I once went on a date with a guy that lived in New Jersey, who I’ll call Mike. Mike and I had plans to meet for dinner at a restaurant called The Park in the city. I had agreed to this particular restaurant because I worked in the area.

That day, however, my boss had some personal business to attend to and told my coworkers and I to work from home. Being the lazy person that I am, when I looked outside and saw how dark and gloomy and rainy it was, I decided that I didn’t want to trek all the way into the city. Not to mention the fit my parents would have thrown.

I texted Mike around 4PM, asking if it would be okay if we ate at a restaurant in Brooklyn instead of Manhattan. He said he had just gotten off the train, and that it was fine.

I figured he had gotten off the train from work, and was heading home to change.

“Great!” I said, and texted him my address.

“Oh, did you want to meet at the restaurant or have me come and get you?” he asked.

“Come and get me ” I replied.

After exchanging a few “Sounds good, see you then” texts, I went on with my day and didn’t think much about the last-minute restaurant switch again.

A few hours, I received a strange text message from Mike that read, “I’m an idiot.”

“Why are you an idiot?” I asked.

“You’ll see,” he replied.

“Did you forget to take the body out of your trunk?” I asked.

“Worse. Almost there,” he answered.

Now I was a little worried. What could be worse than that? I racked my brain for the answer while I desperately tried to get ready before he got there. Three minutes later, around 7:30PM, my doorbell rang.

No! I thought, as I ran around my room, throwing on a necklace and trying to find my shoes.

Yelling “I got it!” over the ear-splitting barking of my huge dog, I flew down the stairs and opened the door a crack.

“Hi! I’ll be right out!” I yelled, and slammed the door, most likely scaring this guy who was standing under an odd umbrella in the pouring rain.

I told my mom to hold the dog, grabbed my coat, and jetted out of there as quickly as I could.

“I’m so sorry!” I gasped, air-kissing him on the cheek. “I’m such a mess today.”

“Don’t even worry about it,” he said. “But you may want to grab an umbrella.”

“Nah, I’m okay,” I said, walking with him to the right.

“Actually we’re this way,” he said, motioning for me to walk in the opposite direction.

“Oh, okay, I said, following him and looking around. Where’d you park your car?”

“That’s what I wanted to talk to you about…I, umm, didn’t drive here,” he said, half under his breath.

I stopped dead in my tracks. “Wait, is that a joke?”

“I wish it was. When you said we were meeting at the restaurant, I left my car at home and hopped on the train.  When you texted me about forgetting to take the body out of the trunk I almost texted back that I had forgotten the trunk.”

“Wait – how did you get here?!” I asked, flabbergasted.

“The subway.”

“No, I mean, how did you physically get here? To my house. Where we’re standing.”

“Oh, I walked here from Kings Highway.”

“Dude, that’s 3 avenues and 5 blocks away!!!”

“I know. And then my umbrella broke. And I was holding it together. And when I was texting you that I was an idiot, the rain was hitting my phone so I had to stop. Plus the phone started dying.”

I stared at this poor guy with my mouth hanging open for a solid ten seconds. His luck makes me look like the freaking Lucky Charms leprechaun.

“Okay, follow me,” I said, marching back up to my house, vigorously knocking on the door, and asking my mother to bring me my car keys.

I pulled out of my driveway, and waited for him to get in. After about 30 seconds of battling his umbrella, he finally looked at me in defeat and said, “I can’t get it to close.”

“Just dump it in my front garden,” I said, shaking my head at what was happening to this guy.

(To Be Continued…)