I Didn't Come Here to Make Friends (9 page)

God, the guy was a total loser! I dumped his ass, paid to put his shit in storage, and thankfully managed to wiggle out of the lease. I moved into my own little house in Santa Monica, mentally exhausted and totally down with love. The first night in my new home, I got drunk by myself and wallowed in misery about my disastrous romantic history. I turned on the TV and
The Bachelor
was on. Brad Womack’s second season had recently started and it wasn’t clear yet that he would turn out to be one of the biggest dicks in the history of the show. At this point, he had humbly apologized for picking neither girl in his first incarnation as the Bachelor and was enthusiastically and sincerely looking for real love and a wife. He was being so romantic and chivalrous, unlike Dylan.

During one of those commercial breaks, when host Chris Harrison asked, “If you’d like to be on the next
Bachelor
. . .” my ears perked up. Impulsively, I got my laptop, logged on to ABC.com, and applied.

The generic questionnaire took about ten minutes to fill out. I uploaded three of my favorite modeling pictures and wrote a short essay, explaining that it was hard finding love in L.A., that I’d dated actors and models, had my heart broken, and worked my ass off. But after being told by my last two boyfriends that they didn’t believe in marriage, I was a hopeless romantic looking for someone who did believe in making a lifetime commitment.

When I pressed
SEND
, it felt no different, no more possible, than signing up for one of those “Win a free iPad!” contests.

I didn’t expect to ever hear anything back.

KEEPING IT REAL

How to Get Noticed in the Application

Send in your best photo. Cut to the chase and save producers time by wearing a bikini in the photo.

Be heartbroken. A good breakup story, in which you’ve been dumped cruelly and callously, helps your chances.

But be ready for love. Nobody wants to date a sad sack. Say you’ve recovered and are looking for the real thing.

Show off your romantic side. Tell stories about the most romantic thing you’ve ever done. But don’t lie. They will eventually figure that out.

Toss around some clichés. They really like it when you say you want a good story to tell your grandkids someday, or that life is better spent when shared.

Don’t beg. That’s unattractive.

I was single again, but not for long. The serial rebounder strikes again! The day after I shot the e-mail off into the
Bachelor
abyss, I ran into Cavan on one of my fat-burning power walks through Venice. He asked me out, and I said yes, even though he was moving back to San Francisco and wasn’t really my type. He was bald and kind of overweight, but had a sexy swagger. His confidence was off the charts and he was really funny. We got some fish tacos at James’ Beach, made almost famous in the movie
I Love You, Man,
and I was instantly smitten. What can I say? After being burned by Dylan, Cavan was refreshing, a real man: he was independent, hardworking, and a true gentleman.

When it rains it pours. Within two days of that first date, I got an e-mail from a producer on
The Bachelor,
asking if I would come in to meet them at their production office on Bundy and Olympic, which was conveniently located just down the street from my new house. I was totally surprised. I was so certain I’d never hear back I’d already forgotten that I’d sent the e-mail. I didn’t respond right away. I went on date number two with Cavan first, and he was so charming, I confessed right on the spot that I liked him. After his eye twitched a little, he said he really liked me, too. And just like that, I had an insta-boyfriend and a response for
The Bachelor
producer. I thanked her for reaching out, but informed her I’d met someone and that I’d be back in touch if anything changed.

Of course, it did change. I quickly realized that at thirty-five, Cavan was a little too old for me. I was twenty-seven at this point. Plus my crazy, nonstop love life was also starting to get a little old. And with Cavan in San Francisco, I was back in an annoying long-distance relationship.

Because I was often home alone, my sister Rachel came to visit me a lot. She unapologetically liked to watch TV, just like me, and we got really into the new season of
The Bachelorette
together. Ashley Hebert was the lucky girl looking for love this time and Rachel asked me which guy I liked best.

“Ben,” I said without hesitation. I thought the sweet wine maker from Sonoma was so cute and almost sad. I loved his long hair. He kind of reminded me of my first boyfriend, Jono. On one episode Ben got to ride mopeds with Ashley through the streets of Taiwan and I was actually a little jealous.

Four months into my relationship with Cavan, I started to pull away. The more I watched
The Bachelorette,
the more I realized that Cavan wasn’t the right man for me. I wanted a guy more like Ben. As I lost interest in Cavan, he started to lose his cool. He got really possessive and obsessive and would text me constantly when I was out. The final straw came when I went to a Victoria’s Secret party and he barraged me with a dozen messages. I couldn’t deal anymore and broke up with him. After it was over, he’d call me crying and bombard my landline fifty times in a row.

Only weeks later Jesse popped back up in my life, “bumping into me” at my gym, curiously right after I changed my Facebook status back to “single.”

“Well, well, well,” I said. “Look who’s here.”

“I was hoping I’d see you,” he admitted shamelessly, like he always did. He said he’d lost my phone number after a jealous girlfriend deleted all the female contacts in his phone.

“Oh no, not again!” the gym’s juice-bar girl cried, rolling her eyes. She’d seen this all before.

And darn it if she wasn’t right. Jesse and I fell right back into it. This time, he seemed different. Instead of partying, we strolled through the Century City mall together, ate at Pink Taco, and he even went to see chick flicks like
Sex and the City 2
with me. But sadly, a leopard never really changes its spots. One weekend I went out of town, to Arizona again for the love of God, and Jesse called me and said he was in Palm Springs for a boys’ weekend playing golf. He was heading back to L.A. and wanted to take me to dinner as soon as I returned home. It was so sweet of him to check in, right? Wrong.

He wasn’t even in Palm Springs! At the same time Jesse called me, I got a text from a friend, who’d spotted him in Venice Beach with a girl. I Google imaged Jesse and pictures instantly popped up on TMZ.com of him straddling some chick in a park. “This is PDL—public display of lust!” the caption read. “Jesse Metcalfe reminded us of his existence by tongue-wrestling this skyscraper of a blonde at Venice Beach. The couple had a roll in the green that left Jesse feeling a little too sexy for his shirt, apparently.”

That was the final straw. All three of the men I considered the loves of my life had used me and/or betrayed me. None of them—not Chris, not Dylan, not Jesse—had any intention of ever marrying me. And I wouldn’t have wanted to marry any of them anyway. They all had major character flaws.

Were there
any
nice guys on the planet who actually wanted to get married?

Ben Flajnik. I felt strangely connected to him. By this point in
The Bachelorette
season it was obvious to me that Ashley was more in love with J. P. Rosenbaum and would probably end up with him. The tabloids were already saying that J. P. won and that Ben might be the next Bachelor.

After being heartbroken about Jesse for about ten minutes, I decided I wanted revenge. I went back into my e-mail inbox and found the address for the producer of
The Bachelor
. I knew the show would start shooting really soon after
The Bachelorette
finale, so I wrote and said I hoped it wasn’t too late, but I was single again.

A producer wrote me right back: “Can you come in tomorrow?”

KEEPING IT REAL

How to Throw the Best Viewing Party

by Rachel Robertson