anon~girl: What should I have for breakfast?
He'd started to become part of my regular morning routine as early as day four, messages hastily sent back and forth as I turned on the kettle and threw a teabag in the cleanest cup I could find, still wiping the sleep-gunk from the corners of my tired eyes. There weren't many clean cups in my kitchen, all of them permanently stained from my almost constant tea-drinking habit. My mother always told me to wash a tea-cup properly between every use, but who really had the time for that? I preferred to use the same cup for an entire day before washing it, which explained why all of mine were always so terribly discoloured.
unknown*user: What are your options?
His message pinged through just moments after mine to him had been delivered it made me smile to think he was actually sat waiting for my words to ping through on his phone, screen open, thread revealed, watching those typing-dots pop up and then down. Sometimes, I'd mess with him: type for a bit, then stop, then start up again a few minutes later, knowing that he'd be watching, frustrated, wondering what I was saying to take so damn long.
anon~girl: I have Weetabix, that's pretty much it. My bread went green and furry yesterday. I had to throw it out.
I didn't even need to rummage around in my kitchen cupboards to know what my breakfast choices were. I'd always dreamed of being the kind of woman who had an impressive assortment of breakfast cereals in the cupboard, but the closest I'd ever gotten was having two boxes of cereal open at once, the second purchased and opened after I realised I didn't like the taste of the first. I'd never really gotten the hang of food shopping. I found it boring and tedious, much like other types of shopping.
unknown*user: That's your answer then, surely? If I were there, I'd make you a great breakfast.
I laughed. It was the fourth morning in a row that we'd had almost the exact same conversation, Weetabix and all. Four days since I'd put a completely anonymous online stranger in charge of my life. It seemed like such an absurd idea when I said it out loud, which I had done, once, to Sarah. I couldn't keep my mouth shut about him any longer; I had to tell someone. Anyone. Just someone. She had quite a lot of opinions about it, but I probably should've seen that coming.
"Catfish, definitely," she proclaimed, after I'd spent seven minutes trying to explain my weird, new, anonymous situation to her.
"Maybe. He's nice though. If I'd met him on a dating app, I'd be properly gushing about him right now," I replied, my eyes lowering to avoid making contact with hers.
"Yeah, but you didn't meet him on a dating app, did you?"
"Okay, no, you're right, but tell me something: how is THIS any different to meeting some random guy on a dating app?" I scoffed.
"Ummmm, well, to start with, you've got a photo of the person, and you know their name, and there are other important bits of information on their profile pages."
"You can get catfished even with all of that stuff, though. It happens all the time. Do you not remember the delivery guy who used photos from, like, fifteen years ago?"
"But you don't even know if this guy is single!"
"Wasn't one of your last boyfriends married and lying to you, Sarah? I think I've proved my point here." This time, I deliberately made eye contact with my friend, an indignant look plastered across my face.
"Fine, but what's up with him wanting to make your decisions for you? Is he paying you to do that? He doesn't even know you. How does he know how to make decisions for you? The more I think about this, the more I think it's actually weird, especially the whole anonymous side. W-e-i-r-d, weird." Sarah waved her hands around as she spoke to me, a bid to show me and not just tell me just how much she couldn't get her head around my situation. To be fair, she'd never been particularly helpful during conversations about my love and sex life, but she had always provided a kind of brutally honest humour about the tales I had to tell and the odd predicaments I seemed to find myself in.
I awkwardly laughed as I tried to answer her questions, mostly because I didn't really know how to.
"No, he's not paying me. It's more like a game. I might ask him if he wants to start paying me, though. Imagine the lush shoes I could buy if random strangers started sending me money to make important life decisions for me. Ooooh, maybe I could start auctioning off my important life decisions...," My voice trailed off as I imagined the possibilities. I was joking, of course. Ish.
"Please don't be mental," Sarah said, wagging a finger at me. "I read on the internet once that some girl sold her virginity to the highest bidder. Do you really want to be a trashy story in the Daily Monument? THE DAILY MONUMENT? It's like the worst of all newspapers."
She'd made a good point, but that didn't stop me from laughing about it in a conversation with my new anonymous friend later on that evening.
anon~girl: How much would you pay me to make important life decisions on my behalf?
unknown*user: Aren't I already in charge of your life? Why would I suddenly start paying you?
anon~girl: I'm just messing around, but I was talking about our little game with a colleague earlier on. She thinks I'm weird. Actually, she thinks *we're* weird. But she asked if you were paying me to make decisions, kinda like a sugar baby situation, I'm guessing.
unknown*user: Are we calling this a game now? Also, is this your way of finding out how much money I earn?
anon~girl: I don't really care how much money you earn. I don't want your money. 😑
I threw in an emoji to show mock-offence, but if he actually wanted to send me money so he could make decisions on my behalf, I was totally down with that. I'd seen a couple of pairs of Christian Louboutin shoes that I really wanted to buy but couldn't afford with my own modest income, plus my phone bill had been extortionate that month. It wasn't even my income that was the problem; my relatively small two-bedroom flat took up almost all of my earnings, but that was the price you had to pay to live in a half-decent neighbourhood in the city's newest up-and-coming district. And as someone who had spent a fair bit of time in the 'rougher' parts of town, I was willing to spend a bit more money each month (or a lot) to be able to comfortably sleep in my bed without the fear of being robbed in the middle of the night. Once was enough for me.
unknown*user: What *do* you want then?
His question felt like a loaded one. Was he flirting with me? Were we flirting? Was it even possible to flirt with someone when you knew absolutely nothing about them? Not the way they looked, smelled, sounded like, nothing?
anon~girl: In what way?
unknown*user: In any way you want.
And I thought about it for a moment.
I did want to know more about him, but I also wanted to keep the protection that anonymity offered me. If I expected him to tell me more, I knew I would need to expect him to want to know more about me, too — and then what would happen? I'd already been virtually stalked by one crazy ex; I didn't fancy falling victim to another lunatic stalker. Plus, I knew the potential risks; we were anonymous. I could be anyone I wanted ... but so could he.
So, once again, I decided to take a very honest approach:
anon~girl: I want to know more about you, but I also want to remain anonymous. I'm intrigued by you.
It felt like a really brave step for me, in my less-than-confident state, to make that first move. But was it even a first move at all when I essentially told him I wouldn't divulge any of my actual personal information? And how could it be the first move? Where did I really think this was going? I was intrigued by a man whose name I didn't even know, and thoroughly confused by the odd, self-inflicted predicament I'd found myself in — but that was nothing new for me.
I watched my screen for a while, picking at a loose thread hanging off my t-shirt as I waited for him to respond. Typing dots appeared, then disappeared, then appeared, then disappeared. I could picture a blurred outline of a man typing something, shaking his head, deleting the words and then typing something else. I barely let myself breathe as I waited for his reply, and I realised something: I was nervous. Very nervous. Nervous because I wasn't really sure what I wanted him to say back to me, but I knew what I didn't want him to say. I didn't want him to let me down, gently or otherwise. I didn't want him to tell me, in no uncertain terms, that he had no interest in getting to know me further. I didn't want him to tell me about a girlfriend that he'd conveniently kept a secret up until this point.
Thankfully, he didn't tell me any of those things.
unknown*user: I'm the same.
It was an answer that I'd hoped for but was totally unprepared for. I inhaled sharply as I read it, re-reading it again and again, trying to quell the anxious, excited butterflies that were spinning around and around inside of me.
I wasn't going to let him off the hook, though; I wanted to know what he'd typed out and deleted first.
anon~girl: You were typing for too long for that to be your response. What did you tap-and-delete?
unknown*user: Okay, I'll answer your question, but only if you answer one of mine straight after.
anon~girl: Fine.
unknown*user: I originally typed: I want to actually, physically meet you.
anon~girl: Well, that's not going to happen.
unknown*user: I know, that's why I deleted it and said what I said instead. Now it's my turn to ask a question: am I allowed to flirt with you? Because I want to.
I snorted a little when I read his message, but I was thoroughly impressed by him asking for my consent. In a world full of unsolicited penis pictures, especially online, him asking for permission made a very refreshing change. As did his openness. At least I wouldn't need to worry about whether or not he was flirting with me again.
anon~girl: Are you going to send me a picture of your dick?
Judging by the fact that he'd just asked me for consent to flirt, I didn't have him pegged as the kind of man who would send me an X-rated snap without making sure it was okay to do so first; but you never can be too sure of these things. I figured it was only smart to check. I certainly didn't need to add any more penis pics to my camera roll; they'd all started to look the same to me.
unknown*user: Not unless you ask me very nicely, and even then, probably not.
anon~girl: Hahaha, then please feel free to flirt away!
As I responded to him, I chuckled, mentally patting myself on the back for allowing this interesting man-creature into my life. And he really was interesting, too. The tiny snippets of information I'd learned about him had done nothing but add all fuel to the flames of my enthusiasm for him. If this had been a man I'd met on a dating app or in a bar, I'd no doubt be shouting about him from the rooftops, declaring my newest obsession to my closest friends and confidantes.
But the fact that he was a little secret in my pocket, like an adventure that only I was having, just made the idea of him all the more appealing. It's much the same way that sex during an affair always seems to be so much hotter than the sex you ever have with the partner you're betraying. Not that I was having an affair, of course, but my anonymous man-friend didn't know that. He didn't know that I was single because we still hadn't discussed it. Maybe he was having an affair? The idea had already crossed my mind once or twice, but I'd promptly dismissed my concerns, especially after he'd ask for my permission to flirt.
It wasn't my responsibility to make sure a man didn't have a partner before he slid into my messages.
Plus, we hadn't exactly crossed any lines from friendship to ... well, something else.
Not yet, anyway.
unknown*user: Excellent. It's almost your bedtime. I want to choose what you wear to bed.
anon~girl: Nice try, buddy. That's not a decision you'll be making tonight 😉.
unknown*user: Boring. What decisions can I made tonight then?
anon~girl: None. Your services are not required for the rest of the day.
unknown*user: Boooorrring. Let's play a game instead.
anon~girl: A game?
unknown*user: Yep, quickfire questions. I'll start: cat or dog?
anon~girl: Dog. Night or day?
unknown*user: Night. Beer or wine?
anon~girl: Wine. Beef or chicken?
unknown*user: Beef. Pop or rock.
anon~girl: Rock. Leather or lace?
unknown*user: Ohhhh ... you made it sexy!
anon~girl: Didn't you just try to choose what I wore to bed?
unknown*user: Yes, but I never made it sexy. I was going to choose some button-up, gingham pyjamas.
I laughed out loud and rolled my eyes at his response. There were times when he'd be completely predictable, almost as though we were reading from a script and I already knew what was coming next. I thought about telling him that, but then I remembered that we'd given each other permission to flirt; so, I took that route instead.
anon~girl: Okay, final question ... black or red?
unknown*user: Black or red what?
anon~girl: Nightwear. You've entertained me, therefore you get a prize. You can't pick what I wear to bed, but you can pick the colour.
unknown*user: Black.
anon~girl: Satin shorts and camisole, matching set. Black with lace trim. Enjoy the thought. Night!
unknown*user: Hahaha, oh, I most definitely will. Good night! x
And there it was: his first 'x'.
I wondered when that would come along.
We were DEFINITELY flirting.