Total pages in book: 90
Estimated words: 91065 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 455(@200wpm)___ 364(@250wpm)___ 304(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 91065 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 455(@200wpm)___ 364(@250wpm)___ 304(@300wpm)
Give my chest a scratch.
Then, I stand up straighter.
“Whoa.” I stop swiping. “Who are you?”
Amid the sea of selfies and cheesy pickup lines, a profile catches my eye. His name is Dex, and he is ridiculously good looking.
Like.
Super hot.
So hot I gaze at his bio with my mouth gaping.
“Stuff a chip in your mouth and get a grip, Margot,” I mutter, still staring at his photo.
Dex, 25
Professional Football Player
Nice young man in search of a serious relationship.
Tall, dark, and handsome.
Funny. Sarcasm is my second language.
Loves eating but not cooking, unless you include frozen pizza.
Still discovering what it is I want.
No cat people. Dogs only (big dogs preferable).
Several alarm bells go off when I read what he has written: still discovering what it is I want?
“Dude, you’re twenty-five, shouldn’t you have it figured out by now?”
My daughter will be a teenager in three years, for heaven’s sake.
Got pregnant at nineteen, had her when I was in college—and, well, here we are.
Single mother of one at twenty-nine.
Good times.
My eyes home in on the career shout-out: Professional football player? He can’t be serious—this must be a joke, yeah? Perhaps he plays football in the park on weekends. Pickup games, I believe they’re called?
No way is he for real.
These photographs of a big dude in a uniform couldn’t possibly be his.
I should report the account as being fake.
I should . . .
But I don’t.
“What I should do is give him a piece of my mind for wasting everyone’s time!” I announce to a room full of no one. “Then I’ll report the fake account!”
Yes!
That’s what I’ll do.
Swipe in the guise of science—see if we match, then chew his ass out for giving women false hope that they’re going to meet a player in the NFL.
With a knot forming in my tummy and a bag of mixed nerves from the impending excitement of catching a catfish, I swipe right, reminding myself not to be anxious.
“This is fun!” I chant. “So fun!”
Plus, if this is a fake profile, I’ll never hear from him anyway, and even if I do hear back, that most likely means he’s a bot. Right?
Seconds pass.
They feel like minutes.
Hours.
I set the phone down and go to the sink, then stack the dirty plates neatly so Wyatt can load them into the dishwasher tomorrow after school, then add the forks, spoons, and knives. I busy myself so I will not be tempted to fixate on my cell, putting it out of my mind so I can—
A notification pops up on my screen. You’re a match!
Hearts flutter, floating over my screen as if they were balloons being released into the air.
“Okay, pal, let’s see if you’re who you say you are.”
I’m not a detective, but I play one when I’m bored.
When no message instantaneously appears from Dex, I bite my lower lip.
“Sir, you are off the hook for having a life.”
It will have to be up to me to make the first move.
I hesitate before typing out a message, fingers hovering over the tiny keyboard.
What do I even say? Should I play it cool—or let my nerves show?
In the end, I settle for something simple yet playful. What do you think would get you laid more often: pretending to be a professional football player on a dating app, or being one in real life?
I hit send, immediately regretting the harsh tone of my first note. He’s never going to message me back when I sound like a bitter shrew! Ugh!
Why would he?
“So what!” I reason out loud. “He’s a liar!”
And I’m going to prove it.
He deserves the lashing I’m about to dish out, and now he knows that I know he’s a liar, so perhaps he’ll delete his profile and create a new one.
None of this stops me from going back to studying his pictures. Why would a man who looked like him swipe on a woman like me? Why would a man who looked like him swipe on a single mother?
“Because he’s fake, Margot.”
He’s big—massive, some would say. I can tell because he is surrounded by a few other dudes and stands a head above all of them.
Bearded.
So handsome.
Younger than I am by several years.
Something about him looks too perfect, too polished, as if his photos have been plucked straight from a stock photo website.
Men like him don’t exist in the real world.
“Not in yours, anyway.”
I’m tempted to do more investigative reporting, though that takes some of the mystery out of dating, does it not? Digging for details? I mean, shouldn’t he be the one to tell me about his personal and professional life? Not the internet?
Yes.
Waiting is the right thing to do, and I have other shit to worry about.
Like my daughter, who’s going to be home soon.
Setting my phone down again, I pick up tidying at the sink where I left off, a long sigh escaping my frustrated lips.