Dangerous Liaison?

I think a single girl's life is not really complete without some liaison with a married man. I was initially surprised that almost all of my girlfriends will have a story about a relationship with a married man, even a nice, smart, religious friend of mine. That sense of surprise slowly abated as I grow more mature and when I almost got involve with one myself.

He was a colleague and there were already rumors flying around that he was involved with a married woman from the same department (only on a different floor). He's a good looking guy, I can say that much and quite charming (don't they all?). I never really pay attention to him knowing that he's married, we talked occasionally and joke around a lot. He's a fun guy to be with. Anyway, he never made a pass at me. But he was close with another clerk, a member of my 'gang' and lunch-mate, F. They were close in the sense that they talk to each other a lot. We still see each other sometimes after I left the dept. especially when I visit my old friends. We said hi, talked a bit, teased each other, you know, things like that. I also bought insurance from him, at least to help a friend.

About a year ago he started calling, asking me out. Ok why not. Might as well take advantage of it. My parents were not home and I was hungry and bored. We got something to eat, watched a movie and just talk.

The next few days he started to call and SMS me asking to be my 'special friend'. You want to know what his pitch was, "We can have something special at least until you get married." Huh?!?

"We can only be friends and that's it"
"Ye la kita kawan, tapi nak la lebiiiiihhhhh sikit dgn saya" [yes, we're friends, let's have a biiiiittttt more with me]
"I'm a one-man woman and I don't like to play around with relationships. If I have a serious boyfriend he would be the only one for me."
"Awak tunang dengan saya la". ["You marry me then"]
Aagggggghhh!!!!

I specifically remembered asking him straight to his face whether he's seriously thinking of 'membesarkan masjid' (i.e. get a second wife). And he said no (of course) and he flatly denied all the other girlfriends that he had. He should have save his spit. I knew about his 'reputation'. I knew that he did have a r'ship with that married woman. I just don't know how far it got. I do know that that was over when she got transfered to another dept. I also knew that he sometimes went out with other clerks from the office including my other 'gang' and lunch-mate, Y. I'm not one who likes to butt into other ppl's business so I never cared to find out what's up with those two.

I told this to another girl that I used to work with, Cik P and she told me that she was also 'propositioned' by this guy some time ago. He even use the same freakin' line, that FREAK! Luckily she already has a boyfriend and so he struck out there. I wonder how many girls has he approached. I won't be surprised if he had asked ALL the girls in the office to be his 'special' friend. Sheesh.

It suddenly sink in on why he suddenly got in touch with me. F just got married a few months back, Y is also getting married and Cik P is married too! I guess I'm next on his list. You got the wrong girl pal!

He kept calling and SMS-ing sayng that I'm "the one" and he was not really serious about the other girls. After some no no no and NO he finally gave up. I think the last SMS got through to his thick head, "Saya dah kata tak nak, susah sgt ke nak paham!" [I said no, is that so hard to understand!]

So after one year, why do I still rant about this? Well, on Tuesday, out of the blue, he called me up asking for an update, "Still working there? Finished your studies? Got a boyfriend?" He told me he's in the midst of looking for other employments. And we did have a nice chat though. It is fun to talk to him, I got to give him props. We said goodbye, with him insisting that I keep him up-to-date with any changes in my life. I got the feeling he called me to see if he has another chance. No way!

Confession time: The thing that bothers me the most about this guy is... I actually do like him. If he wasn't married I would have taken up his offer in a second. He's funny, good looking (even though he looks like a bangla), and fun to be with (maybe it's because it's easy to tease him), things that I look for in a guy. But I'm also glad that I knew him this way. He's the kind of guy that I can NEVER trust. What makes me think that he won't do the same to me as he did to his wife?

In some way, as a friend, I kind of pity him. He has a wife and two cute kids, the eldest is a spitting image of him (yes, I've met his whole family). I feel so sorry that he could not be happy with what he has. Instead he spent most of his time and energy looking for entertainment someplace else.

I wonder if he did this because he's really not happy with his marriage or just because he can, being a Muslim man. If he's not happy, he should be fair to his wife and try to solve this among themselves. If it's just to ease his 'itchiness' to fulfill the 'quota' then he should also be fair to his wife. No matter how understanding a wife can be, she will still have to sacrifice a lot for the sake of a man she call husband. I just want to say this to him and to all the 'miang' married guys out there, please be fair to the woman who said "saya setuju" [I do] to you and the mother of your children. They deserve some respect.