He ordered one of the most expensive wines available on the menu.
“We’re celebrating something important tonight,” he announced, raising his glass toward hers.
Celebrating what exactly? she wondered silently, her fingers nervously adjusting her hair repeatedly.
She kept glancing at his jacket pocket like someone half her age hoping for fireworks and magic.
An Evening That Seemed Perfect
Dinner was extravagant in every way—premium steak, lobster prepared beautifully, specialty side dishes, elaborate desserts they couldn’t even finish completely.
They talked and laughed together, reminiscing about their first tiny apartment, the road trip where their vehicle broke down in the middle of nowhere, the pet they kept saying they would adopt “someday soon.”
She genuinely thought this was finally the moment she had been waiting for.
When the check arrived at their table, she didn’t even glance at it. She was too focused on trying to calm her breathing and racing heartbeat.
He picked up the bill and looked at it.
Then he placed it directly between them on the table.
“The total is three hundred eighty dollars,” he said casually, as though discussing the weather. “Let’s split it evenly.”
She blinked, certain she had misunderstood.
“What did you say?”
