One day I’ll know what makes a great woman, but right now I’m certain that it’s not this mascara. It keeps clumping my eyelashes, but only on the left eye. Ugh. I dab at the mascara with a tissue and smear it across my eyelid, where I had finally gotten the eye shadow to look somewhat close to the right eye. Now I have to start all over again.
The door bell rings.
He can’t be here already.
I don’t know why I let my mom talk me into this blind date. I’ve never been attracted to men who are less intelligent than me. I mean I try to not be arrogant, but it’s hard to talk to a guy who doesn’t understand what I’m saying and can’t think about anything but sports. I like sports fine. I just can’t talk about them for hours.
Ouch! Seriously?
I definitely just poked my eye with the mascara brush. Dang it! That hurts terribly. And now I have to redo my left eye all over again.
The door bell rings again.
Now I’m frantic and can’t figure out whether I need to fix my eye first or go ahead and answer the door with a watering, red eye and mascara running down my cheek. I reach for the tissue box but it’s completely empty. I rip off some toilet paper and…
The door bell rings again.
Sigh. I hold the toilet paper over my eye and run to the door in bare feet.
I fling the door open not knowing if I’ll just end up watching a movie by myself tonight or not. Right now, I think I might prefer the loneliness.
Shoot! He’s gorgeous. Not too beautiful, like a movie star who is intimidatingly wonderful, but gorgeous no less. And he has flowers. Sunflowers, my favorite. I try to smile, but then realize how horrible I must look when his smile fades.
“Theresa?”
I try to maintain the smile and drop the toilet paper from my eye. “Yeah.” I’m defeated already. “That’s me.”
“What did you do to your eye?”
“I got attacked by a squirrel. Just flew right through my window.” I can’t stop myself. I think I know how this is going to end, so I help it along in that direction anyway. Might as well.
He starts to smile slightly out of the side of his mouth. “A squirrel?”
“Yeah. Just whoosh. Right through my bathroom window.” I even throw in an arm movement.
“That must have been terrifying.”
I start to laugh. “Not quite as much as this is. Actually, I just got attacked by my makeup and am trying desperately to win round 3.”
“I kind of guessed. The black streak across your cheek looked a little less like squirrel scratchings and a little more like oil and wax.” He pulls a handkerchief out of his pocket and wipes my cheek.
“Are you serious?” I can’t stop myself again.
“I could have turned around five minutes ago. I almost did when you didn’t answer after the second doorbell.”
My mouth opens again, “I’m glad you didn’t, although you may not be.”
His mouth opens to a full-faced grin. His teeth are perfectly straight and the right shade of white. I’m really surprised I haven’t fallen to the floor. “This has already been the best date I’ve been on in years. And you haven’t even invited me in yet.”
I bite my bottom lip and slap my hand against my head. Then I shake it off, even though I still can’t quite open my left eye. “Would you like to come in and watch TV or something while I finish getting ready?”
“Not really.”
My jaw drops. All of my reactions have been genuine, so I guess I shouldn’t start censoring myself now. “Oh, well. Good night?”
“I was just thinking that you have a nice bench here on your porch and it’s a nice night, maybe we could just sit here and order a pizza. Besides I don’t really know that you should go back in the ring against that mascara, you may very well be out of your weight class there.”
I hold his handkerchief tightly as I walk through the door and shut it behind us.
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