Is it bad luck to get held at gunpoint on a first date?
Allow me to rephrase. Whatever the reason—luck, fate, karma, because you just knocked off a liquor store—any time you’re being held at gunpoint isn’t exactly a banner day. But if that day also happens to be your first date with someone, is that a sign? An omen of ill tidings for your budding relationship? That is, assuming you live through the date.
I’d had less than twenty-four hours to cultivate misgivings about this particular outing, but they’d been tickling at the back of my brain ever since I’d gotten the invitation. It had been an evening of unexpected phone calls. First, my friend Noel Thomas—not exactly a barfly—had called to invite me for a drink after work. Then my sister checked in with her latest pregnancy news. I suppo
