Mr. Lying-Sack-of-Shit

He said he was part owner in the new trendy restaurant that had opened downtown.

He was not.

He said he had connections to art galleries and could get a painter friend of mine in. (No, not that painter.)

He did not.

He said he said he was a gold medal winner in an obscure sport.

He was not.

I really should have run away from this guy like my hair was on fire before the first "hello".

I did not.

He said he lived in a cute little cottage behind a cool, old house owned by a famous artist.

He did not.

He said he had friends in Tuscany who owned a villa that they were turning into a bed and breakfast place…

...he did not…

...and that he was going to go work for them.

Uh, no. He did not.

He said he his decision to get rid of his car and use a bicycle to speed around town had been the result of an accident in which his car had been totaled. "It was unintentional but I ended up liking getting around on two wheels," he said with a smile.

Errr...it wasn’t exactly like that.

In fact, he couldn’t even think about leaving the country to go work with his non-existent friends in Tuscany because he didn’t have a fucking passport! That little accident that had left him carless? He racked up a felony charge for drunk driving with that crash. Uhhhhh, small detail left out of that account.

Although Mr. Lying-Sack-of-Shit should have been behind bars, the only bar he was behind was the trendy one he claimed to own lied about owning. Great employment for an alcoholic whose terms of probation included regular AA meetings, right?

The art gallery connections? Zip. Nada. Zilch. Rien.

That gold medal? Nope, he was just so tall that everyone believed him when he claimed to be a star in his sport, but nope. No medals to his name. Not a one.

Yes, dear readers, I did time with a criminal. (Not much time, mind you, but looking back, responding to that first "hello" was too much time!) This criminal-with-a-very-small-carbon-footprint really enjoyed riding in my Mercedes and being dropped off at the end of an evening. (I was going slowly on this one. And I thought I was being "green" before "green" was cool.)

Because I had started to wise up, I invited him to hang out with my group of closest friends as a “road test”…so to speak. Their verdict when the evening was over?

“He’s a great guy, Gabby!”

“It’s nice to see you with someone who’s into you!”

And this one, “He’s really easy to be with. I enjoyed meeting him.”

Such is the case with sociopaths.

With a thumbs up from my peeps – because I really wasn’t trusting myself at that point – I took the next step. But as I spent a bit more time with Mr. LSoS, I began to notice some irregularities. For instance, he lied about little things. Stuff I knew because the evidence was right there or I had witnessed the act moments before and he lied about it. When I questioned him on the observations and pointed out that he seemed to have a tough time taking responsibility for the smallest things, he got defensive. Of course.

I backed up.

We were only dating so there were no agreements or discussions of any exclusivity at this point and there hadn't even been enough of an investment for any patterns to have developed - like an expectation that we would spend weekends together. Backing up was easy. And as I did, I discretely checked out his claims and simultaneously poured myself into work tasks. My work schedule made the retreat quite easy. My research made the decision clear:

This guy needed to be dumped.

We met for coffee and had an adult conversation about the whole thing. What a relief. In fact, I was so relieved that he was really cool about this ending, that when he asked me if I would mind driving him home, I figured What's one last time for Mother Earth? and and we climbed in the car.

During the 9-minute ride to his house - an austere prison cell of a studio behind the dilapidated cow of a house owned not by a famous artist but by a non-famous lesbian who happened to resemble Annie Leibovitz - he started getting lippy with me about my decision to stop seeing him “without really giving us a chance.”

“This is not up for discussion,” I said and I navigated an abrupt right turn and whipped into the next possible place to stop - which happened to be the parking lot of an abandoned restaurant a good distance from his house.

"It's over!" I said, "Get out."

He hesitated.

"Now!” I snapped.

He was still yelling at me as I drove away. I never looked back.

I also never saw him again. Well...except for that one time...at a bit of a distance...in my neighborhood...40 miles away from his. Does the stalker energy really surprise you? It didn’t surprise me in the least. And I was fully prepared to blow his parole if he fucked with me.

This ripped it for me. I was done. I would take my search off-shore. Or maybe I'd just stop searching. At that point, I was ready to go into a full-stop mode.

I left the country shortly after this experience. I had simply given up hope of finding a suitable partner in the fetid pool of available single men in my region of the US. This felon was the line in the sand for me.

“I wonder what men are like in the Old World?” I mused as I packed my bags.

Next.

photo courtesy of CreativeCommons ©Randy Son Of Robert