If you’ve been following this column, there’s a few things you know about me by now.

I’m great at blowing up marriages (or, my own, at least), not so good at singledom, and f*cking awful at choosing men to invest my emotional energy in. My selection criteria – has good smile and propensity to waste large amounts of my time before never speaking to me again – potentially needs some tweaking.

But what you don’t yet know about me yet, is the fact I had a stalker. And, yep, you guessed it – Stalker Guy was that very person who messaged me on Snapchat when we last left off. (I told you it was about to get juicy. And FYI if you missed the last instalment of this column, go back to catch up here.)

As pitifully bad luck would have it, my first foray into Tinder dating was with Stalker Guy. We met over drinks in a small local bar, where he told me he was an accountant with a secret dream of one day becoming a teacher, though he didn’t have the finances to head back to uni for now. He was cute in an offbeat way – with a full beard, broad shoulders and a dad bod, though he was unexpectedly softly spoken for someone with such a large physical presence.

The date was… nice. I didn’t feel sparks, but I also hadn’t been on a date in nearly eight years, so I couldn’t remember if that was the way it was supposed to feel. We took a walk around the shoreline by Luna Park afterwards and stopped at a park bench to chat. That’s when I realised two things: Stalker Guy was INSANELY boring (to this day I can’t remember what our conversation was about; I drifted off after he started detailing his office filing system) and a really, really bad kisser.

The end-of-night pash felt more like I was being mauled by a Labrador than it did any semblance of a human exchange. Rather than putting his tongue in my mouth, he sort of floundered it all over my face, so that, when he finally came up for air, I could feel a thick slick of saliva still glistening on my cheeks.

*Pause for mini internal spew*

Now, I’m all about transparency and no-holds-barred honesty, so I’m just going to come right out and admit what happened next.

I went on two more dates with him.

I’d like to be able to say his general weirdness, awful kissing style and painfully dry personality were turnoffs enough, but my judgement and self-esteem were basically non-existent at this point, so, thrilled at the possibility anyone would want to date me, I agreed to see him again the following weekend, and then the one after that.

A post shared by Nadia (@nadiabokody) on Aug 5, 2018 at 1:04pm PDT

Both dates were about as enjoyable as waiting in line at Centrelink. Stalker Guy liked to sit and stare at me with a big grin, just waiting for me to talk. If I didn’t say anything, he continued awkwardly gazing at me.

“You’re so beautiful,” he kept saying.

“Why are you here with me?”

“Good question!” I wanted to respond, but instead I laughed and said, “Why wouldn’t I be?”

Then things got even more uncomfortable.

After the third, mind-numbingly boring date, Stalker Guy started sending me dozens of messages, failing to take heed when I didn’t respond. Then he began calling and leaving voicemails, asking why he hadn’t heard from me yet. There was a discernible hint of desperation in his voice, the kind you’d expect from a kid trying to convince their parents to let them stay up late.

In the meantime, I’d racked up a few more matches on Tinder, temporarily bolstering up my flailing self-esteem, and so decided to bite the bullet and gently let him down via text.

‘I had fun, but I don’t feel there’s any chemistry. Thanks for a great time.’

No reply.

Hmm. Okay, mission achieved. Great!

Watch: Dating: Translated

At least, it was great, for a few weeks. Then I did what I, by this point, had become practically a world-class expert at doing, and shit all over my life again.

Arriving home drunk and sobbing after a brutal breakup with a new guy (which is a story for another column), I realised I didn’t have my house keys, and so had the genius idea to go back through all the guys’ numbers I had stored in my phone from my Tinder dating misadventures, and see if I could stay with one of them for the night (because, all the best decisions are made after you’ve had your heart smashed into a million pieces, downed a bottle of tequila and cried off all your mascara, right??). Unfortunately, one of the first numbers I called was Stalker Guy. And, he answered.

Six hours later I woke up in his bed, his googly eyes staring down at me, and a huge grin plastered across his face.

“Good morning, Princess! I’m so glad you got back in touch last night. I just knew you’d come back to me!”

Yes. Mmm. About that.

“I haven’t stopped thinking about you,” he continued.

“What do you want to do today?”

Hmm… be literally anywhere but here? How did I break this to him?

“I’m so sorry,” I finally answered.

“Last night was a mistake. I never should have come here. I’m sorry for using you like this, I was drunk and didn’t know what else to do. I just don’t feel that way about you.”

The Mamamia Out Loud team deep dive on one night stand etiquette.

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The expression on his face changed.

“Well get your shit and leave then,” he grunted.

“You’re a total psychotic bitch, you know that?!!”

Stalker Guy amped up his game after that night. His communication became frequent again, and even more embarrassingly desperate.

‘Please give me one more chance and I’ll prove myself to you’ came the texts.

Clearly, he’d never read the book on why begging a girl to like you is about as arousing as Tony Abbott in his budgie smugglers. Eventually, I blocked his number, and the communication stopped.

So, when his name popped up on my Snapchat three months later, I freaked. And then came the message; the Snapchat message that bought me to this story.

It read: ‘You know you’re crazy. You’ll never find another guy like me.’

I hesitated, went to block him, and then decided to answer instead.

‘You’re right. I’ve been thinking long and hard, and I want your babies. And marriage. And a house together in the suburbs. Where do you think would be good to raise the kids? I need to lock down a husband, ASAP. My clock is ticking. And my parents want to meet you.’

A post shared by Nadia (@nadiabokody) on Jul 18, 2018 at 1:01pm PDT

I never heard from Stalker Guy again.

It took me until then to truly grasp the first rule of modern dating: f*ckboys love bitches. The less interested you are, the more a FB wants in. And so, my coldness toward Stalker Guy had only strengthened his resolve. The antidote? Complete unadulterated neediness. Works like a charm, every time. (You’re welcome, ladies.)

Which takes me back to my f*ckgirl experiment…

After Backpacker Guy and Gym Guy had taken my eye off the ball, my line-up of FBs had steadily dwindled. But Stalker Guy’s spontaneous message had reminded me why I began the experiment in the first place; to take back my power. So, I grabbed a glass of wine (fine, it was a can of UDL. IT’S ALL I HAD IN THE CUPBOARD, PEOPLE!) went into my contacts list, to a guy I’d renamed as: ‘DO NOT MSG UNDER ANY CIRCUMSTANCES’ and opened up a new message.

‘I’ve been thinking about you,’ I texted.

A few minutes passed. No response. I gulped back another wine (fine, UDL).

My phone screen lit up and let out a buzz. A notification popped up: ‘You have a new message from DO NOT MSG UNDER ANY CIRCUMSTANCES.’

I took a deep breath, and opened it up…

…

Oh hai. You’re still here, reading this column? Well, this is awkward, because I’m maxed out on my word count. So you’ll have to come back next week to find out what happened. (Go on, you know you want to.)