A "No" Would Also Have Worked

Story Sent in by June:

Andrew barely squeaked in as a potential date. He was pretty crass online but sometimes funny. On the date though, he was something else entirely.

He took me to a store that sold camping supplies and asked me, "Feel like camping?"

"Tonight? No. It's too cold."

"We can camp someplace warm."

"I don't camp out with first dates."

"You can bring your friends."

"I–"

"Your hot friends."

"They're, they're out of town."

"Where? We can bring the camping to them."

"Like 500 miles away."

"We can do that in a night. Up for it?"

"I have work early tomorrow morning."

"Call in sick."

It went on like that for a while. He had an answer for everything. I eventually convinced him that dinner was the best plan (I was starving by that point) and that launched him into another volley:

He asked, "Chinese or Japanese?"

"Chinese."

"Why not Japanese?"

"Because I'm more in the mood for Chinese tonight."

"Most Chinese places are probably closed. It's Chinese New Year. Let's do Japanese."

"It's November. And anyway, why would you mention Chinese as an option if you would prefer Japanese?"

"Because I thought you'd say Japanese. So Japanese is good?"

We ended up at a small Japanese place that had a half-hour wait. He was dead set on it and so we waited and eventually sat down.

At dinner his side of the conversation was similarly annoying: "How often do you see your brother?" "Why do you only see him that often?" "Do you think he'd like me?" "Who would win in a fight: me or your brother?" "Why did you say your brother? You meant me, right?" "Oh, I see. But what if I fought dirty? Like if I pulled his balls and didn't let go? He'd have to yield." "Why don't you want to talk about your brother's balls? Doesn't he have any?" "Have you ever seen them?" "Why not? He never offered to show them to you?" "Would you accept his offer?"

Oh my God. I had to rid myself of this weirdo. Once the meal was over and we went outside, he asked, "So, that camping shop's probably still open if you want to reconsider camping out tonight. Someplace warm."

"I have to go. Early work, remember? Have a good night." I headed toward my car.

He followed me. "Where do you work? I can call them to ask them to let you come in later. It might be nice to spend the night together. Camping. Just us. Or with your hot friends. Together with us."

I kept walking. He kept talking. I slipped into my car, locked the doors, and drove off, leaving him there to ask himself in a million ways why I didn't want to spend one more moment with him.