Questionnaire

I had a date with Randy last night. It was THE night. Honestly, we had a great time but sex with Randy was…underwhelming. It was nice, but it was very vanilla and just alright. He seemed really nervous, though, so I think once he gets a little more comfortable things will get a little better and if not, I can be vocal about what I want if I need to be. We fell asleep together and I woke up in Randy’s arms. Unfortunately he had to go shortly after waking up to relieve the babysitter. He gave me a kiss before asking if we could see each other again and I obviously said yes. We’re actually going to a movie next weekend…Randy scheduled a sleep over at a friend’s for Teddy.

During our date, though, Randy started asking me questions about my life and dating.

“Do you not date a lot?” He asked taking a sip of wine.

“No, I’m a pretty active dater, why?” I asked putting herb butter on the warm bread our waiter had brought.

“Well…I’m just really surprised that you were single when I asked you out.” He said.

“Oh. Um. Well, to be honest, Randy, I was in a relationship until a few months ago. Things didn’t work out, though.”

“Oh.” He said almost with an air of judgment.

“To be fair,” I said before he could make any snap judgments, “the relationship had ended much earlier than our official break-up. We were barely even together for the last few months of it. I only saw him a few times over the last few months.”

“Oh, I’ve had a few relationships like that.” He said.

I almost let out a sigh of relief.

“Before my wife, of course.”

I was hesitant to ask Randy my next question but it slipped out before I could stop myself.

“Randy, how many relationships have you had since she passed away?”

“A few. Only one serious one, though. I’ve been more careful about my relationships since that one, though. Normally I don’t introduce Teddy to anyone until we’ve gotten a lot more serious because it’s hard for him to really understand what’s going on.” His eyes got wide like he thought he’d said something wrong, “That’s not to say that I think you and I have reached that point, you were just the only person besides Stacy I could have watch him on such short notice with us being new to the neighborhood and the building and everything.”

I touched Randy’s hands as he continued to ramble nervously.

“It’s okay, Randy. I wasn’t going to jump to a conclusion like that and freak out.” I smiled, “I really like Teddy, though, for what it’s worth.”

“I don’t know how he turned out the way he did. I’ve made a lot of mistakes. Being a single parent is really hard and my wife was such a good mom. She was just so good with him. I try to live up to her parenting skills but I’m sure I fall short a lot of the time.”

“I think you’re a great dad.” I said.

Randy looked like he was really touched. Just then our food came and we started raving about how delicious it was and the conversation continued to flow easily until we made it back to my apartment and our mouths were too busy to continue talking.