「故事·听力」I Was Catfished And Heartbroken

I Was Catfished And Heartbroken

This is Greg. He wants to tell you a Tinder story from a couple of years ago. He was in search of true love, and in a way he found it – but he was brutally catfished.

Greg had never managed to find a girlfriend. He thought he was just unlucky – after all, he was good-looking and an interesting guy, but as often happens he didn’t like the girls interested in him, and the girls he did like paid him no attention. What can you say? Life is pain. But he remained positive. If you can’t find someone in real life, welcome to the wonderful world of dating apps! It was fun – he matched with several girls at once, and started chatting. After a couple of days swiping left and right, he connected to a breathtakingly beautiful girl from his city. Her name was Keira, and she was the same age as him.

They started chatting, and she definitely knew how to intrigue a guy. Their conversation was different from all the other chats he’d had with random girls – sometimes, they seemed really shallow and most of the conversations didn’t differ from any other. But Keira struck him at once – not only was she beautiful, she was also witty. 

And that step would be talking on the phone. He asked her for her private number, and she gave it to him. They had a very inspirational talk! She sounded genuinely interested and was nice towards him. Her voice was so profound and tender and sounded strangely adult-like. However, that was ok for a girl who seemed so mature, even if she was a teenager like him. He called her from time to time and she always responded, and they had their regular cute chats. 

At some point he proposed going on a date. He wasn’t sure how she would take it, but she agreed at once. He was already imagining himself dating that gorgeous girl! But when the day came, she told him she couldn’t come because she had got sick. Ok, stuff happens, I’ll have to wait, he thought. They scheduled another date for the following week. The day before she confirmed that she would definitely come, hurray! But an hour before the date she wrote to him apologizing, saying that she has to accompany her mother to the doctor urgently. Now that was really bad luck! She assured him that next time she would come 100%.

Well, as you can imagine, that next time she bailed on him again, for yet another reason. By now Greg was getting irritated. But she seemed so sincere in her apologies that he bit his tongue. However, she did it again, until one day she informed him that she was in the hospital with a “serious illness” as she put it and they needed to postpone any possible meeting. But she was still eager to know more about him, and begged him not to give up on her. Of course, he asked her if he could visit her at the hospital or at least tell him what hospital it was, but she refused, saying that she didn’t want him to see her in the horrible condition she was in. She didn’t say what was wrong with her though, she just implied it was something very dangerous.

Of course he was worried a lot, and decided that he had to help her somehow! He was sure that if he managed to find her, she wouldn’t push him away! He thought it was kind of romantic. So he switched to his Sherlock Holmes mode and decided to find out who she was. One of her pics on the dating site showed her in front of a high school, and he thought that she probably studied there. He decided that the easiest way was going there and asking around if any of the students knew her. That way he could get more info about her condition and where to find her.

So one day Greg left classes a bit earlier and went to the high school. And now imagine the scene – he had arrived at the school, the kids were on a break, and whom did he see at once? He ran up to her, mumbling something about a hospital and an illness, and she stopped him by saying, “Sorry, you must be mistaken, I’m not Keira!” He showed her the pictures on him phone, and she confirmed that they were her pictures, but her name was actually Bella and she has never used dating apps.

Good lord, he’d been catfished! He stared at her with a lost expression on his face, and she asked for the details of where he got the pictures from and who the person was that he talking about. His heart was broken, he’d turned red with shame and he just wanted to go home and delete all the conversations he’d had with Keira – there was lots of personal stuff in there! But Bella was very sympathetic, and suggested going for a coffee and discussing the matter.

It turned out Bella was no less interesting than Keira, and in fact much better, because she was real and single! After a couple of dates they realized that they actually liked each other, and just imagine – they’re still dating now. Greg has never found out who that person was and he’s never understood what the catfishing was for. It sounds obvious but you never know when you get hooked.