Good Signs

Evil

I made reservations at a nice restaurant downtown for R's birthday dinner. Neither of us had been there before, but it's a newish place and reputed to be quite good so I was looking forward to it.

It had been raining lightly but steadily all day, so I decided to dress casually: button-down shirt, jeans, and dress sneakers. The last thing I need is to drag my Ferragamos through the puddles. I meet R at the train station and a mental "uh-oh" immediately pops into my head. She's much more dressed up than me. She's in a simple but elegant black dress. I know it's a new dress because it had just arrived in the mail a few days before and she had showed it to me. She takes a look at my outfit. I see her eyes do the quick scan from head to toe. Then she smiles and even lets out a little chuckle. "I should have dressed more casually too. It's been raining all day," she says.

We take the subway downtown and by the time we get out of the subway station, the sky had completely opened up. The rain was falling in sheets and the wind had whipped up so even with umbrellas, we were drenched within seconds. The restaurant was only 3 blocks away. I ask R if she wants to hide out in a Duane Reade til the rain lets up a bit. She is, after all, wearing a skirt and open toed heels. She says that we're already here, so we might as well make a run for it. We're trudging through the rain. I'm jumping over the deep puddles that have gathered at the curb. R jumps over them too.

We arrive at the restaurant about 20 minutes after our reservation time, so they ask us to wait at the bar til a table opens up. R is wiping her lower legs with paper towels. She shakes the water off her raincoat. Her hair is all wet. I'm all wet too. This seems disastrous: two really soggy people at a nice restaurant, late for our reservations. I ask R if she's upset because this is the type of things that I expect girls to get upset about. She says she isn't. "You know, it's like, whatever." Those were her exact words.

We wait at the bar. It's a great bar area. Really cozy and dim. A good looking crowd hanging out. I ask R what she's drinking. She peruses the drink menu. Great wine selection. Some really good-looking specialty cocktails as well. She closes the menu, looks up. "I'll have a Knob Creek, on the rocks." Awesome! I did the same, and the bourbon felt just right at the moment. It made us a little warm, more at ease. Feeling good.