I knew I would eventually write about this Asian dentist, but I thought it would be in the post about how I realised that thankfully I wasn’t that racist because I finally started dating Asian men. Instead, the Asian dentist will feature in this classic story about how men are really fucking annoying.

There’s a much longer story here that I accidentally started to tell but I’ve deleted that and will save it for later. Instead let me give you the highlights of our very brief “fling”:

1. I slept with him on the first date and he texted me back the next day telling me he had a good time and he wanted to see me again.
2. I told him I don’t do pen-palling* and if he wanted to meet again, we should just do it. He insisted we would meet again and carried on texting me so I carried on texting him back.
3. We met for a second “date” which was essentially a booty call at his house late on a weeknight. I paid shitloads for an Uber there and back – he lived in the middle of fucking no where. I insisted on not staying over.

He was too hungover to meet up somewhere for date three so I had to spend more of that Uber dolla to see him. Going over to a guy’s house goes against every fibre of my being because I HATE wasting my time investing in people who don’t return the effort. I was willing to do it though because I felt like it was “going somewhere”. Even in retrospect, I still don’t think I misread any of those signals.

Date was nice, we went to the park first and joked about what our next date could be, and then had super hot sex on his sofa. Then he suggested we go Netflix for a bit. During this time, he fed me (his leftover Deliveroo food though) and let me stay for two whole episodes of Queer Eye, which we started watching at my suggestion.

However, I could sense that he was being a bit off with me because I was trying to make subtle moves on the sofa but he just didn’t go for it. He also snapped at me at one point when I mentioned something about not being into whole “religion” thing: “people don’t understand you can still be spiritual if you’re Hindu.” Okay mate, it’s not that deep.

I went in for the kiss for our goodbye, and he said he did too, but our heads just bumped together awkwardly. This was not a good sign. I tell him that I enjoy hanging out with him and he should get in touch if he wants to do it again. He says that he was going to be “busy” for the next few days. Also not a good sign.

No messages from him for a week after. So I send him one asking how he’s been, but no answer. Really annoying. He made me lower my guard with his stupid texting and complements and conversations – after I had told him I’m not into much beyond hooking up – and then he fucking ghosts me.

Okay fine. I get over it because I’ve got shit to do with my life. However, I was still disappointed because I built up an imaginary version of the perfect Indian boyfriend in my head, and I thought he was it. But whatever. No point trying to read his mind and figure out why he was giving me the cold shoulder. It could have been because of something I did, or something he did, but either way there was no point dwelling on it because I’d never know. I deleted his number and messages so I wouldn’t be tempted to ever drunk text him. All this happened in early May.

Then last week on a Wednesday afternoon, I get two messages.

“Hey! It’s been a while! How are you?”

“How is your summer going?”

Me:

So naturally, I screenshotted the message and sent it to all my friends so I could decide what my emotions were. And like all other problems in my life, I also asked Google. I toyed with the idea of being blunt and responding “Hi. This is weird, the last time I saw you, it seemed you weren’t into me” but my friend said it came across as ‘a bit scary’. So I just opened the message so he’d see I’d “seen” and then I deleted it (from my Archives folder as well). Petty? Probs. But I realised I was over the initial rejection and didn’t really care much for an explanation. What actually pissed me off was the audacity to get back in touch.

I feel like this is just classic behaviour that results from male entitlement. Nah, Asian dentist, you don’t get to infect my brain with a reminder of your existence three months after you decided I wasn’t worth your time, just because you’re now bored or realise there are no other better options out there. Also – for fuck’s sake, I’m trying to find reasons to not hate Asian men. Why must men like you and Aziz let me down?

Dear all the men out there who think this shit is acceptable: it’s not. Ghost if you want, I do it too in certain situations, but deal with your decision and stop assuming you’re important enough to be allowed to get back in touch.

To all the ladies this shit happens to: block and delete. Boy is not worth your time.

* pen-palling – the act of being stuck in an endless (and often pointless) text conversation with a potential date/previous date that never leads to actually meeting up.