The Costco Guy

(Originally published: 05/04/16)

I guess we all have our very own ideas as to what a first date means, and we all have certain expectations when the time comes to meet that new person. However, things don't always go the way we would like them to, and that is when everything becomes a real catastrophe.

Back then, this story really upset me, but now looking back, reminiscence can only bring out a good laugh.

My story begins in Monterrey, Mexico, I had travelled there to spend a weekend with my best friend, Ulises, and during my last day there, I matched with a pretty hot guy on Tinder. He was taller than me, toned body, and he had a slightly Mediterranean face, with a tanned skin, long nose, and black hair.

For some reason, we were unable to meet during that trip, and I went back home after saying goodbye to my friend.

Turns out, this 27-year-old guy - I was twenty - continued messaging me the following week. Attraction was mutual, and our chats were very exciting. He seemed like the most interesting guy, and it was cute chatting with him. He had a career, a nice job, he was the kind of attractive, confident and independent man that I am usually attracted to.

After six weeks of getting to know each other via text, Facebook and constant phone calls, it was time for us to meet. He said to me that he "couldn't stand spending another minute without me" and that he needed to see me "ASAP" so that we could start "our relationship". We lived at a distance of 2.5 hours between each other, and I really wasn't worried about us living in different cities, given that I'm usually busy throughout the week, and the only times that I can dedicate to someone else, are the weekends.

I accepted going to Monterrey to meet up with whom I hoped - this time, finally - would be my Prince Charming. BIG MISTAKE!

My bestie, Ulises, is a med school student, and he said that I could stay at his place again, so I arrived on a Friday afternoon. I got installed, and went to bed early, given that, the following morning, I would meet this guy whom we will call Josue.

We had agreed that he would pick me up the next day, Saturday, at 1pm, to go and have some pizza. I am one of those people who will always try to give the very best of themselves on a date, which is why, I started getting ready from 11am (Ulises will tell you that I actually started at 9). I tried different outfits, different hair styles, and I ended up looking so amazingly gorgeous that I was even wearing a bowtie!

But disaster began at 1pm sharp, time by which we should already be together. He called me on the phone and he asked me what I was up to, and my response was something like: "Um... waiting for you?" His excuse for being late, was that he didn't have clean clothes and that he was doing some laundry. WHAT?!

It was until 3:15pm, when the guy was finally able to leave his place. I was with Ulises and some of his Med School friends at a restaurant where they were serving pizza. I was so hungry, and it looked so good, but I said that I was waiting for Josue to pick me up, and that we would go have pizza anyway, so I wouldn't spoil my appetite.

By 5pm the guy was nowhere to be found. He called me again and said that he was stuck in traffic, but he lived only 3 miles away from Ulises' apartment, so there was no chance for it to take that long. I kept myself calm, thinking, "maybe he's buying flowers, he knows tulips are my favourite" or "maybe he's just anxious and getting ready himself, deciding what to wear, and that's the reason why he's late", but none of my thoughts could lower the stress of someone as impatient as me, because the thing is... I hate waiting.

When he finally arrived, somewhere around 5:30pm, four and a half hours late, I was like: "this is it, it's finally happening". I walked out of Ulises apartment, full of hopes and dreams, with my little bowtie and my combed hair, and all I see is him inside of a nasty car. He couldn't even get out of the car to say hi first. I saw him smoking inside, and that really put me off. But that wasn't everything: when I open the door, I notice that there is a lot of crap, cables, tickets, coins, candy, and dirt on the seat. And all I can think of is: you knew that I was coming to see you for the past two weeks and you didn't have the time to, at last, clean up the seat of the car?????

Once inside, I said hi, and we briefly hugged each other, before he started driving away. What followed was the most insipid and shallow conversation that you could ever imagine, and it only revolved about whether he had bought a new case for his phone, or a new tool from Home Depot, or a new protein for his fitness routine. I was speechless. What happened to the interesting charming guy that I've been talking to for the past six weeks?!

Honestly, I was starving by this point, because I hadn't eaten at all. Since we were supposed to have pizza, I was picturing us walking into a nice Italian restaurant, you know? With a stone oven and a nice cart of wines, or in the worst case scenario, an Italianni's restaurant. But I was mistaken again. Josue looks at me, and he says: "Let's go to Costco. They have the best pizza ever, and I promise you, it will change your life!". Change my life? Who is this psychopath?!!!!

I was like, is this for real? Are you telling me that I could've eaten that nice-looking pizza with Ulises, but I didn't because of this dude, only to end up at Costco? COSTCO?!!! It's like taking me on a first day to Walmart! I didn't say a thing, I was already in his car, so I just smiled and said that I had never tried the pizza from Costco, but that I trusted his judgement. Obviously, by this point, I didn't trust him at all!

Once we got to Costco, the conversation kept getting worse, but the worst part is that he seemed to think that we were having a great time. I asked my self: am I being too much of a snob? Should I maybe just relax and remove this warning sign in my head telling me that this is a disaster? But Josue didn't help to make things better, he continued talking about his gym, his protein, and the 4K television that he wanted to buy.

I didn't want to eat at the Costco food court on my first date with him, or with anyone! I was wearing a bowtie for crying out loud!! So I proposed taking the pizza with us back to Ulises' apartment, where we would have more privacy and some wine. But that was another mistake.

Once at the apartment, I realised that Ulises was out. He sent me a message saying that he had gone to a party, which meant that we had the place to ourselves. He seemed more excited opening the pizza box than he looked when he saw me walk out of the building. That pizza was extremely overrated, it was too chewy, and the cheese had an awful texture, but he seemed to love it. As we ate, I tried creating some conversation, but there was nothing amazing coming from his side. Yes, he was handsome, but he was a rather dull person.

After eating, we went to the bedroom, and we cuddled up for a moment. I mean, at least something good had to happen! And there, he told me that he was twenty-seven years old and that he didn't like or felt passionate about anything, not even the gym - which he spent so much time talking about - and that the career path that he had chosen was just because a vocational test gave him that result. In a nutshell: he was a muscled loser. But something had to be in there, right? "There must be something that makes him passionate", I said to myself.

Don't ask me how, but we ended up talking about Disney, which then took us to talking about The Little Mermaid, and it happened to be our favourite Disney film. I thought, "Great, finally, some common ground". But that was probably the worst mistake that I could've made that night, because what followed was a thirty minute performance of him singing "Part of It", "Poor Unfortunate Souls" (with dialogues, and all the gestures) and then he moved on to singing some from The Lion King, non-stop. What had started as something cute for the first thirty seconds, became a thirty-minute Disney nightmare. He just wouldn't stop. I started wondering if maybe I had done something really bad in previous lives and now this was my karma.

I could not stand the guy, he was silly, and shallow, and weird, but he was hot, and I had travelled all the way to Monterrey, so the only way to make him shut up was by kissing him. Maybe we had nothing in common... but in bed, that didn't matter. We found something that we would be good at, and after it, he cuddled me until we fell asleep.

I remember waking up at midnight, with my head on his chest. I was hungry, and when I got up to head to the kitchen, I woke him up. I went put in the microwave another slice of pizza from... Costco.... and by the time I returned to the bedroom, Josue was getting dressed up. I know I never mentioned when he got undressed, but I'm sure you guy have very good imaginations!

I thought, "Perfect, he's leaving!" However, he laid in bed again, and we ended up watching a low-budget horror film that he had obviously picked up. I thought hat would be it, a failed first date, but it didn't end there.

By 2am, Josue had fallen asleep again, and by this point I really wanted to know whether he was staying over or leaving because, if he decided to leave, then I would have to get up, unlock the door for him, and lock again, so the sooner he left the better. I said that he should get his jeans off and get comfortable to sleep, to which he replied that it wasn't necessary, because he was about to leave, to which I thought, ok, great, even better, because I really didn't want to to wake up next to him.

By 3am, Josue was still there completely asleep. I was like, "Dear, you literally just spent the night here, get properly in bed". I was like just leave, or stay, but tell me what's happening because I want to fall asleep, and I don't want to wake up in an hour to open the door for you.

By 4am, it was obvious that he had just spent the entire night there, so I repeated, to just get himself comfortable because he was lying over the duvet. But in that moment, he jumps off the bed in rage, mouthing angry comments, and starts getting his shoes on. I said "What's wrong? Why do you react like that? And he then shouted at me saying "You're stressing me, you stressed me, you're stressing me!! You ask me one, two, three, four times, you stress me! Why can't you just shut up?!!

I was so shocked by his reaction that I couldn't even think of anything to say to him. He walked out of the bedroom in a rush, and almost as if he had found a valium in the kitchen, he came back ten seconds later, and gave me a kiss on my forehead and said "I will text you in the morning". I got up to close the door after him, but I was still in shock. I was still processing the last twelve hours. I sent Ulises and SOS text, and he arrived home where we talked about what had happened.

Did I travel all the way to Monterrey only to end up being shouted at? I felt really stupid. I knew that he was shallow, and boring, but I didn't think that he would be so rude and impulsive. When he arrive dot his house, he sent me a text saying sorry for how he acted, and that he was just feeling drowsy.

The next day, I went with another of my friends to have brunch and to visit the exhibition celebrating 100 years of Conde Nast at the MARCO museum. I really wanted to distract myself, and think of anything but Josue. But as it turns out, he owed me money. Yes, on top of everything, he owed me money. Because when he stopped to add some petrol on our way to Costco, his card didn't go through, and he didn't have any cash, so I ended up giving him money for that. It wasn't much, but ultimately, money is money, and if you owe me, you'll pay me back. So we agreed that he would go to the apartment later that day to bring me the money back.

When he arrived, he gave me my money, and started telling my about his day, that he had gone to H-E-B to buy something, and other things that I really didn't care about, so I said:

-Do you have anything to say to me about last night?

But Josue was really clueless.

-What about?

-About how you shouted at me?!

-Oh, I already apologised over text, I have nothing else to say.

-Well I thought you'd have the guts to say sorry to my face instead of just over a fucking text!

-Oh, please, don't exaggerate. I didn't even disrespect you. That's how I talk to everybody when I'm drowsy, even my mom, and they have never complained.

So I said, rather infuriated:

-Well, I'm not your mother! I came all the way here to see you, with the best of intentions, giving you my best so that we could spend some quality time together, and you come and talk to me like that, IN MY APARTMENT?!!! That is disrespectful. Maybe that's how you talk to your mother, but you certainly won't be talking to me like that.

It wasn't even my apartment haha, but that just came out. After a while he said:

-Well, it was good that we met, at least now we know how we are.

-Yes, we do. And you know what, Josue? I don't think we have anything in common, in fact I find you the most boring man that I have ever met in my life, and after what saw last night, I have no intentions of dating you at all, and you know what else? That pizza sucks!

I went with him to the exit of the building, and I saw him walk away for the very last time.

-And clean up your car!!

That had been a disaster. Josue wasn't who he seemed to be over text. I had dedicated time to look good for him for someone who didn't even cared to clean up his car, or to come out to say hi, or to take us somewhere nicer that wasn't Costco! Where is chivalry these days??

Fortunately, or unfortunately for me, I am a hopeless romantic, and I still believe that there's people out there who value first dates, or at least, other people's time.

Sometimes, we have so many expectations that we only end up disappointed. Maybe, even I wasn't what he expected. Maybe he expected to talk to me however he liked and for me to remain quiet and act like nothing happened. But I put myself first before any six pack, and I would never be with someone who shouted at me like he did.

On my last day in Monterrey, I went to take a walk across Paseo Santa Lucia, looking at the crystal blue river, and the imposing mountains, and right there I promised myself two things:

The first one, that I would never set a lot of expectations on a man, because there are many of them who pretend to be something that they're not.

And the second one: that I would never again have a pizza from Costco.