So, I was on a date, and he was so sweet. When the bill arrived, the waitress looked at him and said, “Sir, your card was declined.” He turned pale. I smiled and paid.
As we left, the waitress grabbed my arm and whispered, “I lied.” Then she slipped the receipt into my hand. I turned it over—and in frantic handwriting, there were two words: “Google him.” The moment I got home, I searched his name—and my blood ran cold. He was a fraud.
Apparently, he had a pattern: he would date women, gain their trust, and then begin stealing from them. He had been in prison multiple times for theft, mainly from his previous jobs. One of his ex-girlfriends had even written blog posts detailing every step of their relationship, including how they met—and it was eerily similar to how he had approached me.
I couldn’t be more grateful to that waitress. Her courage, kindness, and quick thinking saved me from something terrible. I realized she had staged the declined card incident to have an excuse to slip me that message.
She didn’t only serve a meal that night. She served a warning.
STORY 2:
I boarded a last-minute flight to my hometown, not knowing if my brother was going to be alive when the flight landed. I was sitting in shock, thinking about how this was going to be one of the longest hour and twenty minutes of my life, and it must have been written all over my face.
This particular aircraft had two emergency seats, then a space before the door (no window seat), giving the person who sat in the window seat behind a huge space for legroom. A guy sat down and commented on how he loved to get that seat—extra legroom, etc.
Then he leaned forward and said, “I saw your face when I was walking up the aisle and can tell you could really do with talking to someone to take your mind off something, so I’m just going to talk. At any point you want to talk about it, you can; otherwise, I’m just gonna chat to you.”
I don’t know if that guy will ever have even the tiniest bit of understanding of how deeply he touched me with his actions or his parting words. Six years later, I still think about what a touching thing he did by just chatting with a stranger who looked like she was going through hell.
My brother is alive and well, but for the duration of that flight, I had no idea if that would be the case.
