Free 30 First Dates by Stacey Wiedower

hands clenched either side of the table.
    Erin giggled.
    Ben looked at her, wide-eyed. He glanced around as if he'd forgotten where he was.
    Her hand flew to her lips.
    "Oh, God, I'm sorry. It's just that you sound like I did a few weeks ago. Remember?" She paused for a few seconds, thinking back to their conversation that launched her blog. "Apparently it's time for a quarter-life crisis."
    After a long moment he chuckled, relaxing his hands and sitting back in his chair. "E, I hate to tell you this, but it's more like a one-third-life crisis."
     
    *  *  *
     
    Erin mulled over Ben's words on her drive home. "A one-third-life crisis." She had a vague idea of the current U.S. life expectancy statistics, and in that sense he was right. Good God, how had that happened. Where had all the time gone? And what was it about this age, anyway? Why did thirty feel like this precipice—this craggy, critical ledge with a 10,000-foot drop and no safety net?
    Were those things Ben talked about—house, mortgage, kids—the net? Were they the answer? Those things she hadn't known she wanted, at least not consciously, now felt like some giant secret the rest of the world had failed to let her in on. A great big cosmic joke on her.
    She felt lost…no, worse—like a loser. A loser at love. A loser at life. Like nothing she was doing was good enough, right enough. Maybe that was the reason she'd started the blog, and she'd been hiding behind the truth all along. It was no experiment, no exploration of the virtues and vices of the opposite sex. Maybe she did just want to find her Bachelor, her shining prince, so he could sweep her off the edge of the cliff at the last second and lead her to that place of safety and security she craved.
    Maybe it was as simple as that.
    Yeesh. Snap out of it, Crawford. She shuddered away the thought.
    Nope, it was growing pains—that was all. Thirty was the new twenty.
    She just hadn't grown up yet.
     
    *  *  *
     
    The Monday after Erin's date with Nate, Dave flounced into the teachers' lounge, plunked his brown cafeteria tray onto the round table, and sat down hard in the chair across from her. She raised an eyebrow.
    "What's up?" she asked, pausing with her fork in mid-air.
    Angie Russell, in the chair to Erin's left, had been telling Erin about a fight in her second-period P.E. class. Now her voice trailed off, and she glanced between Erin and Dave like she'd been dropped unwittingly into the middle of a foreign conversation.
    Dave frowned. "Uh, huh, Miss Thing. As if you don't know."
    She gazed at him for a couple seconds and then popped in a bite of her salad. She chewed, swallowed, and said, "I have no idea what you're talking about."
    Dave lifted a slice of pizza from his tray and examined it before biting off a huge chunk. "The blog?" he asked, his words garbled by the gooey cheese. "I can't believe you didn't tell me about this sooner. You've got this whole list of things you want to do—crazy things, girl—look at you—and this whole love life whirlwind thing happening, and you didn't breathe a word." He twirled his hands in mid-air while he was speaking and then glared at her. "Some friend."
    Erin continued to stare evenly at him. "Honestly, Dave, cut the drama king act. I'm not one of your students." Angie made a choking sound while sipping her Coke Zero. Her eyes still flicked between the two of them. "It's not that big a deal."
    "It is a big deal," he said. "And that Wedding Crashers thing, holy tomato! I can't believe you did that to that poor guy." He leaned around the table and looked her up and down. "Girl, you'd better change your name from bachelorette to heartbreaker, because you're gonna have 'em dropping like flies."
    Erin rolled her eyes. "Give me a break. I don't even know where my next date is coming from."
    Angie hmmphed. "I've got a guy for you."
    Erin and Dave swung their eyes her way, as if they'd forgotten she was there.
    "I don't know what the heck you're talking