Following his break up with Lydia, Charlie experienced the best weekend of his life. He did not wear clothes once, and Noah only shrugged on a dressing gown to answer the door for takeout deliveries. They lounged together on the sofa watching tv, entwined in each other's limbs, they made out passionately, and had sex again and again with no intention of doing anything else. He rode Noah's dick for the first time and revelled in the incredible response that happened in his body. His very bones felt as though they melted into butter, and he leaned into Noah, smelling his masculine addictive scent and felt the relief that he was his, that this was his life now. He was so engrossed in his overpowering and insatiable need for Noah that it wasn't until Monday morning when he found himself reluctantly back at his desk at work that he remembered Lydia and his idea. Finding her a match.
He spent the next few days trying to get in contact with Matched and browsing the internet for others who may be looking. To much disappointment he saw support groups with hoards of people who had been waiting years for their Match. He couldn't let that be Lydia. He sent an email to their customer support address but that too proved useless.
Dear Charlie,
I understand your desires to get your friend Matched however there is no time guarantee on Matches due to the nature of the service. Regretfully, we cannot help you in this time. I wish you all the best for you and your new match.
Best wishes,
Sarah
Customer Support
By Thursday, Charlie was desperate. The hope that had buoyed him when he left Lydia's apartment was evaporating like the air from a deflating balloon. He decided the only thing he could do was to go to Match HQ itself. He didn't know exactly what he planned to do when he got there, but he had to talk to someone, to explain, and maybe just maybe they could push her up the queue or prioritise her profile or find some match that maybe they had missed.
Of course, the moment he decided this was the moment that his boss pulled him into a long meeting that lasted until 6 o'clock. By the time he got out of the meeting and got across London to Matched HQ, it was nearly 6:45 pm.
He stood outside the big glass doors of Matched HQ and felt the trepidation sliding into his stomach. It was dark inside, and clearly they had long since closed. He sighed, and felt angry tears begin to prick his eyes. He had failed. Again. He knew he could come back tomorrow, but what did he even plan on doing when they were open? Demand they match Lydia immediately? Was that even possible?
Just as he was about to leave he saw a light flick on and movement from inside the building. Someone was there. He only needed one person.
He bounded up the steps two at a time, only stopping when he was right at the glass door, his hands pressed against the glass as he peered inside at the distant figure. He knocked hard on the glass, and saw the figure pause, turning to look at him. In the dark building, it was hard to see who it was, but as he approached, Charlie saw a young man of around the same age as him, with brown hair and startlingly blue eyes. He looked oddly familiar although he couldn't immediately place why.
The key rattled in the lock and the man opened the door, looking at Charlie with a mix of curiosity and concern in his expression.
"Um.. can I help you with something?" He asked.
"Yes, I need to speak to someone about a Match."
"Oh," he said his the concern clearing slightly in his face. "If you're a customer you should email the help desk if you're having problems with the-"
"I did that already. It was useless. Please can I just explain?" Charlie begged and the young man glanced behind him at the empty office.
"Alright. What's up?"
Charlie launched into his explanation, starting with him and Lydia being together and she tricking him into the test until this week where he had chosen Noah and decided he had to find her a match for his relationship with her and his child to have any hope of really working.
The mans expression grew interested as he spoke but he didn't interrupt, he only listened as Charlie finished his story, feeling slightly out of breath.
The man smiled a little as he asked, "what did you do? When you found out you were matched with a guy?"
Charlie frowned, finding this an odd question after everything he had said, but decided to be honest.
"I ran off and sat on a park bench in the rain for about three hours and then got shitfaced," he admitted, cringing at the memory of drinking the vodka straight from the bottle. How silly it seemed in retrospect, now he knew what a life with Noah could really feel like.
The mans smile grew and he shrugged, "could have been worse. When I met Damien I fainted."
The name Damien jogged something in Charlie's mind. Newspaper articles and tv reports, a magazine spread on a wedding that Lydia had shown him only days before the Matched incident. He realised who the man before him was. Elliot Green, partner of Damien Parker... now Green had Lydia said? This guy was a celebrity and face of the Matched 2:0 revival story. And here he was pouring out his pathetic story on the steps of Matched when probably all he wanted was to go home.
"I'm so sorry," Charlie babbled, backing down the steps. "I've just realised who- I didn't mean- I'm sorry I wasted your time." He reached the street and started a fast walk in the opposite direction.
"Hey," Elliot called after him, "I think I know how I can help?"
He froze, turning back to look at him. The guy really did have crazy blue eyes, he always wondered if it was just the photos, but even from here he could see them.
"You do?" He asked and Elliot smiled.
"Yeah, come inside."
As Charlie followed Elliot inside the building he looked around, even with most of the lights off it still looked grand, with a high ceiling and marble floors. It was beautiful. Elliot led them up the stairs and Charlie followed.
"Are you sure it's ok me being here?" Charlie asked, feeling like an out of place school child.
"Don't worry about it, Damien's in a meeting upstairs. Will be at least another half an hour, and I'm just hanging around doing some odd jobs until he's done. So really you called at the perfect time."
Elliot opened the door to an office and Charlie saw on the door it read, "Elliot Green, Matching Coordinator"
"So," Elliot said sitting at his desk and gesturing for Charlie to sit opposite. "I'm going to just explain a little bit about how we make our matches. Some of the stuff I'm telling you is not public knowledge, I'm trusting you to keep this between you and me."
"Ok. But how do you know you can trust me?"
"Because I think you're a lot like me. Also because if it gets out I'll know it was you," he added but his voice was cheerful and light.
"So this is our Matched database," he said, turning his screen so that Charlie saw a black background with lots of names and coding. "Can you tell me your name?"
"Charlie, Charlie Thompson."
Elliot typed his name into a search bar and scanned down a list of names. He found a few that were not me, until eventually a familiar face popped up. A photo from only a year ago, one Lydia particularly liked. She must have chosen it when she made the profile.
"Here we go," Elliot said. "And this is your match? Noah Hannigan?"
A small line appeared across the screen to another profile, this one featuring Noah, smiling broadly. Charlie felt himself blush involuntarily just at the photo of him. He looked very good. The photo looked like it was at a party, he was wearing a bow tie.
"Yeah, that's him."
Elliot smiled slightly, registering the blush on his cheeks but he didn't comment on it, returning his attention to the screen.
"So you see this here?" He pointed to a number on the screen below the line.
"Yeah, the 93.8%?"
"Yes, that is the magic percentage that we mould our matches on. Every profile has a compatibility check and a percentage produced. Over time these have become very clear: those that match around 98% upwards are your 'love at first sight' matches. They don't even need to talk and they're head over heels. Super rare. But I've seen it. Then after that you get the 95%- 98% approx, they are the ones that fall very quickly, usually one date is all it takes. Then the 90%-95%," he gave a nod at Charlie, "they too fall quickly but usually there is some sort of obstacle that needs overcoming, in your case that was most likely confronting your sexuality. After that the 82%-90% can take a bit more time, these are the ones who we get calls from usually saying they're mismatched. But eventually with some sort of compromising or bonding activity they fall and settle things out."
"You keep saying 'fall'? What's that?" Charlie asked.
Elliot smiled, the excitement at his work was evident in his eyes. "The fall is what I named it. The important thing to note here first Charlie is that you do not have just one match like everyone thinks."
"What?" Charlie frowned.
"You can have dozens of suitable matches, and it is people like me that make the decision on who gets matched with who. Almost always it's just the highest percentage, but sometimes if it is one of many matches for one and the only match for another we choose a lower percentage for the person with many. But the key thing," Elliot continued, as Charlie was about to interrupt. "Is the fall. Every match at some point experiences something a bit like a switch. A moment when they suddenly lose interest in everybody else. That's important because not only do they lose interest in those around them, but also any other matches they could have had. Even those with a higher percentage. I call it the fall because it's that moment that most people think of as when they fall in love. You follow me?"
"I... think so," Charlie frowned. "But how is all this going to help me with Lydia?"
"Can I have her full name?" Elliot asked, and then typed it into the keyboard, scanning the list until he found her profile. "Yes as I suspected, oh... oh interesting," he muttered.
"What? What is interesting?"
He pointed at the screen, "see she has no matches achieving the 82% mark but this one here is 81.99%."
"You're joking. Surely we can just match them up if it's that close?"
Elliot shook his head, "the company have a clear policy that no matches lower than 82% can be made."
"But- come on! It's 0.01%!" Charlie cried in frustration.
"You haven't heard my idea yet," Elliot hissed, "and please stop being so loud!"
"Sorry," Charlie whispered.
"It's fine. I get it. And I'm sorry but I can't make this match. But you can."
"What?"
"Get them together! As much as you can until the fall happens. I reckon it still will it just needs time, and perseverance. There's no reason why once the fall happens that they won't shoot right up, people do, it's amazing how people adapt."
The way he said it made Charlie think that Elliot seemed to know this personally. And thinking on his own love life, he believed that too.
"Ok, why not right? It's something."
Elliot seemed pleased and grabbed a pen and paper scribbling down the guys details from the database.
