How I Met My Girlfriend
Written by Ash
College freshman Dave tries online dating and is surprised to get matched with Jane, a cute girl so like him in her interests that he almost can't believe it. He is even more surprised when he begins to hallucinate a bustier, sluttier version of Jane in his hornier moments.
What secret is Jane hiding? Who is this sultry alter-ego 'Jade' visiting Dave's waking wet-dreams?
---
I finally swallowed my pride and tried online dating.
Despite my bookish and introverted nature bearing no romantic fruit whatsoever, for years I stubbornly held out hope that one day I might meet my 'destined love' during my routine day-to-day through high-school and now my first year of college.
It happens in all the sitcoms, doesn't it? Man catches a woman's eye in the laundromat every week, one day he makes a witty comment and
Bam!
Suddenly they're exchanging numbers.
I suppose there isn't much chance of that if you only hang around other nerdy guys and spend most of your free time reading or gaming alone. The only 'real-life' girls I tended to see were fleeting glimpses around the pages of my book as they walked past me in class, or together in huddles that I could never imagine inveigling myself into. 'Hi, I'm Dave, do you mind if I join you girls?' Yeah, right.
So, frustrated, and tired of wasting my prime years sating my desires on unobtainable women through a bright laptop screen in a dark room, I resolved to at least *
try*
the digital match-making method. I skipped on Tinder, not wanting just a one-night stand, and instead tried to find a site less focused on hookups. Filling out my profile was I task I completed without much enthusiasm. While I enumerated my interests (video games, fantasy, board games), I took care to maintain a healthy degree of scepticism that there would be any woman using a site like this that might actually share them and match with me. My only hope was that, just like me, they were too busy hiding in their own bubble to actually look for anyone like-minded IRL.
I saved and logged off at once, burying myself in a new book to try and suppress the odd sense of shame that settled on me. Was this a capitulation, an admission of my own failings?
From the start I had told myself from the start that it wouldn't work, so after a few days of obsessively checking my email with no matches I resolved to simply forget about the whole affair. I almost did.
So when I checked my phone one day to a notification for a match with 'Jane', I was taken aback. We exchanged a few messages, and I began to suspect I was being pranked, or this was one of those scams where the girl (or more likely, a guy) strings you along in DMs until you agree to send them cash.
Jane was too good to be true. 22 years old, only a year older than me. A 2nd year biology student at a nearby college, keen fantasy-fiction reader, movie-goer, TV enthusiast, anime-lover, gamer, the lot. Her profile pic showed a cute, petite girl snuggled in a comfy looking arm-chair, lost in a book I recognised immediately as one of my own favourites. I spotted a chibi Chun-Li figurine on the bookshelf behind her.
Could such a woman really exist? After a few hours of DMs she suggested we meet up for coffee and I messaged back at once to say yes, yes, whenever suited her.
God, please don't let this be a fake.
---
I checked my watch again. People passed me by, bustling too and fro around me as I waited outside the agreed-upon coffee shop in my best checked shirt and smartest dark-blue jeans, my heart slowly sinking. Not wanting to be late for my first IRL meeting with Jane, I'd arrived a good ten minutes before our agreed upon time. But that had been half an hour ago, and there was still no sign her. We hadn't exchanged phone numbers, and my DMs on the dating site were left unread.
Ghosted, then? Maybe it was a scam after all, or just a cruel prank to make nerds like me feel bad. I sighed, chiding myself for getting my hopes up, and began to turn away and walk dejectedly back to my flat.
"Um, excuse me!" I looked up from the pavement to find a slightly dishevelled Jane standing before me, cardigan hanging loosely from her slight shoulders, her slightly-flushed cheeks suggesting she had recently been running. She caught her breath before continuing. "You're Dave?" I nodded, mute with surprise. "I'm so sorry! I was reading and I lost track of time and I-" she stammered to a halt.