He Stood Me Up in the Most Elaborate Way Ever

There I was in my car at the airport, or more precisely, the cell phone lot, when it hit me. He hadn't come. He wasn't coming. He was never coming. I had put all this trust into him. I had told my family and friends and coworkers about this marvelous guy from Sydney for whom I was head over heels. Yes, Sydney, Australia. And I had told all of them about how he was flying for 14 hours to spend the week with me. I told them about how we made plans for next month to tour around Scotland and London. I told them how we were thinking about additional trips in New Zealand, Hawaii and Tasmania, and basically planning the next 10 years' worth of potential vacations to catch worldwide events like solar eclipses and the Olympics and the World Cup, and how he may join me in LA later this year for the Air Show. I had left work early to come to the airport because his flight was scheduled to land at 3:30. It was now 4:30 and I hadn't heard from him yet. I had taken several days off work for him. And he stood me up. The plane he was supposedly on had landed and the minutes were ticking by with no contact from him. Of course I haven't heard from him! He wasn't coming. It was 1:30 am in Sydney, he was asleep, that was why he wasn't online. I can't believe I was such an idiot and fell for this! I really thought I could trust him.

To save as much face as I could, I hurriedly went through my facebook feed and made every post about him private so that nobody else could see the posts anymore. My Mom had already seen and commented on my post about how excited I was to pick him up from the airport today, but not too many others had seen it. I hid them all, going back weeks, months. All this time spent talking with him, the video chats. We had even gone on two dates while he was here in the Dallas area for the solar eclipse. But of course those were convenient for him since he was already here. He wouldn't fly out just to see me. I'm such an idiot.

And what I didn't tell people… I paid for his ticket. Not only did I pay for it, I gave him my credit card number over the phone. I hadn't seen a receipt for the plane tickets, just a screenshot of the flights before he purchased them to validate the dates and times were good. My original plan had been to make him pay for the tickets and I'd reimburse him when I picked him up, just to make sure he'd really be here. But he always makes me feel silly when I don't trust him. Like, of course, he wouldn't steal my credit card information, or buy a different ticket. Still, I knew the risk when I offered to pay for the trip and when I didn't insist on him fronting the money. And truly, it wasn't the money that hurt the most. $2500 is a lot but I can make or lose that in the stock market or in a real estate negotiation easily. What hurt was the self-imposed embarrassment. The fact that I'd have to admit to everyone that I'd been had. I really believe him…

And he was good. He had taken a picture of the flight at the airport. I have no idea how long he'd been planning this charade, maybe he took it when he returned to Sydney after the eclipse, or maybe he really did take it 14+ hours ago when he went to the airport to use my kindness to travel somewhere else. And when did the airplane selfie get taken? Was that really 14 hours ago? Or was that from weeks ago? It's impossible to tell. One thing's for sure, he had me going, didn't he? The build up, with a countdown in our messages and chats, and the perfectly timed updates and pictures. All of that had me believing he was really coming.

But here I sit at the airport, waiting. Waiting for what? How long do I wait? Surely, he would have messaged me by now. Maybe his phone died… in that case I should probably do a drive by at the terminal just in case he is there waiting for me. Would he be that irresponsible, though, to let his phone die? Seemed unlikely. The only possible explanation was that he hadn't really come at all. No point in checking the terminal, he's not there.

…and then my phone blinged. He wasn't at the curb of the terminal. He was in customs, and it had taken that long for him to get Wifi. Of course… he didn't have cell service here in the US - the only way we could communicate was via WhatsApp (or the dating app we had initially met on - Hinge). I huge wave of relief coursed through my body, although I was still so shaken I didn't fully let my guard down. I did burn some time (now that I knew customs was going to take a while) going back through my facebook feed and making the posts about him visible to friends again. But it wasn't until another hour later, when I had picked up dinner for us and he finally made it through customs and gotten his bag, and I spotted him on the curb, that I let the last shred of doubt leave. He hadn't stood me up after all! Seeing is believing - never again would I not trust him.