I said it with my whole chest, in our kitchen, the first night of freshers week. I was not going to date anyone for the entire first year of uni. I was going to focus. I was going to read. I was going to finally learn how to cook something that wasn't a grain bowl.
My flatmates nodded politely, which I now understand was them clocking it was going to be me, first.
Day 1: The announcement
I genuinely meant it. I'd had a rough last-year-of-school breakup and I'd promised myself this was going to be my era of Being Single On Purpose. I downloaded a reading app. I started a plant. I bought a kettle.
I did not uninstall the dating app, because apparently I wanted to leave one door open to personally betray myself.
Day 3: The first fold
Wednesday we went to the club that every first year goes to on Wednesdays. You know the one. £4 drinks, sticky floors, the DJ plays the same ABBA song twice per set.
I didn't kiss anyone. I want that on the record. I did, however, give someone my Instagram, which in retrospect is like saying "technically I didn't have cake I only had a slice."
Day 5: The message
He messaged. Oli. Second year, history, from Leeds. Opened with a screenshot of my Instagram story where I had accidentally filmed the sticky club floor.
"This is the real horror we should be talking about."
I laughed out loud in my single-occupancy bed. I replied. I told myself replying wasn't dating, it was being polite. I am a bad lawyer to myself.
Day 6: The coffee
He suggested coffee. I said yes before my brain caught up. We met at the campus cafe that pretends to be indie but is owned by a university subsidiary.
Coffee turned into a walk. The walk turned into him asking if I wanted to see the second-year library because "it's nicer." I said yes. The library wasn't that nice. We spent 20 minutes whispering and not actually looking at any books.
The "no dating" year was already on life support and I had personally unplugged it.
Day 8: The flatmate audit
My flatmate Priya cornered me in the kitchen.
"So how's the no dating thing going."
I tried to explain that a coffee wasn't a date. Priya, who I had known for 7 days, already had my number. "Mate, you came home smiling at your phone. That's a date. That's objectively a date."
I said I was just making a friend. Priya laughed for what felt like an uncomfortably long time.
Day 9: The steps
He walked me home from a pub Saturday night. The sky was doing that pink-orange thing it does in cities at 2am. My building has these weird concrete steps with bad lighting.
We kissed on the steps. It was the most cliche moment of my life and I was fully aware of it in real time, which somehow made it worse and better.
I remember thinking, halfway through the kiss: "I have to tell Priya. I can't tell Priya. Priya is going to be insufferable about this."
Day 10: The confession
I went into the kitchen the next morning. Priya was already there making instant coffee. She did not look up. She just said "so" with the "o" extended for about four full seconds.
I told her. She made me pay her a pound. Apparently there'd been a bet on how long my rule would last. She had nine days. She won.
Why the rule actually failed
I've thought about this a lot. The "no dating" rule wasn't actually about dating. It was about trying to prevent myself from getting hurt by the next year before it even started.
And the thing is, rules you make out of fear are the ones that shatter the second something nice happens. I didn't meet Oli and think "I am now choosing to break my rule." I met Oli and realized the rule was a wall I built because the last breakup felt like a door slamming.
The wall came down because someone sent me a funny screenshot of a sticky floor.
What the 9 days taught me
- Blanket rules are panic, not strategy. "No dating" never meant "no being open to a nice person." It meant "I'm scared." Name it better.
- Your flatmates always know first. Do not try to hide a crush from people who share a bathroom with you.
- Freshers week is a hyper-compressed dating experience. Your normal six-month timeline happens in nine days. This is fine. Let it.
- The "I'll focus on myself" era can include someone else. These aren't opposite. You can read the book and also kiss someone on steps.
Are Oli and I still together?
Going on eight months now. Still together. He still sends me sticky floor photos. We went back to that exact club for one of our anniversaries, which is objectively unhinged behavior, and we loved it.
I still haven't learned to cook anything that isn't a grain bowl. The plant is alive. The kettle gets a lot of use.
To anyone about to make the rule
Go ahead. Announce it in your kitchen. Buy the kettle. Download the reading app. Just don't be shocked when, on day 9, someone sends you a screenshot and you laugh out loud in your single bed. The rule was always going to give. That's kind of the point of being 19.
