Bachelor Behavior - Pt. 01

The net result? I never had a girlfriend. Not since that first time I asked her out in eighth grade. Never a hook-up or even a proper date.

You've probably heard stories about the wild parties and drugs and women that athletes have access to, but I wouldn't know. Other than Reggie, I didn't really have friends on the team, just a room full of friendly acquaintances. The truth is that I kept my head down and worked hard, just like I had in school. That's probably why I was successful; well, that and an overabundance of God-given physical talent.

Enough is enough, though: it was time to find myself a girl. The girl.

Easier said than done. The immediate issue was that people recognize me everywhere I go. Normally, I enjoy that, even crave it. Taking pictures with people, signing autographs, random high fives -- it's all cool and makes me smile, but how do I go about meeting someone who is interested in the unique individual that is Kai Haven? Oh, and don't discount that bank account (almost nine figures, now).

I would have talked with Birdie, but I couldn't bring myself to call her again.

Pop? Not likely. He would tell me to have fun and use protection, so yeah, not really helpful.

I tried the online thing for a short while -- I'm a bit ashamed to say I was paying for three different memberships at the same time. I was worried about it turning into a story, so I didn't use my real name and was sitting in all my pictures to not look so tall -- it didn't matter. I was only online for three days before the whole thing showed up on the back page of the Post; I had to cancel the memberships because there were too many respondents. My agent, who also manages most of my money, wasn't particularly pleased.

The bummer of the whole situation was that online dating really did appeal to me. I liked the idea of taking a huge pool of women and narrowing them down based on preferences. It seems a little cold, but it's also efficient, and I am an engineer, after all. That said, there's no substitute for personal interaction, so I also liked the idea of speed dating, even if it is a little cringy. Enter the creative problem solver.

What if we put together a group of pre-selected women and let them vie for the attention of a single, eligible bachelor, with the hope that he will eventually find 'The One.'

Okay, so it's really just a rip off of a reality dating show, but what if it was done on an international scale with a legit dual-sport star / millionaire as the prize?

With just this general concept in mind, about two months after the Super Bowl I was on the phone with the friend of a friend of a friendly acquaintance, who actually sounded intrigued by the idea. This led to another discussion, and then another.

Eventually, I was at the headquarters of JJC Media Services, inc. to put the plan in motion. These nice folks were the ones who would fund the idea, in return for creating an all-access web series.

Why would I agree to such a thing?

Two main reasons. The first is that I wanted the candidate pool to be as large as possible and JJC is an international company. Second, and probably more importantly, I'm a bit of an exhibitionist.

I don't mean that in the sense of stripping naked and running down the street -- although I would probably do that given the right motivation -- I mean that I like being in front of people and having their attention on me. It's not an extrovert thing; more like an attention-seeking thing. Chalk it up to another one of my quirks. Remember that I had played a prominent role in the Super Bowl two months prior and was now at least casually famous in more than a hundred countries. I missed it.

The folks I hired at Brooke, Brooke, and Ramirez, LLP, went over the contract in great detail, then did it again. There was a little back and forth over how many points I would get against revenue, but that wasn't my primary focus so the negotiations didn't get hung up too badly. In the end, I would have veto power on content, but JJC would retain creative control, which I thought was actually pretty generous on their part.

With the legal stuff in place, we took the idea to my sponsors. Most were on-board with the idea -- any publicity is good publicity, after all -- and the few holdouts were bought out with more help from my lawyer friends.*

*not really friends

To begin in earnest, we needed a way to narrow down the profiles of women to determine who might be a good fit with me. Enter Aristotle Analytics, Ltd., a group of bright young data scientists. They would be in charge of the survey and results, including creating the compatibility algorithm, upon which everything else depended. Nice group of people, but so incredibly smart that I always felt dumb around them.

For me, the survey was extremely time consuming. I was asked more than ten thousand questions over the course of several days, many of which were restatements of previous questions, to characterize my personality, needs, desires, and so forth, as closely as possible. The corresponding surveys for any interested women would be quite a bit different and would narrow them down in stages so that accuracy could be obtained without the hours of computer time required by my version.

Six months to the day after the Super Bowl, I went on a national late night show to discuss my retirement, but in actuality, the purpose was to let the world know about the web series. With a copy of the Post article tucked under my arm, I walked across the stage to greet the host with a smile on my face.

~ ~ ~

The entryway at JJC is beautiful and makes me smile every time I'm there. The front-facing wall is entirely glass, which allows lots of light into the the large, open space. On the right as you come in is an honest-to-goodness brook that runs the length of the room, complete with palm trees and palm bushes (I don't know if that's such a thing, but I'm sure you can imagine). If it weren't for the underwater lighting that changes color to suit the need, you could almost, maybe, kinda-sorta forget you were on West Randolph Street in Chicago.

On the opposite wall is a full service tea shop that specializes in pastries from around the world. I never cared for tiramisu or baklava, but I love strawberry tortes and pain au chocolate, and both go well with my daily cup of Earl Grey or an afternoon chai between meetings. Yes, they have coffee; no I don't know what type, because it's all gross.

I waved to the security guard as I approached, and since it was half past nine, there was no line. I was thinking 'Michael,' but wasn't sure, so just said, "Morning."

"Good morning to you, too, Mr. Haven. Another long day of meetings?" he asked politely as I laid out my personal effects on the small conveyor belt so they could be x-rayed.

"Yeah, but it's interesting, so not bad at all." His name tag said M. Hastings -- not helpful.

"Glad to hear it, sir. You have a great day," he finished, handing me the bowl with my belongings.

"Thanks, and same to you, Micah," I replied, remembering at the last moment. His face brightened considerably and I felt good as I walked to the elevator.

I was still smiling, pleased with myself, as I stepped onto the twenty-second floor. I'm not so good with names, so getting one right for a change was nice. Besides, Micah and I had probably spent an hour shooting the breeze over the course of my previous three visits, mostly about sports, but I also knew he was married and had a seven year old daughter. Weird, right? I could tell you he has a seventy minute commute and drives a Prius, but can't keep his name straight. Or couldn't. Now that I'd almost messed it up, his name would be firmly fixed in my mind (for a while).

Mrs. Higgens, or Gloria, as she asked to be called, was easier for me to remember. I can still picture her waiting for me in the reception area that day, wearing a white dress shirt with a form fitting charcoal pencil skirt. Standard attire for the business world, I know, but I almost walked into a potted plant. I don't know if it was the way she always had her dark hair pulled up and back to show off her face and slender neck, or the rimless glasses that drew attention to her big brown eyes; maybe it was her smooth mocha skin. Or maybe it's that she's the kind of woman I hoped to meet through this whole adventure: smart, professional, classy, and astonishingly sexy.

Remember how I said I get along easily with women? Since Birdie removed herself from my life -- okay, that's not fair, but you know what I mean -- and dating seriously became a possibility, I found myself tongue tied much more often. Gloria did that to me, and it always took a few moments to re-acclimate to being around her.

She was nice enough to ignore my almost-stumble and shook my hand warmly, smiling up at me. "Good morning, Kai. Ready to get started?"

I just nodded and smiled back, not yet trusting my still recovering tongue as she led me down the gray tiled hall toward her office. As we entered she nodded to her assistant, a pretty blonde intern from a local community college, but I couldn't tell you her name. It wasn't five minutes before two men walked into the room, both also wearing smiles that appeared genuine.

Rick was to be the creative genius, and he had the eccentric, slightly scattered look that reinforced the idea. Sam, his partner, was the realist, and was always more buttoned down. Together they were going to help Gloria and I figure how to actually set up the show. Not that it mattered a great deal, but I suspected the guys were effective together because they were more than just work buddies. Regardless, their ideas that morning were great, even though I disagreed with all of them.

My biggest complaint was that I didn't want to follow a 'tried and true' format -- I wanted to do something with an actual chance for success. To me, this wasn't a publicity stunt, and I was eventually able to make them see that I was serious on this point. The other piece that was crucial to me was that I didn't want to lie, deceive, or mislead any of the women. If this was going to be a forever arrangement, it had to be built on trust.

So how do you do those things in a reality show? This was the question we tried to answer for the entire morning as the sun slowly traced a path upward along the wall of tinted windows lining Gloria's office. The process was fun for me, a bit like being back in senior design in college where we had to come up with a new solution to an old problem. It turned out our answer was quite simple: stream the entire thing live with a thirty-second delay in case something really bad happened that shouldn't or couldn't be shown, with the goal being to provide a reasonably realistic, unfiltered view of the entire process.

What about modesty, profanity, or just plain stupidity on my part? It's real life and that stuff happens, so we'd just have a really strong disclaimer.

For me, it was a near ideal solution, because it meant I wouldn't have to keep secrets between women. For example, if they wanted to know where I took a date, or how it went, they could just watch it for themselves. This is going to sound crazy given what I had set in motion, but I hate drama. I don't mind chaos or change or excitement, but artificial, unnecessary nonsense wears me out. I was hoping full disclosure would keep this to a minimum.

Sam gave me a 'you poor dumb bastard' smile and patted me on the back; Rick seemed to think this was the best idea in the world. Gloria was looking downright predatory, and to this day, I've never seen her look sexier (even if she did scare me just a tiny bit in the moment).

The following morning we started on the details.

The first survey phase -- they called it open enrollment -- would last two weeks. They were ambitious, hoping for twenty-five thousand applications, of which maybe a quarter would be serious. The audacity to think that many women might be interested still makes my mind boggle.

From there, it would be a series of increasingly specific questionnaires, eventually narrowing down to around a hundred women. Then I would look through self-written biographies and pick thirty or so that I wanted to meet.

It was at this point that we got into a heated debate. I really didn't want to see the pictures or names, because I didn't want the process to turn into a beauty pageant, nor did I want to let my American white guy biases form the basis for choosing. Gloria argued that I might not be attracted to any of the women I selected, which would screw up the entire effort. I laughed.

Then I laughed some more.

Gloria got pissed.

It took a while, but I eventually won her over with a simple, rational explanation. I didn't have a 'type.' I had only ever been infatuated with one woman, and I don't think many people would have called Birdie beautiful -- that wasn't why she appealed to me.

I would be able to tell a lot from the essays. Even if they weren't good writers themselves, they could get help from people that were, which would at least indicate determination and resourcefulness. There was also the possibility to see their educational background and career choice. I really like capable women. Pair the essays with the Aristotle Analytics Algorithm (that's a mouthful, but data scientists aren't known for their artistic sides -- lets call it 3A from now on), and I would have a great chance at finding one or more women with whom I clicked.

Or so I hoped.

We had agreement! And I only had to threaten to leave one time.

We took a break and I sipped chai while sharing war stories with Micah in the lobby. Now that I had a few of my own, I found I didn't mind so much as I once had.

The afternoon was a bit easier. Gloria had finally accepted my general vision, and her and the guys had become fully engaged, making everything I suggested better. No single house with a bunch of women interred within: remember the no drama goal? No group dates, because who thinks that's a good idea? No fantasy dates, at least until there were only one or two women left. Lots of focus on real conversation, real activities, and real relationships.

As we neared the end of the day, I was ecstatic.

There were still logistics to work out, like living arrangements, but Gloria had people to deal with those details. For me, the task was to rest up for a couple weeks and then get ready for a quick publicity blast to LA, New York, and London to announce the initial survey's launch.

It was a lot of travel in five days, but not nearly so hard as the following months, waiting for the enrollment period and subsequent survey rounds to end. I spent even more hours at the gym, trying to wear myself out so I could sleep at night. I actually lost almost ten pounds, but it was more from having no appetite than anything else.

The Big Day finally arrived and I was back at JJC twenty minutes early, dressed in gray slacks and a black turtleneck, my version of business attire. You might call that eccentric, but suit coats are flat out stupid, because you can barely move your arms, and I'm an engineer, so nine times out of ten I care more about function than form. I was wearing really comfortable, really expensive, really large custom black oxfords, which dressed up the look quite a bit, so at least that's something. My hair was freshly trimmed (but not too freshly), I had shaved carefully, and was even wearing a little cologne. Altogether it was a bit like putting lipstick on pig, but I was hoping to be at my best.

Micah could see I was nervous so he left me be, only motioning me forward when it was finally time. Following a handshake and a smile, he good naturedly pushed me toward the elevator.

The ride up took about an hour and a half and I might have blacked out at some point. Not really, but I was more nervous than I had been at any point during the Super Bowl.

I took a couple deep breaths as we approached floor twenty, forced my shoulders to relax, and was ready when the doors opened a few seconds later. I saw the camera immediately and thought about ignoring it, then decided that was stupid and waved with a grin. Gloria and her guys were also waiting for me, dressed like they were going to the White House, or maybe a funeral, all looking very severe in black suits; she still looked fantastic.

I started to walk toward them and realized the office layout was a little different and there was no sign of potted plants. Before I could help it, I was smiling broadly at the thought that they didn't want me falling on my face in front of an international audience. "I see you rearranged a little," I said to Gloria as I approached. "Didn't want me to make a scene the first day, huh?"

She smiled back, a bit embarrassed. "I thought you might be a bit nervous and trip on something, but you seem to be doing fine."

I chuckled. "I aged about ten years in the elevator, but I'm doing better now. I can't tell you how excited I am to begin."

Gloria laughed, as did Rick; even Sam smiled. "Like a kid in a candy store," she observed.

I shook my head with mock seriousness. "This is going to be so, so much better than that." My fake demeanor broke before I could finish and I was back to bouncing from foot to foot. "Seriously, can we get started? This was already the longest month of my life."

Gloria patted me on the elbow. "Sure, Kai. How about we do some introductions?"

I nodded gladly.

Our day cameraman's name was Bill, a fit guy in his forties that had worked on several reality shows. Our night guy would be Will (yes, really), and I would meet him later. The stand-in's name was Toby, and he would take over when one of the Williams couldn't make it. One of them would be with me Monday through Saturday; Sundays would be shot handy cam style or using cameras mounted in the apartment building that had been rented for our use. As we had discussed, the feeds were going out live, managed by a round-the-clock production crew to make sure the best streams were broadcast.

As me and Bill finished bumping knuckles -- shaking hands would have been difficult with the camera on his shoulder -- a petite blonde woman stepped forward and offered hers; I recognized her immediately. "You were at the Super Bowl presser, weren't you?"

She smiled happily. "Stephanie Perkins, Mr. Haven. I'll be acting as the hostess."

I gave Gloria a confused look, then turned back to the young woman. "Welcome aboard, but what does hostess entail? We're not doing anything so tacky as handing out roses and nobody's getting voted off."

"Stephanie is a late addition, but one I think you'll appreciate," said Gloria smoothly. "She'll talk with the women before or after dates and keep things calm in group settings. She'll also be interviewing you regularly so you don't need to do awkward monologues."

I raised my hand to object, but it made good sense, so I lowered it. Anyway, there was something else she said that caught my attention. "Group settings?"

"Another late addition," replied Gloria. This time, I could see the predator in her eyes.

"Well, at least it will be interesting," I said, realizing it was not the time for a debate. "Ms. Perkins, please call me Kai. I have a feeling we're going to be seeing a lot of each other, so we might as well be friendly."

"Sounds good, Kai -- my family calls me Steph."

"Not other people?" I inquired jokingly. Instead of smiling, Stephanie turned bright red, from the top of her forehead all the way down to the modest gap in her shirt. "Was that too direct?" I asked, feeling immediately guilty, but not really knowing what I did wrong. "Sometimes I overstep with the personal questions."

She stifled a little snort and shook her head, then smiled again, albeit shyly. "They call me Perky."