Once a week, Daily Intel takes a peek behind doors left slightly ajar. This week, the Woman in an Open Relationship With a Boyfriend Who’s Trying to Get His Other Girlfriend Pregnant: female, dancer/office temp, Flatbush, 33, straight, in an open relationship (for 2.5 years).
DAY ONE
8 a.m.: Send romantic morning text to my boyfriend. Good morning, love.
8:30 a.m.: Receive romantic text back.
1 p.m.: Still no word from the Journalist, the cute 29-year-old I’ve been chatting with online for the past couple weeks. It seems the only thing we have in common is that we both think I’m pretty, but that seems to be enough for a fun G-chat.
3 p.m.: Assuming date with Journalist tomorrow night is off. Proceed to text the Fecker, the cute Irish guy with the Elvis Costello glasses. “Want to meet after work tomorrow night?”
4 p.m.: Receive message on OkCupid from a profile with no photo. Normally I wouldn’t respond, but he’s Midwestern and charming. I respond in a similar manner.
5:15 p.m.: Receive response from Midwesterner with a comment about tattoos. I respond asking if it’s thumbs up or thumbs down. I have five.
5:30 p.m.: Receive response while still on the bus. Thumbs up to tattoos. Having fun with this exchange.
6:45 p.m.: Text from the Fecker promising me a good spanking tomorrow night. Feel only slightly ridiculous that it took until I’m 33 to get a man to punish me for being a naughty girl.
8 p.m.: Meet Lizard King in Carroll Gardens for our first date. We met on OkCupid and he’s noticed my status is available, so I’m pretty sure he’s assuming I’m easy.
8:03 p.m.: I might be easy, but not for a guy who shows up to a first date wearing yoga pants.
8:07 p.m.: Already utterly bored. There’s pinball in the back. Why am I not playing it?
9:12 p.m.: Considering blurting the following line: “Anyway, I have an interesting job too. Thanks for asking.” But don’t actually even care to engage with him that much.
10 p.m.: For some reason, decide to sit through three beers with this guy. Don’t offer to pay. He walks me to the train and kisses me. I go along, because, I’ll give anyone a shot when it comes to kissing. If there’s anything I’ve learned from my boyfriend, it’s that there’s a lot you can find out from kissing someone. Still nothing. In fact, ew, gross. “Damn, you’re cute,” he says. I know I am! If you had talked about that instead of The Doors for two hours, my dress would probably be on your floor right now!
12 a.m.: Send good night text to Boyfriend. Receive one back from him.
12:10 a.m.: Text from Boyfriend: “Can we have a minute to talk tomorrow?” Shittiest phrase in the English language.
12:32 a.m.: I call him. He’s beyond drunk. Yells at me because of a Twitter post I made over a month ago, which was perceived as a slight from his other girlfriend. Can’t believe I’m actually defending a Twitter post. Of course it had nothing to do with her. I’m not stupid enough to air my shit online. And why are we talking about this a month later?
12:35 a.m.: He tells me he’s trying to get her pregnant. I call him a lying sack of shit and hang up. Has he just found the final straw?
12:37 a.m.: Run out to Roomie with a pack of cigarettes to cry on her shoulder.
1:30 a.m.: Amazing Roomie smooths everything over. Feel like I might actually be able to sleep.
2 a.m.: Can’t sleep. What the fuck was he expecting me to do if she actually got knocked up?
DAY TWO
8:00 a.m.: Do not text romantic message to Boyfriend.
Noon: Hooray! Journalist is back on G-chat. He’s in San Francisco last minute for work. Conversation somehow comes down to him sending photos of the panties he’s picturing me wearing. He couldn’t be more wrong. I don’t let on that I’m actually wearing Superman underwear. He can find out more details after we actually meet in person. Make a date for the following Wednesday.
2 p.m.: Continue OkCupid messaging adorable Midwesterner. I use “a” instead of “an.” He calls me a philistine. He’s just become even more interesting.
2:15 p.m.: Boyfriend attempts to Facebook chat with me. I ignore it.
5 p.m.: Run errands after work and exchange texts with Boyfriend. He misses me. We have a lot to talk about, but I don’t know when I’m going to be ready to see him. Was really excited to have a drink with him before my date tonight. He says he won’t contact me, the ball is entirely in my court. Chicken shit.
11:30 p.m.: The Fecker is late for our date, which makes sense, since he’s just getting off work. Awkward conversation. I feel boring. Mind has drawn an utter blank. Figured we’d be making out at his place by now. He runs into a friend at the bar. “How do you two know each other?” “Emmmm. Just from around.” Which is the most obvious way to indicate we met online, right?
11:45 p.m.: He asks if I still have that boyfriend. I actually don’t know if I do or not.
12 a.m.: Finally headed back to his place. More strained conversation on the way there. Until he asks if I’m an exhibitionist. Oh yes, I respond.
12:15 a.m.: He pours two glasses of red wine with which he ends up being incredibly disappointed. He wants to know more about what turns me on. Since he asked, I tell him how I enjoy public sex: in an alleyway, in a bar … and the ultimate in exhibitionism, my fantasy-fulfilling experience of five guys on various parts of my body at a sex party in Midtown. His version of exhibitionism is a little different: cam sex with people he’s met online. I don’t find it a particular turn-on, but he’s so sexy, and talking about it clearly puts him in the mood. Next thing I know, I’m on his lap wearing just panties. He’s amazing at sucking on my tits, but his constant, rhythmic moaning is a bit of a distraction. It takes him a huge effort to get his skinny jeans off. Oy, hipsters. We move to the bed where he fingers me until I beg him for sex. He gives me a good spanking for asking for it. I give him oral while he gets out the condom and proceeds to slam into me hard, but just for a minute. Then he takes it out. He enters me again for a little longer and then takes it out. We continue like this for a while. I know he’s doing this so he won’t come, but I hate flow being interrupted. Finally I beg for him to let me have it, and he has one of the longest, loudest orgasms I’ve ever seen from a man.
1:30 a.m.: Discover while we’re talking that the first time we had sex three weeks ago he didn’t come. He can only do it once a night, I find out the hard way. This is what I get for dating older men. Our first date was an hours-long power-sex romp. I’m disappointed to see him unable to keep his eyes open this time. Home by 2:30 … much earlier than 6 a.m. like last time.
DAY THREE
7 a.m.: Actually wake up on time.
8 a.m.: Do not text Boyfriend.
1 p.m.: Text Fecker thanking him for last night. “U R Welcome, miss ;).” He’s really got to knock it off with the emoticons.
7 p.m.: Meet old friends for a birthday party in Hell’s Kitchen. There’s a huge group of young, scruffy guys encroaching on our area. It looks like a snowboarders convention. One friend suggests it’s like a buffet. “Oh please. Honey, I got out of my twenties so I wouldn’t have to fuck a dude in his twenties ever again,” I tell her. Horrified as those words fall out of my mouth; I’ve become that sad, sassy divorcee. I immediately call myself out on it, but I’m not sure that it helps.
11:15 p.m.: Fall asleep while watching Netflix. Miss pathetic, apologetic texts from Boyfriend.
DAY FOUR
7 a.m.: Slightly hungover and desperately don’t want to get out of bed. Masturbate to get a jump start on the day. Imagine being double-teamed by my boyfriend and the Irish guy. Have I actually gotten to a place in my life where I’m fantasizing about people I’m actually sleeping with?!
8 a.m.: Boyfriend texts. We’re supposed to have plans tonight. I was really excited about having a date night with him. He assumes we don’t have plans, but is waiting for me to make the call. I ask if I can just get through what will almost certainly be a stressful day at work.
1:00 p.m.: Yes, it is a stressful day at work.
1:15 p.m.: Attempt to have phone therapy session from the temp job. I have got to talk to my therapist about all this Boyfriend stuff. Have never been so betrayed. Almost get fired.
3 p.m.: Send Facebook friend request to the Fecker. Spend way too much time thinking about whether or not it’s a good idea. Friend reminds me: “You’re fecking, it’s okay.”
4 p.m.: G-chat with Midwesterner. Is it possible to actually have chemistry via IM? Because we do.
6 p.m.: Decide I’m not ready to see Boyfriend. Give him a call. He gets mad at me for making him wait. Asshole. Tell him I miss him and just need a little more time.
6:30 p.m.: Give a call to the Poet. He was the great unrequited love of my high-school career. We saw each other for the first time in seventeen years and it was like no time had passed. Except that he’s now an extremely overweight middle-aged man. I am no longer attracted to him (just lose 40 pounds and I would be!), but he’s family. I have no problem spilling all my guts to him. We make a plan to see each other tomorrow night. Eating Chinese food at his place. Naked. Not sure what this will accomplish, but I’m up for it anyway.
10:15 p.m.: As the B train crosses the bridge, I get chatted up by a cute, drunk 25-year-old. Flirtatious, but he’s clearly not hitting on me. He’s on the way to an OkCupid date. He tells me about the one time he licked a girl’s asshole. I don’t know how I’ve ended up having this conversation, but I encourage him to explore the glory and wonder of salad tossing.
2 p.m.: Heading back in a cab over the bridge with Roomie. It seems the Poet’s date has ended early and he wants me to come all the way up to the Upper West. His plans have changed tomorrow night and he can’t have me over. I should just come up and crash tonight, he begs. He calls just to hear me and Roomie screaming with laughter. If the 16-year-old me knew that the Poet was begging me to come over, she’d absolutely die.
DAY FIVE
7 p.m.: I go to the East Village to watch football with my brother. When did Avenue A start looking like the Upper East Side? Brother totally blocks my attempt to flirt with the cute, late-thirties fellow football fan at the bar.
DAY SIX
10 p.m.: More heart-to-heart at a bar with Roomie. She’s having boyfriend issues, too.
12 a.m.: Last ditch effort for a dirty text exchange with the Fecker. He’s heading to bed soon. Fine with me, actually. Just realized it’s too dark in here to take a photo and I really don’t feel like getting up to turn the lights on.
DAY SEVEN
8:00 a.m.: Romantic text from Boyfriend. He wants to know when he can see me. I tell him I have a date tonight that I don’t expect to be going very late. He can come over after that and we can finally talk. I miss him. I miss his face close to mine. I miss being in his arms. And he is the best kisser I have ever known.
10 a.m.: E-mail from Lizard King asking for a date this week. I ignore.
Noon Currently have G-chats going with the Journalist and the Midwesterner. Both charming and cute … but something about that Midwesterner. Why am I not seeing him tonight?! So excited to meet him tomorrow.
7 p.m.: Meet Seattleite, a single dad from OkCupid, for a first date in Carroll Gardens at a fancy cocktail place. Discover he’s a software engineer. He’s definitely paying tonight. Try to leave before 8, but he convinces me to stay for dinner. This is my first online-dating dinner-date. Have a perfectly nice evening discussing the joys of divorce in New York state with a perfectly nice guy, but there’s no spark. Nonetheless, he kisses me at the bar. He walks me to the bus so I can get to Red Hook, where I’m cat-sitting this week. We make out while we wait for the B61 that is way late. He kisses without tongue. Weird. I’ve never experienced anything like this. Still waiting, waiting, waiting for this bus. Realize I could never live in Red Hook.
11 p.m.: Call boyfriend. He’s beyond drunk. I tell him he’s not welcome to come over. We’re not having this conversation while he’s blitzed. Sad I’m not seeing him, but relieved I can get to sleep before midnight. Will be refreshed for date with the Midwesterner tomorrow night.
TOTALS: One act of intercourse; one act of oral sex (giving); two really bad first kisses.
