We gaze into each other’s eyes over glasses of port in the Italian restaurant where we’d had our first date. A ring, The Ring, in my coat pocket.
It’s nerves that I’m sweating, right? And my stomach doing gymnastics. She looks concerned but I wave it off; this will not ruin my proposal. But maybe a splash of water is needed.
I start to stand up but the ground tilts underneath me and I guess my head bumps into the table as it rushes up at me.
I come to and an ER doctor tells me it was food poisoning.
