A Bad Man in a Bad Place

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On Monday, The Sous Chef dropped an ultimatum in my lap. Stop seeing other women or stop having sex with her.

At first, I’d agreed to stop seeing other women. Most of the dates I’d been on had been pretty dreadful and I was happy to find someone that I genuinely liked. And like her I do. It’s complicated by her work schedule and part time job on the one hand, and me with my foolish barroom antics on the other. Balance, but at the end of the day we still wanted to come home to each other when we could. An acknowledgement that if things were different we’d probably spend more time together, but they’re not, so we can’t.

I started to do the math in my head. I’m not going to be able to keep up a four-hours-of-sleep-a-night pace up for very long. I’m not going to be able to make plans to do anything with her because there’s a part time job in addition to her day job. So it’s late night sex and hanging out and talking for what seems like hours and usually is.

A severely imbalanced relationship in which I get very little, because she’s already got a lot.

What the situation came down to was this: I like her. She likes me.

So I called her on it.

We went to a movie on Wednesday night and afterwards we started to take a walk. It was midnight in midtown and things were a little dicey both in the neighborhood and our conversation. So I told her that I had a problem.

“In our conversation the other night, I have to tell you, I realized I’m not comfortable with the way things were left. I don’t think that I know you well enough to stop dating anyone else right now.”

“I didn’t say you had to stop dating other people.”

“No, but you gave me a choice between sleeping with you and dating other people. Obviously, I’m going to choose sleeping with you.”

“I didn’t mean it like that.” And she hadn’t. We spent two hours outside the Bryant Park hotel talking about the issue and what was revealed surprised me. I don’t know why it did, and it probably shouldn’t have, but it did. It’s not that she didn’t want me sleeping with or dating other people, although she didn’t. Rather, the concern was that she likes me more than I’d realized or thought she would, and that she’s old school about relationships - reserving sex for people that she cares deeply about. I respect that, and appreciate it.

As I walked her home to the Upper East Side, we passed a cop on the beat in front of the United Nations. I’d been trying to explain to her that a random kiss in a bar wasn’t going to impinge on how I felt about her. She had a hard time agreeing to that, and I don’t think she fully accepts it. I still believe it though.

“You know, my objection wasn’t to being serious with you, or about having feelings about you, or anything like that at all. I just don’t like being dictated to, particularly by someone I’ve just met.”

She looked at the cop and asked him “if we’ve just started dating, he shouldn’t be sleeping with anyone else, should he?”

The cop looked at us both and said “it depends on the situation.”

I laughed at that. She got indignant and cute about it.

“Ok, I’m just not used to this. I usually don’t get physical with someone before I’m really emotionally attached to them.”

I had a bolt of mental inspiration and suddenly felt like an asshole. “Oh God. Did I pressure you into having sex with me? It just dawned on me that you could have read into what I said about not lasting more than three dates with women before having sex or we break up?”

“Well, yeah, a little. I worried that you were going to get bored.”

“Oh fuck. Seriously. I didn’t mean to pressure you.” I didn’t. Christ, I’m an asshole sometimes.

“You meant it to reassure me, didn’t you. Like, ‘hey, you made it past three dates and we didn’t have sex. You’re pretty special.’”

“Exactly.” We lapsed into a comfortable silence for a few minutes. It began to rain.

“You can keep dating other people if you want” she mumbled.

“It’s not about that, it’s not. Look, I like you. I’ve tried to respect your time and space and lack thereof, but with all of the other things going on in your life I don’t know if you’re going to have enough time for me. I’m pretty high maintenance and I’ve got a hypersexual libido. I don’t know where this is going, I just know that I like you.” We kissed in the rain. It was romantic and cheesy and kind of cool for being romantic and cheesy. We stopped at Dunkin Donuts at nearly 4 and grabbed a snack. Kept walking until we got to her place, where I left her with an “I’ll see you soon” and a kiss before sending her upstairs.

I flagged down a cab to go home.

“How are you doing tonight?” I asked him. He had an accent that suggested he was here from China, but had an Americanized name.

“Good, good. How are you?”

“I’m ok. A little trouble with women, but otherwise good.”

“Problems with your girlfriend?”

“I’m not sure I’d call her that, but yeah, basically.”

“Is she hot?”

“She’s beautiful.”

“Does she have a good job?”

“Yes.”

“Is she nice?”

“Yeah.”

“Then what’s your problem?”

I told him that we’d only met two weeks ago and that she had told me to be exclusive with her so quickly that it sort of shocked me.

“So? She’s pretty and nice and has a job. Do you like her?”

“Yeah.”

“You’re very lucky. You need to stop sleeping with other women. Do you know how hard it is to find a nice, pretty girl with a good job in this town?”

I laughed. “Yeah. I’m a little old for her, I’m 33 and she’s 24.”

“Oh my god. Stop sleeping with other women. Start treating her better. You’re a very lucky man. I see lots of people in this cab and give lots of advice to men, women, everyone. You’re a lucky man. Don’t screw this up.”

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