My Unexpected Valentine

Emily sat at her desk, a pile of papers spread out in front of her. She was going over the files of the case she had just lost. Trying to pinpoint where she went wrong. What she could have done better.

Hosea and Andrew, her partners at the firm, had both tried to act like it wasn’t that big of a deal. That she should just move onto the next. But she knew they were disappointed in her. Their firm gained clients through the success of its lawyers. This wasn’t only a blow to her, but to them, as well.

She felt like such a failure.

With a groan of frustration, she closed the folder and stood up from her desk. She opened a desk drawer, pulled out her purse and went for the door.

“I’m taking my lunch break,” she said to the secretary on her way out. She didn’t need to tell her to hold her calls. She wasn’t going to be receiving any calls today anyway.

She got in her car and drove to a local sandwich shop. As she was sitting down to eat, she pulled her out phone.

Did you sign up for the app yet?

Emily stared at her sister’s text. She had received it last night, but purposely ignored it. She still hadn’t decided if she wanted to do it or not. A part of her wanted to. For Talia. At least that’s what she was telling herself. Maybe deep down, she did want to try it for herself too. She could really use something to take her mind off losing the case.

At the same time, did she really want to put herself out there like that? The app didn’t connect you to people the same way most dating apps did. It created a blind date. She didn’t get to see what the person looked like until she actually went to meet him. What if it paired her up with a guy that looked like a toad or something? If that happened, she knew exactly what she’d do. Turn around, leave and never look back.

She took a bite of her sandwich, as she poked around on her phone to find and download the app. She guessed the least she could do for Talia was check it out.

The bright pink app nearly blinded her as it appeared on the screen. Okay, it wasn’t really that bright, she just wasn’t a fan of all the pink. She crinkled her nose in disgust.

She continued to eat her food as she went through with signing up. She put in all the general details, but then the app started to ask for more personal things.

Why does the app need to know how many times I’ve had sex? she couldn’t help but text her sister.

You signed up?!?!

Yeah. But I dunno about this questionnaire. It’s too personal.

It’s completely confidential. No one is going to know your answers. Not even your perfect match.

But what does it matter how many times I’ve had sex??

Trust me, every question in that questionnaire matters. And you HAVE to be truthful too.

Emily let out a sigh, and switched her phone back over to the app. For the sex question, there were four options. Three of them were approximate ranges. 1-10, 11-20, 21-50. The last option was labeled ‘I don’t keep track’.

Emily stared at the last option, feeling very tempted to pick it. The truth was, she did keep track. She knew the exact number of times she had had sex, and it wasn’t a big number.

She closed the app, and finished up her lunch, before heading back to the office. She busied herself with paperwork and legal documents. She didn’t think about the app again until she went home to her apartment.

She greeted Leo, her tortoise, and let him out of his pen. He was a Greek Tortoise. A gift for her 28th birthday from Talia. Something to keep her company.

He was a tiny baby when she first got him, but he had grown a lot since then. Thankfully, he wasn’t one of those huge tortoises. And he was much lower maintenance than something like a dog.

He served his purpose well. He may be just a tortoise but he did keep her company. It was nice having someone to come home to.

It was that thought that led her back to the app. As she got settled onto her couch, a blanket wrapped around her, she reopened the questionnaire.

Would it really hurt to try it out and see what happened? She didn’t honestly think an app could find her perfect match. Not with the crazy questions that it asked. And the toad man was a big risk. A huge risk.

But she had to admit, she was kind of curious to see who it paired her up with…

It took her about ten minutes to answer all the questions. When she got to the end of the questionnaire, she hesitated to hit the submit button. Her finger hovered over the screen as she glanced at Leo who was casually walking across the floor.

“If this sets me up with a toad man, I’m gonna hurt Talia,” she said to her tortoise friend. Leo didn’t respond. He never did. With that, she hit the button.

She put her phone away and picked up her latest book. She was done with the app for the night.

The next morning, the alarm on her phone woke her. When she went to shut it off, she saw she had a notification from Cupid’s Arrow. Your perfect match has been found!

With messy bed head, she sat up in bed, grabbed her glasses from the nightstand and opened the app. There were instructions on it. The blind date was set up for this evening, and both parties needed to confirm if that would be a good time for them.

This was it. Was she really going to do this? Was she really going to go on a blind date with her so called perfect match?

It found a match, she texted her sister.

It was an hour later before Talia replied. OMG When are you going on the date????

I haven’t confirmed.

Em, what are you waiting for?!?

From her desk, Emily looked at the app, debating. This evening would work. But what would she wear? She obviously wanted to look nice. She only had a handful of dresses and all of them looked professional. Not something she should wear on a date.

I don’t have anything to wear.

You can borrow something of mine.

That brought a scoff out of Emily. She couldn’t imagine wearing anything from Talia’s wardrobe. The bright colors would be nauseating.

I’ll figure something out.

Does that mean you’re going to do it?

I guess…

With that text, she finally hit the submit button. It was confirmed. She was going on a blind date with her perfect match.