Sticky Notes on Red Flags
And we are back y’all! It has been one heck of a vacation, that is for sure. I needed the time to go over some things in my life, do some self-reflecting and soul searching. And that kind of stuff is best done away from the public eye. I hope you do not misunderstand—I love sharing my stories, it is just that sometimes, a story can become overwhelming. For those stories, I need to sit with it and assess the situation. After taking time to reflect, I am now in a place where I feel good enough to share some of these stories.
Today’s pandemic potential began back in January of 2021. I had recently re-downloaded my typical dating apps (Coffee Meets Bagel, Hinge, and Dil Mil). I find it useful to take a break from these apps so the algorithm can reset itself. And, of course, I cannot overstate how beneficial it is for your mental health! This time around, I came across a few profiles that seemed to have a lot of potential. But today’s story is going to be about one that really caught me off guard, and not in a good way.
Like the beginning of most potentials, this started off new and exciting. Once we matched, we started talking almost immediately. One of the first things I appreciated about Grant was that he would respond to our conversations fairly quickly. That is not to say taking time to respond is a bad thing; I understand that life sometimes gets in the way. But there is no denying that excited feeling I get when I get a new message, and quick replies means more happy feelings.
We would talk daily, and pretty soon, our conversations fell into a regular beat. In the morning, he would be the one to send me good morning messages because he worked night shifts. Grant would still be on duty by the time I woke up. Around the time he clocked out of work, I would be clocking into my work. Throughout the day, we would send each other messages. Most of them were not anything serious, just the meaningless banter of young love. Was I in love with Grant? I do not know, but I knew I enjoyed his texts. He got me to loosen up, to be silly, to laugh at myself (more than I usually do).
Within a day, we exchanged numbers and switched platforms to continue our conversations. Were we moving too fast? Perhaps, but I was on a high from the attention. Within a week, Grant told me he loved me. I did not take it seriously, of course. I hoped he was not serious. How can you say that to someone you have known for less than a week? In hindsight, that was a huge ass red flag.
It was not that I was ignoring the red and yellow flags. I distinctly remember thinking how strange Grant was compared to the other people I had spoken to. But strange is not necessarily a bad thing; I like to think I am strange from time to time. So, I put a sticky note on this exchange and filed it away. I would come back to it if there were other unusual patterns.
Unsurprisingly, there were other flags and plenty of sticky notes as we continued talking. For instance, he wanted to schedule when we would text each other. We could only text from 9am to 5pm. I already know what you are thinking, how could you ignore that?! Listen, I am not that naïve, I know it sounded suspicious; but it was not completely unusual. The thing is, Grant works nights at his job (11pm to 7am). His excuse for not texting after 5pm was that it was his bedtime and he would be asleep.
As someone who used to work a late night/early morning shift, I empathize with strange sleep schedules. Back in those days, I would sleep from 4:30pm until 9:30pm. My shift started at 1am, a time when most normal people were asleep. I never had a problem with people messaging me while I was sleeping, in fact I would encourage it (it is nice to wake up to a text). Of course, I would let the person I was messaging know not to expect a response from me until later on in the night, after I had woken up. I also understood that not everyone was like me, there could be people who would rather not wake up to text messages. So when Grant asked me not to message him after 5pm, it was odd but understandable.
Now, most of you might think the timing was the red flag I chose to ignore, but it was actually something else. I brought it up to Grant that I did not mind messaging him at weird times. His response was to play it off as if he was doing this for my benefit. He wanted me to have quality time with my family. Umm, no. He does not get to decide how I allocate my time. We were nowhere near the stage where he needed to worry about what was good for me.
There were a few more things that I thought were strange, but I was not sure what to make of them just yet. Were these harmless quirks he had? Or would these turn into bigger problems down the line? The tricky thing about warning behaviors with new people is that I do not know how to evaluate them. Just because someone acts in a weird way does not mean their behavior is inherently bad. I will typically let a few of them build up (the behaviors that are “quirky”). But sometimes, you just have to trust your gut when something feels off.
I should listen to my gut more often. It has yet to lead me astray or get me into trouble. Quite the opposite, really. I tend to end up better than I was hoping when I follow my intuition. But it usually does not make me feel good. There is a lot of sadness and heartache when I really pay attention to what is going on. I guess it picks up on the things my mind and heart ignore. My intuition is the cold, heartless, bitch I need to keep myself safe.
Typically, if I get to the point where I am exchanging numbers with a potential, I will do a quick social media search. I will not expend a lot of energy on this since these guys do not last long. But usually, a quick search will provide me with some very useful information; specifically, mutual friends. The thing about the Malayalee community that is both a blessing and a curse is that we are all connected. If you do not know someone, chances are someone you know knows them. We are all just a few degrees separated from everyone. So, it was no surprise to me when I looked up Grant on social media that our mutual friends happen to be a couple of people from my old church and my cousin Rowan.
Under normal circumstances, I would not have reached out to mutual friends until I had a chance to form my own opinion of the guy. Just because they are friends on social media does not mean they are friends in real life, or can offer me any insight on my guy’s character. Besides, the person might behave one way with their friends and another way with their partners. I try to judge the other person’s behavior based on our interactions, not hearsay from other people.
As unusual as it was, something urged me to reach out and find more information about Grant. I guess my subconscious was seeing something my regular conscious was not. On Thursday, March 11th, I was messaging Rowan and I decided to ask him how well he knew Grant. Rowan replied, “I know him, but I don’t hang out with him.” Turns out, Grant was a friend of a friend. Even with that degree of separation, Rowan knew more than enough about Grant. I guess it is that Malayalee sixth sense to know just enough about everyone.
For one thing, Rowan provided some insight into the type of work that Grant does. Grant did not lie about his job, but he did avoid the specifics. Anytime I had asked him about how his shift was, he would provide vague responses. At the time, I chalked it up to the nature of Grant’s work—by its nature, it required a level of secrecy which I was not privy to. Also, why would he tell a random girl he met online the details of his work? So finding out that truth did not bother me.
What did bother me was the second thing my cousin told me, about how Grant’s wife is a nurse and studying for her practicing license here. Y’all, let me tell you, my blood ran cold and my heart ached with betrayal as I read and reread what Rowan had just told me. Never in my wildest imagination did I think Grant was married!
By the time I was messaging Rowan, Grant had already gone to sleep. He had a shift that night so we stopped messaging each other at 5pm. In a way, this was better because I did not have to pretend like everything was normal. I had some time to collect my thoughts and reevaluate everything that happened in the past two months. But in order to find out how this situation was handled and the fallout from it, you will have to wait until the next post. I am leaving y’all on a cliffhanger, until next time.
- Aemi
