LABELED: The Pizza Box by Nate Fredrick
In my years of dating, I had never had a truly horrible experience in which I was mistreated, lied to, disrespected, etc. I've only dated three guys my entire 28 years of life, and while they didn't work out, there are no hard feelings. Throw that all away when I met “Pizza Box.” In just two months of dating, I now have enough horrible experiences to make up for all the years I've avoided them. Let's begin with the first red flag.
The Pizza Box Incident:
Two weeks into us dating, he invited me to his apartment. To say it was messy and dirty would be an understatement. We went to his room and it was messy, but nothing bad at first glance; so off to the bed and fooling around we went. After we had some fun, I leaned over to the edge of the bed and out of the corner of my eye I saw an empty pizza box underneath his bed. For the life of me, I could not comprehend why he would have this hidden under his bed. So I asked, "Are you using this pizza box for storage, like a hipster thing?" He looked me in the eye and said he'd been too lazy to throw it out. I asked how long it had been there and he said two weeks. For some reason unknown to me, I chose to ignore this filthy sign.
Work of Lies:
PB, as I've now come to call him, graduated from nursing school in June, and we started seeing each other in mid-September. While "looking" for a job, he was bartending at a hotel. I usually choose not to date somebody in nightlife, but I was willing to overlook this as well. The hotel he claimed to work at is well-respected, and since it was for events, I thought at least it wasn't a dive. I came to find out a month later, that he only worked at the hotel a couple of times a month. It turned out he actually worked at a BDSM Leather Bar. A super-trashy dive on top of a dive leather bar! He told me that he "swore" he mentioned this to me and apologized. I still liked him so much, I felt bad for him, and didn't want to be "that judgmental person," so I let it go. Plus, I was confident that he would get a nursing job soon.
When I date somebody, I put my heart into it all. So I started getting on the phone and trying to find out if anybody I know had an available nursing position. It turned out I have a friend who works in nursing that said they could speak to their HR person, which was great news! The only thing he needed to do was actually apply for the job. I found out a week later that his application hadn't even been turned in. I now looked stupid to my friend, who then looked stupid to the HR person; and now I truly was questioning the validity of all of his statements of “I apply to places all the time.”
The Birthday Incident:
As all my friends know that I loathe reality television with a passion. However, Patti Stanger from The Millionaire Matchmaker has some of the best advice one could ever give: “NO SEX BEFORE MONOGAMY." These are words I take to heart. Once guys get what they want, they are out of your life like a bat out of hell. Never in my life had I thanked Patti Stanger more for those wonderful words of wisdom and my own strength to reject his failed sex attempts than the night of the infamous “Birthday Incident of 2013."
Birthdays are usually a cause of fun and celebration. So, while I was hanging out with some friends at my party an acquaintance I see a few times a year started talking to PB. She asked him how long he and I had been dating; his wonderfully classy response was, “Oh, we’re not dating, we're just fucking.” On top of being super hurtful on my birthday, we NEVER HAD SEX!
Without knowing about the birthday incident yet, we broke things off the following week. I then found out about what he said, through my ex-boyfriend of all people, who is best friends with that acquaintance from my birthday. As I ran to the bathroom to avoid crying in front of my ex-boyfriend, I thought to myself, “Wow, you've sure gone way downhill from him!”
Ladies & Gents, the lesson here is: never trust a guy who has a pizza box underneath his bed. Nothing good can or ever will come from it!
