The Creepy Cupcake

------------------------------------------

Age:  29

Height:  5' 11"

Hometown:  Chicago, IL

Best Quality:  Spontaneity

------------------------------------------

I work at a law office as the Administration Director. Good title but it should have actually been titled “let Maggie do it.” The position and pay are great, the people I work for equally as great but the mundane tasks of keeping a multi-location firm together was uninspiring and extremely tedious. Basically, it continuously bores me. So I turn to my forever friend, Facebook.

My love of Facebook, Blind Gossip and political websites has gotten me in trouble at work again today! I had a lovely, 20-minute, 3 person bitch-fest directed at me and dedicated entirely to my love of trashy websites and non-work ethic…again. Of course they tell me this at 2pm, when I still have hours left to act busy and NOT pissed off. All in all, today was a bad day at work. At least it was Friday. I didn’t have to come back here tomorrow. For the next 4 hours, that thought got me through the day.

Finally, 6 o’clock rolls around and I quickly gather my things, leave and lock the office and head for the elevators.

I work on the 10th floor of a 12-floor building. I praised Jesus for quickly providing me my exit rather than waiting, every second opening up a chance for other co-workers to join me on my way out. I stepped into the elevator and pressed B2 for the garage. The elevator stopped at the 8th floor. Ugh, can’t I just get out of here already.

A guy walks in presses B1 and all I can do is roll my eyes in utter annoyment and anxiety to just get the hell home.

“Um, you are way too pretty to look so miserable.” He says to me as the elevator doors shut

“I’m sorry, what?” I was so confused. Was he serious? I looked like hell. I hadn’t put any makeup on that day, had on a scowl the size of Texas and this guy actual chose to hit on me? Los Angeles is weird.

“You look like you’ve had a rough day?” he responds

“Ya, I’m really looking forward to being home.” Get me out of here, get me out of here. Why do strangers insist on talking to me at the worst times?

“So you work in the building then?” he asks.

“Yup. 10th floor.”

“I don’t think I’ve seen you before, and I’d remember. Do you eat lunch?” he says.

I was shocked. What was going on? Did I miss something?

I said with a quizzical look “Well I do eat lunch.”

“No way! I eat lunch too!” he cutely and excitedly responded. “So since you eat, and I eat would you like to go grab lunch sometime?”

I once asked my mother on a scale of 1 to 10, with 10 being the highest, how pretty she thought I was. “Anywhere from a 4 to a 10” she replied. Meaning I looked like hell when I didn’t try, but looked ‘like a super model’ when I put in the effort. I was most definitely a 4 today.

Still in shock and impressed by his cute response to such a strange question I say “Are you serious? Wow, um, ya. I’ve never been asked out in an elevator before, I think you just made my month.”

“Well I’m Heath, here, my email address is the best way to reach me, because I run around to meetings most of the day.” He gave me his business card and I managed to soak up whatever information I could in the time that remained (all of 10 seconds).

Heath was on the highest end of 5’, just coming in under 6’ (have I mentioned height is the first aspect I see in a guy yet?), short dark hair with a lean body and nice brown eyes with two-days scruff worth of facial hair. I would peg him for Greek or Italian, but really he could have been anything. His business card showed that he worked in TV ad sales on the 8th floor of my building. All in all… this guy was good get for a 4. “So, just email me when you want to have lunch. I’m out of town next week but I’d love to take you, put a smile on your face.” Heath said as backed out of the elevator

“That’d be nice.” I smiled back and the door closed and I was alone again.

I got out at my elevator stop and walked to my car all the while thinking how that a small 90 second interaction just made my week, maybe even month. It’s funny how fast, in such a random moment, things can just happen. The whole scene reminded me of the time I was also leaving work and a guy in a convertible driving next to me started yelling “You’re pretty. Can I take you ouuuuuuuuuut!?!” Random, weird and a definite ego boost.

I was instantly happy for the whole weekend.

* * *

I waited until right before lunch on Monday to email him. God, I love modern-day dating!

From: McGuiser, Maggie
Sent: Monday, July 14 1:20 PM
To: heath@mediatv.com
Subject: lunch

Heath? Gosh, I hope so.

Anyway, this is Maggie, the gal that takes elevators and eats lunch! Just thought id get in touch about lunch if you are still interested. I think you said you were out of town this week but here’s my email.

Tag, you’re it!
Maggie



From: heath@mediatv.com
Sent: Monday, July 14 1:32 PM
To: McGuiser, Maggie
Subject: RE: lunch

Hey Maggie!
Of course I’m still interested—a girl who rides elevators AND eats lunch is something a guy can’t let pass him by. Let me know when works for you—I can do today, tomorrow, or any day next week. Looking forward to it.

H


Oh, look at that! Only 12 minutes to reply…this is good.

We set lunch and emailed a couple more times on the day of to confirm the meeting place and time (lobby @ 1:30pm). I found myself getting a bit nervous the day of, as always. I needed more information, I needed to know who this person was, after all besides the 3 or 4 emails I had no idea what I was getting myself into. He could be a serial rapist for all I knew. That’s it. That thought broke me into stalker mode.

I googled him.

You learn interesting things when you put a person’s name into the Google search engine. I highly suggest you google yourself; if there are any of you out there that haven’t thought of it yet. You’d be surprised what you will come up with.

Well apparently Heath grew up in Chicago, well at least went to undergrad in Chicago. He had a Masters in Communication from a So Cal university. Hmmm, must have been here for a bit. I wonder how old he is.

I MySpace searched him.

BAM. There it was. Age, picture, quote…aka, the only three things you need to know about a person!


Pic = nice!
Age = older!
Quote = not funny/witty/interesting. boo

Two out of three aint bad.

* * *

The Thursday had come to go meet my elevator man for lunch. I took the elevator to the lobby and he was standing in the door way, sunglass on, waiting for me to arrive. (I never get there early. I look stupid when I wait.) I hugged him hello, smile across both our faces.

We walked over to a small deli across the street, trading our basic where-are-you-from/what-do-you-do-exactly information. It was a sunny day and I was cursing myself for leaving my sunglasses in the car and having to squint the entire walk over as if I was a 97 year old bat-shit-blind woman straining to see the directions on her prescription meds.

The lunch was good, the anxiety I had felt at the beginning of the day wore off by the time we sat down and waited for our food. Awkward moments were a plenty on our cas lunch. Besides the basic background information, there wasn’t much for us to talk about. I really had no social life, having A) just moved here and B) just been broken up by the only other person I knew in town so my topics of conversation were lacking and borderline contrived.

Heath was talking about how he had moved from Chicago to Los Angeles about 5 years ago, originally from Florida. As he talked I got this effeminate feel from him. Not metro. Not full-on gay. Just, let’s say …animated. He used his hands to talk a lot and had a bit of a feminine draw to his speech. It was fucking distracting. That’s all I could focus on. He would “tsk” when talking about something he disapproved of, for example “Ugh.” Tsk “I got this new boss” tsk “SUCH the micromanager, ugh.” Tsk.

The lunch came to a close and we walked back to our building. I made an excuse that I had to go run a work errand so we parted ways at the lobby elevator doors.

“So, I’ll talk with you. We’ll get lunch again. This was fun!” he animatedly says

“Ya, thanks again for lunch. Email me and we’ll plan something else.” I walked into the elevator and watched him, watch me until the doors shut.

Well that was interesting.

Over the next couple of weeks, Heath & I kept in touch via email. He had taken me to two more lunch dates, all with about the same effect of the first one. He kept getting more and more, er, animated and in turn, not attractive to me. But it’s not like I had anything else going, and I HAD in the past always been too picky, so maybe I wasn’t giving Heath a chance. He was really nice, successful, cute (enough), seemed interested and was on top of it with me. But it just wasn’t there. Again.

We still emailed once or twice a week, but I have to say after 3 ‘lunch’ dates, I was getting quite bored with the situation. Until one day when the building was having a “Tenant Appreciation” BBQ on the roof of the parking garage with free food, drinks and a - don’t mind the pun – garage band. A gal from my office and I headed down the elevator to the 4th floor to, well mainly get away from the office. We grabbed a plate of food, jacked some decorations for the office and headed back up stairs.

As we walk into the elevator, guess who happens to be coming out of the same one? You got it, good ole Heath himself. It had been about 2 weeks since we had our third lunch date and about a week since any email exchange.

“Whoa, HEY! I don’t think I’ve ever run into you around the building. You coming from the BBQ?” Heath says, surprised.

“Actually I’m just grabbing a plate for a girl upstairs that can’t come down.” This was true a gal couldn’t come down, but the plate was for me. I still don’t know why I lied. I shouldn’t have.

“Well come back down and have a plate with me.” He replied

“Just give me 5 minutes, I’ll be back down.”

I came back down and made, yet another plate of food to eat, this time a bit more conservative since I was eating in front of people, especially a guy.

Heath introduced me to his co-worker friend standing at the table with us. Immediately, Ken – or so he claimed – launched into his interrogation:

Where are you from?
Why did you move here?
Where do you live?
Why are you working for a law firm?
What do you want to do in life?
Where did your parents grow up?
What do they do?
Sooo, how much do you like Heath?

And on, and on, and on….

It reminded me of that scene in “Uncle Buck” where the 7 year-old kid shoots a barrage of questions, to be immediately and precisely answered by John Candy. I did the same and answered every question with quick, concise answers. What the hell is with this crazy guy? Is he on something? Does he want to stalk me?

I couldn’t take it anymore. I was weirded out by home-boy’s co-worker and his Spanish Inquisition; the effeminate nature of my once-promising date. I had enough of all of it.

I easily finished my plate and made my apologies about having to head back to work, as I was already walking towards the building while saying goodbye. Not the least obvious, quick-exit ever, but whatever.

“I’ll walk you to the elevator.” Keith responds tailing after me.

yay.

He walked me to the elevator and rode up to his floor with me, staring at me the whole time. As we reach the 8th floor, Heath looks at me and says, “Ok, honey. I will talk to you soon.”

As I’m standing there, wondering where the fuck THAT ‘honey’ came from, Heath swoops in and goes for a kiss. In the elevator. Door open. Someone standing at the landing waiting to get into the same elevator. Oh, no. We have an audience. He did a head bob as he got closer to my lips, as if hesitation (THAT SHOULD HAVE STOPPED HIM) was creeping into his mind making him rethink his decision. Finally it all ended with a quick, wet peck a bit rougher than I was expecting seeing as it took him all of 15 seconds to fucking commit to the action. Afterwards he exited the elevator and briskly (if not an actual jog) walked away towards his office, never looking back.

The elevator doors closed and I did the cooties dance and shivered the entire way back to my desk. Buhuluhuluhugh….CREEPY!

To this day, every time I’m in the elevator and it stops at the 8th floor, I mentally beg God Almighty to save me from another encounter.

I haven’t ran into/emailed/spoken to Heath since. He knew what he had done, there’s no turning back from a kiss so terribly gross, poorly timed and awkward as shit!

And Heath? …that co-worker….might want to rethink that introduction with the next lady friend, buddy.

Just sayin...