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activity is fun without the presence of a couple of six
packs and a ten-pound bag of Doritos. His hobby is taxidermy. But
the way his eyes crinkle at the corners when he looks at Patty and
the easy way he drapes his arm across her shoulders show that she
is important to him.
    I’d no sooner returned from the ladies room
and plopped into my chair, when Patty fixed me in a meaningful
stare, her eyes made more blue by the sapphire colored shadow she’d
slathered on her lids. She danced the faint line of her eyebrows at
me, raising and lowering first one then the other until even Herman
noticed. I could tell by the way his lips slowly parted, revealing
a hunk of meat caught in the gap between his front teeth.
    “Susan and I have to powder our noses.” Patty
slid out from under Kyle’s arm.
    I stood and retraced my steps, weaving
between tables and back to the ladies room. I knew the drill—any
woman who’s ever been through school has the routine down. Patty
was supposed to ask how I liked Herman. I was supposed to say he
was nice, but we didn’t have that much in common. Later she’d find
a private moment to tell Kyle. Kyle would relay the message to
Herman and Herman would know not to call me.
    I resolved that this would be my last blind
date. I should have learned my lesson in high school when Mama kept
fixing me up with poster boys for misfits of America.
    “You could have waited a few minutes instead
of being so obvious,” I said. “You could have brought your purse
instead of leaving it hanging over the back of your chair. We’re
supposed to be powdering our noses.”
    I could have told her about her eyebrows, but
I was ticked off about Herman. I peered at my image in the mirror.
My nose looked okay, but my lips could use attention.
    “How should I say this, Susan? He’s just not
that into you.”
    I stopped in the middle of extracting my
makeup case from my purse. “He’s not that what?”
    “The relationship isn’t working.” Patty
looked apologetic. “While you were in here doing sauce clean-up,
Herman said he--”
    “What relationship?” I fixed her in a laser
glare. “It’s simply a blind date, for God’s sake, not a lifetime
commitment.”
    The insurance salesman with all the
personality of a bowl of noodles was rejecting me ? I was
supposed to be the one to say, “No, thanks.” Was there something
wrong with me? Why had I struck out on my first date post divorce?
For one ghastly moment, I even considered that my mother might be
right and maybe I shouldn’t have been so quick to accept the end of
my marriage after T. Chandler refused to dump what’s-her-name and
go to counseling.
    “What are you so upset about? I could
tell you weren’t crazy about him. You know how good my intuitive
vibes are and you were simply oozing boredom mixed with annoyance.”
    “I’m not upset.” I let my makeup case slide
back into my purse.
    “Ha! You look like someone stole your last piece of
candy and threw it under a truck. Let it go, Susan. Let the
Universe take it from you.” She spread her arms out to her sides at
shoulder level, closed her eyes, and hummed Ohhhhmmmm. A woman
pushed open the door, caught one glimpse and backed out.
    Patty blinked herself back to reality. “We
both know you weren’t any more interested in Herman than he was in
you.”
    “True, but I wanted to do the dumping.”
    “Hey, we all do, but the Universe doesn’t
always grant our wishes. It’s not a genie in a bottle, you
know.”
    “Forget the Universe. What ever made you
think I’d hit it off with someone like Herman? First he tries to
fascinate by telling me, in excruciating detail, how he worked
himself up from number four salesman to number three—in a five
salesman office. Then he tells me that as a woman I don’t have the
faintest idea whether I’m carrying enough insurance to protect my
loved ones. What if, God forbid, I run my car off the Arthur
Ravenel Bridge on my way home from Charleston some day? Is