When Friday afternoon rolled around, I had successfully procrastinated in ever way I knew how. I had watched TV for a few hours, eaten two meals that I had actually taken the time to prepare, did the dishes, and had finally unpacked from tour. I had even put the suitcases away in my storage unit in the basement. But while I should have been experiencing a sense of real accomplishment, I instead felt guilty and a little stupid. What was I afraid of?My computer taunted me, sitting over there on its desk, gaping at me with its big black eye in the form of a dormant screen. There was an e-mail in my inbox, welcoming me to eHarmony. It told me that I needed to complete the Relationship Questionnaire to get my Personality Profile so that I could start receiving matches. After stalking around my desk like a wild animal scoping its probable prey, I finally took a deep breath and sat down before stabbing my finger at the button to awaken the screen. I wanted this part to be over with. Or maybe I didn’t want to do it at all. Maybe I really had experienced a total breakdown of normal brain functioning the day before like I had attempted to convince myself as I had lay sleeplessly in bed the night before.
I logged onto the site using the information I had selected the day before and started filling out the incredibly detailed Questionnaire, but not before getting back up to get a pop. And some chips. And go to the bathroom. And then to go get the mail. Once all of my junk mail was in the garbage and my bills were not only opened, but also had checks written out and return addresses and stamps on the envelopes, I knew that I had to stop being a pathetic procrastinator and sat back down determinedly. It was only a few hours of my life, right?
And so I started, intending to complete the entire thing in one sitting and trying to be as honest as possible. I went back to change a few things before I finalized my answers and moved on to each next page. It felt strange to be so honest about things like how much my partner’s feelings about religion or whether or not they smoked really meant to me. I didn’t want to admit that things like that had that much of a bearing, but when I made myself be truly honest, they did. They all did. So many of these things were the items that wound up being deal breakers in relationships. Like whether or not you wanted to have kids. Of course I did, but a lot of people didn’t. And at the end of the day, I knew that I would never end up with someone who didn’t want to have children. I wasn’t looking for a future wife, but if one fell into my lap, or into my match list, then so be it. That was how life worked. Things happened whether you asked for them or not, no matter what medium you invoked. It could have been in a bar or at a book club meeting or on the internet. Love was going to find you when it was supposed to no matter what. These were the kinds of things that I couldn’t tell my brothers I believed in. I could only imagine what they would have called me if I had.
I was almost done with the Questionnaire when I heard a key turning in my front door. Panic spread through me instantly. I couldn’t click out of the browser without losing my work, but I certainly couldn’t let either of my brothers know what I was doing. There was no way in hell that they would understand. So, I simply turned off my monitor just as Isaac was walking through the door.
“What are you doing?” he asked, his eyebrow immediately rising judgmentally at me.
“Asks the guy walking into my apartment without knocking or calling,” I said, annoyed beyond description at the interruption.
“So-rry!” he rolled his eyes, “I just came to see if you wanted to go to dinner with us.”
“You see this thing?” I asked, holding up my cell phone in his direction, “It’s called a phone. You could have used one of these newfangled contraptions to ask me the same question.” He didn’t respond right away and just kept looking judgingly at me.
“Why are you sitting at your computer with the monitor off?” he asked, “Were you looking at porn?”
“What? No! Get out!” I said.
“Are you coming to dinner or not?”
“Not,” I said, looking pointedly at him until he left grumbling under his breath about my behavior. As soon as he’d left, I let out a whooshing breath of relief and turned back around to resume my work. I hadn’t answered more than five more questions when my door swung back open and Taylor bounded in before I had the chance to do anything.
“Ike said you were looking at porn. Anything good?” he asked, coming over while I just sat there helpless, shaking my head and for lack of a better option, placing my hand in front of the middle of the screen as if that covered anything.
“I’m not looking at porn. Go away!” I knew I was behaving childishly, but what other option did I have?
“What are you doing?” Taylor asked, obviously intrigued by my secretive behavior. He moved quickly over to me and I turned off the monitor just as he approached. Now he was really interested. He gave me an incredulous look before reaching forward to turn the monitor back on. When I tried to block his path, he just slapped me hard in the head with his other hand, the one I wasn’t anticipating, and he managed to hit the button. “eHarmony?”
“It’s nothing,” I lied, but I didn’t make any moves to click out of the browser.
“You really signed up for this?” he asked “Zac, you can’t be on a public dating site like this!”
“How is it any worse than you and Isaac being total manwhores in every bar in town?” I demanded, “And besides, you don’t find out people’s last names until you decide to provide that information and I’m not going to put up any pictures. So just shut up.”
“Why are you doing this?” he asked, suddenly sounding like a concerned older brother. It wasn’t a good look on him, I decided. “Is it because of what I said yesterday? I was just messing with you.”
“I’m doing it because I want to,” I said, though I still wasn’t sure about the truth of that statement.
“Just be careful. If the girls on there find out it’s you, then things are going to get crazy.”
”It’s not like I’m putting up a personals ad on Craigslist here, Taylor. It’s eHarmony. The process is apparently really slow, I only get matched with people I’m compatible with based on this survey that I was filling out until you guys started bothering me, and I don’t have to meet anyone if I don’t want to. And I won’t meet anyone unless I’m really sure about it. Okay, Dad?” Taylor just shook his head at me and left, apparently having intended no more out of his intrusion than to sneak a peek at some free porn.
I finished the Questionnaire then abandoned my computer for a hot shower and trip to the deli down the street for a big meatball sub. When I checked my mail later that day, I found a link to my Personality Profile and found the results to be disturbingly accurate. So accurate that they kind of creeped me out and I once again signed out of my e-mail until the next morning.
It was Saturday morning and when I was home, it was when I usually went out for breakfast with Matt to get strong coffee and greasy food in hopes of eliminating whatever traces of a hangover he had from the night before. Always punctual if nothing else, he knocked on the door a little before ten. As I went to let him in, I made up my mind to tell him about eHarmony. Matt would understand, or at least I imagined that he would.
“Ready for some foodage?” Matt asked when I opened the door.
“Yeah, in just a minute. I need to talk to you about something first,” I told him. He followed me inside and I sat down at my desk, prompting him to drag a chair over to face me.
“You’re freaking me out, what’s going on?”
“It’s not bad. I just did something and I need to talk to someone who won’t just be a dick about it,” I explained.
“Is this about what I said to you the other day? I mean, if you’re gay that’s fine, I was just giving you shit.”
“That is so not what I’m talking about. I’m not gay,” I told him, trying not to laugh at the sincere look on his face, “I signed up for eHarmony.”
“No shit?” Matt laughed, “How’s that going for you?” I shrugged.
“I got an e-mail that I have matches, but I haven’t looked at them yet.”
“Did you put up a picture and everything?”
“No, I did the complete profile and I did it honestly, but I’m not putting up a picture.”
“Only trolls refuse to put up pictures on sites like that,” Matt laughed, scooting his chair so it was alongside mine.
“Well, do you blame me?”
“Not at all, but let’s go through these matches and see what lovelies you were paired with,” Matt said.
“I thought you were hungry.”
“It can wait. I’ve got to see this,” Matt told me, and with that, we started going through the fifteen matches that were already waiting for me. Most were easy to dismiss based on their answers to the questions. There were girls who claimed that Britney Spears was their biggest role model and those whose favorite book was Cosmopolitan Magazine. As I sat there wondering how in the hell I could have ever been matched with these women, Matt nudged me hard in the ribs and pointed to the screen. “She’s cute.”
“She is,” I responded, my eyes reading her profile quickly.
“She’s not a moron either. Far from it.” I reached for the mouse and clicked on the button that said “Request Communication.”
“Maybe the system isn’t so bad after all,” I shrugged.
“What do you do now?” Matt asked.
“Now we go eat breakfast and I wait to be rejected,” I laughed.