Sydney and Tom have an excellent dinner date, and Sydney feels that the connection is even stronger than what she felt with Travis. Tom impresses Sydney by being attentive, confident, and easy to talk to, and Sydney is especially charmed by his old-fashioned gestures, including insisting on paying for dinner and helping her with her jacket.

After they leave the restaurant, Tom offers to take Sydney home. Sydney declines because she follows a rule about not letting men know where she lives on a first date, and because she knows she would be tempted to invite Tom upstairs if he walked her home. Instead, the two linger outside and Tom asks for Sydney’s phone number.

Sydney gives Tom her number, and Tom asks whether calling the next day would seem too eager. Their teasing exchange confirms their mutual attraction, and Tom then asks whether kissing on a first date is acceptable. Sydney agrees, making it clear that she wants the kiss as much as he does.

Tom kisses Sydney outside the restaurant, and the intensity of the moment overwhelms her. Sydney experiences the kiss as unusually powerful and intimate, and when Tom pulls away, both of them seem dazed by it. Tom promises that he will call her the next day, and then he kisses her a second time.

When Sydney gets home, she is still elated from the date. Only then does Sydney realize that Tom never returned her bloody shirt, a small but unsettling detail that lingers after an otherwise perfect evening.