Page 41 of Courting Clemson

Laughing, I said, “Not yet. I was starving when I walked in. Plus, I was waiting for you.”

Her face lit up like the Eifel Tower at midnight. I was glad I said that to her, even if it were only partly true. It made her feel important and giddy, and that mattered more than anything else.

Yep. I am a people pleaser.

“Where’s your laptop?” she asked, bouncing up and down now.

“Okay, calm down, sister. What if none of them responded?”

“Just go get the damn thing so we can see. I don’t know how you haven’t looked at your phone all this time. I’d be glued to the thing.”

“That’s exactly why I kept the notifications silent. I can’t be doing that shit while I’m at practice. They ride us about everything, and I’ve seen more than a few teammates get extra laps for being more concerned with their social lives than their split times.”

“Assholes,” she mumbled as I went to my room. Like a little duckling behind its mama, she followed right up my ass, so when I stopped abruptly inside the door of the space, she ran right into the back of me.

“Shit, sorry,” she said.

I just laughed and began emptying my practice bag. I needed to hang up my damp towels and soak my suits so the chlorine wouldn’t destroy the fabric.

“Oh. My. God.” Grace punctuated each word dramatically. “What are you doing?”

“Hanging up my wet stuff. It will be musty and smelly by morning if I don’t. And I swear, you never get that stench out of a towel once it’s in there.”

Grace wasn’t interested in my laundry tips at the moment, though. She plopped down on my unmade bed with a heavy sigh while I filled the sink in my bathroom with warm water and added some vinegar from the big gallon jug I kept below it.

“Okay, let’s see what we’re dealing with here.” I sighed as I sat down at my desk.

She scooted the little stool from my bathroom vanity up beside me and waited while I logged into my account.

“Oh, this is crazy,” I muttered as the page loaded with a bunch of new messages. These were initial contacts, like the list we went through this morning. There were at least as many as before.

“You’re a popular girl,” she teased.

“Solei warned me the first few days would be heavy like this. I don’t think it will be like this every day. There’s no way to manage it if so,” I said, shaking my head at the monitor.

“Let’s come back to these,” Grace suggested, pointing at the list. “What about the four direct messages you sent back? Have any of those guys replied?”

I clicked into the next screen and found three of the four men responded. The one I was most attracted to, Brian, was the first on the list.

“Ooooh, the hottie was quick,” my roomie noticed.

Opening his message, I smiled as I read the words. He was very upbeat and friendly and asked a few more questions about what I liked to do for fun and what I was hoping to get out of this experience. He mentioned, if I was comfortable, he would like to see a photo I hadn’t posted on my profile. Something current, maybe even a selfie from today.

I scrunched my face up after that. I looked like a drowned, tired rat at the moment. There was no way I’d send him a real-time photo. But I scrolled through my camera roll and tried to find something I could send.

Grace leaped up from the stool with enough excitement for both of us. “I have a great shot of you from the beach the other day. Let me grab my phone, and I’ll send it to you.”

“Not if Luke is in the shot, though,” I called after her.

Admittedly, I was new to this sugar dating, but my gut was telling me that having a guy in the picture wouldn’t go over well. A lot of the men said in their profiles that they didn’t mind if I had a significant other, but again, that just felt weird to me.

The picture was cute enough. I was sure the men would like it because I was wearing a bathing suit. My toned, tanned body was on full display in the shot, and my legs looked a mile long. The only complaint I had about the pic was my hair. We had been at the beach for hours when she took that shot, and by then it was piled in a messy nest on top of my head.

After typing a quick response to his question and attaching the photo, I hit Send. I was completely honest why I was looking to get into this type of arrangement by my mentor’s recommendation. She’d told me the men like honesty and don’t want to play games. That’s why a lot of them get into this too.

From a middle-aged man’s perspective, finding dates or a relationship with very clearly outlined parameters cuts down on wasted time getting to the desired outcome—companionship. Most of the agency’s clients, according to Solei, list that as the number-one reason they are looking for help being matched up with dates. They just don’t have time to go out and meet women, let alone spend the extra time figuring out if they are compatible.

Fair enough. It all made perfect sense to me. I wasn’t a big fan of the first few dates with someone new, either. I liked the excitement and newness of the process, but not investing a heap of time getting to know a guy just to find out how wrong my first impression was.

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