Date Diaries: The Woman Who Took Her Clothing Steamer On A One Night Stand

Date Diaries is an online Grazia franchise chronicling the anonymous adventures of those involved in the ever complicated and increasingly unbelievable world of modern dating. To submit your story, fill out the form below.

This week, Felicity a 25-year-old heterosexual assistant manager from Oxford takes her first steps into millennial dating.*

My first foray into dating apps was at the grand-old age of 24 and let me tell you, I quickly realised why it had taken me so long to dive into millennial dating. I’d downloaded Hinge because I was told by my highly-qualified friends that Tinder was full of fuckboys and Bumble too much effort. It felt like the best option for real relationship potential.

The first guy I started talking to was Ben. He was 27, a secondary school teacher and while he wasn’t my usual type physically, I gave him a shot based off his question replies (that’s how they get you, huh?). We quickly bonded over the season of Love Island that was showing at the time, and while his running commentary each night was no comparison to Ian Stirling, he seemed pretty funny.

On one fateful evening discussing Anton’s likeability, I decided to take this virtual watching offline and asked him for a real date. We lived in different towns, so we arranged to meet in the middle of us both at a bar in Oxford – not for a Love Island screening unfortunately, but an actual drink.

Arriving at the bar, I sat down and realised he’d messaged to say he was running 20 minutes late. While I’d usually be annoyed, I was commute-sweaty and sober so I thanked my lucky stars I could get a wine down me before he arrived. When he finally did, the vibe was instantly awkward and we were both very well aware we needed alcohol to settle into this.

As we made conversation over wine, the vibe got less and less awkward and out witty Love Island repour slowly returned. But I soon realised why, we were both downing our wines like fish. He was fun, easy to talk to and becoming more attractive by the glass.

Three drinks later, it was 10pm and I was drunk. I know this because when he suggested we go to a club, I agreed instantly. Plus, I messaged my group chat to say I loved him. Reader, I did not love this man. He was nice and all, but I was absolutely blinded by rose-tinted glasses.

As we stumbled into the club, we were offered free Jagerbombs on entry and it was suddenly a very different kind of night that both of us were happy to oblige. The type of night that means grinding on the dance floor, necking shots and then – much to the pleasure of a creepy man in the corner watching us - each other. Before you ask, yes… it was super romantic. Even more so? When he whispered in my ear ‘as soon as I saw you I knew I wanted to fuck you.’

So, I guess there are a few fuckboys on Hinge then, huh. Unfortunately for him, I had no plans to fuck him – I had a friends birthday the next day in London and it wasn’t the type of event you could stroll into in last night’s clothes. My house wasn’t an option, I live with my parents still.

He, being a man, thought of a way around all of this and decided that if I wanted to go back to his, we could stop off at my house and pick up my stuff to get ready the next day – steamer and all. My plan quickly changed as I threw caution to the wind and thought ‘fuck it’. Well. Fuck it as long as I get my clothing steamer first.

Now, remember I said we met in the middle of two different towns? Well, this is where it got tricky. We were 45-minutes from my house by taxi and another 45-minutes after that to his. 90 minutes, £150 quid and one awkward run-in with my mother later, I was at his house. With my steamer. Or at least, the remnants of his house.

All of his stuff was in boxes, and while I was concerned he may be a squatter it was soon apparent the real situation was worse – for my dating life, at least. ‘Oh yeah, I’m moving to Kent next week,’ he tells me. Good job I wasn’t actually in love with him then.

The thing about Ben was, he wasn’t the classic uncaring fuckboy, he was the sell-you-a-dream-you-don’t-even-want fuckboy. You know, the ones that seem more sensitive until a month in when you realise they’re full of shit and actually worse than the ones who just blatantly don’t care?

As I questioned why he was dating women in his town if he was moving so quickly, he spewed out this crap about how easy it is to visit Kent. ‘I really like you,’ he said. ‘You have to come visit me when I’m settled.’ Eye roll.

At this point, I wanted to have sex with him just to shut him up. But, as is classic with salesmen fuckboys, when we eventually did have sex – after settling in to watch at least 10 minutes of Love Island first, of course – he was the only one actually having it. While he used my body to masturbate, I started to understand why he’d been so keen to go the bar every 30 minutes. No sober woman would enjoy this, or drunk woman too it turns out.

I woke up hungover, dissatisfied and with one thing on my mind: how the hell I could get out of here as quick as possible. I had a big problem: all of my stuff, including hordes of makeup, hair straighteners and fucking STEAMER, were in his room. I would have to come back to his lest I carry my entire life around the polo I was about to meet my friends at.

I got ready while coming to terms with this sad truth and naturally, since Ben had already made his sale, he stayed in bed and barely talked. Although, he did offer me a falafel and hummus wrap to take with me as I left. I declined of course, since it was literally 9am.

Five hours, a lot of standing around and many a glass of champagne later, I was back on this fateful journey to Ben’s house to rescue my steamer. When I arrived, the salesman was back. As we’d missed the Friday night episode of Love Island, he asked if I wanted to watch it. Since I was now tipsy again and tired, I said yes. I did actually really want to watch it, but he had other ideas.

We got into bed and he barely made it to the first ad break before he was all over me. I didn’t want to have sex with him, not at all. But honestly, he was so persistent it was easier to just do it than it was to say no and leave. I don’t know how that equated in my mind, but it did.

I woke up the next day and couldn’t wait to leave. I grabbed all my stuff and headed for the door with that distinct feeling of shame you can only feel when you have sex with someone without really wanting to. Guilt regret and self-hatred all intertwine as you chastise yourself for not putting the emotional labour in it takes to say no when someone is being so insistent.

Naturally, that sick feeling I now had left a bad stain on my first Hinge experience and I decided to delete the app. More than that, to delete dating from my life altogether until I had taken some time to work on my confidence. Or you know, meet a man that wouldn’t try to have sex when the cues a woman doesn’t are so obvious.

While I’m in a much better place now, I’m still not quite ready to re-download Hinge. Maybe in 2020?

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