Consequences of a Perfect Date

The refrigerator hummed mildly in the corner and Stella couldn't sleep. It was 3:10 in the morning. Wednesday. Really, it was still Tuesday but officially, the time was 3:10 am on Wednesday. She had last seen Ren on Monday.

The first date turned out to be perfect and surreal. Like a movie. It hadn't even been 48 hours since the date but already it seemed so far away, as though it had never happened at all. This worried Stella. It wasn't the actuality of the date that bothered her so much as the fact that she felt she was losing touch with reality. This was a very, very bad sign for her. This meant that she liked him. A lot. She instantly wanted to talk to him again, make another plan to see him soon, but she had nothing to offer. No clever ideas, no witty remarks. Should she wait for him to call? How soon is too soon to start saying 'hi' just to say hi? She was jello.

Funny thing about a perfect date--it doesn't matter how many dates or partners you've had in the past; once you have that perfect date with someone you're completely infatuated with, all the coy moves you had and all the dating etiquette you learned fly right out the window, laughing at you and disappearing off into the distance. Stella couldn't even remember how she had gotten any boyfriends in the past. Maybe none of them were as dashing and cool as this guy. Dashing? Wait a second, this isn't the 19th century. What's another word for dashing? Intrepid? No. Smooth? Better. But smooth still could have that negative connotation to it... like player. He didn't have that way about him. Debonair? Maybe that works.

Ren was just so much of everything Stella liked. He basically embodied what she really wanted. Yet Stella had always been too scared to believe someone like that could want her back just as much. She realised she had been settling in the past for men who were safe--she liked them and they loved her. The encounters she did have with perfect guys never quite worked out because of timing or they just weren't that interested in her. Or they were, but she was too scared of getting hurt to let them go on being interested. This time, all the variables seemed to be right and Stella wanted to go for it.

"I just don't want to ruin it," she thought. And the refrigerator continued to hum, and she still couldn't fall asleep.