The Meeting

I woke up at 5.30am that morning, took a shower, got dressed and had a quick breakfast. As my mother was driving me to school, all I could think about was tomorrow; because tomorrow was the day I would get to meet Joe.

Joe and I met on the Internet. I keep a blog on the Internet and about seven months ago, he sent me an email. He told me he wanted to be my friend because he was very captivated by what I wrote. Although I was skeptical about the sincerity of his compliment, I was happy all the same.

I didn’t reveal my little secret to anyone, not even my mother. Although my mother and I have a strong relationship, I didn’t tell her for two reasons. One was because she has told me many times that she does not understand why teenagers love the Internet so much. The second reason that I didn’t tell her was because I know that she will worry about me.

On the day before I met Joe, I was on tenterhooks. I couldn’t stop thinking about what it would be like to meet Joe face-to-face. There were a million questions in my mind. I was thinking about what to wear, and whether I should secretly borrow some of my mother’s make-up. I thought about the things that I would ask and say to him because I wouldn’t want to spoil the meeting by saying something stupid. Mainly, I didn’t want to disappoint him. From the emails that we have exchanged, he seemed like a very interesting person. It also didn’t hurt that he looked pretty good.

Unlike some of my friends, I don’t make it a habit to ask for photos over the Internet. With Joe, I was willing to make an exception because I felt there was something different about him. When I first asked him for his photograph, he was reluctant. After a month, I managed to convince him. I thought he looked like a younger version of Andy Lau.

He told me that he was thirty five and worked as a consultant in a corporate sales company. I am not ashamed to say that I have a soft spot for older men. What made everything so much more exciting was the fact that he was actually interested in the inexperienced ramblings of a seventeen-year-old teenager. He made my day when he said that I am the most interesting seventeen-year-old that he has ever met.

On that fateful day, I put on my favourite pair of denims and my cutest Mambo t-shirt. I stole some of my mother’s lipstick and trimmed my hair before I went to the café where we were supposed to meet. When I reached the café, he was already there. I sat down and we started chatting. I thought he looked a lot like Andy Lau and even his body language seemed the same. After chatting for about forty five minutes, things started to go downhill.

It seemed that Joe couldn’t stop talking. What made it worse was the fact that he was a very opinionated person. He shot down most of what I had to say, insisting that he was right. At that point, I was beginning to get uncomfortable. I felt stupid and cheated. I wanted to leave. When I told him that I had to go, he began asking where I was going. I told him a lie and perhaps he could sense it. He retorted by asking me why I had agreed to come out if I was busy. He was becoming scary, so I got up and left without saying goodbye. Since that day, I never saw him again.