The Slightly Mad Cuckquean: Chapter One

(Editor's Note: To start at the beginning of this story, please see: http://pjwrites.hubpages.com/hub/If-your-husband-and-best-friend-were-drowning-which-would-you-choose-lunch-or-a-movie)

I met them both online and within two months of each other.

I was new to the online social scene and the only reason I had a page was so I could spy on my kids. After a while, I started feeling like the stinky kid, watching from the sidelines, with no “friends” of my own. So, in an attempt to make it look like I was popular and cool, too (which I was, but just not in cyberspace. No, really.) I reached out and tagged someone - a perfect stranger.

She seemed nice. She stared out from above her glasses with a stern, schoolmarmish look on her face, but there was twinkle in her eye and she had red hair, like my mom. I could tell by her page she was smart and funny. And she was. We became fast friends almost right away and soon were messaging daily. Lively, witty conversations and debates soon graduated to phone calls and, months later, to our first meeting. She was married and younger than me by a few years (b-CENSORED-h!!!), but already a proud grandmother of two. I had a new friend! Woo-hoo!

He was the dad of one of my daughter’s friends. Divorced for four years, beginning to get lonely, tentatively reaching out to some women he found attractive and, of course, he found me. (Hey, I didn’t say it, he did.) As it turned out, he had known my daughter through his son, but I had only ever met his former wife and never him. He seemed a bit of an odd duck, weirdly mysterious and aloof and, from his pictures, not at all my type. But the more we chatted, the more I realized he was actually kind of sweet – and really, really funny. I’m a sucker for a guy who can make me laugh. If he can make me shoot beer out my nose, I'm his sandwich slave for life.

He had a formal writing manner and I could tell he was smart. After about 6 weeks of him gently flirting, and me trying to be nice and polite but not encouraging, we agreed to have dinner - strictly as friends.

Until we had dinner, that is.

This is where the cartoon coyote’s eyes bulge and turn into hearts, where he kicks his feet up and spins around, love-struck. The minute I saw that man, my heart skipped a beat. Number one, he was much better looking than his pictures. Number two . . . no we'll skip Number two for now because I might make a joke in poor taste. Number three, in photos and behind his glasses, you couldn’t see his warm, brown eyes light up when he laughed or when he found something new that excited him. He was smart, shy, sexy, thoughtful and, did I mention nose-snortingly funny? Number four, he was taller than me and had all his hair. Tall, dark, and hairfull, what else could a woman want? We were made for each other.

He waited 6 weeks to kiss me and when he did, he did it in the deserted paint aisle at Home Depot. Oh, I know what you’re saying - “be still my heart” – because I felt the same way. To this day, I get turned on looking at exterior stains - and don’t even get me started on sponge rollers.

It took him exactly 60 days to propose. I said “yes” on the spot.

I wish now I had feigned a seizure or something, but how could I have known what I know now? Is it too late to feign a seizure? Would it be believable six years later? Aw hell, I think I’ll do it anyway.

Stay tuned for Chapter Two: Will You Marry Me and Do You Mind if She Does, Too?