TOOLBAG TUESDAY

My friend Sarah just wanted to have some fun, and this guy TJ fit the bill.

Turns out, he was a lemon.

A lemon, like when you buy a car or a phone or something else fancy that LOOKS good on the outside, but is really defective on the inside.

TJ was cute, dark and mysterious (mysterious in that he wouldn’t tell her what the initials TJ stood for…ha) and he lived in a very swanky high rise, exactly two floors up from a party Sarah attended.

TJ and Sarah met and talked all night at the party and, at the stroke of 2 a.m., instead of taking the elevator down to the first floor and catch an Uber, she joined TJ in his apartment instead.

It was an “OK” one-night stand (haha), and Sarah left the next morning, despite TJs pleas to stay. She put her number in his phone just to placate him and told him goodbye.

And that’s all the time she planned to put into this “connection.”

Sarah had actually forgotten all about TJ until exactly seven days later, at the exact same time (roughly 2 a.m.), when he texted her.

“Been thinking bout you. When you gonna back and see me?”

It was a lame text; he had obviously only been thinking about her late on a Saturday night, not during the day, or during the week.

Sarah was put off by his late-night booty call and also that it was only two sentences and not thoughtful or interesting. 

She ignored him.

Yet TJ repeated the same message week after week, always texting on a Friday or Saturday well past midnight with various versions of, “When you coming to have fun with me again?” “You really don’t want to come over?”

GET A CLUE.

He was now just getting really annoying.

So she texted back.

“I told him that while I don’t regret hooking up with him, I didn’t want to be a stranger’s booty call,” Sarah recalls.

She thought that would take care of the problem.

But then TJ did the opposite of a booty call: He asked her out for a meal.

Considering guys rarely do this anymore, it was a shock.

“I genuinely like you and want to get to know you better!” he texted.

LOL

After two more weeks, Sarah caved and agreed to meet him for brunch one Sunday at a hot new place he suggested.

Sarah wasn’t entirely sold as she got up early to get dressed to meet her one-night stand whose name may or may not really be TJ.

She got to the restaurant four minutes late and scanned the dining room. No TJ.

She texted him, “Hey, I’m here. Are you?”

He responded, “No, just getting up.”

!!!!!!!!!!!!

UGH.

LEMON.

Already an enormous waste of time.

“I’ll be there in a second,” he said.

Sarah believed him and went to the bar and got a bloody Mary, staring at her phone when, 20 MINUTES LATER, he texted, “In an Uber now. On my way.”

This now put him 45 minutes late to the brunch that he insisted she join him for, and had set the time for.

When TJ arrived, he still looked cute but she was annoyed at his LEMON lateness and they sat awkwardly at a table.

Then the server came up to take their order. After Sarah ordered, all eyes were on TJ.

“Oh, nothing,” he said.

?!!??!!!!!!!?!??!

“WHAT? You’re not hungry?” she asked.

“No…I’m just not much of a breakfast person.”

The server shot her a look of pity.

“Then why did you agree to brunch? Why did you suggest this place?” Sarah asked.

He didn’t respond.

And that’s how Sarah found herself EATING BY HERSELF, suddenly massively regretting her life choices.

THIS IS WHY YOU NEVER TALK TO A ONE-NIGHT STAND AGAIN.

And then came the icing on the cinnamon roll: The bill came, and SARAH PAID FOR IT.

“Well, I didn’t technically eat anything….” TJ said.

!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

It was the most mortifying scene ever.

All Sarah could think about was how fast the server could run her debit card and she could leave, when she felt TJs hand ON HER KNEE.

She jerked it, smashing it on the underside of the table. On purpose.

“OWWWWWW!” TJ wailed. My hand! Why did you do that?!?”

“Because you unexpectedly put your hand on my knee, and I don’t know why,” she said, cooly.

“Well, I was about to ask you if you wanted to come back to my place,” TJ said.

LOL

LOL

“...You know…to have some fun. Like we did the other night.”

The other night?!?! 

Try the other month.

After a long pause Sarah said, “Oh, no, I’m good. I’m really full after all that awesome food.”

Then TJ said, seriously, after she had AGAIN turned him down: 

“After all this, you won’t even come back to my place for a little fun? C’mon, you know you want to.”

All this??

All what???

All $30 on her debit card?!??!

Sarah looked at him dumbfounded. Did this guy seriously think that after the most awkward “date” in the history of brunch THAT HE DIDN’T PAY FOR, which included a complete disregard for arriving on time, being a weirdo and not ordering anything, and failing other basic social clues, that sex was a natural follow-up?!

UGH.

SUCK ON A LEMON TJ

-Jenny