Suddenly I'm thinking this was a bad idea.

I mean, I've already paid a ton of money to a professional match maker to meet this woman, I've talked the people I trust most in this world to help the match maker find me a bride, and I've spent the last 6 months being interviewed by people who were talked into finding a husband for some woman who's hoping to get the same thing out of this that I am-- a short cut to happily ever after.

Except it doesn't feel like a fucking short cut. It feels like the longest damn 6 months of my entire life.

I've met this girl's mother, sister, 2 co-workers, and a sorority sister. I feel like I know everything about Kim's life except for how Kim herself fits into it.

My brother, Jake, stands outside the bowling alley with me, checking his phone and returning texts as they come in while I pace back and forth on the sidewalk.

"Dude, chill," he tells me.

Easy for him to say. He's not the one who's about to meet his future wife for the first time.

I grunt at him.

"You're gonna like her, Rye," he says, putting his phone back in his pocket, "she's really cool."

I roll my eyes, "'Cool,' I repeat, great, we all know what that means."

Jake leans against one of the concrete pillars and shakes his head at me.

It's not like I'm hoping for someone who looks like Brent's fiance. Shit, I don't even think I want a girl that looks like Kay. Too high maintenance for my tastes.

No. I like my women a little more real. A little unique. With her personality showing through her style, not just another carbon copy of every other girl at the bar or where ever girls go that they all seem to dress the same.

But my brother's "cool" comment worries me. Guys don't call hot chicks "cool." "Cool" is what you call a girl who's one of the guys-- a chick who watches science fiction movies with you and likes sports. Not that those are bad things, but they rarely come in packages that make your dick too hard to finish watching the game.

I can't help thinking that Kay is probably the exception to the rule when it comes to the type of chicks who hire a match maker to set them up with an arranged marriage.

I trust Jake's taste in women when it comes to knowing what kind of girl would get along with me and fit in with our family but I'm not so sure he'd have my back when it came to the looks department.

That's what I have Joe for, I remember myself. My old coach and I stayed tight after graduation. He was always trying to pick out cute girls for me to date back in school-- told me he was too old to go after them himself, so he had to live vicariously through me.

Joe said he's on board with the family on this Kim chick being the right girl for me if I'm serious about going through with this plan. Joe knows me, he knows what I like in a girl, so I should be able to relax a little.

Of course, that doesn't mean I do.

"Why'd we have to come all the way out here to go bowling?" I ask Jake.

"No bar," he says without looking up from his phone.

"No bar? What kind of bowling alley doesn't have a bar?"

"The kind you get to go to for your first date with your Amish girlfriend," he quips.

"Ahhhm--?" It's my brother. I know better than to take him seriously but, under the circumstances...

"Chillax, dude," Jake pushes himself off the pillar and comes over to me, grabbing my shoulder and shaking me roughing, "I got your back on this wife thing. You have to trust me or you wouldn't have put me on your team, right?"

I think about it for a minute, not entirely sure if that's the case. I mean, it was-- months ago when I had to hand over a list of people I trusted for the job. Now I'm not so sure.

"No booze on the first meeting, remember?" Jake slaps me on the back and gives me one of those worried big brother looks I've been seeing my whole life, "And chaperoned like you're in junior high, man, that's why I'm stuck with you."

"We could have just gone to the bowling alley in town and not had anything to drink," I point out.

Jake shrugs, "I don't think your chaperons are supposed to drink either."

"You really can't bowl 10 frames without a beer in your hand?" I ask sarcastically.

"Why would I want to?"

Jake's cell phone makes the obnoxious noise he keeps as his text notification and after checking it, he looks up and scans the parking lot.

"They're here," he says nonchalantly as he heads toward a trio of woman who are walking toward us.

OK. I know Stacy and Crystal, that's Kim's mom and sister. Seeing familiar-- and friendlier than Jake's-- faces helps with the nerves a little bit.

I try to decide if I should go out with Jake and meet them before they get up to the sidewalk where I'm standing in front of the bowling alley.

Jake hugs Crystal first, then Stacey, then the petite redhead walking with them.

It doesn't take much work to do the math. Since I already know the other two, the redhead has to be her.

Her.

I swallow hard and try to dry my sweating palms on my pants.

Shit.

She's cute.

Not like cute cute, like wow cute. Like, I can't believe she's here to meet me cute. Like, there's no way this girl is going to agree to marry me cute.

The woman I'm going to marry is 5 feet tall without those heels on-- if she's lucky. Her hair is a mass of soft ringlets cut in a blunt bob that falls just above her shoulders. They bounce with her steps as she walks-- and her curls aren't the only thing that bounce.

Kim's got a sweet figure on her and she's wearing a dark green dress that shows it off. I watch as one hell of an hour glass of pale skin and freckles makes its way toward me.

Now is about the time I start thinking I shoulda jacked off before I left the house because damn if my dick doesn't start to perk up at the sight of her.

She's wearing glasses too. Just simple black frames that give her a sort of retro, pin up, naughty librarian thing going on. The glasses, the hair, the skin, the tits...and full, pouty lips done up in a shade of red that looks like sin...stick a fucking fork in me. I'm done.