With things between me and Mr. Buff only seeming to go from strength to strength, there was no question about the fact that I was ready to get hurt again – yes, Michael Scott from the US Office is my dating hero.
Not only was he…well…buff but he was smart, funny, ambitious, patient and most importantly he was, for some reason, still interested in the Scottish ogre that was myself (I’m an OGRE!). All key ingredients that were required to peel away my hard green Scottish exterior.
You see, coming to Dubai, I had no expectations of finding anyone. It was a place, described by many, as being devoid of meaningful, loving relationships. A place where fuck boys and high maintenance woman ruled and going beyond three dates with someone was viewed as a cardinal sin. A place where princes saved princesses from towers one day, only to lock them back in the next.
Yet, this wasn’t the only reason as to why I had no expectations of finding anyone in Dubai. I didn’t want to find anyone. I had just came out of the worst relationship ever, a relationship that made even the one between Johnny Depp and Amber Heard look healthy, and I had no intention of getting into another.
Therefore, I was looking forward to the single mingle death to Cupid environment I was moving to – burn that bitch ass faeries bows!
However, somehow, one of Cupid’s bows had survived the flames of my anti-love campaign and had found its mark. And hanging on to the end of it, trying to pull it tenderly out my ass, was Princess Fiona – sorry, I mean Mr. Buff. An individual that Cupid knew I wouldn’t be able to resist.
While I couldn’t resist him physically, I found that with the more time we spent in each other’s company, I couldn’t resist him emotionally either. We both taught the same subject. We both played team sports. We both had similar ambitions. We both had a (serious) alcohol addiction and we both shared a similar vision for what we wanted from our futures.
Combine that with some of the amazing dates we had went on together, the late night phone calls that went on for hours and his constant reassurance when he was out socialising (something I had never experienced before), I found myself allowing the layers of my onion to be pulled back and suddenly I realised that I was in danger. Ralph from The Simpsons sat on the bus level danger.
The danger that I was in was that I was falling. Falling so fast that to suddenly hit the ground would be something I wouldn’t be able to survive; that I couldn’t survive. Therefore, did I let myself continue to fall and take the risk or did I pull open the parachute and pull myself back up to safety?
I guess the real question that needed to be answered was: was I ready to open up emotionally to someone again? To allow them to have that power over me? Did I even have the capability to lower my barriers and let someone in after everything I had been through?
Or do I just shut myself off? Save myself any potential future pain and go back to my hut in my swamp and enlarge my sign that said ‘NO TRESPASSING.’
It seemed like the easier option. Nobody to have to think about, nobody to have to worry, nobody to have to lose sleep over as visions of stunning girl after stunning girl attempted to seduce Mr. Buff at brunch. Nope. It would just be me and my boulder living our best lives.
But what sort of life was that? While I knew that me and the boulder would have a rocking time together, it would still be a hard life to lead (okay, I’m done with the boulder puns, I swear). And everyone deserves love, right? Queue man holding up a sign that says laugh.
Which was why, as we sat under the stars, sharing chocolate fondue with the beauty of the Burj Al Arab in the background, snuggled safely into one another as I told him about the famous Ogres in the night sky, there was no thinking needed.
It felt natural to take that next step. To only be seeing each other and nobody else. While it wasn’t boyfriend and girlfriend, it was still a massive step for me and all I was ready for in this moment in time. But, who knew how many more layers could be peeled back in the future.
