because the chemistry of attraction is correlated with our senses of smell and sight.”

“Don't forget taste.” Joker Boy was on a roll.

Professor Golding didn't even frown at him. I guess she might have appreciated someone who could lighten the mood. Our subject matter for the class was likely to make us all tense. “Not everyone gets to that stage before the senses of sight and smell have turned us away.”

“Maybe that's Mother Hubbard's problem—she doesn't have a sense of smell.” A guy way in the back in a torn T-shirt and a bored expression called out.

Joker Boy didn't like losing his momentum. “Right on. Mother Hubbard says she even turns the hotties away. What else could explain that?”

A girl who looked like she'd spent six hours getting ready for class, her hair was so model perfect, said skeptically, “Maybe she's lying. No one turns hotties away.”

One poor clueless guy shouted, “There aren't guy hotties, anyway.”

The girls in the class let out a collective belly laugh at that one, and the decidedly not hot speaker turned red with embarrassment.

“The question remains, how many of you have turned someone away for a reason that was changeable? If you'd stuck it out, would it have lasted? Or were your instincts worth trusting?”

I raised my hand. What can I say? There weren't a lot of freshmen in the class, and I didn't have too much experience with just speaking out. But I was tired of not having an opinion on the subject just because I was the opinion behind Mother Hubbard.

Professor Golding looked at me, taking me in, like she did all her students who contributed during class. I only had one second to worry that I'd been unwise to speak up before she said, “Yes, Katelyn, is it?”

Too late. I couldn't back out now, or she'd think I was lame. Who knew what that would do to my grade. “What if love takes time to develop, but it's better that way, instead of just letting your nose lead you?”

She nodded, and smiled as if she knew just what I meant. “Ah! Slow and steady, building up a fire from nothing but kindling, a small spark and a lot of time?”

I nodded.

“I call that the best-friends approach, and it is definitely one way for a relationship to grow. Good question.”

“That's a crock!” The guy in the torn T-shirt was definitely hostile to the discussion today—and we hadn't even got to the hard part yet. Professor Golding was just easing us into it. “That's just something best friends tell themselves to keep from crying themselves to sleep at night.”

“Whoa. Sounds as harsh as Mother Hubbard.”

Everyone turned to look at T-shirt Guy, but then shook their heads. He was clearly an upperclassman, and had a beer gut to prove it. Older students were usually more cynical. Although, this guy was a harder case than the others I'd seen. Probably to compensate for the fact that he was already starting to lose his hair. Which the professor had pointed out was a sign of high testosterone.

I pretended I was turned to listen to what he had to say, when really I was examining him. Not a hottie. Probably never had been, even when he had hair. But the high testosterone and the muscles made me think he didn't have trouble hooking up. Getting to the third date may not have been working for him, though. Did the testosterone make him smell better or worse to women? Or was there something else that made him cynical?

Joker Boy didn't like losing the attention to T-shirt Guy. “I don't care how a girl smells if I like how she looks.”

Professor Golding dismissed his comment with a quick smile. “You're not the first young man to declare that sentiment, but blind studies prove you're in the minority, if you're right about your own preferences.” The class erupted into commentary at that.

“Isn't it called love at first sight? Not love at first smell? And what about the billion-dollar business in makeup? I bet if we asked every girl in here to hold up their makeup, we'd have hundreds of dollars' worth.”

“Hey—don't forget the perfume and scented soap and lotion business. That's catering to the sense of smell.”

“And scented candles on dates.”

Joker Boy tried to hold his own against the majority of the class. “That's to hide the fact you haven't cleaned your apartment in a month, not that you haven't showered.”

“Don't forget the smell of food—my mother always says the way to a man's heart is through his stomach.”

Professor Golding broke in. “Interesting discussion. We're a little off topic, but before we get back to the subject on the syllabus for today, I have a question for you. Do any of you think you ‘missed' the love of your life because you didn't give someone enough of a chance?”

“No way. One chance. That's all any of us get.”

“I'd like to challenge us all to a general experiment.” There was a collective groan at the thought of extra work.

“For extra credit.” The groan softened.

I wrote down the assignment, just like everyone else, even though I was fuming inside at the unfairness of it all. Blogging for Mother Hubbard had seriously cut into my study time. Extra credit was going to be a real stretch.

“Anyone who gives a second chance to someone they've written off, then writes a three-page paper on the results—confirmation of attraction or not—gets an A on the chapter quiz, and doesn't have to take it either.

Hmmm. That was an appealing thought—at least to those of us who thought knocking out a three-page paper was nothing. Except I was already doing the work. I'd already done it twice over. And I couldn't claim it. Because then Professor Golding would know I was Mother Hubbard. Sigh.

I was almost relieved when we got back to the subject on the syllabus. The upshot was, trust your instincts and run, even if you look silly. Don't let anyone make you do what you don't want to do. And don't make excuses for bad behavior. Not even if you're really Mother Hubbard and have to sit there listening to people talk about you without knowing who you are.

I typed the last sentence with a little jolt. It was sound advice. So why couldn't I follow it? Had I passed up a person I could love—who would love me back—just because I let my crush make me too picky? I thought about the guys I'd gone out with in high school and my first weeks of college.

Were the readers right that I'd invented reasons not to go on a third date? Was longing for the clarity of those old-fashioned dating rules actually just keeping me from finding someone? No. I refused to believe that. After all, I'd given every guy a second chance. What more could a girl do?

No. I just hadn't been lucky at the dating game yet. But that didn't mean the odds weren't with me…did it? I had to believe that, at some point in the near future, I'd find a guy worthy of a third date. Otherwise known on campus by the code name “the one.”

The one. I hadn't used that phrase so much in…forever. But I was using it a lot in my blog. Besides being gender neutral, “the one” just sounded better than “Mr. Right.” Because there is no such thing as Mr. Right. There's only the one whose shortcomings you don't mind because he makes you overlook your own imperfections.

There's something so appealing about blogging. It seems like just you and your keyboard and screen. Dear Diary, with the lock and key that your little brother always wants to steal and all that.

And the comments are as addictive as potato chips. You can't read just one.

When I blogged about Hands-On Guy being so cute that I was afraid I'd do something I'd regret in the morning (who knew I was a prophet?), I got these kinds of replies—from very different types of people:

Well, frankly, no. I had heard about it. It was a book. Maybe a movie. Some old guy fooling around with a farmer's wife. There was probably even a bridge in there somewhere, but I didn't see how that applied to my situation. And, as it turned out, my risk with Blaine had been riskier than I'd expected. And now I had to do it all over again.

I confess I had some hope that, after the exciting times with Blaine, the bloggers would vote to let me out of the third-date hamster wheel. No such luck. More people thought like the
Bridges of Madison County
guy than like the smarter bloggers—especially the smartest one, who had come right out and said:

Now, that girl I could relate to. She and I both knew it was no fun to love someone who just didn't know you existed and had the bad taste to be happy within sight of you.

So caution was the watchword of Mother Hubbard—and her alter ego, Katelyn. Too bad it sometimes backfired.