JAKE: In your post

My heart thumped in my chest.

LORI: Thanks

JAKE: Is that for dance?

LORI: Um, sort of. I guess

JAKE: Sort of?

LORI: Well, I wasn’t going to go, but Thembi broke up with her BF and so we’re going together

JAKE: Oh

JAKE: So you have a date then?

LORI: Well, it’s Thembi

JAKE: I thought you weren’t going to go?

JAKE: I thought dances weren’t your thing?

LORI: Well, I wasn’t

JAKE: And now you are?

LORI: Yes

JAKE: With Thembi?

LORI: Well, yes

LORI: And you, are you going with Amber?

JAKE: NO

JAKE: What makes you think that?

LORI: You said it at Kirstenbosch

JAKE: I said she asked me. Not that I was going with her

LORI: Well, I mean, you can

JAKE: I know I can, maybe I don’t want to go with her

LORI: You don’t?

Another lull pushed its way into our conversation and I sat there shaking my head. What was happening? It felt like this conversation was sliding somewhere and I didn’t know how to stop it. He seemed angry, the tone of his messages short and sharp. After a while he finally typed.

JAKE: I’ll probably go on my own . . .

Dot, dot, dot. Again. Crap! I wished that somewhere out there was a guide to interpreting all these dots. What did they mean? So I did the only thing I could think of.

LORI: . . .

JAKE: ?

LORI: ?

JAKE: Huh?

LORI: Okay

I said it, although I didn’t know what I was saying okay to.

JAKE: Okay?

LORI: Cool

LORI: I got to go. I’m on another chat

JAKE: Cool

LORI: Bye

I lowered my phone. That conversation had confused the hell out of me, and I felt like I needed someone to weigh in on it, so I took some screen grabs and sent them to the guys.

ANDILE: OMG, are you blind?

ANDILE: He was asking you to go with him to the dance

LORI: No he wasn’t

ANDILE: Uh . . . yes he was

GUY: He was very clearly hinting. Not very well. But that’s guys for you. They suck at hinting

LORI: I don’t think so

LORI: Not after what happened

ANDILE: ?

LORI: We kind of kissed

ANDILE: What? Tell us

LORI: I don’t know. It just happened . . .

LORI: And then I sort of ran away

GUY: Why?

LORI: IDK. IDK. I guess . . . I felt . . . IDK!

GUY: That’s a lot of IDKs. Which leads me to believe you really like him?!

ANDILE: She obviously likes him

ANDILE: And now she needs to message him right back and ask him to the dance

LORI: I can’t do that

GUY: Why, you’re a hot, cool chick, asking a hot, cool dude to the dance—who you already kissed

LORI: IDK

GUY: Stop saying IDK