Over the weekend, I was lucky enough (said with intense sarcasm) to see an old flame of mine, and at 6’4”, this guy is hard to miss.
I don’t have to see him very often, but we do have a group of friends in common, so being him from time to time is sort of a given. I knew he might be out for the birthday occasion, but I wasn’t quite sure. I think so little of him now that I really didn’t care either way, honestly. He spoke, and I spoke back, but I felt nothing. How funny it is then that when he ended it two and a half years ago, I was crushed! Crushed I tell you!

He and I were introduced through a mutual friend who was dating (and is now married to) one of my best girlfriends. The guy – let’s just call him Mr. Mistake – had just moved back from out of the country and seemed to be everything I liked. He was funny, charming, good looking, cultured and intelligent. He really seemed to have it all. We hung out in a group a few times, then after kissing one night at a party, decided to go out on a date. Then another. Then another. Then another.

This went on continuously for about six weeks (or maybe eight…my memory fails me). We were pretty inseparable, even dealing with the loss of one of his friends and a wedding of one of mine. I also took him to my 10-year high school reunion and to my cousin’s high school graduation and to meet my family. His friends loved me, I loved his friends and we seemed genuinely happy together. We had even hinted that the "L" word was on the horizon.

Until. After meeting me at my house one evening and us working up an appetite for dinner, we left to eat at Cantina. I’d been telling him about their gaucho sandwich and how I loved it more than chocolate, so we decided that was the place for dinner.
In line to order, we were hugging and kissing and being generally gross. We sit down to eat. We’re holding hands. Our food comes. I’m happy, he seems happy…so I say something along the lines of how content I am, and that I think we’re going in a great direction.

As matter-of-factly as saying “your shoe is untied,” he looks at me dead on and says, “I actually think we need to stop seeing one another.”

Huh? Oh snap, asshole. You just made me not want my gaucho. You’ve gone and pissed me off now.

I was floored. I sort of laughed because I truly thought he was kidding.
He wasn’t.
I asked him to take me home, and then stopped him in a parking lot on the way to ask what the hell was going on and where did I miss something along the way. He had no real response other than, “I just want to run away from this situation.”

There wasn't much more clarification from him. In the days following, I was really upset, needless to say. I was dumbfounded. Completely out of sorts. It had been going so so so well. Our group of friends had planned a weekend trip to Atlanta to a Braves game, but he would not be going. I decided to try to push past my complete humiliation and enjoy it.

Clencher. I was entering Turner Field when I get a text from him saying: “Hey sweetie. Did you work all day or are you getting off early? XXX”

That text was not meant for me. At all. My heart went to my feet - I knew then and there that I had my reason for why he did what he did. It was another girl. Another girl, who I later found out, was only 19 years old. There was another girl too, a little older than I, but another nonetheless.

It was a very humiliating, very painful setback in my dating life that summer. But the good thing is that through that situation, I introduced one of my best friend’s to Mr. Mistake’s best friend (who is amazing and all things Mr. Mistake is not). And that couple is getting married this spring.

Moral of the story: Something good comes out of every negative situation. Oh, and…don’t let a douchebag cheater spoil your gaucho. Ever.