My four-inch heels made me impossible to miss beside the restaurant window. I thought Richard wanted me to feel beautiful on my first date in 12 years. Then a black SUV stopped, two men got out, and he dragged me toward the kitchen. I couldn’t tell whether he was saving me or leading me into a trap.
Richard checked his watch for the third time, then looked past my shoulder toward the restaurant window.
He was clearly nervous.
I just couldn’t tell whether it was because of me or something outside.
He was clearly nervous.
“Are you expecting someone, Richie?”
His fingers paused against the watchband. “No. I’m enjoying the evening.”
“You seem more interested in the street than your dinner.”
He gave me a quick smile and reached for his water.
“Are you expecting someone, Richie?”
The ice had melted, but he still stirred it with the straw.
Something about the way he kept watching the street bothered me.
I blamed it on first-date nerves.
At 74, after 12 years without romance, I was nervous too.
Something about the way he kept watching the street bothered me.
Besides, Richard had seemed different.
Most men noticed my height before they noticed anything else.
I had been six feet eight since I was 19, which meant I had heard every basketball joke and every question about the weather “up there.”
Richard had seemed different.
My husband, Thomas, had been five feet ten and entirely unimpressed by the difference.
When we danced, he rested his cheek against my shoulder and claimed I had the best view of his thinning hair.
We had 41 years together.
My husband, Thomas, had been five feet ten.
After he died, I assumed that part of my life had ended with him.
My granddaughter disagreed.
“Grandma, you need to meet people,” she announced one Sunday, taking my phone before I could object.
I assumed that part of my life had ended with him.
“I meet people at the grocery store, dear,” I said. “The butcher gave me a free chicken last month.”
“Geez! I’m thinking of someone who might buy you dinner.”
Twenty minutes later, I had a dating profile.
Marilyn, 74. Loves detective novels, gardening, and men who don’t ask whether she plays basketball.
“I meet people at the grocery store, dear.”
She insisted on listing my height.
I hesitated.
“Why frighten them before they meet me?”
“Anyone frightened by you isn’t worth meeting, Grandma.”
She insisted on listing my height.
***
Three days later, I matched with Richard, a 76-year-old widower who stood five feet five.
His first message asked whether I preferred solving a mystery before the detective or being surprised.
“Surprised,” I wrote, “provided the author hasn’t cheated.”
For two weeks, we traded messages.
I matched with Richard, a 76-year-old widower.
“Did I tell you the neighborhood cat has begun sleeping beneath my hydrangeas?”
“No. That’s nice!” I’d replied.
He remembered small things.
When I mentioned my roses were struggling, he asked about them days later.
He remembered small things.
When I told him about Thomas, he didn’t offer advice about moving on.
He simply said he missed his wife too.
Then he invited me to dinner.
The night before our date, a peculiar message appeared.
He missed his wife.
“Would you mind wearing your tallest heels?”
I thought it was weird.
I sent a reply immediately.
“Richie, I’m already six foot eight. In heels, I’ll be over seven feet tall.”
“Would you mind wearing your tallest heels?”
“Please, Marilyn. It’s important to me.”
I almost canceled.
Men before Thomas had asked me to sit for photographs or wear flats around their friends.
Richard was the first to request more height.
I almost canceled.
Perhaps he liked it.
Perhaps he wanted me to feel beautiful.
At the back of my closet, I found the navy four-inch heels I had worn to my granddaughter’s wedding.
I thought they’d go well with the navy dress I planned to wear.
Perhaps he liked it.
I sent Richard a picture.
“All right, Richie. But don’t complain if I block the restaurant lighting.”
He replied with three smiling emojis.
***
The following evening, my granddaughter stood in my bedroom doorway while I fastened the ankle straps.
I sent Richard a picture.
“You look gorgeous, Grandma.”
“I look qualified to dust ceiling fans.”
She took a photograph anyway.
In it, I was smiling more broadly than I had realized.
“You look gorgeous, Grandma.”
The navy dress had been Thomas’s favorite, though I had not worn it since his funeral.
Choosing it did not feel like replacing him.
It felt like carrying the life we had shared into a room I had been afraid to enter alone.
I had not worn it since his funeral.
***
Richard waited beneath the restaurant’s brass awning.
He was smaller than his profile pictures suggested, with silver hair carefully combed and a red pocket square that sat slightly crooked.
He looked up at me and smiled so broadly that I laughed.
He was smaller than his profile pictures suggested.
“Perfect!” he murmured.
“You certainly got your wish, Richie.”
He kissed my hand.
Then his gaze slipped past me toward the traffic.
“Perfect!”
Inside, the hostess offered us a quiet table near the fireplace.
Richard pointed toward the front instead.
“Could we have the one beside the window?”
The hostess warned that it was exposed to the sidewalk, but he insisted the view was better.
Richard pointed toward the front instead.
I thought he meant the city lights.
Now those heels rested beneath a table beside the restaurant’s front window, exactly where Richard had insisted we sit.
***
Moments later, a black sedan slowed outside.
Richard stopped stirring his water.
I thought he meant the city lights.
When it continued down the street, his shoulders lowered.
“What was that?” I asked.
“Nothing. I’m a little nervous.”
That answer might have satisfied me if he hadn’t immediately checked his watch again.
“What was that?”
Our appetizers arrived.
Richard asked about my garden, but his gaze kept returning to the glass.
I tried to recapture the easy man from our messages.
He hadn’t heard a word.
His gaze kept returning to the glass.
Then he set down his fork.
“Marilyn, would you mind standing?”
“Standing?”
“Just for a moment. I’d love to see how tall you look in those heels.”
“Marilyn, would you mind standing?”
I glanced at the surrounding tables. “Right here?”
“Please.”
There was no admiration in his voice now.
The word came too quickly, as if we were running late.
“Right here?”
Still, refusing felt like turning a peculiar request into a scene.
I pushed back my chair.
“If someone asks me to change a ceiling fixture, you’re explaining.”
Refusing felt like turning a peculiar request into a scene.
In those heels, I stood close to seven feet tall, and people noticed immediately.
A little boy near the entrance stopped chewing until his mother redirected him toward his plate.
Richard did not look at me.
He stared through the window.
People noticed immediately.
A black SUV had stopped across the street.
Two men stepped onto the sidewalk.
One wore a dark jacket.
The other surveyed the restaurant entrance.
A black SUV had stopped across the street.
Richard’s hand closed around my wrist.
“Sit down. Now.”
His grip hurt.
“Richie, let go.”
He loosened his fingers but kept hold of me.
“Sit down. Now.”
With his free hand, he dropped several bills beside his untouched plate.
“We need to leave.”
“Who are those men?”
“I’ll explain outside.”
He pulled me toward a doorway beside the kitchen.
“We need to leave.”
My heels struck the tile sharply, each step reminding me how difficult running would be.
I could not tell whether Richard feared those men or intended to hand me over to someone waiting behind the building.
***
The restaurant manager stepped into our path.
Richard feared those men.
“Sir, guests aren’t permitted through the kitchen.”
“We need another exit.”
The manager looked at Richard’s hand around my wrist, then met my eyes.
“Ma’am, do you want to go with him?”
“Sir, guests aren’t permitted through the kitchen.”
I pulled free.
“No. I don’t.”
The manager shifted between us.
One of the men from the SUV entered the restaurant.
I pulled free.
He spotted Richard near the kitchen and walked toward us.
“Richard.”
Richard pressed two fingers to his forehead.
The stranger stopped several feet away.
His anger seemed aimed entirely at my date.
He spotted Richard near the kitchen and walked toward us.
“Where are you going?”
I stayed beside the manager. “Who are you?”
The man looked surprised. “I’m Eleanor’s husband.”
“Who is Eleanor?”
“Where are you going?”
Richard studied the floor tiles.
“His daughter,” the man answered. “The daughter he asked to drive past this restaurant tonight.”
I turned toward Richard. “You arranged this?”
“His daughter.”
***
The man introduced himself as Daniel.
The other man was the driver, waiting near the SUV.
Neither had come for me.
“Eleanor thought you wanted her to see something,” Daniel told Richard. “Why did you run when we arrived?”
The man introduced himself as Daniel.
“I panicked.”
“Because of me?” I asked.
Richard rubbed the side of his thumb against his palm.
“I wanted Eleanor to see us together. She has worried about me since her mother died. I thought if she saw me enjoying dinner, she’d stop treating me like I was falling apart.”
“I panicked.”
The window table, the watch, and the heels settled into one ugly picture.
“You asked me to stand so your daughter couldn’t miss me.”
He looked toward the dining room rather than at me.
“You weren’t admiring my height,” I added. “You were using it as a sign in the window.”
The heels settled into one ugly picture.
“Marilyn, I do admire you.”
“Did you ever plan to tell me she was coming?”
His lips parted, but no answer followed.
The request for heels had made me feel chosen.
“Marilyn, I do admire you.”
Now I understood that Richard had chosen me partly because no passing car could overlook me.
***
A woman entered in a wheelchair and moved toward us with practiced, quick turns.
Daniel stepped aside.
Her eyes went first to Richard, then to me, and finally to the wrist I was rubbing.
A woman entered in a wheelchair.
“What happened?”
“Eleanor,” Richard began, “I can explain.”
She ignored him. “Ma’am, are you all right?”
“I’m Marilyn,” I said. “Your father grabbed me when he saw the SUV.”
Eleanor’s hand settled on one wheel. “Did he tell you I was coming?”
“What happened?”
“No.”
She closed her eyes and rubbed her forehead, as though she’d heard a version of this before.
“Dad, I agreed to drive past because you said there was something you wanted me to see. I didn’t agree to watch you turn a woman into part of an argument.”
She’d heard a version of this before.
“I wanted you to know I was fine, sweetheart.”
“Then you could have told me. You could have told her too.”
Richard looked smaller than he had at the entrance, and not because I was wearing heels.
“I wanted you to know I was fine, sweetheart.”
***
The manager offered to arrange a car for me.
Before leaving, I faced Richard.
“Richie, I came because I liked you.”
“I like you too,” he whispered.
The manager offered to arrange a car for me.
“Then you should have trusted me with the truth.”
He stepped forward.
My shoe moved back against the tile, and he stopped.
***
My granddaughter was waiting when I got home.
“You should have trusted me with the truth.”
I sat on the sofa and reached for the buckle on my left shoe, but my fingers kept missing it.
She knelt without asking and removed both heels.
I told her everything.
“Are you deleting the app?” she asked.
I told her everything.
I looked at my phone on the coffee table.
“No. One foolish man doesn’t get to decide whether I ever have dinner with another.”
***
Three days later, Richard’s handwritten apology arrived.
He admitted that he had treated me like a prop and frightened me when he grabbed my wrist.
Richard’s handwritten apology arrived.
He did not ask for forgiveness or another date.
A week later, Eleanor called with my permission.
She explained that after she began using a wheelchair, Richard often confused protecting her with controlling her.
He did not ask for forgiveness or another date.
He canceled plans before asking what she wanted and called restaurants about access without including her.
He canceled plans before asking what she wanted.
“And had it been cleared?”
“Before his own street.”
Her laugh held affection as well as frustration.
Richard was not a scheming stranger who had invented every kind message.
“And had it been cleared?”
He was a lonely man who cared about people and then pushed their choices aside whenever fear took over.
Understanding that did not excuse what he had done to me.
But it explained why Eleanor had looked tired rather than shocked.
He was a lonely man who cared about people.
“Mom could make him listen,” she said. “Since she died, he keeps deciding what everyone needs.”
“He decided I needed to feel admired.”
“And decided I needed proof he was happy,” she added.
“He keeps deciding what everyone needs.”
Before hanging up, Eleanor told me her father had asked where she wanted to meet the following week.
“Is that unusual?”
“Very.”
***
Two weeks later, I agreed to coffee with Richard.
“Is that unusual?”
I chose the café and the time.
I wore flats.
He stood when I arrived and wisely said nothing about my shoes.
On the table lay a small paper bag.
I chose the café and the time.
He pushed it toward me only after I sat down.
“Tea biscuits,” he explained. “You mentioned Thomas used to buy them for your road trips. If bringing them was presumptuous, I’ll take them home.”
That was different from deciding I needed them.
“You mentioned Thomas used to buy them for your road trips.”
He had remembered, offered, and left the answer with me.
I opened the bag and placed one beside each cup.
After we ordered, I rested both hands around my cup.
“Do you know why I wore those heels?”
He had remembered, offered, and left the answer with me.
He shook his head.
“Because you asked. Most men spent years wishing I were shorter. I thought you wanted me to be proud of taking up space.”
Richard turned his cup until its handle faced away from him.
“Most men spent years wishing I were shorter.”
“Instead, I discovered you wanted your daughter to notice you standing beside me,” I finished.
“I’m sorry, Marilyn.”
“I believe you. But believing an apology isn’t the same as trusting you again.”
“I understand.”
“You wanted your daughter to notice you standing beside me.”
He told me Eleanor had chosen the location for their next visit and that he had not argued.
“That’s a start, Richie.”
When coffee ended, he asked whether I might see him again.
“Perhaps. Slowly, and without surprises.”
“Agreed.”
He asked whether I might see him again.
***
At home, I placed the navy heels beside my flats instead of returning them to the back of the closet.
My granddaughter called to ask how coffee had gone.
“Pleasant,” I told her.
“Will there be another date?”
I looked at the shoes. Richard had not ruined them.
“Will there be another date?”
They still belonged to the woman who had chosen to wear them.
“Possibly. But next time, darling, I choose the height.”
My granddaughter laughed. “Deal. But I’m still taking the picture.”
I laughed too, already imagining the next photograph with whatever shoes I chose.
They still belonged to the woman who had chosen to wear them.
