Before I could say anything else, the waiter returned.<\/p>\n
My date smiled and pushed the bill toward me.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe\u2019s paying.\u201d<\/p>\n
The waiter looked at me.<\/p>\n
I shook my head.<\/p>\n
\u201cSeparate checks, please. We agreed before the date.\u201d<\/p>\n
Her expression changed instantly.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou\u2019re seriously doing this?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cYes.\u201d<\/p>\n
The waiter separated the bill without argument. My portion was reasonable. Hers included the lobster, two cocktails, an appetizer, and dessert.<\/p>\n
She stared at the total.<\/p>\n
\u201cI didn\u2019t bring enough money.\u201d<\/p>\n
That was when karma arrived.<\/p>\n
The restaurant manager walked over.<\/p>\n
Apparently, she had been there before.<\/p>\n
More than once.<\/p>\n
And according to him, she had already caused problems by ordering expensive meals, expecting dates to pay, then becoming argumentative when they refused.<\/p>\n
Her face went bright red.<\/p>\n
The manager remained polite.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou\u2019ll need to settle your portion before leaving.\u201d<\/p>\n
She tried three cards.<\/p>\n
The first declined.<\/p>\n
So did the second.<\/p>\n
The third finally worked, but only after she called someone and transferred money into the account.<\/p>\n
By then, everyone nearby knew exactly what was happening.<\/p>\n
I paid my bill, tipped the waiter, and stood.<\/p>\n
She glared at me.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou\u2019re really leaving me here?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cOur dinner is finished.\u201d<\/p>\n
That was our first and last date.<\/p>\n
The lobster never bothered me.<\/p>\n
What bothered me was agreeing to one thing and expecting someone else to pay when the bill arrived.<\/p>\n
She thought ordering the most expensive meal meant I had no choice.<\/p>\n
The separate check proved otherwise.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Before I could say anything else, the waiter returned. My date smiled and pushed the bill toward me. \u201cHe\u2019s paying.\u201d The waiter looked at me. I shook… <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":4048,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4313","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/ternalnews.xyz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4313","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/ternalnews.xyz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/ternalnews.xyz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ternalnews.xyz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ternalnews.xyz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=4313"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/ternalnews.xyz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4313\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4314,"href":"https:\/\/ternalnews.xyz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4313\/revisions\/4314"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ternalnews.xyz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/4048"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/ternalnews.xyz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=4313"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ternalnews.xyz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=4313"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ternalnews.xyz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=4313"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}