The Non-Date

April 26th, 2024

I was attending a “Friends in DC” event at Metrobar, an outside bar in NW DC for a trivia game night. I was seated in the very front despite me being absolutely terrible at trivia games. The host of the event was this guy who I could see myself going on a date with. I won’t lie I tried to scope out his demeanor to see if he would possibly be interested back but I wasn’t picking up any vibes. After coming in 4th place in the game (humble brag because there were about 30 teams), everyone dispersed going their separate ways.

They had a food truck out front and the nosiness in me wanted to check out the food options. I saw jollof so you already know I had to get it. So I’m waiting for my food and I see host guy order some food shortly after me and then go sit at a table by himself. I’m looking at him for a bit to see if he was with anyone – a girl, a group of friends or whoever but he was alone.

So my order is called and I went to sit at a table opposite him by myself. Now at this point I'm racking my brain trying to figure out how to approach this guy. 

‘Hey are you seeing anyone ?’

‘Hey are you here alone ?’

‘Mind if I sit here?’

‘How bout those Lakers?’

All of these are going on in my mind but none of them felt right. This was new to me too because I typically just write my number or IG on a napkin or receipt, hand it to the guy, and dip from the establishment. But I wasn’t about to leave soon so I felt the need to strike up some type of conversation with this guy. Literally as I’m trying to think of a conversation starter, homie gets up and leaves melting emoji. Chance gone.

After a few minutes of me playing on my phone, all of a sudden I hear from behind me “excuse me do you have a minute?” and yall already know who it was… host guy! I started stuttering over my words as if learning a new language, “no.. I-I mean yes, sure!” Way to sound eager Eboni.

“You wanna run a game of connect 4 real quick?” he offers.

“Sure let’s get it!”

internally screams

So now host guy and I are playing giant connect 4, a bit of banter here and there. We start talking about the event, where we work, we had both moved out here and didn’t know many people… typical first encounter conversation. The only thing missing: there were no flirty vibes. Maybe he does have a girlfriend and he’s just being nice?

We played three rounds of connect 4 until he said he was going to check if his food was ready. Honestly I didn’t know if he wanted me to follow him but I did anyway, and luckily too because his food was not ready so we were able to talk more. He mentioned wanting to see the movie Challengers and I wanted to say “was that an invite?” but because there were no flirty comments from him I decided it was best to keep that to myself.

He finally gets his food and says he’d walk me out, but we didn’t make it that far because we had parked on opposite sides. So he gave me a side hug, we exchanged IG’s, and parted ways.

But look, I can be a bit bold sometimes. I’m not one of those girls who believes only guys should do the chasing. As we all know men can be oblivious, so sometimes you have to show you're interested.

I decided to give it a few days before hitting his DMs:

“Hey [name redacted]! I remember you talkin about wanting to see Challengers and I had already planned to go this weekend.. you wanna see it with me? Only thing is I’m going to one of the luxury theaters and if you don’t already know.. They’re pretty far laughing emoji”

“Hey Eboni! Yes! Let’s do it, I’m a movie theater connoisseur so the more luxurious the better laughing emoji

Time date and location and I’m there”

Yall have no idea I was sooooo excited! Ok bet. So I sent him three different theaters I wanted to try with pros and cons for each.

“Oh you weren’t joking. When you said far you meant FAR dead emoji you know what, I’m down for whatever you choose since you put the research effort in. You let me know and I’d be happy to get the tickets, which day were you thinking?”

As we’re working this whole plan out, he feels the need to mention:

“Also, I’ll go with you on one condition…

I’m not trying to be turned into a DC date night number on your IG lol”

Lmaoooo I couldn’t even blame him! And I’ll be honest with yall, I did not consider this to be a date because in the pros and cons message I told him how much the tickets would be for each of us, and also because the movies is a terrible first date. And because I wasn’t getting the flirty vibes from our first encounter, I really did want to hang out on a friend level to see what the vibes were between us. So I replied:

“LMAOOOOO honestly I was not considering this a date but if we make it that far I will promise to keep you out of it” A promise I would have kept. And I purposely put that ‘...if we make it that far…’ line in there to sort of hint that I was interested. Not sure if he picked up on that though.

So we’re still working out the plan, and yall remember when he said he’ll get the tickets right? Honestly I debated on telling him to let me know how much it came out to. I consulted with my friend and his girl about it, who had differing opinions. My friend said to bring it up just to be considerate. His girl said if I liked him to not say anything, but if I didn’t like him in that way then to say something. I did agree with her tbh but I also wanted to be considerate so I told him to let me know how much the tickets come out to.

Now yall tell me if this is weird or I’m trippin: Mind you, I already did my research so I knew that on average the tickets were about $20 each (I know, tickets are skyrocketing nowadays). He sends me a screenshot of the order, it only came out to be $16.49, and in parentheses underneath the screenshot he says “(I’ve got AMC stubs so mine was free)”. Now look, I’m all for people getting free things by any means necessary, but did I have to know that you are going for free to a movie that I invited you to? I just thought it was weird. He didn’t even have to provide the screenshot, he could’ve just said my ticket was $16.49 and I would’ve paid no questions. But whatever, I wasn't going to dwell on it.

May 4th, 2024

The day of the not-so-date comes, and he’s a tad late which wouldn’t have been a huge problem if it wasn’t a timed event. But he came with a fresh haircut so I said let me ignore your tardiness for a minute and just admire you. Like I said this is a luxury theater and as someone who looks at menus beforehand, I already knew what I wanted. This was my first time at AMC Dine-in in Gaithersburg, MD, and it wasn’t like the other luxury theaters I went to where you press a button and the server comes to you; apparently you have to order it at the concession stand beforehand. I wouldn’t have minded waiting in the long line with him but we were one of the last ones to take our seats, the lights had already dimmed, and why have both of us disrupt others when it can just be one? So he said he would go get the food.

Homie comes back with two drinks and says he ordered the food. Shortly after the movie started, they only come with my food. I asked where his food was and he said he ate beforehand and that he has a headache so he isn’t hungry. Ok…

Challengers was great though! 8.5/10 I forsure want to see it again.

It’s late now, about 10/11 o'clock. We’re discussing the movie as he walks me to my car and he stops when we reach my car but I tell him to come on I’ll drive him to his car since I was on level 2 and he was on 6. He said he can just take the elevator but I’m like why we’re already here and I’m offering. He talkin bout “are you sure?” like sir if you don’t get in this car and come on. “Plus we’re still talking about the movie,” I told him. 

He gets in and we do still talk about the movie, but the minute I pull up next to his car he got his hand already on the door handle before I can even put my car in park. I’m used to sitting in the car going from the movie conversation flowing into another topic of conversation. He wasn’t sticking around for nothing. So I tell him to let me know how much my food was and he quickly dug into his back pocket and pulled out the receipt as if he was waiting for this moment all night. “You can just calculate that with the movie ticket” he told me. Oh…

So yea I paid $30 for my ticket and my food and he bought the two drinks…

Forreal forreal if I knew he wasn’t going to eat we didn’t have to drive 45min-hour from our respective homes to go to a luxury theatre, we could've went somewhere local. I would’ve rather had that experience with myself or someone who would’ve enjoyed the full experience as well. And if I knew I was going to spend all this money I would’ve kept these plans to myself and go to an earlier showing like I wanted to (he preferred the latest time).

I made it home around 11:30pm and he was gentlemanly enough to make sure I made it home and made sure to send me his CashApp. We both said we had fun and that was the last we talked. Very friendly vibes so it’s safe to say he wasn’t as interested in me as I was him. I’d be down to go on an actual date with him in the future but only if he brings it up, I’m forsure not hitting him up again, but I’m happy we got to hang out at least once.