L.A. Affairs: I was absolutely attracted to him. Then he body-shamed me
(Liam Eisenberg / For The Times)
The night I met Buff Ben, I was coming from a Hinge date. The night had started auspiciously. My date was a fellow screenwriter who had worn a Hawaiian shirt, smiled and asked a few good questions. Then he had dropped the act of polite curiosity and begun reciting his accomplishments aloud. Not wanting to betray oncoming tears of self-pity and envy (unlike him, I had not a credit to my name), I stared at the booth divider until the check came. Then I ordered a ride to Shatto 39 Lanes in Koreatown.
A hand placed a pair of bowling shoes into mine, and I looked up to see my kickball teammate, Ben. Exactly 10 years older than I, Ben had distant hazel eyes, an avuncular face and bulging biceps that sent a jolt of simultaneous familiarity and excitement through me — it was as if I had hit my funny bone hard against a table.
We flirted the rest of the night. I swooned when he leaned into me, snapping a greasy fry into my mouth. “I’m a salt queen,” he whispered.
I was thankful for romantic love, but mentorship and friendship were huge loves too. I found a mentor in L.A. Unfortunately our relationship changed.
As the night went on, he pouted adorably every time he didn’t get a strike. Eventually he ended up winning the game.
Sure of reciprocation, I asked him to dinner the next night. He agreed but had one caveat. “Do you mean it as a date?” he texted. “If so, I’m too old for you. I’ll tell you my right-wing opinions so you get over me quicker.” Caught in the vertiginous thrill of three dots bouncing in response, I ignored the red flag. We met the following night at a Chinese restaurant in Silver Lake.
Across bowls of rice and steamed greens, I studied his face, which had struck me as alluring and playful the night before. Long eyelashes lent his eyes a feminine sparkle, a counterpoint to his manly chin. I compared it to my own visual lexicon of roundness: cleft chin, tight curls, bumpy nose. We both looked Jewish, I thought, but in different and perhaps opposing ways: Heat Miser vs. Snow Miser, hot vs. cold, curly vs. straight. (He’s Jewish on both sides, and I’m half-Jewish.) He also was tall and imposing, and I was short and amusing.
At a lull in the conversation, Ben asked where I went to college.
I was ready to date again but I really wasn’t sold on a guy I met on Bumble. Then after we made out, I noticed he was texting another woman.
“Princeton,” I answered. “What about you?”
“Harvard,” Ben said.
“Did you like it?” I asked.
“No, I hated it!” Ben smiled ruefully as he recounted his loneliness there: the time he had crushed openly on a fellow actor in a play before turning bitter when his advances were spurned. Also, there was that time he answered a Craigslist ad to lick an elderly man’s feet for cash.
He briefly caught me up on his life thus far. He had tried to make it as a screenwriter and teamed up with a famous actor, and, filled with pride, refused an early opportunity. He flashed a bitter grin. “I realized unless you have some hidden diversity or a parent in the industry, you’ll never make it.” He had pivoted to journalism and garnered a blue check on Instagram for his original column in an L.A. publication.
Although I’d been in Los Angeles only a month, this wasn’t my first rodeo for such displays. Nearly every date I had been on had involved some version of the “I was once you, kiddo” speech. In contrast to their usual effect, Ben’s made me want him even more. I shared my stories of loneliness at Princeton, hoping their relation to his stories would make Ben feel less alone. “I’m on your side,” I wanted to shout. “Together, we could support each other’s dreams, hopes, selves.”
He smiled and asked to know more about me, as I had done for him. I felt elated, carried away on the current of refuge in another.
I found out that my ex was putting on a show in which she’d talk about her romantic history. I was nervous about it and reached out to her.
We got the check and walked to our cars in silence under a surprising canopy of stars. I leaned in to kiss him. He recoiled. My stomach dropped.
“I’m sorry. I don’t date guys … who look like you,” he stammered, in a bashfully amused sing-song, as if I had asked him to autograph my underwear.
“What do you mean?”
He chuckled. “I only date fit guys,” he said, as though this were so obvious it didn’t merit explanation.
I scanned his prominent pecs and tense arms. I asked him how he got so fit. He recited his workout regimen to me.
I typed his words furiously into my notes app. Then he put his hands on my stomach. “You have a good base,” he said. “I looked like you once. Then I started working out.”
“What did that get you?” I asked, hoping impossibly that we could reverse time to the part before he had body-shamed me.
“Well, a certain caliber of guy started noticing me,” he said in an authoritative tone.
I really wasn’t attracted to the photographer’s curly hair or intense eyes. I was used to dating really handsome men.
We walked to his car. Clearly the night was over. “And I almost got a boyfriend out of it,” he said before shutting his car door. “Bye. I had a good time.”
And this was another way we were similar, I thought as he drove away. Here were two lonely intellectuals, two once-precocious children who were addicted to the feeling of “almost.” I changed Ben’s contact in my phone to “Buff Ben.” He had almost achieved a romantic rejection of me without profoundly hurting my feelings. I had almost gone on an incredible date with someone I actually liked.
The author is a screenwriter of teen dance dramas. He lives with his seven housemates and a very cute cat in Los Angeles. He’s on Instagram: @keiserwilhelm
L.A. Affairs chronicles the search for romantic love in all its glorious expressions in the L.A. area, and we want to hear your true story. We pay $400 for a published essay. Email LAAffairs@latimes.com. You can find submission guidelines here. You can find past columns here.
It's a date
Get our L.A. Goes Out newsletter, with the week's best events, to help you explore and experience our city.
You may occasionally receive promotional content from the Los Angeles Times.
