Sam didn't go straight home. He parked his car in the usual place outside his house, then went for a long walk across the flat stretch of parkland that bounded his back garden. He sat on a bench by the side of the lake and watched the play of the moonlight and the distant streetlights on the water's surface.
He felt deflated. To have come so close, and to have failed. Why didn't she like him at least a little when he was so bowled-over by her? The only girl since Trudy who had actually made his heart leap when he laid eyes on her, who had brought the sweat to the palms of his hands, who had left him tongue-tied. That must have been it. She must have thought him a total fool, babbling with all that nonsense about how wonderful she was when they'd only just met. It was a ridiculous way to behave. She must have been laughing at him inside. She must have felt something close to contempt. Somebody as beautiful as that already knows she's beautiful. She doesn't need a half-witted totally ordinary person like himself to go on and on about it. It must have been such a let-down for her when she saw what he really looked like. She was so careful to hide it too, to protect his feelings. She must be such a lovely person, to humour him like that.
He took the little piece of paper containing her phone number out of his pocket and looked down at it, held it against his chest for a moment like a talisman, cupped it between his two hands.
He was going to have to be a little bit more realistic, he told himself. Lower his sights a little. Stop dreaming impossible dreams.
"Ugly ducklings shouldn't go bothering swans," he announced to any resting water-fowl that might be within earshot. Then he crumpled-up the piece of paper, flicked it neatly into the waste-paper bin beside him, and started back towards the house.