Dating While Classified

Dating at Area 51 is kind of weird.

Besides the whole “office romance” angle, you’ve got to deal with the “summer camp” factor (relationships based on proximity instead of mutual interests), the “collateral damage” factor (you don’t want to get in the sack with someone and find out – whoops! A gene sequencer mishap gave them extra genitals), and most importantly, what I call the “noble/serf” factor.

Because there are only 2000 employees at Dreamland, everyone is broken into small and very hierarchical sub-groups. It’s not just Aircraft versus Weapons Systems; folks are divided by which section they work for, then which level they’re at within that section, then by IQ. So while working for Wormhole Research is cooler than Nano-Computing, a Nano project lead has way more cache than a Wormhole research assistant.

To make things worse, the whole place is divided into Scientists V. Maintenance, and guess which one is ranked lower? Yeah – I’m stuck at one of the only joints in the country where a 90-pound nerd gets more respect than some bruiser who can bench 220.

Because of this, it’s pretty unheard of for anyone from the blue-collar crowd to date a lab coat. It’s frowned upon for us worker bees to even talk to the intellectual elite. In fact, in my two years here, I’ve never seen anyone exchange more than a few sentences with the eggheads. If they spill some shit, we’re called to clean it up, and the relationship ends there.

So there are a few teensy obstacles when a janitor like me gets a crush on a scientist in, wait for it – Black Project 9. For all the crazy projects you see on the shift schedule (Dimensional Physics, Dark Matter Research, and Extra-terrestrial Communication are just some of the highlights), there are 13 “Black Projects,” which even those of us with top-secret security clearance don’t get to know about. And yes, the people who work on those are cooler than Ferris Bueller, while the rest of us are like Chunk from The Goonies.

And of course, the first thing I found out about Hotness is that she’s working on a black project. That makes it tough to even see her, much less try to ask her out. But I’m a new man and shit, so I refused to be deterred. Even the black project folks have to hit the cafeteria, so I staked myself in one corner, mopping and re-mopping the same puddle of Mountain Dew until I saw her walk in.

The first day, I was too frozen to say anything. The second and third day, she was with some other lab coats from her division. But the fourth day, my friends -- the fourth day, I manned up and sat at the other end of her table, lunch tray in hand. (Thankfully, it wasn’t meat loaf day – I heard they sell the leftovers of that as moon rocks).

Here’s a recreation of our earth-shattering conversation, with inner commentary:

ME: Chimichangas, huh?

(God. I need to work on my openings.)

HER: Yeah, well – they were out of Agent Orange.

(Holy crap. Hot AND funny? I gotta step up my game here.)

ME: At least it wasn’t the meat loaf. I heard they carve that out of rocks and sell it on the moon.

(God dammit! Why can’t I ever remember the punchlines to jokes?!)

HER: What?

(Maybe if I change the topic, she won’t notice my stupidity?)

ME: So you just started here?

HER: Yup. Any inside dirt I should know?

ME: Don’t bring in an iPod unless you want a body cavity search.

(Jesus. Am I trying to convince this chick I’m a psycho?)

HER: Good to know. I like to get wild on Fridays.

(Did she just give me an opening? I was happy not to get smacked.)

ME: Um, I was wondering. There’s a screening of The Day the Earth Stood Still at the Crystal Springs drive-in this weekend, and if you’re not on rotation –

(Suddenly appearing out of nowhere --)

PHILDO THE DILDO: Hotness! There’s some kind of (insert dick-swinging techno-babble obviously trying impress her), and we need your expertise.

HER: Okay. (To me.) Enjoy the rest of your lunch.

Then she was gone, my nimrod IT nemesis actually turning back to give me a “That’s right, sucka” smirk. So I’ve clearly got to take things to the next level here. I have to do something that will get Hotness to notice me, something that will prove I’m not just a regular janitor. I need to do something that will BLOW HER MIND.

And I have no idea what that is.