Train Man (74 page)

490 Name: Train Man ♦ 4aPOTtW4HU Post Date: 16/05/04 18:02

This thing you’ve been worried about, that she would find out about the postings, well, you don’t need to worry about it anymore. I showed her the entire log last night. I really wanted her to see everything.

I was confident she would read it and understand.

All I was worried about was that I was risking exposing her identity.

It took a long time to read everything but she was really surprised and said ‘There really are such good people out there, huh’

I’m watching the thread as I write but man, does it move fast!

Let me post this first.

548 Name: Train Man ♦ 4aPOTtW4HU Post Date: 16/05/04 18:05

About coming out about my anorak-ness, I didn’t really address that part but she has anorak-like tendencies herself so I was pretty confident that she’d be able to accept my leanings. I can’t divulge what exactly her fetish is as that may expose her indentity . . .

647 Name: Train Man ♦ 4aPOTtW4HU Post Date: 16/05/04 18:13

I’m at home now so she’s not here.

726 Name: Train Man ♦ 4aPOTtW4HU Post Date: 16/05/04 18:27

Yesterday I went over to her house around midday. So I could show her the log.

I also wanted to check to make sure her PC was working OK. And I took the teacups again.

Her mother was home this time. I was supa-dupa nervous . . .

‘Hello.’

‘Hello, come on in . . . make yourself at home.’

‘Nice to meet you asd98@#^*#_+K_ihui’

I was dead nervous in the beginning so I don’t remember what exactly we talked about . . .

But her mother seemed like a sweet person. Since she was going to make tea for us, I handed her the teacups.

I made it up to her room that day.

I was kinda taken aback because her room definitely had a semi-anorak vibe floating through it but I pretended not to be shocked because she was coming out to me in her own way that day.

I’d love to be able to give you the details but . . .

I quickly got to the point

‘That thing I’ve been talking about wanting to show you . . . ’

I was confident but still nervous . . .

‘Yeah. Show me, show me.’

She seemed really interested . . .

837 Name: Train Man ♦ 4aPOTtW4HU Post Date: 16/05/04 18:39

‘Have you heard of 2-Channel?’

I needed to explain before I showed it to her.

‘The bulletin board?’

‘Right, the anonymous bulletin board. It’s a vortex of all kinds of people and their feelings,’ I said, to which she replied with a ‘?’ on her face. I got all lyrical about the dirtiness of anonymity and the flip side, the beauty of it.

In reality, my explaining went on forever.

‘Remember when I said I asked friends for advice? I was talking about these people.’

Then I told her a bit about the thread.

And I owned up to writing a blow by blow account of our relationship, from the moment we met till the day I poured my heart out to her. She didn’t say anything right away and I was relieved.

‘The record includes my hearfelt but dirty thoughts as well as some secrets but I’d really like you to read it,’ I added, as I handed her a CD-R of the log. I brought both the log and the edited version but I decided to let her read the real log first.

Real log. That would be the uncensored version of the posts. On the Flash site, the dirtier posts had been edited out just in case Hermes found out and came to the site. Feeling as though their depravity had been exposed, the netizens became flustered.

984 Name: Train Man ♦ 4aPOTtW4HU Post Date: 16/05/04 18:55

After reading for about 2 or 3 minutes, she moved the scroll bar all the way to bottom and said ‘There’s . . . so much here’ ‘Yep, there’s two months’ worth.’

We decided to put my screen name as a search and read through. The posts about the train incident gave us a little jog down memory lane.

She laughed out loud at ‘It says Hermes. Guess they’re some household goods brand.’ I thought I was in the clear . . . after she read the part about me calling her and asking her to dinner, she said

‘You were trying so hard . . . ’

‘No kidding,’ I replied, and we smiled.

Then she told me that seeing how hard I had tried made her heart flutter.

286 Name: Train Man ♦ 4aPOTtW4HU Post Date: 16/05/04 19:24

In the middle of this, her mother came in with tea and biscuits.

They were homemade again . . .
They were yum. and yeah, I asked for Benoist tea . . .

As she got to the end she said

‘It reads like a novel’

as if it was somebody’s else’s story

When she finally finished reading, she sighed and said

‘I’m glad I got to know what you were thinking about. Thank you.’

And then

‘Why didn’t you tell me sooner?’

‘But really, I’m so happy it turned out this way,’ she said and squeezed my hand. And then as if signalling a kiss . . . the vibe shifted suddenly and . . .

I reckon it ended up being a positive thing.

Other than the fact that men are pervs.

She did say that it was because of people cheering me on that I was able to work up the courage and that was how we ended up together.

And finally, she said

‘Why are these wonderful men Geeks?’