Xavier and More

Okay, I have a lot to update.  After my last post on Monday the 22nd, I was just about to start writing a post about my friend Xavier's party when Facebook e-mailed me to let me know that Nathan had commented on my status.  My heart sped up and my face got warm before I read the innocuous joke.  I hadn't talked to him since New Years', so I was kind of shocked to hear from him--especially because the day before I had changed my News Feed settings to exclude anything from him and Charlie.  Timing is everything.  Anyway, I got over it.  Then he happened to call his youngest brother when a group of us were hanging out at their other brother, Nelson's house on that Saturday night...and happened to call his sister-in-law when Sophie and I were hanging out with her on this past Friday night.  It's like he has a radar for when I'll be around so that I'm forced to remember him.

 

But let's move on.  My friend Xavier had a party with his housemates, so Sophie, Dwight, and I attended along with Marchella and her boyfriend and a few other friends of ours.  These parties are always super fun, with Rock Band going on in one room and flip cup going on in the other.  Xavier and I are almost unstoppable when we're on the same flip cup team, so we carried on that tradition.

 

Xavier recently broke up with his girlfriend of almost a year.  He and I have known each other for almost two years, having met at a mutual friend's birthday party while I was still dating Charlie.  Xavier and I sat talking for a while and really hit it off as friends.  We cemented that friendship later that evening as beer pong partners when Charlie chose not to play with me because he wanted to be on a "winning" team.  Xavier and I demolished him.  Ha!

 

Now that X is single and I'm single and I've written off The Fourth, Sophie decided that I should date X.  I was surprised when she told me that because I've always had a mini-crush on him, but I'm pretty sure that I didn't say anything about it.  Anyway, I decided to flirt with him at the party and see what happened.  I didn't count on Sophie pretty much suggesting to X that he and I should date.  It seemed like after that suggestion got out, everyone seemed to pounce on it.  According to Sophie, X seems a little wary of the idea--we might just really be too different, it could go south, and he saw me and The Fourth together at my party back in February.  Oops?

 

But he flirted with me anyway and at one point told me that I was looking really good that night.  We challenged anyone who wanted to play against just the two of us in flip cup and beat a team of five twice--and then were beaten by a single opponent.  I hit a point where I couldn't drink anymore, so he took over against the other girl, but I had to kiss him on the cheek a few times--for luck, of course.  That girl, our friend Cesar's girlfriend (Cesar is the guy whose birthday party we met at), flat out told him that he should ask me out.  Our friends are not ones for subtlety.  Before I left, we had a long, drawn out hug.  He told me that I should come over and hang out sometime, and I responded that he should invite me.  Apparently they're used to just having people drop in, but I view an open invitation as no invitation, so I wouldn't just come over.  He said that I had his number so I should contact him sometime, but I said that he had mine, too, trying to make it clear to him that I'm not going to do all of the work.  He received that message and I think that he said that he'd talk to me soon or something.

 

Afterwards, I wondered if he was too drunk to remember any of that, but I didn't let it concern me, either.  If he never asked me out, we'd still be friends with no harm done.  At dinner that Tuesday night, I filled Marchella in on things, even though she had been there to witness most of it.  I also discovered that once upon a time she had told the guys that I would only date Catholics or super Catholics or something, which isn't true.  Sure, I'd love to marry a guy who already has the same faith as me, but it's not at the top of my list.  That weekend, X's roommate, Kal, came to Marchella's place to play video games with her boyfriend, Bob.  I was brought up, Marchella retracted her earlier statements about my supposed Catholic-only desires, and Kal apparently went and told X who texted me on Monday night.  He said that there were a lot of rumors going around and that he'd give me a call when he got back from a business trip and that we could sort some of them out.  When he told me that he'd heard that I was a socialist, I texted him back that Bob was a dirty liar and that I'm not a socialist at all--not even close.  That's when I figured that Bob/Kal/X had been gossiping, so I e-mailed Marchella and she filled me in on the above.  And that she'd suggested to Kal that X had maybe missed his shot with me.  I don't know why she said that.

Anyway, he called me on Friday night and asked what I was doing Monday night (tonight).  "Um...nothing," I said, unable to remember if I had anything scheduled.

 

"Wrong, you're coming with us to the Caps game," he said.

 

"Okay!" I agreed automatically.  As if I would turn down a sporting event.

 

He said that there was a lot of stuff going around about the two of us, but that, as he saw it, we're friends and maybe we should just hang out a little more often and kind of see what happens--and that we'd talk about all the rumors flying around.  I agreed.

 

So I got up at the buttcrack of dawn this morning to go to the gym before work just so that I can rush over to the Verizon Center as soon as I get off--and after I change clothes.  Since I need to park at Pentagon City Mall before I Metro over, I also might see if I can't buy a red t-shirt first.  Caps colors, of course.