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A common issue on a first date usually revolves around who should pay or even whether the bill should be split equally.
In a since-deleted Reddit post shared on the popular subreddit “Am I the Asshole?”, a woman explained that she met her date through a friend, and despite offering to go out for coffee or to a cheaper restaurant, he insisted on going somewhere more expensive.
“It's a nice place and I was planning to go. I thought that if worst comes to worst I'll get a chance to try the food,” she wrote in her post about the restaurant.
She went on to recall the date, noting that she had enjoyed it and had ordered “drinks, appetizers, my main course and dessert,” while her date only ordered water and his main course.
When the bill came, she made sure to ask the waiter to bring them separately, because splitting the bill is always their policy on first dates.
“The first thing I did was point it out because I thought it came out well. He seemed like a genuine and nice guy, I was looking forward to seeing him again,” the Reddit post details.
However, his date ended up going back to their mutual friend to express how upset he was for not knowing his intention to split the bill. “He thought I was some kind of idiot for not telling him I was going to pay for my own food,” he wrote in his Reddit post.
“The reason I only had water and a faucet was because I thought I was going to pay a lot of money for food and drinks.”
After posting, many people took to the comments section to explain that she wasn't wrong and that her date's behavior towards her proves that he's not worth scheduling a second date with.
“Would it have been better to specify beforehand who was going to pay? Sure. Would it have been awkward to bring it up before a first date? Sure. So it’s completely normal at the end of a first date to suddenly realize that you had different expectations about who would pay,” one comment began.
“There is nothing wrong with you assuming you would split the cost. Him thinking you are “stupid” for splitting the cost is absurd. It strongly suggests to me that there should not be a second date given the lack of respect he has shown you.”
Another commenter agreed, writing: “I think you dodged a bullet, that's a WEIRD thing to get upset about. If he was that keen to pay for you, he could have said 'let's go out to dinner on me' at any point before you sat down at the restaurant.”
“Plus, it sounds like he couldn’t afford to pay for two meals at that place anyway, and I think it’s weird to pick a place you really can’t afford and then get upset about half-paying for the meal when you haven’t even openly offered to treat him. In my experience, guys who tune out these things have control issues.”
One commenter thought another problem with the situation was that it was a mutual friend who said it to him and there could have been a chance that the phrase was slightly misinterpreted.
“I bet TA in this story is your friend. Your date could have told you it was a shame he didn’t know you were going to pay for yourself, because if he did, he would have asked for more for himself,” they wrote.
“Keep in mind that he didn’t tell you this, he told his friend. Your friend then told you the information, perhaps exaggerating, misinterpreting, or just plain misstating it. If that’s what happened, the guy didn’t do anything wrong. If you liked him, ask him out on a second date, and if you want, you can ask him about the situation.”
