Worst Valentine's Day Ever: A Lonely Hearts Romance Anthology

by Kilby Blades

  “Liar!” Rosalind blurted, even as some small part of her cringed at how much drama she was delivering for Greg. “You are a whole entire lie. Ladies, don’t listen to this man. He cheated on me three years ago on Valentine’s Day, of all days! I received a bouquet of roses from Kevon but addressed to another woman.”

  The crowd gasped.

  The blonde directed her attention at Kevon. “Is that true?”

  “Yes and no,” he said, nervous. “I sent the roses to a woman who was sickly. She was a friend of a friend.”

  “Hold up.” Rosalind held up her hand. “You told me you sent it to a widow.”

  Kevon’s eyes shifted. “A widow who was sick.”

  “This man is trash, ladies! Pure trash,” Rosalind said. “And I need to make a public apology to all of you. I knew my boss was going to have him on the show, and I should’ve taken a stand then. Instead, I was quiet because I wanted to work towards ratings. But ladies, you are worth more than anyone’s show ratings. So for Valentine’s Day I say, forget about vying for a man. Forget about trying to land the perfect date. Forget them. Let’s celebrate Valentine’s on our own.”

  “Yeah!” One contestant stood. “I am woman, hear me be single on Valentine’s Day.”

  The second and third contestants stood up and nodded in sync. The last one remained seated. “I was looking for a date.”

  There was always one who betrayed the revolution.

  “If you still want to date Kevon after everything I told you, go ahead,” Rosalind said. “But you can’t ever say I never told you.”

  “That’s right!” a voice called from the studio audience.

  Energized by the excitement of the crowd, Rosalind felt something about to break lose inside of her. Years of waiting on no-good men to do something in her life. First her father. Then Kevon. Now Greg, who wanted to turn her life into a ratings spectacle.

  Hell to the no.

  “And you know what?” Rosalind pointed to Greg, who was now cringing. “That man concocted everything. He wanted to make a fool of me in front of the entire world. He set this up, and I’m not playing by his rules anymore. I quit this show. I refuse to be a puppet in another man’s game. Happy Valentine’s Day, folks. Ladies, let’s get out of here.”

  The crowd cheered.

  For the first time, Rosalind felt free.

  “Asking for a Friend” by Averil Daye

  Go back. Cancel. Continue.

  Sarah MacNeil stared at the options on her laptop screen for so long that a fifteen-second “please make a selection” timer in the shape of a peach appeared in the middle of the matchmaking site’s page.

  Fifteen, fourteen, thirteen…

  Feeling the heat of panic and indecision, Sarah hit ‘go back.’ The timer vanished, and the previous page reappeared.

  What are you looking for?

  She scoffed, just as she had the first time she saw the question. Hell if I know. She’d checked the boxes next to “companionship” and “friendship” and ignored the more romantic choices. Sarah didn’t want a lover, boyfriend, or anyone else looking for regular access to her vagina. Not now, anyway. Probably not ever.

  Friends and family had tried to tell her otherwise—at the repast, no less—not thirty minutes after she and her daughters had tearfully left her husband’s casket at the cemetery.

  “You should get back in the game ASAP, ” her cousin had advised in the buffet line, dumping a heaping pile of macaroni and four cheeses on her plate. “Greg would want you to keep living. Those kids need a daddy and you’re gonna need some Vitamin D.” She’d nudged Sarah’s ribs with her elbow.“If you know what I mean.”

  “He would want you to be happy,” a distant aunt of Greg’s with ashy hands had told her at the dessert table.

  “Greg wouldn’t want you to be lonely,” his mother had said.

  Sarah was so sick of hearing that Greg would want her to have a love life. How could anyone possibly know that? Maybe he wouldn’t have wanted her to waste her time or get hurt. Maybe he’d never even given it a second thought because he’d planned to stick around a lot longer. Fit, seemingly healthy, strong men don’t expect to drop dead of a heart attack at 50.

  Cancel. Continue. Need more time?

  Sarah continued.

  The next set of questions focused on hobbies: sports, movies, watching television, etc. Unfortunately the list didn’t include staring into space and getting envious of her friends’ happy Facebook posts. She had mastered that over the last three years. So Sarah clicked “reading”, “writing”, “watching TV shows and movies”, “going to the theater” and “attending concerts”. She actually hadn’t done the latter in several years, way before Greg died, but she liked the idea of dressing up and seeing a live performance with someone other than her two kids. If she could do it in the days leading up to February 14th —a horrible period on the calendar she referred to as “Febzilla”—even better.

  The anniversaries of Greg’s death, their wedding, and Valentine’s Day occurred within days of each other. Last year, to keep her mind off the terrible trifecta, she raked about ten tons of leftover autumn leaves into garden refuse bags on all three windy, chilly days. Her daughters—at the time five and eleven—watched her from the family room bay window, crying. They didn’t recognize or understand her behavior. Sarah barely raked leaves on the nicest of days, let alone in the dead of winter for hours over multiple days.

  “I just want my Mommy back,” Grace, her youngest, said after Sarah came inside last February 14th.

  Sarah didn’t have the heart to tell her kids that the person they used to know died with their father. Women don’t spend years pouring their all into building a life with their partners without losing an enormous sense of purpose when the loves of their lives check out. Between her weight fluctuations, disinterest in cooking and touch-and-go listlessness, Sarah didn’t recognize herself, either.

  Her grief therapist recommended exercise, a healthy diet, and a social life without the kids. Exercise? She walked around the block a couple of days a week and ate healthy most of the time. She still liked chocolate almond crunch ice cream way too much.

  As for her social life…

  “My husband was my social life,” she told Dr. Hudson at her last session.

  “You shouldn’t have let that happen. Everyone needs friends besides their spouses.”

  “I had friends, I just preferred to spend time with Greg.”

  “Well, you can’t do that anymore.”

  Sarah rolled her eyes. No shit, lady!

  “Go out with some girlfriends from work,” Dr. Hudson suggested.

  “I work from home.” Editing student essays for college applications and scholarships helped put food on the table, but survivor benefits from Social Security paid the big bills.

  “You said you had a lot of support after Greg died. Surely someone from that circle can be a movie buddy sometimes.”

  “They’re busy.” Sarah’s once-sympathetic friends had stopped checking on her as soon as their procession of post-funeral casseroles ended. She had no siblings, and none of her extended family lived in the state or the region. She’d lost her parents years ago, before having kids.

  “Then you’re going to have to find someone who’s available. You’re only 45, Sarah. You have a lot of living to do. You don’t have to have a lover. A companion will do.”

  Cue PeachDate, the site with the peach-shaped timer and a billion questions to answer. A play on Georgia’s nickname, the peach state, the year-old site had received rave reviews for its spot-on matchmaking algorithm. It claimed hundreds of happy platonic and romantic pairings, but received scrutiny for its tagline, “uniting the souls of people who are destined to meet, from booty calls to BFFs.”

  It had made her laugh—one of the few things that could outside of her daughters’ corny jokes. Sarah had taken it as a sign to register and submit her profile.

  Congratulations, you’re almost finished!

&nb
sp; An animated waving banner with tiny peaches appeared, followed by - what else? - peach-colored confetti.

  Now, add a PeachPic (selfie) and/or a Peachvid to your profile! Don’t worry, if a potential PeachDate sends you a PeachNote, you’ll get to see their theirs too! And remember, there’s absolutely no obligation to respond to anyone!

  Sarah had totally forgotten about the selfie requirement. She picked up her phone and scrolled through her camera roll, already knowing she had nothing on it but photos of her and Melody during a recent field trip to the Atlanta Botanical Garden. Sarah had stopped taking vain selfies a long time ago.

  She would just have to crop Melody out of the pictures and hope that the passerby who shot the photos got one of her looking peachy.

  When a set of unfamiliar photos came up, Sarah inched her face closer to the screen. She recognized herself in front of a shelf of canned goods. Apparently, Grace had taken a handful of candid photos of her the night before at the supermarket instead of playing the spelling game app Sarah had downloaded for her.

  Pics of Sarah squeezing avocados and reading the nutrition label on a six-pack of candy bars hardly seemed selfie material. But one photo caught her eye: she had a wide, genuine smile on her face, and she looked directly into the camera. Sarah loved how her long brown braids, cascading from her Mardi Gras-inspired head wrap of purple and gold masquerade masks, lay against her high cheekbones.

  Grace must have snapped the photo after telling that joke about a cow, a pie and a milkshake. Sarah and Melody had both laughed at the gross punchline.

  “We have a winner,” Sarah said.

  After she uploaded the photo, the site unleashed a fresh buttload of animated confetti. The site presented her with her final options.

  Go back. Submit. Cancel.

  Sarah pressed submit before she changed her mind.

  Carter pulled the chair back from the table and offered a warm smile to his girlfriend as she took her own sweet time sashaying over.

  “I’ve got it from here, thanks,” Maggie said. He stopped sliding her chair forward toward the table.

  “That’s right. Sorry.”

  He took his seat across from her and tapped the menu. “This place is famous for its blackened salmon,” Carter said. “They have a really great sweet-and-sour shrimp dish, too.”

  “I hate seafood.” Maggie didn’t look up as she glanced over the menu.

  Damnit! Another miss. He should have committed that detail from her dating profile to memory.

  “We can go somewhere else,” he said.

  “No need. They’ve got plenty of other things I like.” She looked up that time and gave him a thumbs-up.

  Carter already knew he wanted a salad, the blackened salmon and a glass of white wine, so he slid the menu aside and folded his hands.

  “How are the kids liking the tablets?”

  Maggie finally perked up. “Oh, my goodness. They love them!” she exclaimed. “They can go to a lot of great math game sites that reinforce my lesson plans. I’d say about a third of my students didn’t have access to a computer before now. Thanks to you, they do.”

  Carter beamed. “That’s awesome.”

  “I still can’t believe you did that. Neither can the other teachers.”

  “Do they need tablets, too?”

  “Of course. But no one’s expecting you to do that again. I certainly didn’t even expect it.”

  The waiter brought them two glasses of water. He took Carter’s order, but Maggie said she needed another minute.

  “What are you guys famous for, besides seafood?” Carter asked.

  The waiter twisted his lips and looked at the ceiling, tapping his pen to his notepad.

  “Um, our cocktails, I guess?”

  “I’m talking food-wise, sir.”

  “Carter, it’s OK.” Maggie turned to the waiter. “I’ll have the baked ziti and a glass of Merlot, please.”

  “The ziti’s pretty good.” The waiter wrote down her order.

  “But not great,” Carter said.

  “I mean, I guess some people think it’s great. I personally prefer the pasta and shrimp over the ziti.”

  “Ashley doesn’t eat seafood,” Carter said.

  Maggie furrowed her brow. “Who’s Ashley?” She folded her hands under her chin and waited. Carter’s mouth opened slightly, but no words came out. It felt as if his brain had abandoned him.

  “I’ll just get these out of the way,” the waiter mumbled as he swiped the menus from the table. He hurried off.

  “Ashley was my wife,” Carter said. “You know I’m a…a…”

  The “w” word caught in his throat. Six years later, he still couldn’t stand to say it.

  “You know my wife died,” he said.

  “I guess I forgot. You haven’t said her name once since we’ve been seeing each other.”

  Well, not exactly. He’d moaned Ashley’s name during his first night with Maggie, but she hadn’t hear him. He didn’t dare bring that up now, though. He sipped his water and looked away sheepishly.

  “What’d she die from?”

  “Complications from diabetes. I told you that, too.”

  “Damn. I’m really sorry.” Maggie took a sip of water. “Was she a math teacher, too?”

  “She was a seamstress. She worked with a lot of costume designers on movie sets.”

  “Still, though. She dealt with numbers. And she had to have a certain amount of creativity.”

  Carter nodded, sensing something bad about to go down.

  The waiter returned with their wine. Carter positioned his glass under his nose and inhaled deeply, detecting the pear and lemon notes. He took a few small sips, savoring the liquid on his tongue.

  Maggie slowly traced the top of her glass with her index finger.

  “I think we should take a break,” she said.

  Still in mid-sip, Carter coughed and dribbled a small amount of wine down his thick beard.

  “Why?” He dabbed his face with his napkin.

  “Come on, Carter. You know why.”

  He sighed. “It was just a slip of the tongue. I know you’re not her.”

  “You’re with me because your website told you that you should be with a math geek who’s also creative. That was your wife. I took a few pottery classes at the community center. That’s where my creativity ends. But you think your logarithms found a copy of Ashley.”

  “Algorithms.” Only his mouth moved. His body sat rigid as a rock.

  “And another thing: you’ve got to stop trying to fix everything. My chair, my food options, the tablets - ”

  “You can’t be serious. I was just trying to help! You wouldn’t have gotten those tablets otherwise.”

  “How do you know? I casually mentioned on our fourth damn date that the kids could use tablets and the next day, thirty tablets are being delivered to my classroom. You just wanted to fix a problem.”

  “I can’t win.” Carter let out a bitter laugh and threw his hands up.

  “I don’t think it’s always about winning. Sometimes you just have to let life happen and stop trying to straighten its course.”

  “Yeah. OK.” Carter wanted to gag. He couldn’t remember when he’d heard such inane trite. Let life happen. Easy for her to say. Hers hadn’t fallen apart.

  A member of the kitchen staff brought their salads. Carter stabbed his fork through a spinach leaf and cherry tomato, then dropped it.

  “OK, maybe you’re right,” he said. “I do have a tendency to want to - I don’t know - make things right. Set things up for success. Look at PeachDate. I started it so people don’t have to rely on pure chance to meet someone special. PeachDate fixes that. But I guess I do go overboard in my personal life, too. That doesn’t mean we have to break up.”

  Maggie finished her wine.

  “There’s more to it, Carter. You just have to figure it out.”

  Her arms filled with grocery bags, Sarah blindly unlocked the front door and pushed it open wit
h her foot.

  She still couldn’t get used to doing the task alone. Since they’d both worked from home, Greg used to accompany her to the store, help her shop, load and unload the car, stealing kisses along the way. Her body still ached to feel his arms around her, his mouth on her.

  Sarah’s phone started to vibrate in her back pocket. She had two email notifications from the matchmaking site. Both subject lines read:

  You have a PeachNote from a potential PeachDate!

  Finally. A week had passed since she’d uploaded her profile and photo. Several PeachDate testimonials claimed that their love connections had happened the same day they registered. She could have checked out other profiles and made the first move, but she rather liked the old-fashioned idea of being pursued, even for companionship.

  Though, anxiety, anticipation and hope trumped her jitters. She went into the family room, plopped on the couch, and opened her first message from a member named Arnie.

  The incorrect grammar and lack of proper punctuation struck her first:

  You come to the wrong place your pretty but this site isnt for your kind.

  The room suddenly got very hot. Sarah fanned herself with her hand before reading the PeachNote again.

  Only a few words stuck out this time. Wrong place. Your kind.

  Sarah looked at his PeachPic. He had short hair, wore a T-shirt and had a thick neck. She couldn’t really tell anything more about him because of the poor photo quality.

  Sarah grabbed her purse and removed her reading glasses. Surely her bare, nearsighted eyes had skipped a word or misinterpreted the context.

  Wrong place. Your kind.

  Sarah began to tremble, just as she had when some random, high, tenth grade loser walked through the quad and shouted “Hey, shouldn’t you people be cleaning up our shit?” to Sarah and her friends sitting in the grass after lunch, minding their own business. The same rage and hurt flowed through her veins now.