Winds of Change

by Gwen Cooper — April 18, 2007

Last night, I attended a fancy-dress-up New York function. It was one of those occasions that almost requires an escort, and the man I've been seeing recently--Paul--was unable to accompany me, because of a last-minute business trip. So I asked my friend Robert to step in. I wrote about Robert not very long ago--one of my closest friends for many years, with whom I've never had any romantic attachment or relationship. And yet, a couple of weeks ago, there was a moment between the two of us. It was one of those hard-to-define moments where nothing specific has happened and yet you know that the tenor of the relationship has subtly shifted. Last time I wrote about Robert, I said that there was a split second in which I was certain he was about to kiss me...and almost equally certain that I wanted him to. But the moment passed without a kiss, and things between us went back to "normal."

And normal they have remained. Until last night.

There's probably nothing like the combination of a special occasion, a suit, and a cocktail dress (when Robert and I usually see each other, it's almost always a jeans-and-sweaters kind of affair), and a great deal of champagne to suspend the ordinary rules and make two people suddenly see each other in a new light. I thought he looked very handsome. He thought I looked very beautiful (or so he said). And at the end of the night, as Robert was helping me on with my coat, he turned me around and kissed me. In front of the coat check room. As softly and sweetly as I've ever been kissed in my life.

"I'm sorry," he said. "But I've been waiting a long time to do that."

How the evening progressed from there is not something I'm ready to write about just yet. But I will. I just need a couple of days...

Gwen Cooper is the author of Diary of a South Beach Party Girl, out this month from Simon & Schuster. To read all of Gwen Cooper's posts in The Dating Life, click here.