Tess asked with the curiosity of a professional matchmaker, she needed to know what’s going on there, she felt there was more into it and she would go to the bottom of it. Carolina knew that Tess wouldn’t leave her alone until she got the whole story out, Carolina felt the curiosity coming out of each Tess pore, she could hear in Tess voice. Therefore Carolina tried to say as natural as possible on the phone:
"We met a while ago and we realized that we had nothing in common"
She was hoping Tess wouldn’t ask more questions for now, she just couldn’t handle it right now, it was too much for her, she thought that JP was in her past already, and now he returned to hunt her mind like a prayer again, it wasn’t fair.
"I see"
Said Tess, but Carolina knew she wasn’t convinced and this wouldn’t end here.
Tess continued:
"Bloody hell...I was convinced that you were really made for each other, well I have to go, talk to you later"
Tess hung up.
There, damaged is under control, it was easy, hmmm too easy to convince a woman like Tess. - Carolina was expecting not to be disturbed with this issue again, but knowing what moved Tess, she was certain that she would come back with the same subject to discuss it further. Hopping that she could recover from all what was happening before Tess strikes again with questions. Sighing when she hung up, leaning the chair back, she fixed her eyes on the ceiling trying to relax for a little bit. She needed to get back to work again, there was lots of decisions that she needed to read with attention first to give her approval, but her thoughts ran again for that unusual situation, if she had not received the photo, and had gone to the date for a romantic dinner to meet Mr Marvellous, it would be pretty nasty find out is was JP at the restaurant.
JP didn’t know that she was looking for a life partner, because they had only talked about sex and that what they focused on because there would be no more than it would have been. She tried very hard to get back to work, the rest of the day she took work into hands not allowing her getting distracted with her personal issues. Carolina was already on the way home, ending another day of work when the phone rings, she looked at the phone and saw Tess name:
"Hi, I just wanted to tell you that I just spoke with JP. He shares the same opinion as you do, that is, as you said you didn’t want to go to dinner with him, he said he also was not interested. I feel there is more then what you want to tell me and if I don’t know the entire truth I can’t help you, if you want me too of course."
Carolina had no strength to an open and honest conversation about JP right now, when all she needed was to forget him once and for all, after a few seconds of silence she said:
"Look now is not a good time, but if you want to know everything, talk to him, if he wants, he will tell you everything. I have to go now. Bye"
Turning off the phone without giving Tess time of argue anything. Carolina was hoping that JP would like to see her, even after he knew who she was, but he didn’t want to. Carolina wasn’t really surprised, she hopped he would meet her again, but the reality was he wasn’t interested in her, in anyway, form or shape.
Good thing we didn’t manage to go dinner, it would be just a traumatic experience for both. - thought Carolina relieved.
This was no news to Carolina, they had so many opportunities to go out together and he could ask her out at any time but he never did. With her mind thousand per hour, trying to understand how she got to this point with JP, why did the universe trapped her mind to start thinking about him again, she thought he was closed matter already, but isn’t, all her feelings for him are now on the surface again. While she was fighting with her thoughts with what had just happened, the phone got a new text message:
"I can’t believe a matchmaker wanted to match us :)"
She left the phone slip between her fingers when she read the message.
It was JP’s message.
With her reaction, she left the phone fallen to the floor, and only when she heard the phone crashing the floor, she realised he had fallen on the floor. She picked up the phone slowly making sure it was in was piece. After all the unexpected surprise and shock she had lucky, the phone wasn’t broken and it was still working normally.
What does he wants now?
What should I say to him?
Would he think that I asked a friend to do all this? It was likely that he would think that.
I don’t know what to say to him.
I can’t answer him.
I don’t know what to say.
After the dinner she had prepared to entertain her sons and their friends, her sons have gone out with friends and she found herself now sitting comfortably on the couch, her body was stretched along the couch trying to relax a little bit. She loved having the couch just for her sometimes, and tonight was one of those occasions. She tried to distract by seeing some series on television that she enjoyed. Trying not to think about what had happened during the day, but it was not possible, every second she had her mind free and already thoughts had fled toward the recent events.
She couldn’t believe that Mr Marvellous could be JP, it made no sense at all.
Where are all the other men in the world?
Could it be that he was the only one in the world that matches me?
Tangled in her thoughts, the phone rings, she jumps of the couch, forcing herself to return to the present. She got up to see who was calling, it was Tess again. She gave a huge sigh from the depths, trying to find the courage to answer the phone, and soon she recovered a little strength that was still left to hear what she had to say she pressed the green button to answer.
"Hello"
She tried to say animated failing completely her emphasis.
"What's up?" asks Tess.
"Today was a long day, that's all"
Not wanting to give big talk to Tess, hoping the conversation would be short and finish fast.
"I was talking to JP this afternoon and he told me some curious things about you..."
Tess makes on purpose a dramatic pause, but Carolina remains in silent, only thinking:
Oh gosh...here we go again.
Even feeling the big tension what’s about to follow, Tess decides to continue:
"So did you meet JP and he said you had sex with him 20 minutes after?
If that’s true, don’t you know the basic rules to build a solid relationship with a man?!"
She waited a moment to have a reaction from the other end, Carolina took a deep breath. She couldn’t lie to Tess and finally answers:
"That's what happened yes. The idea of meeting him was only to have sex and never see each other again, that's all.
It's something I’m not proud about and it’s something I’m not walking around to spread it, but I don’t regret it having done so."
"Caroline ..."
Began her friend saying, trying to explain something to someone with a learning deficit:
"You know you blew it with him, don’t you?! Do you have the notion that he could be the man of your life and because you didn’t thought about the basic rules of an encounter between a man and a woman, your image is completely denigrate at his eyes. I don’t have any idea how you can rebuild your image to him. You have no idea what he feels and thinks about you. Do you?!"
She waited for Carolina’s answer, to defence herself, to hear her side of the story. But Carolina couldn’t speak, her voice was silent, even if she wanted to talk she wasn’t able to make a sound. Tess knew she was listening to her, so she continued:
"You know he sees you as a sex object?!
He has an image completely denigrated of you, he thinks you're not worthy of having a relationship with, he see’s you as a whore, as a woman having sexual meetings with all men on the internet. He can’t think of you as a girlfriend, having a relationship with you, nor be married with you!
He doesn’t see you as a woman!
And all this because you had sex with him on the first date!
; I am sure that you never had a second date with him. Because you gave him what he wanted in the first date. He probably never contacts you for a second date and if he contacts you, it was because you were initiating contact with him, he replied to you only to know if you are still available for him, and if one day he was bored and needed some fun he knew you would be there for him. He just wanted to have you handy for a dull day, maybe one day he would end up calling you and you're going running to him to satisfy him. Then the cycle would continue until you can’t deal with it anymore, because there will never be more than sex. Generally men continue to have basic instincts as in the animal kingdom: protect, hunt and breed. If a man doesn’t fight for a woman to have the feeling that he chased or hunted you, if he doesn’t feel that you are selective in your choices, that you are special and have high values, he will never feel anything for you.
When a man starts to have feelings for you, devote himself exclusively to you, then yes they can have sex, after sex comes the feeling of wanting to protect you.
A man can only commit at this stage to a serious relationship and marriage.
Rarely occurs otherwise.
In JP’s case he didn’t felt the adrenaline of the hunt and you were there at his disposal, ready for him to devour you. He used you, and then he lost interest, because in the man basic instinct he had hunted you already in order to procreation. Its objective was completed. It looks very animalistic, but it’s how it works, believe me.
A woman wants to do the same, but she hasn’t the basic animal instinct like a man does, that’s why woman normally get attached to a man more easily, because they are emotional, they can’t help it. You were most likely trap in emotions and he wasn’t. Now there is no more news to him because you offered yourself in a tray your treasure. You know he ranked you as unattractive, stupid and boring?!
He thinks you're uninteresting because you don’t have any assets, imagine that"
All these words were reaching Carolina as if they were punches in her stomach, one punch after another. It was an intense and real pain making her sick. She had another pain the psychological pain of deception and heartbreak which was almost unbearable. In addition to the pain of the words caused her heart pumping fast, making a pain on her chest. She was about to get unwell, she felt like throwing up. Here were the words, the simple truth, which Carolina needed to hear to wake up to reality once and for all. After hearing all that, it was as if she had awakened from a dream or a nightmare she didn’t really know. Now she was sure that she and JP could never be a couple.
Both were still on the phone and Tess continued:
"Friend, I don’t know how contain all this damage.
Because my friend, you screwed up in a very bad way. I don’t know if I can put everything right. I mean, I don’t know how he can see you as a worthy woman, investing his time to get to know you and start to build a future together. If this incident hadn’t happened and if he saw you at the dinner for the first time after the study I made of him, he would be in your feet a couple hours later and you would have the second date for sure.
There is one thing you need to know, you are one of the most compatible couples I've ever had in my matchmaker experience"
Tess finalizes at least.
Carolina says trying to sound natural, failing miserably:
"There is nothing to resolve, we made the choice to meet with a purpose and nothing else. There is nothing more to say to each other.
Now I just want to continue with my life and try to forget this entire incident"
"Okay friend, if that's what you want."
They hang up.
How could JP have such a negative image of me?
Caroline couldn’t believe in such thing. She never imagined that anyone would think something like that as Tess described JP saying from her.
What kind of person would it be like his description? But she was not at all like that because she was not the way he thought she was.
He didn’t even care to know the truth about me - Tess's words echoed in her head forming a terrible headache, ending in no time to a terrible migraine. She felt so unwell that she had to run to the bathroom arriving just in time to tilt the head to the toilet and vomit dinner. Without any strength left she took a huge effort to wash her face and mouth, she stood a few minutes looking at the mirror, seeing herself in the emptiness, returning to present after some time.
Finally she found herself in the mirror and noticed how pale she was. She looked ill, she felt not less. Returning to the living room threw her on the couch, lying just there. Her heart was palpitating, it felt like it wanted to jump out, she felt having an anxiety attack again. She sat on the couch with her head between her hands looking at the ground, with the eyes closed and began to inhale and exhale deeply trying to gain control of her heartbeat and to calm down.
Minutes later she felt a little bit relieved.
The latest news about JP caused in Carolina the diminished of a feeling she had for him since they met. She always tried to shake the thought out of him, but could never completely do it, he was still so present in her mind as if he did actually part of her life. She thought she was starting to go insane, all this was really insane. She thinks that she needs medical assistance to help her overcoming this strong feeling that she can’t control and makes her feel sick the way it does and yet was so stupid having feelings for someone she didn’t know and he didn’t know her either. One thing Carolina knew now for sure, if he thinks the way he does about her, he didn’t deserve her at all. She was so disappointed that he didn’t felt anything for her and worse he couldn’t see Carolina as a woman, how was this possible?
The cruel words, but real and wise from Tess, awake in Carolina once and for all into reality. This time it's for good and definitive, she couldn’t love a man who saw her that way. It was very simple he didn’t deserve her love. In Carolina’s head she review over and over again all Tess words and a continuing agony began to grow inside her and an irritation to her own.
Tess was right – Carolina admits to herself shaking her head. How had she been so stupid and foolish acting the way she had with JP, but now there was nothing to do, there was no way to modify the past. She couldn’t ever guess that JP could be a man with the potential to be the man of her life but it never crossed her mind that she would eventually like him for real too. If she knew it, she had never agreed to meet the way they did, but she never imagined or had never crossed her mind that they could have this outcome. She always thought she would have sex and never would see him again, and that after sex she never thought about his existence, but she was so wrong.
That night when she went to bed, still unwell, she couldn’t sleep, though she hadn’t returned to vomit, still in agony she tried to hold up all night. She got up, went to the kitchen to make some tea hoping it could calm her stomach in flames since the call from Tess. She lay down on the couch watching TV and fell asleep already dawn.
Leaving the past behind
In the morning, the boys went up and saw their mother lying on the couch and they knew they needed to wake her up to go to work. It was not usual seeing their mother lying there, but they saw her a couple times fallen asleep when she was watching TV. They knew she would appreciate been waken up. She woke up indisposed and went to work with a horrible headache like if she had a hangover. On the way to work she saw the messages on the phone and reviewed JP message again. She was so disappointed and angry with him, she didn’t know what to do or answer or rather if she should answer him at all. She didn’t want to talk with him anymore because he didn’t deserve a second of her attention any longer. Carolina managed to hold on for five days without answering JP, finally after her irritation have calmed down and with a cool head she sent him a message saying:
"Imagine she wanted to introduce me to someone I already knew, she must been hitting her head somewhere."
She tried to send him a relaxing message, no details about the potential romantic encounter that was
almost happening and they refused to go into details, let alone talk about what he had told Tess about her.
But she thought and rethought about it – She wouldn’t tell him anything, if she did, he would think that she would be giving too much importance to what happened. That's why she decided to send him a message to relieve pressure between them. He didn’t deserve to know the truth.
As soon he gets her message, and for Carolina’s surprise he replies immediately:
"Ah ah I need you, I want you in my bed again, and shall we meet again?"
That it was, the message that Carolina wanted to receive for so long, the message she was hoping to receive over and over again to set another date, to be with him if only to repeat the extraordinary sex they had. For a moment she is tempted to say yes, but she held back and recalled everything Tess had told her, the way he acted with her and why. Tess was absolutely right, all the messages he sent Carolina, they were all only to confirm if she was still available for him, she couldn’t continue acting the same way as before. Carolina was not a sexual object of anyone, much like less to a man who doesn’t deserve her. She wasn’t willing to give up on her woman’s right for a man. She knew there was no point to continue any conversation with JP, because the only person who would end up suffering it would be her and no one else.
Asking her mind over and over again if she could live and illusion to be happy only for brief moments would that be reasonable.
Would it be worth it?
Or was she just being masochistic?
No, it was over. She wanted to move on in life, she wanted to forget him, and she chose not to give him any answer.
The next day she receives another message from JP:
"I thought that you also wanted to see me"
When Carolina sees the message smiled and thought.
You have no idea how much I want you, how much I want to see and feel the urge to smell you, but you will never know.
Replying hours later:
THE DEAL: Novel Page 6