Page 6 of I Know How This Ends

Here we go: Date Sixteen.

As I wait, I scan the Criteria List in my notepad.

One date every week for the last sixteen weeks, and I only have four left to go. Twenty first dates, total. A data-collecting

experiment in which I prove that I’ve given it my Best Shot: to myself and to everyone else. But all I seem to have gathered

is exactly what I don’t want, in laborious detail.

Which is, it appears, literally everyone.

“Can I get you anything to start?”

The waiter hovers politely over me like a kestrel and I shake my head while I scan my list more carefully. My list of Red Flags is long enough now to overflow onto a second A4 page, sporadically highlighted and double underlined,

with capital letters. In meteorological terms, a red flag is a warning of fire. It’s a danger alert sent out when high temperatures, low humidity and strong winds mean an increased

likelihood that things will literally burst into flames. But it works the same way with dating and love, so what are the signs

you should run?

How do you tell if this whole thing will burn to the ground?

The answer: I collect, I analyze and I watch.

Do they order for me? Do they suggest a change to my physical appearance? Could they be controlling? Do they only talk about

themselves? Are all their ex-partners “psycho”? Have they lied on their profile?

The problem is that the more you look for Red Flags, the easier they are to find. Until you’re no longer looking for fire: you’re looking for just the faintest bit of smoke, a hint of heat, a puff of ash, and you’re out of there, running for safety.

A fire is a terrifying prospect when you’ve already been burned.

Carefully sliding my notepad and pen back into my handbag, I focus on the door and try to breathe slowly. Henry is already

nine minutes late, and this demonstrates such disrespect and carelessness, such hubris, it strongly indicates he’s selfish

in other areas of his life too, better nip it in the bud now before it gets any worse—and I’m doing it already. Fuck .

Then the door swings open and I take a deep breath.

Henry is gorgeous and as we lock eyes, my stomach wriggles. He smiles widely and a pulse of lightning shoots through my shoulders,

down my arms and into my fingers. Heat flashes. Warmth glows. Fire or chemistry?

I smile back; his smile broadens, dimpled at the corners.

For a surprising moment, I find myself thinking: is this it? Is this the arm I want around my waist at night, the man I want

filling the empty frames still sitting in a cardboard box in my hallway?

“Margot!” Henry’s voice is deep and warm. He approaches me as I stand cautiously and all six foot two of him bends slightly

to kiss my cheek, smelling faintly of cinnamon. “What a place! I’ve never been here before! Thank you for choosing somewhere

so lovely for us to meet.”

A flush of fierce pleasure, completely undeserved: I have literally brought every date here for the last four months.

“Thank you for coming at such short notice.”

As if this is a Zoom meeting I’ve just decided to hold after lunch and nobody really wants to be here but me.

“My pleasure!” Henry holds the back of my chair so I can sit down again. “I was going to take an extra shift, but this is

a much more fun way to spend an evening.”

He takes his seat and grins at me while I study his handsome face.

What am I even looking for? A twitch of a muscle that shows he can’t be trusted? A strain around the eyes that indicates disappointment

in me? I look briefly at his large, tanned hands—no wedding ring or imprint—and the collar of his T-shirt: no lipstick, accidentally

rubbed. Is he actually a fireman? That much remains to be seen, obviously, but he looks like he could be.

And now I’m staring at him as if he’s a frog on a table, waiting to be dissected.

Which, in so many ways, he is.

“Sorry,” I say quickly, looking away. “It’s just rare to meet someone who actually looks like their profile.”

“Why, thank you.” Henry laughs warmly, teeth glowing white. “As do you, Margot. Thank goodness for photography. Imagine if

we were dating in the 1500s and all we had were watercolor portraits to go by.”

“Anne of Cleves springs to mind,” I smile. “The worst possible outcome for a too-flattering dating profile picture.”

“Divorce, ridicule and public shaming.” Henry is studying my face too, and I try my hardest just to let him. What does he

see? That my eyes are too large, that my nose is too sharp, that my mouth is a little too small for my head? Or is he just

looking without pulling me apart? If so, how ? “I remember that bit from school.”

“Yes.” I pick up the menu. “Luckily, now the consequences are just being loudly labeled a catfish in front of seven other diners.”

“No!” Henry laughs. “They wouldn’t dare.”

Date Number Seven: he of the three missing buttons. He said that my hair was “more red” in my photos, which was “misleading,”

and wouldn’t accept the existence of hair dye as an answer.

“Oh, they do dare,” I grin, still pretending to scan the menu. “The internet is full of people who dare continuously, in my

experience.”

“This is actually my first online date ever. I think I mentioned that already. It’s all very exciting. Although you’re making it easy on me so far, which I appreciate.”

I briefly think back a year to when online dating apps were a beguiling mystery to me too, full of exciting romantic opportunities

just waiting to be unearthed. I’d sit next to Eve while she scanned reluctantly through them, glibly telling her how “fun”

it looked and how I was “a little sad I didn’t get to try it.” Safe in the knowledge that I was exempt from this particular

adventure.

Frankly, I still shrivel in shame. I was the woman who rolled smugly around in her own love life while pretending she envied

others their freedom, and I got everything I deserved.

“I’ll try not to traumatize you for the others,” I flirt slightly.

“If it goes well,” Henry says, glancing across the room at the waiter with a wide smile and then back at me, “maybe there

won’t be any.”

It feels as if somebody just trickled icy water down my back, and I have to fight an urge to stand up, shout “NO, THANK YOU”

and flee the scene, taking the olives with me.

“Whoa, boy,” I say as lightly as I can, taking a large swig of wine as the waiter approaches. “Let’s have starters before

we become exclusive.”

“OK.” Henry smiles. “But I’d quite like marriage before we finish pudding.”

He’s joking and it’s sweet but also terrifying, and I can feel my eyes pop like a hamster held a little too tightly.

“I’m teasing, Margot,” he says gently. “Obviously.”

“Yes!” I straighten my striped top with suddenly sweaty hands. “Ha ha! Brilliant. I... um...” I look wildly around as

the waiter pauses. “Just have to pop to the bathroom. Be right back. Please tell the waiter I’ll have the pasta carbonara.”

Fuck.

Breathing too fast, I scamper through the maze of tables—knocking over a vase with a fake flower in it—and into the bathroom, where I promptly slam the stall door shut, sit on the lid of the toilet, drag my legs up to my chin and pull out my phone while I hyperventilate into my knees.

HELP

Eve: Oh no! Is D16 awful? Shall we call you and fake an emergency getaway?

Jules: Breathe, Mags. What’s going on?

He’s nice.

There’s a pause for about thirty seconds, as well there might be.

Jules: Maggie I say this with love but GET FUCKING THERAPY

Eve: Maybe you’re not ready to date yet?

Obviously I’m not ready to date yet.

That’s been clear every time I sit down at the same restaurant table and scan the man in front of me for ways I can dismantle

him, as if he’s a life-size game of Operation and I just need to pull him apart carefully without his nose lighting up. It’s

not the satisfaction of a healthy, well-balanced and emotionally open woman, that’s for sure. Every time I see a Red Flag,

all I feel is triumph: there it is, you didn’t trick me. No shocks here.

But I had to at least try , right? Twenty dates. That’s all.

Because if I didn’t try—if I didn’t conduct this experiment—I’d probably just never date again. The hurt would solidify inside

me, harden and brick me into myself, leaving me comfortable inside a tower I’ve built: isolated and alone. Month by month,

I’d find a new excuse—a new focus, a new distraction, a new ick—and the cement between my bricks would become permanent.

It’s been eight months: time to get back on the bike.

Even if the last one threw you directly into oncoming traffic when you weren’t even wearing a basic helmet.

It’s OK. I’m better now. Just needed a quick panic attack.

Jules: Gnocchi him dead ha ha

Eve: You’ve got this, Maggie! We love you!

Breathing out, I unlock the door and stare in the mirror: I have the wide-eyed expression of a wild horse some cowboy just

tried to tie to a lamp post.

Stop being such an asshole, Margot.

Carefully, I smooth my expression back to neutral. Then I return to the table, where Henry has apparently already ordered

food and is now drinking a beer, completely unfazed by my freak-out.

He smiles. “All good?”

“Absolutely.” I’m feeling calmer already. “So tell me about yourself, Henry.”

Date Sixteen passes with flying colors.

He’s the age he claims to be (he shows me ID); he’s never been married, has no children; he asks me questions too, which is

a disarming change. He doesn’t refer to me at any point as a “girl,” or immediately delve too hard into my past as if relentlessly

foraging for historical truffles. It’s his first online date because he “normally meets women organically,” but he is “looking

for a real connection now.” Our political beliefs align and what we’re looking for in a relationship matches. OK, he doesn’t

know what a meteorologist is—he thinks I study stars—but he accepts my correction with grace and aplomb.

Henry is intelligent, erudite, honest, incredibly warm and charming.

He’s almost painfully beautiful.