One for the Record Books! in These Foolish Things

What a Friday night! It took me the whole weekend to recover!

How do I even set up this story? I tried to go back in my PB to see if I could find the not-so-humble beginnings, but it seems I never wrote about it because I was distracted by the possibility of The Scot and I guess I had other things going on.

So, here’s the thing: when I wrote in my last entry about the drama that was probably going to happen, I was referencing something entirely different than what actually went down on Friday night. See, I thought what was going to happen was that the ex-boyfriend of my friend Barbi was going to show up with The Opera Singer (you may or may not remember these characters, but it doesn’t matter because they never showed up), but what happened was something so crazy I guess I’ll just set it up from the beginning…

So last year, I suppose right around this time, my friend Maria was dating this man who she was really excited about. He’s a super wealthy rancher who is also co-owner of several different restaurants and night spots in town, in partnership with his brother and sister and I guess some other people. Bottom line, he is this kind of larger-than-life character who is totally magnetic and fun-loving and he’s a big daredevil as well with race cars and motorcycles and he’s into all kinds of dangerous sports.

ANYWAY, Maria liked him but really didn’t know what to do with him as he lives on a ranch that’s an hour and a half away and she lives with her daughter and son-in-law and their kids and it would be weird to have him come spend the night when he came into the city and such. It was even more complicated than that, but it was…complicated. So they decided to not continue dating but to remain friends. Maria even had suggested that she liked the guy so much that maybe he and I should think about dating, but I didn’t even know the guy.

Flash forward to Christmastime last year. I’d been invited to Maria’s annual party and he had too. It was the first time I met him and there was a definite magnetism between the two of us. I knew that he and Maria weren’t together, and we had quite a bit of flirtation and apparently he and I had even KISSED at the very end of the party when I was getting into my Uber on the way home. I say “apparently” because I don’t really remember that, but whatever. I’d had enough to drink, obviously…it very likely happened.

And unbeknownst to me (truly, she’d told me at one point that I should try to date him), Maria still had feelings for the guy and she didn’t like it very much. So she told the both of us - separately - to cut it out and we did! Right then and there, we both stopped (we’d even exchanged numbers but both deleted immediately!).

And that was that. Next thing you know it was New Years Eve and I was having my moments in New York City with The Scot and Big Wild Rancher was the furthest thing from my mind.

Flash forward to last Monday. Maria was putting together this private event for Friday night and was inviting her close friends. She had a table reserved at the fancy-pants bar we like to go to occasionally and we even had to put a down-payment on the table! All good, but then Maria texted me to say she wanted to ask me a personal question.

How curious. I was like, “shoot!”

She asked, “If things hadn’t gotten weird with [Big Wild Rancher] would he be someone you could be interested in?”

And guys, that gave me such pause, because…was this a trick question?

I told her I’d have to think about it. Because even if it WAS okay, I told her I wasn’t sure of his lifestyle and that I’m ready to be partnered up and she said that he is too and I was all, WE’LL SEE.

Flash forward to Friday night.

I was in my Lyft on the way to the event when Maria sent me a text telling me that there was an uninvited “guest” who was there and SHE was sitting next to Big Wild Rancher. Maria was NOT happy about it, but I didn’t even think anything of it.

When I showed up, sure enough, there was this gorgeous blonde woman sitting on one side of BWR and a man sitting on the other side, but he got up and gave me the seat next to BWR. So. The stage is set: Blondie - Big Wild Rancher - Me. What do you think happened?

But let’s back up just a bit, shall we? Because, while I knew that Maria was kind of trying to set me up with BWR, she never mentioned her intentions to HIM! So here he was, thinking that I was still off-limits because of the Christmas party! And even though he was being polite to me…turning to me occasionally and talking and laughing and joking with me, he was deliberately trying not to be flirty AT ALL! Because he knew he was not supposed to - Maria’s orders!

Meanwhile, Blondie, who was friends with one of the other invited ladies, had been told by that woman to GO FOR Big Wild Rancher because he was suuuuuuch an eligible bachelor!!

And OH MY GOD was she alllllll over him! I mean CLAWS AND ALL! She had those hooks in him and she was not letting go. She went so far as to pull him onto the dance floor and make out with him in front of everyone. The WORKS!

And Big Wild Rancher was none the wiser. Of course he was enjoying the attention - who wouldn’t? He was eating it up like a delicious banana pudding with whipped cream on top!

Meanwhile, the night was getting later and I could tell she was going to try to get him to go home with her and something inside me went into overdrive! All of a sudden, I couldn’t take it any more and I knew I had to do something very drastic. I didn’t know what to do! But I had to do something to keep him from leaving with her because I knew it was my ONLY CHANCE at that point. For what? WHO KNOWS??!! But it was absolutely urgent at that moment.

So I told him that if he went home with that woman, I’d never, EVER speak to him again. He was like, whaaaaa? So I repeated it.

“If you go home with her, I never want to see you or speak to you ever again!”

And he was confused, but Maria saw this go down and she came over to me and I told her that I’d told BWR that I’d never talk to him again, and that’s when things went beyond dramatic!!! It was like I was a part of a movie:

Maria grabbed BWR and pulled him into a hallway so she could talk to him and TELL HIM what was going on! But the thing is, they were strategically standing in that hallway in such a way that you could see the reflection in a mirror and the whole table could see Maria reading BWR the RIOT ACT! I suppose she was telling him that she wanted us to get together and that she’d told me but wanted it to happen organically with him. But when she saw that I was SERIOUS and that he was about to leave with Blondie, she had to intervene!

Apparently he told her that he had no idea and that, sure, Blondie was the kind of woman that he’d go home with but that I was the kind of woman he’d MARRY!

And then, Maria started walking in the direction of the table. There were three of us left at the table: me, Maria’s guest of honor (birthday girl) and Blondie. So she was motioning for me to come talk with Big Wild Rancher and Blondie could tell, so as I got up to go talk, Blondie RACED over to BWR to beat me to him!

Maria pulled me over and was like, “he wants to be with YOU! He doesn’t want to be with her!!”

And at the same time, I guess he was telling her the same thing!

So before I even knew what was happening, she started storming towards me and came up so she could say into my ear, “…FUCKING WHORE!!”

And then she STORMED OUT OF THE RESTAURANT leaving a trail of angry blonde behind her!

It was AWESOME!!!! I don’t think I’ve ever participated in fighting over a guy like this ever in my life!

At that point, Maria was telling us to go be alone where we could figure it all out together and then she and the guest of honor left and we were the last ones in the bar. We ordered champagne and toasted to ourselves and he told me that he could see himself with me…as in, forever.

Now. Whatever that means, of course, we still need to figure out whether we are compatible enough, but the bottom line is, HE WENT HOME WITH ME!!

And it was all very innocent - even though we slept in my bed together, we kept it on the up and up and barely even kissed (though we did sleep together quite well, spooning and cuddling).

In the morning, he had a two hour conference call about his business dealings so I took the dog for a long walk and got us something to eat and some coffees and generally minded my own business while he took his call, and then I had to drive him back to Maria’s where he’d left his car overnight (he had originally planned to spend the night in one of the guest rooms at Maria’s) and he told me he’d call me later and that was that.

So.

Maria was at brunch when I dropped him off, so I ended up meeting her and her friend at the restaurant where they were and had a mimosa and a snack and Maria was pleased as punch that her plan had worked.

Now, where do we go from here? Who knows. I do know that I will see him tomorrow night as I’ve been invited to a dinner (long story) and he’ll be in my neighborhood so he’ll probably spend the night again - which is kind of weird because we haven’t even been on a date yet, but this is super exciting and fun and I’m still feeling like I WON!!

Proudly,
GS