Girl Gone Wild: Good man gone AWOL

By Loki Ferris

What is a woman to do when she is slowly becoming the last single girl out of all her friends?

Kate is still single. She was always the friend who didn't stop being there just because I was married. Now that I'm single again, she is the Virgil to my Dante in this Divine Comedy known as single motherdom. I now know how important it is to be supportive of someone in a relationship, regardless of whether it has the potential to end in matrimony. But it's easier said than done when someone new knocks at the gates.

The intruder's name is Noah, and I interpreted that he planned on saving her from the massive flood of shitty men with his disarming confession that he had a crush on her since high school (yes, another one of those...they are all coming out of the woodwork with their declarations of young love). He wined and dined her and literally had her eating out of his hand after the first date.

All the while I smiled and said, "Yay, go for it." And I did mean it at the time because he was truly a kindhearted, intelligent man. The only blemish on his otherwise impeccable dating resumé was that he had been married three times.

Kate's concern met with mine when we found out he had four children, too. "I don't want to be a fourth wife and mom to four kids! His attention will always be elsewhere!" she lamented.

"But his attention thus far has been on you despite the fact that he's a busy entrepreneur and dad," I replied.

Am I a man's woman or what? I thought to myself. Damn, he's lucky she has a friend like me! If he showed one prick tendency, I would have unleashed the fury without hesitation, but I was at a loss for negative comments, for once.

"Regardless of his relationships with other important people in his life, how do you feel when it's just you two?" I asked, all Dr. Phil-like.

"Great, and that's the problem. I LIKE him."

We concluded he was a serial monogamist, which is what Kate is too, though she'd never admit it. And if anyone is ready for a relationship, she is....but only with a quality chap like No-ahhhh.

Wait a minute? Did she say LIKE? What was I doing? Try as a desperate girlfriend might, my damn conscience would not, could not let me find even the smallest detail to blow up into a potentially huge problem that she should watch out for. The kind of problem I could sit back and say "I told you so" about.

The big LIKE. That's different from the "oh, he's hot, he's cute, he's sweet, he's cool. She LIKES him, fer chrissake!

Next thing I know, he's all she can talk about. I heard the obtrusive din of wedding bells in her future. Blech. Noah this, Noah that. Noah got invited to Ka, the show I hadn't seen yet. Like a good wing girl, I said let da' man go.

I really did feel she deserved a good one after all the frogs she'd kissed lately. The proverbial prince had finally arrived on his white steed and I, scared shitless that my last single best girlfriend was going to leave me in the realm of bachelorette purgatory to fend for myself, moved out of the way and waved goodbye as they happily rode off to their castle in the sky.

He told her he had business in Tucson, and would call her upon his return. Time was running out and she still didn't have a confirmation call for the show. She called him three times.

"Forget him," I ordered, but she was seriously worried that something had happened to him. Baffled, she called two more times just to be sure.

That was a month ago. We have not seen or heard anything from Noah since, but one of Kate's good friends revealed a little bit of past history suggesting he wasn't quite as good as we all thought. It's too bad he didn't give me the chance to prove myself right or wrong--especially with such a fabulous woman waiting for him, ready to take him to MY SHOW! But then again, maybe it is better to be remembered as the good guy who dropped off the face of the earth than the bad guy who eventually fades away.

E-mail your comments and questions to loki@lasvegasmercury.com.