catfish and the bottlemen imagines for rainy days + mondays

Cocoon // Van

You weren't one for dating, never had been and, though your friends had bullied you into downloading several apps the night before, you were pretty much convinced you never would be.

You hated the idea of some strange preorganised meet cute, meeting for the first time in a bar or a cafe, to spend the evening forcing conversation, gently interrogating one another between awkward jokes and one liners. Lingering eye contact which always felt forced too.

Like youd signed some silent agreement that you were meeting this stranger with one purpose, to fall in love.

It always felt forced and you always felt awkward and today you were convinced would be very much the same.

You hadn't even been the one to swipe right on him, that had been your best friend after several glasses of wine.

You'd been round hers with the rest of the girls and as always the subject had inevitably turned to dating and when it did it inevitably circled round to you, until everyone was talking about your sex life again - or more to the point lack of.

It wasn't that you were particularly antisocial, it wasn't that you were a prude. It was that you were a tragic and tragically stubborn idealist. You romanticised love and dating beyond repair, certain that if you weren't going to meet your handsome stranger in a coffee shop or a book shop, or walking your dog in the park, even just simply lost in the super market, then you didn't want to meet them at all.

The idea of swiping right on a lad based purely on a social media profile made you feel strange and uncomfortable. Like you were playing god or messing with fate. And the idea of creating your own profile, letting yourself be judged in the same way, well that was just out of the question.

However despite your protests when the girls had tried to convince you to join tinder, you had somehow finished the evening with a new profile and several matches, and this; one lunch date.

You'd no idea who you were meeting, only that his name was Ryan and you were going for a walk, down along the canal path out of town. Your friend had told him you knew a nice pub and though that wasn't a lie, you couldn't help but feel everything else about this introduction was completely false.

And as you got ready for your date, this date you'd protested to at first, only agreeing to go on when it had been suggestion to you that you'd be standing the poor lad up if you bailed out now, you felt this growing anxiety like he was going to sus you out.

Like he was going to take one look at you and realise that you'd been too chicken shit to make any kind of move yourself. That he'd been texting your friend up until now and you were just the puppet imposter.

As you tied your long hair back into a loose plait with a white ribbon you tried to give yourself a little pep talk in your mirror. Tried to tell yourself you looked good, cute but casual in your blue white plaid skirt, your oasis tshirt baggy and tucked in at the waist.

Your friends had promised you this lad seemed cool, promised you you'd have at least one thing to talk about and that that one thing would be music, so you were hoping to be setting yourself off on the right foot there.

But now you were stalling. Glancing between your reflection and the clock on the wall, knowing that with every second that went by you were risking making yourself late.

As it happened however it didn't really matter that you were late, because the lad you were meeting had lost his phone, gotten lost twice trying to find the place and, when he recognised you from across the road and greeted you with a smile, seemed so laid back and in his own world, that for a moment you wondered if perhaps he'd forgotten why he was meeting you. Or whether he'd ever been on a date before.