when, by mistake, I picked them up, he let out a little cry and accused me of trying to steal them. The man was in his seventies and though his glasses had plastic frames like mine and were a similar shade of brown, his were aviators. Mine was an honest mistake. I apologized, but still he called the waitress over, saying, “This guy was trying to steal from me.” The waitress talked to him the way you might to a child. “Oh,” she said, “I’m sure he wouldn’t do a thing like that.” The man, frustrated that nobody recognized the kind of person I really was, lifted his coffee cup and held it close to
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