Unanimous. Four to zero. I was the fourth vote and I still pressed it. That should tell you everything.
His name is not going in this. He does not get the courtesy of a full sentence at the top. He gets the outcome. Voted out. Mid. Talked about his founder journey like it was a eulogy for a person who was still sitting on my sofa.
Never again. I mean that in the way I always mean it, which is until the next one buys a decent drink and has a nice mouth. Still. The principle stands.
How he even got in the door
We met on a Thursday that was pretending to be a Friday. Shoreditch, obviously. One of those bars that has lighting designed to make everyone look available and slightly unwell. He was tall enough. Clean trainers. The kind of haircut that costs more than it looks. I clocked the watch and thought, fine. I have worked with less.
He bought the second round without making a speech about it. That bought him an hour. Then he told me he was building something in climate tech, or fintech, or climate fintech. I stopped listening at the point where people usually say the word “impact” and wait to be congratulated.
I still went home with him. Or he came home with me. The logistics are blurry because I had decided by then that the night was already spent and I might as well get a story out of the receipt.
Mia was still up. She clocked him from the hallway, gave me the look that means “I will wait until morning”, and shut her door with her whole personality.
The morning performance
He made coffee. I will give him that. He also talked through the entire process like he was on a podcast nobody asked for. Seed round. The co founder who “didn’t have the vision”. A sentence that started with “what we’re really trying to solve” while I was looking for a clean spoon.
Sophie came in for water, took one look, and left with the face of a woman who has seen this film. She later said he had the energy of a man who would explain your own job to you. She was not wrong.
I walked him out in yesterday’s makeup and a jumper that was not seductive so much as tactical. On the step he said we should do this again and that he had “a really good feeling about the timing”. I said I would text. I did not specify what I would text. I think I sent a thumbs up two hours later, which in my language is a eulogy.
The group chat does not play
Our chat is called something I will not print because it would get this site flagged and also because it is mean in a way that only works if you live with the people. There are three of us most days. Sometimes a fourth if Mia’s cousin is staying and wants blood.
I dropped two photos. One of the bar. One of the back of his head in the kitchen, which felt fair. Caption was just “verdict.”
Sophie: “founder journey???”
Mia: “he said impact unprompted. remove him.”
Sophie’s friend who should not even be in the chat: “mid. next.”
Then the poll. Mia made it in the time it takes most people to find their keys. Stay / Out.
Out. Out. Out.
I stared at it for a second like I was going to defend him. Then I voted Out as well. Loyalty to a man who used the phrase “go to market” before 11am is not a value I hold.
Sophie sent the little confetti thing. I hate that she knows how to do that. I also needed it.
Why mid is worse than bad
Bad can be funny. Bad can be a night. A man who is properly terrible at least gives you an anecdote with edges. Mid just sits there. Mid asks if you have heard of his waitlist. Mid thinks chemistry is a calendar hold.
He was not ugly. That is the irritating part. He was the sort of handsome that looks good in a group photo and then disappears when he starts speaking. I kept waiting for a turn of phrase that would save him. It never came. Every story circled back to the company. Every question to me was a chance for him to compare notes with himself.
I asked what he did for fun. He said he liked “building”. I said I liked sleeping with people who do not treat a date like a pitch deck. He laughed as if I was joking. I was not joking. I was previewing the blog.
There is a type in this city. You know him. Member’s gym. Opinions about oat milk that he thinks are personality. A story about almost moving to Lisbon. He will tell you he is “intentional” and then leave his socks by the bed like a warning shot.
I used to think I could train them. I cannot. The group chat can though. The group chat is a knife.
What I told him, which was almost nothing
He double texted in the afternoon. “Good to meet someone who actually gets it.”
Gets what? The Series A? The lighting in my kitchen? I typed three versions of a kind let down and deleted all of them because kindness would have implied there was a misunderstanding. There was not. He was mid and I was bored and the vote had already closed.
I sent: “Think we’re better as a one off. Good luck with the raise.”
He replied with “all good” and then a paragraph. Of course a paragraph. I did not read the second half. Mia read it for me and summarised it as “confused but branded.”
That is the other thing. Even the goodbye wanted a narrative. I already have a narrative. It is this one.
The fridge scoreboard
We have an unofficial system. It started as a joke and then became policy, which is how most things happen in this flat. Height. Exit time. Whether they offered to take the bins. Whether they talked about work before they asked a single question that was about me and not about how I could “add value” to their evening.
He scored a six on face, a two on conversation, a zero on self awareness. Sophie added a note in the margin: “would explain blockchain to a child.” Mia drew a little sad face. I left it. It felt accurate.
The landlord does not know about the scoreboard. The landlord thinks we are three tidy professional women who recycle. We are. We also run a tribunal.
I voted against myself on purpose
People will say that is sad. Let them. I know my pattern. I will forgive a man in the moment because the night is warm and my standards drop by the second drink. Morning me is meaner. Morning me has Sophie drinking tea like a clerk of court. Morning me remembers that I said I wanted fame and stories and not a plus one who uses the word ecosystem about an app.
Voting him out was not cruelty. It was admin. If I leave it open I will text him when I am bored on a Wednesday and then I will have to write a worse version of this with more lies in it. Cleaner to kill it in the chat with witnesses.
Mia said I looked almost proud. I was. Not of him. Of the process. There is something very soothing about four little Out votes stacking up. Democracy, if democracy was three girls in dressing gowns and one hungover blogger.
What I am taking from this, besides the obvious
I am not done with men. Please. That would be a different girl and a quieter website. I am done with this specific flavour. The founder monologue. The unsolicited vision. The assumption that ambition is the same thing as charm.
Next time I am asking earlier. “Do you talk about work before you take your shoes off?” If the answer is a speech, I am leaving my coat on. I say that now. Watch me forget it the second someone has good arms and a reservation.
The chat will not forget though. The chat has the photos. The chat has the poll. The chat has my own vote sitting there like a signed confession.
He will be fine. Men like that always are. There is always another bar, another girl who has not heard the pitch yet, another morning coffee that comes with a TED Talk. I wish him a raise and a personality. He can have one of those. I am not convinced he can have both.
As for me, I made toast, I wrote this, I put the good towels back where they belong. Sophie said I did the right thing. Mia said we should go out tonight and look at no one who has a LinkedIn that reads like a prayer.
I said maybe. I already know I will go. I also already know I will check the chat before I bring anyone home again. Four votes. No speeches. If he mentions a journey that is not the night bus, he is already out.
