Certitude

Certitude

By Frederick J. Blahnik

 

The two good friends were enjoying drinks after work at a local watering hole.

“So……how did your big date go last night?!”  Miriam’s eyes opened wide while she spoke and her lips curled up at the corners.  “Didya like the guy??”

Janelle was quick to reply.

“Yeah, I liked him…..”

“But then we both know the real question that matters here:  Did he like you?”

Miriam smirked slightly and rolled her eyes knowingly as she spoke.

“He’ll call me back…..”

Janelle’s response was as surprising for its certitude as it was for its instanteity.

“He will, huh?”

Miriam was surprised by the rapid reply, startled even, as only two lifelong friends who could swap horrific war stories on dating back and forth for hours on end might jadedly have come to expect.

“How can you be so certain, Janelle?  What is it about this guy that makes him different from all the other egotistical, asshole men we’ve dated in the past?”

Miriam—in her early thirties and no ingénue any more–well knew the vast majority of men out on the social circuit are looking for just one thing, and if they don’t get that thing on a first date—or at least a trail of bread crumbs indicating that such would soon be forthcoming—a second date was not a strong likelihood.  She also knew that her best friend Janelle was not the type of woman, for reasons of principle, to flippantly offer those types of benefits to someone she scarcely knew.

Janelle was unwavering in her response, though.

 “He’ll call me back soon, Miriam.  I know he will.”

Miriam became even more perplexed now, and her demeanor began to approach frustration—almost agitation.

“How can you be so sure of that, Janelle?  You know our sorry track record when it comes to men in the past!  It’s one thing for your first date to have gone smoothly—and I’m very happy to hear that it must have—but it’s quite another to sit there smugly and profess without doubt that this dream guy of yours will automatically call you back for a second date.”

Miriam stopped talking then to consider for a moment.

“Unless there’s something you’re not telling me…..”

Her eyes next exploded and her face dissolved into an unapologetic frown.

“Janelle, Janelle, Janelle…..don’t tell me that you gave everything away to this guy on your very first date!!!”  Miriam stared wide-eyed and accusatory with her mouth agape at her longtime friend.

Janelle was noncommittal.

“No, Miriam, I didn’t give ‘everything’ away to this guy last night.  In fact, I gave him next to nothing.  The only carnal thing he received from me was a few smooches as we sat on his sofa and a brief kiss on the lips as we said our farewells for the evening.  But he’ll be calling me back within the next week.  I can personally guarantee you that!”

Janelle’s cocksure smugness was annoying to her lifetime buddy.  This was a characteristic Miriam had never witnessed before in her best friend and co-worker.

“Okay, okay, I’ll admit that you’ve got me on this one, Janelle.  I am now firmly convinced that this new guy friend of yours will be calling you back soon, simply because I know you better than anyone else in the world and consequently know that you would never tell a lie or make something up purely to be dramatic.  But, dear girl, can you solve this riddle for me now once and for all by explaining how you can be so absolutely certain the new guy you went out on a date with last night and obviously like a lot will definitely call you back for a second date?  I’m just dying to hear the details, best friend!!!”  Miriam leaned over at the bar at this point and gawked straight into the face of her tavern mate.

Janelle drew a long sip on the Moscow Mule she was drinking, brushed some rogue strands of hair back from her face, and grinned mischievously before replying.

“How can I be so certain, Miriam?  Easy.  At the end of our date last night Jim invited me up to his apartment for a nightcap and, given the fact I liked this guy and trusted him implicitly, I of course accepted his offer with no plans to do anything other than a bit of kissing. “

Janelle stopped talking at this juncture to take another sip from her Moscow Mule while Miriam stared at her raptly, albeit impatiently.

“So anyway, the two of us were sitting on the sofa in Jim’s apartment—having a good time and making out a little bit—when I couldn’t help but notice that Jim had this humongous, fiendishly difficult 3000-piece jigsaw puzzle that was nearing completion laid out on a sheet of cardboard on his living room floor.  I already knew that I liked this guy quite a lot and wanted desperately to see him again so—Bingo!—a light flashed on in my brain right then and I hatched a devilish, can’t-miss plan.  When Jim got up to go use the bathroom a few minutes later, I casually stole one of the unfinished pieces from his jigsaw puzzle and hid it in my purse.”

Janelle paused one last time to draw the final remaining drops of alcohol from her vodka drink.  The look on her face was the bastard child of cleverness and certitude.

“Jim is gonna call me again within the next week, Miriam.  I have never been so certain of anything in my life…..”