How I (Didn't) Meet Your Mother

Emma 

“Where’d you meet this one?” 

“Oh, it’s a great story, you’ll never believe it. I was on the bus,” he settles into the chair, shuffling his feet in those loud brown shoes, “And all of a sudden this girl walks in. She’s got this,” hands above his head, miming tall hair, “Pink mess of all these braids and, man, the first thing I have to think is that her brains are coming out of her head and I’m like, woah, zombies!”

“You thought this girl was a zombie?” 

“No, of course not. Her hair just reminded me of those things. But anyway, she gets on the bus and I’m looking at her hair and then before I can move another muscle, she sits,” he smacks the side of his leg, “Right down next to me. Let me tell you what, she smells like roses. Literal roses! And bubblegum, there was this strong undertone of bubblegum.” The man gets this dreamy look over his face, eyes all glazed like the last donuts in the box. “Like she’d chew me up and spit me out and I’d still follow her to the end of the world.” 

“And if she was so out of your league-”

He holds up a hand towards you, “Who said she was?” 

“Your eyes. They’re all… dreamy. She was way out of your league.” 

“True. But she didn’t have to know that.” He grins, and leans closer to you, eager to continue the story of his latest escapade. “And do you want to know how I got her number?” 

If you say no, you’ll end up hearing about it anyway. You nod and he grins again, teeth shiny in the lamplight of the room. “I saw she was reading this book, right, about art. So I told her,” he starts up chuckling, like he’s the best finder of opportunities there ever was, “I told her that I was an artist myself. The kicker, though, the kicker is that I told her, I said, ‘Oh, yeah, I’m an artist looking for a muse.’ If you don’t thing that settled the deal, well, I don’t know what did.” 

“You lied to her. She thinks you… what? Draw? Paint? Sculpt?” 

He shakes his head, “No,” then he nods, “Well, yeah. But you didn’t see her! She was, I mean, hey, she was magnetic! Enigmatic! One of those girls you usually only read about in books.” 

You know for a fact he hasn’t read a whole book in about three years, not since graduating college. “Oh really? What books?”

“The one about that girl and the boy, the sick kids! They’re in love and then one of them dies and it’s not the one I was expecting, it was that guy. Man, I think I may have shed a tear at that ending.” You find it really hard to believe he didn’t just watch the movie. “That’s alright though, I’ve found that, over the years, women have come to like a sort of more sensitive fellow.”

“So this Emma, she’s your muse?” 

He leans back in his chair. “Yeah,” he nods again, “For now. I told her I had an art show, up at the convention center-” 

And you know how this goes. A new girl- sometimes a muse, sometimes an adventure- and a new him, time and time again until you hardly recognize your friend in the midst of all the pieces he built himself up with. 

Jean 

A month before, he walked into your living room wearing a suit and tie. It was weird. You knew it had something to do with a new girlfriend or potential girlfriend of his, someone he had his prospects set upon. When he got tangled with the likes of one, he got tangled deep. So deep, you realized, that he was willing to change his entire wardrobe. 

“Do you like it?” He said, spinning around. 

You shrugged and stood up. There were three mini pizzas in the oven. “It’s nice, sure, why’re you wearing it? Planning a gala?” 

He followed you into the kitchen. His shoes were big and black and shiny and they made little sad duckling noises whenever he shuffled about. “No, not a gala. I’m going to church.” 

“To church?” 

“Yeah, this new girl, I met her at a soup kitchen-” 

“Why were you at the soup kitchen?” 

He didn’t want to answer. He blinked and smiled and handed you an oven mitt. You asked the same question and he sighed. “I was volunteering.” 

Ah. Community service. “Mandatory?” 

He nodded in a small way, “Yes, but that’s not important. Aren’t you listening? I met this lovely woman, really, I think she’s one of the most inspiring humans I’ve ever had the chance of meeting. Jean, that’s her name, Jean’s father is the preacher at one of these churches down the road. I asked for her number and she said,” he was getting to the part of the story where he thought he’d been cute and clever, “She didn’t like guys who didn’t go to church. So I said, naturally, of course I go to church! But did I stop there? Oh, no, I told her I’d do better than just visit her church.” 

“What did you do now?” 

“I said I’d love to give the congregation a bit of a sermon. Told her I was some kind of preacher, I don’t know, it was all a beautiful, beautiful blur.” He clapped his hands together and jumped onto your counter. “What do you say, pal? Do you wanna join me?”

“In case you didn’t know, and you obviously forgot, you are not a preacher.” 

“I know, I know, and I’ll have to tell her eventually, but that doesn’t mean tonight and so I’m headed down to the church and I’m gonna be the best fake preacher there ever was!” 

He called to cancel ten minutes before the service started, five minutes after he walked into the building and ate more than half of the complimentary donuts. 

Ari 

Ari worked as a party clown. You first heard about her while ordering food from a drive through. He didn’t have money, as usual, and you were paying for his double decker bacon and biscuit cheesleburger over the sounds of his rambling. His nose was painted bright red, like an embarrassed fire hydrant, and on his feet were yellow shoes so large they bumped the dashboard. 

“She makes my life so much more fun!” 

“You know what else would make your life fun? If you got a job. That would be really cool. Paying for your own food? Ever heard of that one?” 

He went on, pretending like he hadn’t heard you. “I was sitting in the circus tent, minding my own business, when out of the corner of my eye I saw the brightest blend of colors I’ve ever seen. And she was riding a unicycle. Get that,” he shoved your arm, “She was riding a unicycle, of all things. So after the show, I went up to her and she still had most of her clown makeup on and I didn’t mind because- holy smokes- she was one heck of a clown. I asked if she was interested in sharing her number with me, and she said, are you funny?” 

You felt instantly bad for this clown girl. He was not funny. He was overzealous about his jokes, all hands and little words of good impact. “What did you tell her?” 

“I told her I had a comedy show running Monday through Friday at the Salami and Whiskers Bar and Grill.”

“You do?”

“No, of course not, but I had to let that hook sink in. I had to. If you were the one who saw her that night, you’d be studying comic routine too, just like me! I was thinking you might wanna join me, right, we could be a famous duo and all.” You took the food from the window.

“No.” 

“And why not?” 

“It’s about the last thing on my agenda and the first thing on my anti-bucket list, is why.”

He grabbed the bag of food from you and unwrapped his sandwich. “I think you’re jealous of all the attention I get, is what I think.” 

“You mean all the attention you get from the lies you tell?”

Ruffled, he took a bite into his cheesleburger, “I mean, when you put it that way, doesn’t sound near as nice.” 

Emma, Jean, Ari

Thank heavens for a good imagination, or else your buddy would be down about three great stories about three great- and nonexistent- girls.