An Interesting Date at 100 Day Mark

I didn't think it would come off. I actually had a date, in Cape Town, with my Banker boy. It was confirmed at the very last minute, just as I was sitting down with Nesta and her family and my family for a braai. I said I could only leave there at 9. He said his whole family was out of town so he had his house to himself for the night. The drive from my place to his was about 45 min long. In the dark. He asked me to drive through to him anyway.

I decided to humour him. After all, it was my 100 days' final day. I could easily have a sexy date with maybe some delicious sex to mark the occasion. So I drove across town. Late at night. But I was nervous. Banker boy is intimidating. He's clever. And a straight talker. I have huge respect for him as a businessman and leader. He's fit and strong. And fuckoff sexy! Cycles. Works out. I was nervous that I wouldn't match up to him. Meet his expectations. I am also clever, and we have good and engaging conversations together, but I sometimes feel out of my league with him. And that doesn't happen to me very often. And physically? I'm nowhere near as fit and lean and strong as him. I'm just out of a year of rehab for my RA. I've lost 15kg, but I'm still on the soft, curvy side of womanliness, and I'm proud of myself when I manage to walk 10 000 steps a day, which is only 7.5km of walking. I can't run. Or cycle. In fact I have absolutely no idea why I interest him at all. In those 45 min I managed to talk myself right out of any confidence I may have been feeling before, and was relieved that he chose a bar near to his home to meet, instead of his house itself. I don't think I could have handled being completely alone with him that night.

This man and I have been flirting on and off for years. In fact, he was flirting with me before I even noticed, so caught up was I in my addictive relationship with John-the narc, that I didn't even give Banker much of a thought. We'd flirt in meetings. Maybe share a text message or two. But I was committed to John, so not taking down new potentials at all.

When John and I crashed in May, and I was floundering around trying to grab onto any blade of grass that would reassure me that I wasn't a complete and utter reject and loser, he was one of the boys I upped my flirtation levels with. Just to see if anything came of it. It's become quite a strange relationship and I don't really know quite what to make of it.  When he's away from home, he contacts me out of the blue, sometimes after months of silence. Tells me something suggestive like he's in this really beautiful hotel room but that the bed is really lonely. And I'll rise to the bait and play with him about that for a bit, and then suddenly it's over - no phone sex or anything like that, just playful stuff - always short of getting too explicit. If I contact him in between those times, he may or may not respond - he seems quite happy to leave me hanging, and then reel me in when he has bandwidth for me.

Mark is exactly the same - and it really hurt me earlier in our relationship when he did that. I felt like he was just playing with me. But I've come to realise with Mark that he's actually just like that. He really cares for me, as I do for him, but he has very little bandwidth for me, and will check in when he can. And because I know now that we do care for each other a lot, that feels just fine. I could call him from Russia at 2am and he'd be on the next plane to help me, if that's what I needed.

It's possible that Banker boy is a Narc. That he's developing me for supply in the future sometime, and is just toying with me to see what lengths I'll go to to be with him. A few months ago he popped into my inbox at about 7ish at night, saying he was alone in his hotel room in Rustenburg, and wouldn't I like to join him? That's about 2.5 hour's drive from my hometown, and along a very dangerous road. I declined, saying I was on my own with my kids. But I do wish I'd just said 'No'. It's too far. Instead I said 'Ask me again': I'd like to do that. He said he would. But I feel a bit sad that he's not really concerned about my safety on long dark roads at night. He's not protective in the least. Red Flag?

So there is a lot of innuendo and brave suggestion when we text each other. All of which seems to evaporate when we meet. Because then we are mostly about business. We talk about ideas and strategies and leadership concepts and such. And catch each other up a bit about what's going on in our lives. But we don't get sexy. At all. It's so weird. Are we both just actually shy of each other?  But he just doesn't seem like the shy type. And I'm sure as hell not going to make the first move in case he's really just being lighthearted with me and I'm reading him all wrong.

Or maybe he's into the slow seduction? Seems unlikely. He feels like the kind of guy who has done this kind of thing before, so I would have expected him to be more forthright with me about his intentions.

But again I catch myself doing the 'pick me' dance. I'm not really asking myself whether I want HIM or not. He really is a clever and sexy man. I'm very attracted to him. But when we're sitting opposite each other at the table, I'm not feeling that intense chemistry that I first felt with John-the Narc. And feeling intimidated by someone you're considering for an intimate partner is probably not the best emotional response to a man? If I think of how easily I chat to Berlin, and Mark, and the CEO, and my Lawyer, then this one is definitely a tough customer.

He drank a lot of whisky that night. I didn't. We left the bar at 12. No sexy lingering kiss in the car park - just a warm hug and then on our way. That lean body felt great under my hands.

And that was that. A very inauspicious way to mark my 100 days. Which is fine. I do think I need to watch myself with this one. I think I would really enjoy some sort of intimate relationship with him. It would be engaging and stimulating. But I have no idea whether that would ever come to be. Or whether I actually want it.