No Job, No Car, No Problem!

Use Me And Lose Me

Dick and I spend a lot of time together.  We haven’t exactly been dating.  Instead we just went right into seeing each other.  We skipped all the glam and butterflies that are involved with going out some place nice or wearing something nice, in the hopes of seeing the one you care about. 

“Let’s go slow Jenny,” Dick would tell me when we found we weren’t sleeping together after the third date.  “Sex changes everything and I want both of us to be ready for those changes.”  He was telling me?  Sex basically screwed me up in the head.  I was bound to immediately fall in love with the person I was sleeping with.  That’s just what I do.  “I completely agree.  Plus I’m not ready either,” I tell him relieved. 

Instead of dating, we played…friends.  Sure we would kiss and cuddle but when it came to a Saturday night out together, we’d end up out in his garage.  I’d sit watching him work on the motorcycle, that was someday going to actually drive us out to dinner, while Dick would sit on the cement, filthy dirty, cussing up a storm. 

“Sorry I always have to do this Jenny.  Did you want to go out?”

Try not to sound bitter Jenny.  “Well, it would be nice if sometimes we went out and did something.”

“You’re right.  You want to go to Burger King and grab a bite?  Then we can watch a movie or something?”  Burger King was his idea of out? 

“Sure, why not,” I said shrugging my shoulders in despair. 

Other than not going out nice places, me always being the one to drive and quite often somehow picking up the bill, Dick and I do things right.  We get to know each other on a sober level, watching movies or talking while cooking dinner together.  See Sandy?  I can be in a completely sober relationship.  But am I enjoying it?

Despite growing comfortable with him so fast, there are some serious red flags with Dick.  “I can be a very selfish person” he tells me one night over dinner.  Why should I worry?  He’s telling me this because he is hoping going to change, right?  Maybe I help him to feel less selfish and rather yearn to be a better person.  That happened all the time in relationships, didn’t it?  It does get old constantly driving to his house and him never taking the time to come see me.  I find that I’m staying at his house at least three nights a week and he has yet to even see mine.  And with staying over comes the surrender of sleeping together…and it changes everything. 

I fight becoming too attached to Dick.  How can I become infatuated with a man that doesn’t ever take me out?  I love the idea of a low key, comfortable relationship but to never do anything fun was getting old.  Dick still hadn’t made any effort to meet my friends either.

“Hey Dick, there are some friends and I meeting up for a drink after work.  Please come and meet them.”

“No,” he’d quickly respond.  “Jenny, I am not going to go out and meet your friends so I can tell them I don’t have a job or any money.”  Does he think I don’t already share this information with my friends?

“I’ll buy you one drink.  No one will notice.  I’ll just put it on my card and I promise no one will ask you anything like that.”

“I said no Jenny.”

So we continued to not go out.  Instead I fall asleep on his lap watching a movie and he gets irritated with me for falling asleep before the ending.  But what can I do?  I’ve worked a long week while he’s sat home playing on the computer, supposedly looking for a job.  Then when I get to his house, he keeps me waiting till 10pm while he works on the motorcycle that still isn’t running.  Of course I’m going to fall asleep.  Still, ending the night in each others arms does feel good.  At least I’m finally with someone.  That’s what I wanted most, wasn’t it?  But then the reality of having to rise early in the morning to go back to work hit, day after day.  I wasn’t sure it was all worth it when he whined about me turning on the light to see where my clothes were strewn.  After all, he did need to get extra sleep for his big day of doing nothing.  This is the pattern Dick and I fall into for three solid months.