After Tatenda, I wasn't heartbroken. I hadn't spent enough time with her to develop a bond or connection. Plus she was too beautiful and ambitious to settle for good ol' John West. I actually took that meeting as a good sign.

SimuDate actually did work. And besides the disappearing issue in the chatroom( which I was sure they were working on), everything seemed to be fine so far.

I took the initiative the following week to send out as many winks as possible. Of course, the number was limited since there were only 500 of us in the program. But there were 280 women that I sent winks to. Including Tatenda, who had blocked me, that made it 281 women, leaving 219 guys. I'm sure I wouldn't fail to find at least one desperate lady who found me bearable.

While I was trying to escape a haunting nightmare that I had had that morning, a girl named Nomvelo winked back.

However, her MeetFirst profile had no profile picture. Her age and her romantic interests were also hidden. When I signed up the first time, MeetFirst notified me that a profile would not be verified without at least one fullbody picture.

I logged into the system and waited for her in the chatroom. I was sure it was a glitch since this was still a BETA program.
What appeared before me was quite disturbing, but sensible.

The figure was that of your generic female. A hint of long hair, the rise of where boobs were supposed to be, and a small oval face. But the gray humanoid had no discerning features. She sort of reminded me of those robots from iRobot, but at least those had eyes and lips.

She finally spoke,

"Hie"

"Hello"

"My name is Nomvelo. You're John."

"Yeah...nice to meet you Nomvelo."

"Nice to meet you too."

I was taken aback by what was happening. Was this how we were actually going to do this?

"You're quiet," she said.

As if that's the elephant in the room here...

"Yeah, sorry, uhm. It's just that you do know what you look like, right?"

A laugh emerged from her faceless face.

"Oh yes, this is an avatar you can use as an option if you're not ready to show your identity."

"Oh, for real?"

"Yes, don't you read the updates Elizabeth sends?"

I opened my panel. Three rows down to the left was an update box, and the badge told me that I had 67 unread messages from Elizabeth.

"Well, this is embarrassing."
She giggled,

"So you can see me?" I asked

"Well yeah, think of it like this.
You know how I can control who sees my profile picture?"

"Yeah"

"Well, your default setting allows everyone to view your identity, but you can change that in the profile settings."

I heeded her words, and it was true. There was a feature named Hide My Identity. I checked the box.

"Well, now I can't see you."

"This is both creepy and cool at the same time."

"Yeah"

"So tell me about yourself, Nomvelo."

She was an accountant at a bakery in Harare. She was also in school, pursuing her masters. And she liked cats and cake.

"And you?"

I told her the same thing I told Tatenda.

"I feel like we can probably build something here," I said.

"Me too," she said, "I should probably reveal my identity to you now."

"Okay."

Her featureless avatar glowed brilliantly before revealing what she looked like. She looked like a forty-year-old woman.

I opened my panel, and it told me that she was, in fact, 45.

NOTE FROM AUTHOR:
THANK YOU SO MUCH DEAR READER FOR STICKING AROUND. PLEASE VOTE AND LEAVE ANY CONSTRUCTIVE CRITICISM IF POSSIBLE.

-EMOLYON