Every party has a pooper, and for my blog, that party pooper was the subject of this story. I’m going to call him Bruce. I did reach out to Bruce to ask him if he was okay with me sharing this story, and he said he would prefer that I not, but considering that nothing really happened, and I’m already being nice by changing names and leaving out most identifying features, and I could easily just be super vague about who he is (he needs to realize that he’s not THAT famous), I wanted to write it anyway. So with the encouragement of my friends and family who are much more fun than Bruce, I decided to go for it – I mean, you know what they say – ask for forgiveness, not permission, right? So, here we are. Ready? Me too.
Given that Bruce is a “private” person, and I’m a nice person (mostly), I do have to be awfully vague, for which I apologize for in advance. But, I will do my best to keep this as entertaining as possible despite the fact that I can’t tell you too much information about Bruce. I’m up for the challenge!
For the sake of the story, let’s just say that Bruce is a guitarist in a very, very small band – like, two people – that comes from the land down under (sorry for getting that song stuck in your head). My parents have season tickets for the local performing arts hall near them in Sarasota, so they had tickets to see their show when they were on tour in the USA. I was at my parents’ home during that time as I was in between jobs and wanted some Florida sunshine. A day or two before the show, my dad realized that based off of the marketing of the show, and their band name, he didn’t think he would enjoy it as much as the female-crowd, so he told me I could take his ticket and go with my mom. So, I decided to go.
My mom figured that this “band” might call people up and have some audience participation moments, as their type of performance typically involves them, so she told me to dress nicely because of course I’d get called up. Low and behold, for their first audience participation moment, when they announced that they needed a “beautiful, sexy lady” to come up and join them, guess who Bruce’s bandmate made a beeline for? Me. So, I ended up onstage with his friend, Nick, to help him out with one of the songs.
I helped him out, was given a little memento as a thank you, went back to my seat, and enjoyed the rest of the show. Afterwards, I snapped a picture of my little memento and tagged the band, thanking them for a great night, and thought nothing else would happen. But I was incorrect.
As I was lying in bed, I decided to take one more look at my Instagram before going to sleep and I saw that I had a new message. I was very surprised when I realized that it was Bruce. He told me that, “He heard I completely stole the show.” I responded that I hadn’t heard that, but I’d take his word for it. And then we began talking. Apparently, it was more the side view of my butt that stole the show (let’s be real, we all know it’s pretty great) and he couldn’t help but check it out from the wings of the stage. So, we talked, we flirted. He shared a revealing picture, I shared a much less revealing picture. I could tell what we both wanted the conversation to lead to, and clearly, I’m always game for a good story, so I kept egging him on a bit until he started saying things about being lonely in bed, yada yada.
I’m not an idiot – I know that he’s like, not even D-List famous even in his home country, but because he’s a very attractive performer with an accent he could and probably does have a little bit of fun in every city. But I was willing to be part of his American tales for the sake of getting some tales of my own. He told me what hotel he was staying at, but then I got nervous. I wanted to go, but didn’t want to wake up my dogs, who would wake up my parents, and while I do sometimes feel like I missed out on the “sneaking out of the house” phase of my teens by going to boarding school, I don’t feel the need to live these moments as a 28-year old woman. To be totally honest, I also didn’t want to have to put makeup and real pants back on, either. Instead, I told him I was going to sleep but to message me in the morning and I’d come over before he left.
And that he did. He told me we wouldn’t have much time, but at least something, but only if I wanted to. I told my family that he had invited me out for coffee, hopped in my car, and drove to his hotel. I got there only for him to tell me that I had *just* missed them, they ended up leaving to go to the next city earlier than expected, and he was sorry and disappointed but we wouldn’t get to hang out. He also couldn’t believe that I actually drove over there – clearly, he doesn’t know me well.
But, since we couldn’t hang out, I told him that actually, I lived in Boston, and I knew from looking at their tour page that they’d be up that way in a few weeks, so he could make it up to me then. He agreed, saying he’d take me out for a drink and we would hang out then.
Totally an aside, but I find it hilarious that I told my family he had invited me out for an innocent cup of coffee and they went with it for my sake. To be fair, I think my brother (who found out about it last, because it’s my brother) was suspicious but didn’t want to know the truth because I’m his baby sister, my sister-in-law DEFINITELY did not buy it and I confirmed her thoughts that coffee was not on either of our minds later, and my mom is my mom – she knows when I’m lying (and not just because my right eye twitches when I lie – true story) so I’m about 99.9% sure that she knew I went over there for another type of pick-me-up, but again, didn’t want to push it because I’m an adult and I’m her child and there are some things you just do not want to know.
At this point, Nick (the bandmate I helped with the performance) and I had also exchanged some DMs, and he promised me that if I bought tickets to see their show in the Boston area, he’d upgrade me to VIP. I wasn’t sure if he’d remember, but figured I enjoyed the show, and the one in Boston was around my friend’s birthday, so I’d get some tickets for us as a present to her and see what happened as it got closer.
Well, Bruce got weird. He was following me on Instagram for a while and liking my pictures – even ones from a long time ago, so you KNOW he was trying to get in my pants – and then one day he was not. I tried to have a few conversations with him while he was traveling, nothing crazy but just recommending places for him to check out while he was in different cities, small talk kind of things late at night, and he got less and less responsive over time. I don’t know if he was getting nervous about meeting, if I was being too forward (very possible), if he had just changed his mind, or if something weirder was going on, but I could tell that that meant we were not going to hang out like he promised.
But I am very petty, so I messaged Nick again a few days before the show to ask if the offer for VIP still stood, and he said yes. With that, I made sure to pick out a very nice outfit to wear. My friend I had invited, Celia, and I met up and went to the theatre where we got our VIP bands. After getting settled into our seats, I decided to mess with Bruce a bit by snapping a photo of the stage and messaging it to him – amazingly, he responded. I told him I’d see him after the show (which would technically be our first time meeting) and he went quiet again.
We had a great time at the show and then went up for the Meet and Greet. When Bruce saw me, I could tell he was nervous. He started holding his guitar defensively in front of him, and I made a sassy comment about it not covering anything I hadn’t already seen a picture of, which actually made him laugh. We took a photo, and I went home.
We did message a bit more after that, I thanked them both for a fun night, may or may not have made some sarcastic comment to Bruce about him not following through on his promises, and carried on with my life. I decided to unfollow Bruce and their page because they were going back to another country for quite awhile and it just didn’t make sense to keep in touch.
The last time we spoke was when I ever-so-kindly told him about this blog and asked if he was cool with me using the story and he said that “his dating life is very private” but mine clearly is very NOT private, and I didn’t actually tell you his name or what he really does, so I’m kind of meeting in the middle. Compromise, right? Plus, like I said, he’s not famous – I promise y’all it’s not someone you would ever know or who you’d be excited about. If it was Liam Hemsworth, trust me, you’d know. Anyway, I’m not trying to make him mad or throw him under the bus or anything, but, this story is funny! Really, I’m the one who looks crazy because I drove to a 3-star hotel to meet someone I’d never even spoken to in real life, and then used their bandmate against them to get my own petty revenge, so honestly I don’t even know what he’s worried about.
But, it was still a cool story of what could have been a GREAT night but instead is just a “what if?” tale of the time I had a guy slide into my DMs after his show purely because of his view of my butt. It would have been a better story if he hadn’t chickened out, but everything happens for a reason, right? Maybe I’ll get to have a story with another “guitarist” or semi-famous person someday.