Cue Ball

I met a man while leaving my work holiday party one year who asked for my number almost immediately. We worked for the same company at the time, but not directly together. Despite being 14 years older than me, and much further along his career path than I, he seemed interested, so I gave him my number. From a conference room the next morning, he called me to say how lovely it was to meet me, and asked if I could join him for drinks at a local champagne bar the following week. One of my coworkers saw the two of us chatting before I left the party, and spent that morning trying to dig details about "Cue Ball," as he affectionately nicknamed him, out of me. Leaving the desk to take a call piqued his curiosity, so when I returned, my coworker excitedly inquired, "Was that Cue Ball?!?!"

When Cue Ball and I met the following week, our conversation flowed right along with the champagne, and he suggested continuing it over dinner at the London. Upon sitting down for dinner, he handed me the wine list, suggesting that I order the wine. Big mistake. With my borderline professional boxed-wine drinking skills, and I did not qualify to select the wine for dinner at such a lovely restaurant. Knowing I liked sweet wines, I ordered a $100 bottle of Riesling. Typically, such an overpriced bottle wouldn't earn a second glance (I'm 97% sure that it should be illegal to charge that much for Riesling), but I ordered it anyway. I saw an opportunity, and took it. The wine couldn't hold a candle to the meal we had, but was consumed just as quickly. Afterward, he walked me toward my train station. He gave me a quick peck on the lips before I descended the stairs to the subway, and made his way to West Chester via Grand Central.

Later that night, his texts detailed how much he enjoyed spending the evening with me, and that he was looking forward to seeing me again. This conversations continued via IM the next day, then carried on for several weeks afterward. While he wanted to see me again, he was traveling for business almost every week, and we never made solid plans for round two.

A couple of weekends later, I was out for drinks with my sister and her co-workers on a Saturday for some day drinking. I started chatting with one of her co-worker's wives about work, and I mentioned the name of my company. This woman was familiar with the company I worked for, and knew a few people there.

Colleen: Oh, do you know [Cue Ball]??
Me: I actually do. We don't work directly together, but I know him
Colleen: Well you have to tell him that Colleen said hello, and that we absolutely MUST get together soon to celebrate [his wife]'s birthday. I know they've been busy with the new baby, but we should be able to find a night some time soon to get out! His wife is a real ball buster, ya know? Really great at what she does.

I was in shock. I was absolutely disgusted that I unknowingly went to dinner with a man that was not only married, but recently had a SECOND baby. Colleen and I continued chatting, but I couldn't bring myself to go into any further detail about Cue Ball nor address him at all. The culmination of disgust, embarrassment, and regret rendered me speechless.

Cue Ball continued to reach out to me, but I stopped responding. At the time, I did not call him out on his behavior, and just let him fade away. Years later, I ran into him while out with coworkers. He approached me immediately, flooding me with compliments about how fabulously the yoga was treating me, and informing the group that we had gone for a lovely dinner once. Finally, I was able to acknowledge his lies face-to-face: "Yes, it was a lovely dinner, but you neglected to inform me of your wife, child, and newborn baby who were awaiting your return home." He seemed shocked that I called him out (or even knew now of these facts), and somewhat attempted to apologize while offering to buy me another drink. I ignored him for the rest of the night, and he eventually left. I am certain I was neither the first nor the last girl that he was attempting to woo while wed. I do have faith that Karma and the universe will sort Cue Ball out in some way or another eventually, if they haven't already.