Disappearing Act

I wish I could see inside people's heads sometimes.
My latest curiosity is a fellow I'll call Bill.
We responded to each other's questions, exchanged personal email addresses and had some good exchanges. He seemed so interested!  Wanted to know all about my work and was positive about all the things we had in common, complimenting my writing style.

A phone call seemed to go well.  We chatted amiably and covered a lot of ground including when to meet.  Dinner was on the agenda....he professed to be a bit of a foodie but assured me that he didn't need fancy places to eat.  I promised, since he was the one driving to me, to research places to eat in my area and report back with options.

Armed with a great recommendation by a trusted friend I reached out to Bill, ready to solidify the time.
I was looking forward to meeting.
His response:  "How about coffee instead of dinner at this first meeting?  Then if we want to we can move to dinner."  It wasn't that he preferred coffee that threw me off base.  It was that he downgraded our meeting to coffee after clearly signing up for dinner.  I don't want to overthink things but I am positive that I understood dinner.  Sigh.

Okay, coffee it is.  Let's meet at the local gourmet coffee place.
The next day I received another surprising response..."I forgot I have a meeting at 4 p.m. followed by Bible Study.  Can we meet one day later?"  Well, goodness.  I realize that there are calendar challenged people, and I have had my own transgressions with dates and times and events.  So who am I to criticize someone when it happens TO me, instead of me as the cause?  Still, what if I wasn't free?  In fact I had another potential commitment on the day he proposed but it wasn't solid (that's another post!) so I agreed to the date change.
Still looking forward to meeting Bill as he had seemed like a good enough bet for a pleasant cup of coffee.

Then came the final blow, the day of the intended meeting.
"I've caught a cold of all things.  I'm going to stay home and take care of myself.  Maybe we can meet another time."  Bill

Okay, wiser minds than mine:  How intent on meeting does this person seem to be?  No mention of let's talk in a couple days to pick another time.  No 'warm regards' as had been the case earlier.  Suddenly all the promise of Saturday night's phone call was shrunk to a postage stamp size of possibility by Thursday.

Trying to take the high road while balancing irritation, confusion and curiosity, I sent another email professing my uncertainty that he wanted to meet at all.  Confirming that he didn't owe me a thing, I offered my intuition that the jets were cooling quickly.  Could he please let me know what he thinks of my impression?
That was Thursday.  Today is Tuesday.  Not a peep.  Is he a coward?  A cad? I can't tell you because I didn't even get far enough to hazard a guess.  What he is however, is off my list and someone about whom I'm not going to spend any more time wondering.

Still, I'm mighty curious:  did he think he was being smooth?  Did he think I couldn't telll the difference between Saturday and Thursday?  Why not just say, "I've changed my mind and prefer not to meet after all."
Does anyone say that?

Next time, three dates in one week....with the same guy.