Mine! No, wait, Yours!

Last night, the BEST THING EVER happened.
No, I didn't win the Albertson's Monopoly Game (though on Saturday night, I was briefly convinced I'd won a $1,000.00 gift card, but that was a false alarm).
No, I didn't have the people from ABC come knocking on my door to tell me I was going to be on "Extreme Makeover."
No, I didn't even get a letter from my beloved Jacob Hatch.
OK, so it wasn't the best thing ever. But it was rather funny.
So there's this girl I know from church. She is, to put it delicately, a handful. Nice girl, I suppose, but she has a reputation for being wildly inappropriate. She's a major bum-slapper (which is mostly a problem because she tends to do it to all these guys she doesn't know) and often throws out the false doctrine during Sunday School. She means well, but being around her can be more than a little taxing. Even writing this, I feel a little guilty, but those who know her would likely say I'm being more than generous.
Well, probably one of the more difficult aspects of her personality is that she's a bit of a claim-staker. We all know those girls. They let all the other girls know that some guy is "hers" and that the rest of us should keep our mitts off. The best thing about claim stakers is they never "claim" their boyfriend, because they inevitably don't have one. They just pick out any number of men they like (and yes, it's always more than one) and let all the other girls know he's (they're) the One, so stand back.
I've had a lot of experience with claim stakers. I think I even was one, back in high school. I was in LURVE with this boy (lurve because I thought it was love, though it was really just that childhood infatuation-- one of the most enjoyable times of my life, though the friendship was complex and silly, and now he's happily married and I am thrilled for him), and everyone in the world knew it. Including this girl who moved into my high school and moved in on my man. He took her to prom. I was devastated, and went to Utah with my mom instead. I remember when she showed me their prom pictures, and I wanted to slap her across her ugly face. But then I grew up. If he'd liked me, he would have asked ME to prom. So he didn't. So I moved on. And even though I can laugh about it now, I really thought she was the meanest girl ever.
In an effort to not duplicate her despicable actions, I became very aware of other girls' feelings. When my childhood best friend asked me to Prom the next year, I had to tell him no. Why couldn't I go? We would have had the best time ever! But this nice little German-Turkish exchange student had told me for months that her dream of dreams and the thing that would make her time in America absolutely complete would be if Justin took her to Prom. She didn't mean to be a claim-staker (I don't think), but I just couldn't face the idea of being her Danette, and ended up going with my friend Josette and only dancing with drunk Mr. Peters. Not the most fun night of my life, but I still left with the satisfaction that I'd not been THAT GIRL.
Well, fast forward ten years (ten years!) and I'm still trying to not be that girl. I've been on the other end of it plenty of times, though. In college, I had a MAJOR crush on a guy with curly brown hair and converse, who just happened to be a genius and a dreamer. He was the bomb. But this little girl I knew kind of weaseled her way into my life, establishing herself as my "best friend" (and don't get me wrong, I love her!) so she could get to this guy. She approached me saying, "well, you know Mr. Hot Face so much better than I do... could you put in a word for me?" Of course, it never worked. Because if he'd been interested in her, he would have asked her out. But in the mean time, when she asked me early on if I was interested in him, I certainly couldn't tell her the truth, because that would be breaking the girl code. I was stuck. Not that I would have had much more chance with Mr. Hot Face than she did, but her stalking him took a major toll on my relationship with him. Boo.
Anyway, the funny thing last night was when current claim-staker called, asking me for a major favor. She wanted to know if a certain man of our mutual acquaintance (read: one of my closest boy friends) was available. For one brief wicked moment, I thought about telling her, "Yes, please go forward full steam ahead" only because he spent about two months being super mean to me. But instead, I was honest and told her that he was seeing someone, and I thought they were exclusive. But of course, she wasn't phased. In true claim-staker fashion, she moved on to her No. 2 man, who just happens to be another boy who recently asked me out and then bailed at the last minute. I have very little use for him, so I gave her my whole-hearted endorsement. Perhaps this is wicked, but all's fair in love and war, right?
She then said, "Oh, Rach, who are you interested in? You're welcome to confide in me!" Um, no thanks. Because claim-stakers are inevitably back-stabbers as well. I was happy that I could honestly tell her I'm in the midst of a self-imposed sabbatical; that the last boy I thought I could be interested in has turned out to be far beneath my personal standards, and that I was honestly not interested in anyone. But you can bet that if my status changes, she'll be the last to know. In the meantime, I am kept plenty busy with girls walking me out to some parking lot or another telling me who I'm not allowed to go out with. Joke's on them, though, because I don't want them anyway.