The Yeast Infection Girl Who Kidnapped Me

Below is a story from my new book, MY LIFE AS A FREAK MAGNET, which I'll be signing from 1 to 3 p.m. tomorrow, aka Saturday, at Waldenbooks, SouthPark Mall, Moline, IL.

Hope you enjoy it, hope to see you at the signing, and hope you have a great weekend!

(The previous paragraph was brought to you by the word ....hope.'' Hope. It's not just for Barack Obama's campaign speeches anymore.)

As with all my stories, feel free to spam it out to your friends and share it with whoever you want. Just include my byline/copyright/etc. when you do.

And heeeeeeeeerrrrrreeeeesssssss......




THE YEAST INFECTION GIRL WHO KIDNAPPED ME

By Sean Leary

Ever notice those eHarmony commercials never feature anyone talking about their venereal diseases?

I guess they never got an application from Renee.

I met Renee (not her real name) in college. I was 21. When we were introduced by a mutual friend, we hit it off well. She seemed completely normal, stable, funny and cool. It's not like she was dressed head-to-toe vampire, or sporting several facial tics, or brandishing a swastika tattoo on her forehead. She looked like Elizabeth Shue in ....Cocktail.'' Girl next door type.

Little did I know her white picket fence cottage house was hiding a dungeon beneath it.

She offered to drive on our first date. Not typical for me, I'm used to driving, but it seemed like a refreshing change, so I went with it. When she picked me up, the first things she said to me when I got in the car were, ....You look great!'' and ....You know, you asking me out has made my entire year!''
Two huge compliments. Not bad. I'll take 'em. Things were going just fine with me up to that point.

....I want to take you to my favorite restaurant!'' she said, excitedly. In fact, pretty much everything she said during the first hour or so, she said with an incredible zeal.

Okay, sounds good.

So, we're driving and talking and driving and talking and I start to realize we're heading out of town. We're 20 minutes, half-hour out of town, and I ask, ....Where is this restaurant?''

....Oh, it's in Barrington.''

Barrington is over two hours away. It's in her hometown.

....Hmm. I hope it's a really good restaurant,'' I joke.

....Oh, it's awesome, and I really want you to like it!'' she says, in a way that made me think this was about more than me enjoying the appetizers. ....I really hope you do, because it's my favorite restaurant, and I want it to be yours too!''

....Well, it'll have a difficult time knocking off Burger King,'' I said, obviously joking.

Silence. Three, four, five seconds of silence. Accompanied by an oddly perturbed look on her face. And then...

she busted out laughing.

....Yeah, I think it'll be better than Burger King!'' she guffawed, awkwardly.

Okay, I'm fine with the adventure of going to a new place, and while it's more than a little unusual that she was taking me two hours out of the way to do it, that's cool, it's something different, and it'll give us time to talk. At that point I was just hoping that we would hit it off, and would have enough to talk about, otherwise the two hours would be deadly. But the delayed reaction on the joke, as well as the sort of vague anger about it, was starting to make me a little suspicious that the two hour drive – not to mention the two hour drive back, or the time spent there – could possibly become a bit strange.

The next thing she said, to break the uncomfortable silence, kinda confirmed my suspicions.

....Yeah, while we're there, I want you to meet my parents!'' she says.

Huh?

....Oh yeah, they'll love you!''

Hmm.

Then, silence, as though she realized she had just said something she probably shouldn't have, and changed the subject to working at the school newspaper. She was a fellow journalism student and she asked me what it was like to be an editor. Then we started talking about music. And movies. Pretty tame stuff.

Then, a few minutes later, she asks me to hand her her purse. I do. She shuffles through it, and, quite conspicuously, takes out her birth control pill and takes it right in front of me.

Then -- and this is the capper -- she says, ....Oh, I don't mean to be a tease. I mean, yeah, I'd love to have sex with you tonight, but I can't.''

And at that point, she LITERALLY starts scratching at her groin area.

....I've got this awful yeast infection!'' she says. ....And I'm sure you don't want to get that!''

She then laughs in a nervous, high pitched squeal and begins to talk, for a good 10-15 minutes, about her yeast infection. How it feels. How she hates yeast infections. How she gets them too often. Her theories on why she gets them. How she takes wears saran wrap bikinis filled with yogurt to try to get rid of them. And on. And on..

As I sit there, just sorta kicking back, taking it all in, wondering what's next.

Then she starts to tell me again how happy she is to be with me on this date.

....Yeah, I haven't really dated anyone since I broke up with my last boyfriend...''

Keep in mind this girl is a 19-year-old college student.

Her last boyfriend?

Her 42-year-old, MARRIED, band instructor.

The remainder of our trip to her hometown is spent with her dissecting that relationship. How it started. How it continued. Why she did it. How often they had sex. Where they had sex. Where they had to have sex because he was sneaking around and they were keeping it a secret. The time he gave her an STD and she found out he'd also been sleeping with third trombone or something, who had crabs. Good stuff.

Now, some of the time is also spent comparing me favorably to said band instructor. However, the bar is pretty low, so I don't feel all that accomplished to be stepping over it. Also, by this time, the ego stroking isn't even working. I'm just completely knocked aback by this girl's bizarre conversational choices and the way she expresses them.

We get to her hometown. Before going to the restaurant we stop at her house. Unbeknownst to her Mom and Dad, both of whom are dressed for bed. Dad in a sleeveless t-shirt and boxers, Mom in curlers and a housecoat. They're not particularly happy to see us, and her Mom tosses me a look that basically says, ....I'm so so sorry...''

Renee, on the other hand, is oblivious to this, giving me a tour of her home and showing me various pictures of her in various stages of growing up.

One such picture is of her around age 12 in a softball uniform.

....I think that was the summer I got my period,'' she says.

The More You Know...

We disengage from the parents house and go to her favorite restaurant, a Chinese place that wasn't half bad, but which was a rat hair from closing when she showed up. So the next hour is spent with the two of us – the only ones left in the place – eating as the employees vacuum and tidy around us trying to get her to take a hint.

Dinner conversation is about Renee's former relationships prior to the band instructor guy. The guy she lost her virginity to, who was also sleeping with her best friend. The guys who have cheated on her. The guy whose house she egged. The guy whose car she keyed. The guy who she intentionally gave an STD to again because he'd already given one to her, and how they both found it hilarious later on. Thank God for penicillin!

I think I get in a total of three or four minutes of convo.

And for any of you who know how chatty I am, you realize what an incredible aberration THAT is.

So, we wrap it up at the restaurant and start to head home. At this point, Renee thinks the date has gone fantastic. She's talking about our future together, and dropping hints about what we can do next, and talking about what we can do over the summer together, and how Barrington and my hometown of Joliet aren't really THAT far from each other (actually they're pretty far from one another), and by the time she gets around to talking again about her yeast infection I'm just trying to find my zen quiet place.

We pull into my driveway at the end of the night and she says, and I quote:

....Do you want me to come in? I mean, I know, I said we can't really have sex, but like, there are other things we can do.''

She looks in the driveway.

....Is that your car? If your roommates are up, we can go hang out in your car.''

At this point I wouldn't care if I'd just gotten back from a 10-year stint on a submarine with nothing but men. There's no way I'm encouraging Renee with any form of physical interaction. So, she goes in for a kiss and I shuffle over last minute and make it a hug.

Awkward.

....You don't want to kiss me?'' she says.

....Um, I think I'd like to take things slowly,'' I say. ....I get the feeling you're still kinda rebounding from your last boyfriend so maybe we should just be friends and see what happens.''

She starts to cry.

Just a reminder: This is a first date.

I'm horrible with the crying. I start to feel bad for people. As I've been told countless times, I'm too nice. I give her a hug. She pulls back, looks at me like she's going to go in for a kiss again, so I disengage and pull back since she's stopped crying.

....I'll give you a call!'' I say, getting out of the car.

....Okay,'' she says, I think, because I'm trying to get the hell out of there as quickly as possible.

I go inside, tell two of my roommates about the date. One of them says, ....Dude, she kidnapped you!''

....Hmm, I guess she did.''

....Did you notice any strange smells coming from the trunk?'' the other roommate adds. ....She might've had the body of the last guy she dated in there.''

Anyway, in the middle of me talking to my roommates, another roommate tells me I have a phone call.
It's Renee.

She blurts an apology for about 10 minutes. I accept the apology, but I don't agree to date her again.
That doesn't go over well, so she hungs up.

Nonetheless, for the next two weeks, she's relentless in trying to get me to go out with her again. I very politely continue to refuse. I'm busy. I think she's still hung up on the ex. I have to hop on a plane to Tibet to join the Peace Corps. Etc.

Then, for some reason, she suddenly changes tacks and starts telling people what a jerk I was. This goes on until she finds another guy. A fellow journalism student. Three weeks later, this guy comes to me and says, ....Uh, did Renee kinda stalk you or something? Because I can't get rid of her and I think she keyed my car.''

Suddenly I'm thankful I didn't make it to the third week. Apparently that's when she shifts into vandalism. I'm guessing week four or five involved the exchange of venereal diseases, if things got that far.

Shortly after that, the semester ended, Renee quit the newspaper and I never saw her again. Five years later I saw in our alumni newsletter that she had gotten married. Another five years later and she was a Mom of three. Maybe she settled down. Maybe her bizarre nature was just a phase for her, like ripped jeans or big hair. Or maybe she joined eHarmony and found that one special person whose turn-ons included talking about yeast infections.

I can just imagine the conversation.

....Yeah, I'm so glad eHarmony matched us up. I can't wait to take you to my favorite restaurant,'' she would say, starting to itch. ....Damn! I can't stand yeast infections!''

....Did you say yeast infections?'' he would ask, his eyes aglow, as he reached into his pocket to pull out a business card that said ....Roy Jones, Executive Vice President, Monistat Corporation...''



from the book MY LIFE AS A FREAK MAGNET by Sean Leary
copyright 2009 Sean Leary .. for more writing see www.seanleary.com