"Shall I take the other or do you still need it?
"Its fine, you can take it." Zara mutters, at a tone of someone that could change his mind a second later.
"You still don't want to order anything to eat yet?" The boy asks.
"No, but I just want to see the wine menu," Zara replies.
"Of course, sir. Certainly, sir. "
When the waiter leaves, Zara pushes his chair back, nods at the handsome woman and for the second time tonight goes to the toilet.
While intently watching how the urine flows out his willy (his prostate has not abandoned him despite his age), he glances at his watch.
She is now half an hour late exactly.
Half an hour is not too bad, half an hour later can - as they sit together in a bath or relax in Tuscany and look back on their first date - simply be forgotten. Perhaps she will say something - "I do remember that I spent half an hour in my car in the parking lot, because I was afraid" - and he probably will have forgotten about it.
Half an hour is nothing when it comes to love, Zara, thinks while he shakes his penis to get rid of the last few drops.
On his table sits the wine menu, bound in leather. On top of it is a yellow sticker, the kind that people working in offices stick on each other's back, fitted with a funny text that much later, on the couch of a costly psychologist, will be explained as stigmatizing.
Madame will be some later. Being delayed. Humble excuses. sincerely
Zara looks at the note, turns it around, as if someone would ever write anything on the sticky side. The back is empty, yellow and sticky.
He sticks the note on a blank spot of the tablecloth and looks into the wine menu. His right hand automatically moves back in the direction of his glass of beer, which he thoughtlessly starts to slide back and forth while he studies the wines that are listed.
"Have you been able to make a choice, sir?"
'I'd like the Merlot,' Zara says. You can`t go wrong with a Merlot.
"Excellent. A glass of Merlot. "
"A bottle of Merlot."
'A bottle?'
"With two glasses."
"Yes, sir. Have you received the note? "
Zara gestures to post-it on the tablecloth.
"Very good, sir. Thank you sir. May I congratulate you on your choice, sir. "
Zara drinks his beer. He thinks of the ad, the emails, the text messages.
He slides his phone out from the inside pocket of his jacket and reads a few of her old messages. Specifically rereads one sentence in one those short messages again and again, as if he constantly wants to check whether it really says what he remembers.
He can`t find anything out of the ordinary among it.
The sentence is barely noticeable in an endless list of compliments from a woman he has never met, compliments for his photo, his digital profile and stylistically outstanding emails.
She is an English teacher, she is prone to stylistic excellence.
The bottle and glasses are put in front of him.
"Shall I ...?" The waiter asks.
"Soon."
"Excellent, sir."
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