Available by Laura Friedman Williams

Author:Laura Friedman Williams [Williams, Laura Friedman]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: HarperCollins Publishers
Published: 2021-05-10T17:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER 20

Number Four (and a Half)

As a warm-up exercise, I arrange to meet a man named Kevin on a weekday afternoon. He and I had been exchanging texts on Tinder when he tersely let me know that he isn’t into endless text exchanges, that if I’m interested in him we should arrange a phone call. His bio lured me in with his having attended an almost-Ivy League school and his career as a writer. On the phone, I decide to ignore his heavy Brooklyn accent tinged with a nasal quality, opting instead to focus on the fact that he is smart and funny. We set a date for me to go to the residential neighborhood where he lives in Brooklyn. He will meet me at the subway station and we can walk to a café from there. I tell him I know my way around the area and can meet him somewhere, but he says it’ll be easier to pick me up at the station. I will soon learn a valuable lesson: meet on neutral ground and have a plan so you don’t have to make decisions on the fly, especially when you’re someone like me who often resorts to being polite first and self-protective second.

Climbing up the stairs of the subway station on a beautiful blue-sky September day, I spot Kevin waiting at the top. He looks like his pictures – bald, gleaming head, muscular, a bit thicker and more solid than I had pictured him. He leans in for a quick hug and then points me in the direction we will walk in, which I know is where the main street is, with lots of cafés where we can perch for an hour or two. He asks if I want to grab cups of coffee that we can take to the park, which I immediately agree to – going for a walk seems less intimidating than sitting face to face.

A few blocks later, he says, “Actually, we can make coffee at my place to take to the park, my apartment is right here.”

“Oh,” I say, pausing. “Um, no, you don’t have to bother, we can just pick it up.”

“It’ll just take a minute and we’re here already,” he says, pointing to a street-level door at the base of a brownstone.

I reluctantly agree. This is my first Tinder date and he seems so self-assured that I try to ignore the red flag being waved directly in front of me. I don’t want to seem nervous or suspicious as that would be a huge turn-off, but entering his apartment seems like a frankly bad idea. I feel trapped and unsure what to do, still more concerned with how I appear than with my own safety, but I try to exude nonchalance, following him as he slides the key into the iron gate leading to the front door. Inside, the apartment is dark and drab – the natural light is dim and his room-length bookshelves are filled with bulky hardcovers, CDs and DVDs.

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