A Real Story

I was between paychecks after my car needed a new transmission, so paying for a dating app felt absurd. I downloaded one of the free ones everyone complains about and set my filters to men within 15 miles, ages 30 to 40. Within two days I matched with a guy named Nate who said he ran his own contracting business, had two dogs, and sent a photo of himself standing in front of a half-finished kitchen island that looked genuinely impressive. We texted for almost three weeks. He knew the names of streets near my apartment, complained about lumber prices, and once sent a voice memo of him laughing at something I said, which felt like proof he was real.

The cracks showed up slowly. He canceled our first coffee date because a supplier fell through, then canceled the reschedule because his truck broke down. The third time, he asked if I could Venmo him sixty dollars for a permit fee since his business account was frozen and he’d pay me back that weekend with interest, he said, joking. I sent it. Nobody paid me back that weekend, or any weekend.

What stings isn’t the sixty dollars, it’s that I ignored the obvious tell: he never once agreed to a video call, always blaming bad signal on job sites. On a free app there’s no verification badge forcing anyone to prove they’re who they say they are, and I’d assumed a few weeks of texting was the same as actually knowing someone.

I still use free apps because I like not paying for the privilege of being disappointed, but now I have a rule: no money changes hands and no serious plans get made until we’ve done one quick video call. It’s a small thing, but it would’ve saved me sixty bucks and three weeks of writing back to a guy who was probably three guys in a call center somewhere.