Reed and I should never have had that phone fight. There wasn’t an arguable point.  I was the host, and he was the visitor. Guests come when invited. So what happened?

A common trigger is expectations. When you meet people online, you create a scenario of yourself with this stranger that may or may not be accurate. I was flattered that Reed wanted to fly to CT to meet me and pleased he could afford to. He was an attorney, so he was educated. I was captivated by the guy in the photo. Other guys on Sexy Singles that had contacted me had pictures of themselves that looked like grandpa selfies.  But once Reed argued with me, my hopes began to topple. Was he a control freak? Reed probably had the same thoughts. He saw photographs of me and thought he and I were the perfect match. A delay made him feel out of control.

Once we both calmed down, we settled that Reed would come one day later. A friendly conversation ensued. He casually mentioned he’d recently had brain surgery.

Uh oh.

 Nothing too serious.

 What isn’t serious about brain surgery?

He explained that he’d been a Navy pilot. His plane crashed, and his co-pilot died. Reed suffered massive head trauma that led to tremors. The surgery was to correct that problem. 

I didn’t ask any questions.

The Sexy Singles site offers members the opportunity to video chat. I suggested we use it to get acquainted, and we agreed on a day and time. Reed was a no-show. Perhaps he forgot. We set another date, and again, Reed wasn’t there. I was disappointed and angry and didn’t respond to his calls or texts for a week. But finally, we spoke on the phone. He said that a tree had fallen in his yard and he needed to remove it. We got back to our regular banter. My original expectations kept me interested.

Reed’s birthday came just before mine. I wanted to send him something, but I didn’t know his address. I subscribe to Been Verified, a site that does background checks. I entered Reed’s name and found his address. I also learned he’d had fourteen foreclosures in Texas, a few evictions in Virginia, and a significant mortgage on an expensive home.

I used a company called Send-A-Cake to deliver his gift. I called him on his birthday and told him there would be something waiting for him at home. 

“You sent it to my home?”  He sounded concerned.

“Yes,” I replied. “What’s wrong with that?”

“Nothing,” he said quietly.

 I got the feeling there was something very wrong.

A few days after his birthday, an email arrived from Reed’s AOL address. But the email was not from him. The writer used Reed’s computer to contact me. The subject line was,

 I am saving you; please save me from Reed.

 As I read the email, it was evident that the writer was female, lived in Reed’s home, and sounded desperate. She knew a lot about me. She’d seen the cake. Said it was beautiful. She implied that she and Reed had been lovers. She wrote, 

He is the most racist, bigoted, verbally abusive man you will ever meet not to mention a liar.

Included with her message was a photo of a heinous-looking fellow that didn’t resemble the picture of Reed I had. I couldn’t determine if she was a jilted lover or a crazy lady. 

Sometimes she seemed not to want him to visit me. But then, she implied that once he left,  she could escape. What made her believable came at the end of her litany.

I came to Colorado to help him with brain surgery for his tremors…..three of them….

he had it all taken out and now tremors are worse.

I wondered what they took out.

The writer ended the email with,

Women to women pls don’t risk my life by telling him I contacted you. [sic]

 I wasn’t sure of my next step. What if Reed was dangerous? Maybe she was crazy. Was her life really in jeopardy? Reed was supposed to visit soon. That couldn’t happen without my knowing the truth about both of them. But how could I stop him without mentioning the email?

© Miriam Greenberg, and the blog Love In The Time Of Corona, beginning April 2022 to the Present. Unauthorized use and/or duplication of this material without express and written permission from this site’s author and/or owner is strictly prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used, provided that full and clear credit is given to Miriam Greenberg and Love In The Time Of Corona with appropriate and specific direction to the original content.