After my success, mainly at not being murdered, at the dinner date, Elly and I saw a sort of gap in the market for men who wanted to take women out for dinner. And after I remembered a dating website I had seen on day time TV while Coco was at the veterinary clinic, I decided to do some research. After lots of debate and laughs with Elly, I decided to sign up with one of the websites, Seeking Arrangement.com. At first, it was a little bit of a laugh that Elly and I had over wine one night, but I soon began to wonder more.
Apart from the fact that if Ben found out all hell would break loose, I did generally care about him. He was my hero and my best friend, and I in no way wanted to hurt or upset him and I particularly did not want to make him angry, so I opted not to tell him…not yet, anyway. If I ended up marrying one of those men, of course, I would let Ben know, but at that point it was highly unlikely. I guess the truth was, although I loved Ben, I wanted more. I wasn’t about to start sacrificing my own life, or fun, for a relationship that was going nowhere. Not again.
For those of you that don’t know, Seeking Arrangement.com is a website that promoted just that; arrangements between men and women whether that be rent paid, money, dinner dates, business trips or sex. It appealed because of the lack of commitment (after all, I wanted to move back to the UK eventually and, therefore, did not want to fall for another Aussie man…my mum would kill me!) and to be perfectly honest, I thought it would be a bit of fun as long as I was careful, stayed in control and always told Elly where I was going. After only a week on the website, I had received over five hundred emails. I narrowed it down to five men and decided to meet them over a two-week period and hopefully start some sort of arrangement with one of them. To be honest, I really had no idea what I was doing, but not for the first time since I had broken up with Guy, I couldn’t help but think why the hell not? So far, my new ‘go with flow’ attitude had mostly brought me fun and excitement. I had turned into a more confident girl, and I really liked the new me.
The first man I arranged to meet for coffee was fifty-seven, divorced and a multi-millionaire. He was from the UK and, although I was so very nervous, we got on extremely well. I had come straight from work and despite my efforts wasn’t feeling overly attractive, but when he saw me, his face lit up and he said, ‘Wow, you actually look like your profile pictures! That’s a first!’
When he asked me what I expected from this ‘arrangement,’ I completely froze. I had no idea what to say and immediately went very shy. Much like when I went for my visa interview with Sarah all those years ago, this was an obvious question, but again, I hadn’t been prepared for it. In any case, what in the hell was I meant to do? Hand him a list of demands?
He obviously started to realise this was my first time and decided to make me an ‘offer.’ He offered me $1000 a week and he would take me to dinner that Friday night to test out the arrangement.
Of course, I agreed! A thousand dollars to hang out with someone I get on with and have a lovely dinner; who wouldn’t agree? So, the next day, he put $1000 into my bank account. This is fun! I thought.
On Friday, I spent hours and hours deciding what to wear. In the end, I opted for a bright blue floaty dress that was very girly and made me look young. I had lied on the website and stated that I was in fact 25. After all, who wants a 31-year-old girlfriend?
I was very nervous and really just wanted to get the whole ‘first date’ thing over with. However, that night, I had a very pleasant evening. The man was well educated, funny and charming. What’s not to like? I thought. Plus, the food in the restaurant he took me too was absolutely delicious. After dinner, he invited me up to his apartment to show me some pictures of a house be had built. House was not the word—more like a country manor. It had twenty bedrooms, and the master bedroom had a lap pool just off of the ensuite.
By that time, I was feeling a little tipsy and for the first time in the evening I started to entertain the fact that maybe he wanted me to have sex with him. Since my breakup, I had learnt that if a man asks you back to his house or vice versa it was defiantly meant to be a come on, but, I very hastily pushed the thought out of my mind; after all, who would sleep with someone for $1000?
Oh, how wrong and naïve could I be! The lovely gentleman I had just had dinner with downstairs was now gone and in his place was a crazy man who honestly thought I was going to be on hand to have sex with him whenever he liked for $1000 a week! That time, of course, I drew the line at ‘going with the flow’ and ‘living for the moment’ and made a very quick exit, where I literally had to push my way out the door to get away, not in a scary way but more in a ‘hang on a minute you are breaking your promise’ sort of way. Maybe if he had added a few zeros to the amount I would have considered it, but I’m pretty sure even prostitutes gets more than $1000 a week!
However, not giving up, I decide to give a second man a try. Don’t ask me why now, but it felt like a good idea at the time. Elly loved to hear my dating disaster stories over lunch the next day, and I guess between us we thought it was pretty funny. When I arranged to meet the second man, I didn’t tell Ben again as it was just a coffee, and what was the point in upsetting him and putting pressure on our friendship / relationship if it doesn’t go anywhere? The man turned out to be a creep. After informing me that he would pay my rent, he very stupidly said to me, ‘When I come over to your house, you will have to lock your cat in the bathroom as I don’t want “it” crawling all over me.’ Number one, you will never be allowed in my house, I thought, and number two, if she did crawl on you, it would be an honour, as she doesn’t crawl on just anyone! Although that man actually offered me $2000 a week to have dinner with him on Fridays and Saturdays, I rejected the offer and got the hell out of there. See you laters, cat haters!
After a few more days, I met the third man, Richard, after work one night in a bar of his choosing. The bar turned out to be very run down, completely empty and less than appealing. I was immediately put off and although he was tall, young and relatively good looking, I could not get over the venue he chose. The fact that he was wearing what could only be described as ‘workmen’s clothes’ was also a big turn off. It was obvious he did not have a penny to his name, and to be honest, he could have passed as a serial killer when he walked into an otherwise silent bar with big black muddy construction site footwear making the only noise. Not that it was all about the money, of course, but if I had wanted a ‘normal’ relationship, I would have gone on E harmony or such a website!
Although I never saw Richard again, his stories about his previous encounters on the website were very interesting and made me laugh a lot. The first girl he had met would have ‘stopped traffic,’ he said. Apparently she was absolutely perfect; tall, slim with long blond hair. Now, she had chosen the venue in which they met, and it turned out it was her local. Richard said they got on extremely well at first, and it entered his head he may have found the perfect girl! She was beautiful, kind and funny. After a few drinks and lots of fun flirting, Richard went to the bar, rather pleased with himself, to get some drinks. For some reason the bar man sniggered at him and said, ‘You having fun?’
Richard immediately thought the bar man was jealous, probably wondering how a man like him could ever get a girl who was so perfect. Instantly Richard said his defences went up and so he began to embellish a little, telling the bar man they had been dating for a while and she was totally amazing, and beautiful and smart and kind and loving and how she had actually chased him rather than the other way around. At first, the bar man was silent and Richard smirked back, assuming he had silenced his critic. Then the bar man turned around and said, ‘Are you gay, mate? Because you do know she is a he, don’t ya?’ Richard told me he wished the floor would have swallowed him up.
His second story involved a girl from the site that he texted back and forth with for three months. After the girl cancelled numerous meetings because of work, family and many other excuses, Richard gave her an ultimatum: ‘Either we meet up or our ‘relationship / arrangement’ is over.’ He was surprised then when she suggested he come round to her house that night and she would cook him dinner. He excitedly agreed as they had been getting on so well through text messaging. He really hoped that time he would have some success—or at the very least, that she would be a she!
When he knocked on the girl’s door, she answered and greeted him with a kiss. At first, he was shocked. Not because of the way she looked, although she was a lot older than he had expected, definitely a middle-aged lady rather than a young girl, but she was very pleasant to look at. However, she was completely naked. Now Richard seemed like a very nice guy—not my type but very nice all the same—and even after knowing him for only half an hour, I thought he would have been very uncomfortable in that situation. As would most people, if we are honest.
Apparently, the lady acted as if she was completely unaware that she was naked and led him to the dinner table. As she sat down, she greeted him like they were old friends, chatting about her day and trying to exchange small talk. The conversation was somewhat one-sided, as Richard had obviously been shocked into silence, but she didn’t seem to notice as she got up and busied herself around the kitchen. Next, she served up a lovely meal, bending down to open the oven completely naked, reaching into the cupboard completely naked, and serving him food, all completely naked. She then sat and ate her dinner entirely naked, urging him to eat up even though he had lost his appetite completely.
Now I was laughing so much by that point, but Richard seemed deadly serious as he continued his story and pre warned me that it got worse. He next told me the two of them were sitting there having their dinner—she entirely naked, and him in absolute disbelief, chewing on the same mouthful of food for minutes at a time, both staring at her naked, slightly saggy breasts and trying not to stare at her naked, slightly saggy breasts—when a man (fully clothed, thank God) walked in the front door of the house. Richard told me he jumped with fright and was ready to tackle the intruder to the ground but the stranger walked straight into the kitchen, put his keys on the kitchen table, and then strolled right up to the naked lady, who, with a loving smile on her face, greeted the stranger with a kiss.
Apparently, the stranger was in fact the lady’s husband, and they had an open relationship in which they both entertained other partners on a regular basis at their marital home. Whether the wife was naked at all of these encounters remained to be seen. Richard told me he left very sharpish after the husband went upstairs to bed, wishing the two of them a good night and even shaking Richards hand. But to be completely honest, I’m not sure I believed him. I think maybe he stayed a little while longer!
Richard’s third and final story, I found the most worrying. Again, he had met a girl in a bar, and they were chatting about the usual get-to-know-you things. He started to tell her the same stories he told me, hoping to make her laugh (it worked with me!), I guess, or at least to break the ice between them. But completely out of the blue, she started crying about how he was talking about other women on their ‘date.’ He immediately apologised to save embarrassment, but it was too late; she had ‘gone into melt down,’ as he put it. As her voice got louder and louder, he began to realise she was absolutely mental, but by that stage, the whole bar was watching him and he knew it was too late to just get up and leave. He continued to try and calm her down, but as people in the bar began to tut in disgust at the womanising man who couldn’t help but talk about other women when he was on a date with his girlfriend, she actually threw a glass at him and slapped him across the face before storming off in hysterical tears to the bathroom.
I, of course, immediately asked, ‘What did you do? Did you just get up and leave?’
But he said he just sat there, absolutely stunned, with the whole bar staring at him in disapproval. He said he wanted to get up and leave, but how could he? From an outsider’s point of view, he had just really upset his girlfriend. How could he then leave her there, sobbing in the toilet? He would be labelled as the world’s biggest asshole. So, he stupidly stayed, almost frozen to the spot in disbelief at what just happened, and waited for her to come out of the toilet. When she finally reappeared, she sat back down and said very calmly, ‘Would you mind not talking about other women as it really upsets me?’ The whole bar then watched for the next hour as the lady acted complete normal again.
Although I was laughing at that story, I actually made a mental note to myself to be more careful on the website. I then casually asked him, of course joking, ‘So, did you see her again?’ and when he answered with, ‘Yes, but just three more times,’ I thought it was probably time to go home.
For some unknown reason, nonetheless, I kept going with my dating experience—self-destruction, boredom or just to make Elly laugh, even I don’t know. The fourth man I decided to meet was a texter (you know, the kind of man that likes to text). That didn’t bother me in the slightest, and by text we got on extremely well. By text, it’s easy to talk about money and an arrangement. We arranged to meet for high tea at a very lovely hotel in the city. Even after my last few experiences, I was excited to meet that man, as we had chatted so much via text. But when I walked in to the tearoom in my cute little cocktail dress, my heart stopped as I saw my boss from work sitting alone on the other side of the hotel lobby. I stared for a few seconds, heart in my mouth, unsure of what to do, before I turned around and walked straight back out the door, praying he hadn’t seen me half laughing, half cringing, half beginning to wonder. At first I thought to myself, What a coincidence that was, and I texted the mystery Seeking Arrangement man making my excuses. After all, what if my boss had started talking to me. How on earth would I have introduced the mystery older gentleman?
But after going over a few things in my head, I began to wonder. The night before that arranged meeting, I had had a work-related social function. It was a Friday night and fifteen lovely ladies and gentlemen from my office had gone out to a very swanky restaurant for dinner to celebrate ten years of our little department. After a lot of wine, I found myself sitting next to my boss, a very well off, good looking, married gentleman in his fifties. We had never really had a conversation outside of work, but he seemed like a generally nice man. Now it had crossed my mind before this occasion that my boss had a lot in common with the mystery fourth man from Seeking Arrangement, but only for literally one second, before I completely dismissed it without it ever entering my head again—until I stepped inside the hotel. They both had the same first name, but there was nothing special about that, as no one used their real name on the site anyway. They were both the same age, again nothing that should have rung alarms bells in my head. They both lived in the same suburb. Again, people from Seeking Arrangement rarely divulged the real suburb they lived in and so I did not consider it a problem at all. As the wine kept flowing that night, I remember mulling over some other similarities between the two men; they were both in the medical profession, and they both had pet dogs (I only knew my boss had a dog because when he was on holiday the previous Christmas, I had fed it for him one day). As I chatted to my boss about dating, about why I was technically still single and about his marriage, there were certainly a lot of coincidences, but for some reason, more than likely the wine, I didn’t see them at the time, or if I did I choose to ignore them.
To this day, I am still unsure whether it was my imagination running away with me—after all, perhaps my boss was there coincidently—or whether my boss really was the man from Seeking Arrangement. I still cringed every time I had to speak to him at work. If it wasn’t him, no doubt he thought I was absolutely mental for the way I now acted around him. If it was him, surely he must have recognised me from my pictures that I’d sent, even if I did use a fake name. To be honest, with some of the emails and text messages that were exchanged between us, I’d rather not think about it. Needless to say, I decided to take a break from ‘dating’ for a while—but not before one last try, as I had already arranged a meeting!
The fifth man I met from the website was called Andrew and was abrupt and quite honestly rude in his emails, but he wanted to meet on a weekend and at the beach a fifteen-minute walk from my house. Since it was convenient and close, I agreed. By that stage, I was well used to meeting up with strange men and making small talk. It was the time wasted that really annoyed me, but I knew I could judge just about straight away if I liked someone or not.
That said, Andrew confused me a lot. He was very abrupt in person and to a very polite British girl, he also seemed rude, however, there was a lot I could not read about him and that intrigued me a little. He was a good looking man in his late fifties that had recently divorced. He brought up money, which I liked and respected, but even after we agreed on $5000 a month, more than I got paid at my full time job, I could not read whether he really liked me or not. With all the other men so far, it had been very obvious that they found me attractive, but with Andrew it was hard to even judge whether he liked me or not, let alone found me attractive. In fact, at times, even on that first meeting, I felt like he was annoyed and a little frustrated by me. I remember leaving that day thinking I would never hear from him again. Nevertheless, I was very wrong.
The next day, he texted me, saying what a pleasure it had been to meet to me and asking whether I would have dinner with him in Darling Harbour. I agreed, half because I was intrigued by him and half because I wanted to have a nice dinner in the city. The night he had chosen I had actually already agreed to be part of a quiz team at work, which included free pizza and wine. So, at 8.30pm, I left the quiz night and my workmates and went to dinner, unfortunately half drunk. That was probably not the best idea I’d ever had, but I didn’t want to let my workmates down, and the alcohol gave me a lot more confidence.
Dinner that night was really lovely, although I have no idea to this day whether he realised I was drunk or not. He was funny, engaging and a gentleman, but again, I was at a loss as to whether he found me attractive or not—even though I was wearing a very tight white see-through shirt with at least the top three buttons undone for good luck. After dinner, he drove me home without even an indication that he found me attractive or trying to hit on me, and while in the car, he gave me a copy of a book he had written. By that time, it was gone midnight, and I was very drunk, so I didn’t really see the consequences or meaning of the book until the next morning, when I googled it and found out that man was actually quite famous; not only in Australia but also in the UK and the USA.
My stomach dropped as I recalled some of my drunken rants from the previous night; particularly when I remembered he was completely sober. I kicked myself for throwing such a good opportunity away, resigned to the fact that I would never hear from him again. But, again, I was wrong.
A week later, Andrew invited me over to his house and offered to cook me dinner. That time, I managed to limit myself to only two drinks before leaving the house and knocked on his door at 7.30pm with nothing more than Dutch courage in my system. The problem was, as soon as I entered his house, I completely froze with nerves. The house was absolutely breath-taking. He obviously had a lot of money, and he was looking very attractive. I soon began to feel like I was way out of my depth.
For some reason, he completely intimidated me, and I found it hard to even hold the simplest of conversations, as he began to notice. I started to feel as though he found me annoying and maybe that time a little stupid as well, which made me even more nervous. So, I did the obvious thing in that situation; I drank two bottles of wine. The only good thing to come out of that night was that he also drank two bottles of wine and so neither of us remembered very much. I believe that is the way it should stay, as the last joke I recall telling him was that I had lied about my age (which was true; I had said I was twenty-five) and when I saw the horrified look on his face, I guessed he assumed I was actually younger.
I went in for the kill with, ‘I’m really only 14!’ but he did not find that funny, even in the slightest, but in my drunken state, I managed to wind him up for at least fifteen minutes, watching him completely freak out, before I told him I was really twenty-nine (I couldn’t admit to being over thirty!).
I woke up in his bed in my underwear at 8am the next morning and was then very late for work. I also had five missed called from Ben on my phone, and my heart sank with dread. Strangely, after we both got dressed, Andrew offered to drive me half way home. The drive took ten minutes, but I really was at a loss as to why he couldn’t take another ten minutes out of his day to drive me the rest of the way. Ben called me again within seconds of me getting into the house, and I truthfully told him I just fell asleep, but obviously I didn’t tell him where.
A week after that, and $3000 later, I headed off to Andrew’s second house for dinner. This house was a little bit further away from my house than the first house I had met him in, but it was just as beautiful. Even though I still had no idea what he thought of me, I was very much enjoying myself. In the months that followed my breakup, I had gained so much more confidence in myself and very much enjoyed ‘living on the edge.’ Furthermore, although Ben knew I had been going out for dinner with ‘friends,’ he hadn’t asked too many questions, and I hadn’t told him that much information at all. Although I had a feeling he was getting suspicious with my ‘I fell asleep’ or ‘It was too late to call you’ excuses.
That night, once again, my nerves unfortunately got the better of me, and I drank way too much wine. After watching a film, we headed to bed, and I vaguely recall thinking I should probably go home, but instead, we had great sex that I actually remembered that time, and I fall asleep. Now, don’t think I slept with that man for money, because I did not in the slightest. I slept with him because I had wanted to, and maybe also because I was a little drunk. It was as simple as that. When I woke up the next day, it was 8am. I was relieved that it was my day off, but my heart sank thinking that Ben may have called me.
However, when I went to the bathroom and checked my phone, there were no missed calls, and I was so relieved. Just as I began to relax, at that very moment, my phone rang and, of course, it was Ben. Now, he was never ever up that early, so I answered it and without thinking, went for the ‘I’m still in bed, I’ll ring you when I wake up’ line. As I said the words, I was riddled with guilt, and I began to think I wasn’t cut out for that sort of life. When he turned around and said, ‘Ok, cool. I’ll be there in ten minutes,’ I immediately wanted to throw up and had to think quickly and try not to panic, because if he found out what I’d done, I was certain he would kill me.
Of course, it was too late by that point to lie and say, ‘Oh, I’m at the gym’ or ‘I’ve gone for a walk’ or ‘I’m at the shop,’ like I should have done in the first place. I had already lied. I had no idea what I said to him, but before I knew it, I was off the phone and frantically searching for my clothes and bag, so I could at least try to get home before he got there. Although, deep down I knew it would be near impossible. I made my crazy excuses to Andrew, who no doubt thought I was mental but in all honesty was probably just glad he didn’t need to be polite and offer to drive me anywhere.
I got dressed as best I could, not bothering with underwear or shoes, instead throwing them in my bag. I ran out to the street in tears, thinking about what would happen if I couldn’t pull this off, and it was more than likely I wouldn’t. First, I would hurt Ben and I couldn’t let that happen, and second, Ben would no doubt kill me. I knew that his ten minutes would be longer than that, and at that time in the morning the Sydney traffic heading into the city would be on my side. However, my house was still a forty minute walk up the hill from where I was.
When I got to the main street, there was a taxi with his light off, obviously waiting for someone who had booked him, to come out of their building. More than likely some normal person who was just going to work or to the airport. When I saw the taxi, I made a run for it and knowing he was not available, I bundled in the back seat anyway. It was life or death now. The driver turned straight around and started to tell me he was booked, but when I told him I’d pay him $100 to drive me up the hill, which would take less than twenty minutes even if the traffic was bad, he agreed. When we got to my house, I threw the taxi driver the money and literally ran full pelt across the road, straight in front of oncoming traffic that all had to brake and swerve out of my way, but I knew it would be the seconds that counted now. When I ran up to the building entrance, I was relieved first that my apartment had not been set on fire and second that Ben was not outside the front door waiting for me.
I ran inside and let myself into the apartment. Then, with so much relief he was not inside (he had a spare key!) I pulled off my dress from the previous night and threw on some old PJs. I just had enough time to rough up the bed to make it look like I had slept in it, when Ben walked in the front door without even knocking. Thankfully, he didn’t seem to notice my suicidal state and suggested we go and grab some breakfast before he went to work. Maybe I was cut out for a life of crime, I thought to myself, with a sly little smile that I just couldn’t help.‘If you aren’t living on the edge, you are taking up way too much space!’ — Jim Whittaker.