The elevator doors opened onto a long hallway with a door at the end. The door was emblazoned with an awful logo that looked like a hubcap. I rang the bell. I was buzzed into a small ante-room where another buzzer went off and the safe-like metal showroom door opened. Inside, the walls were covered with framed pictures of Jack with his arm around various hip-hop artists. Rows of ugly diamond watches adorned the walls. Cases of diamonds glittered under glass. If he meant to impress me, he had definitely piqued my interest.

“Can I help you?” asked a man. I looked around. I was the only one in the showroom since this was obviously an appointment-only establishment. Several women sat at desks in the back staring at me.

“I’m looking for Jack?” I said.

The man retrieved Jack, who looked totally flustered and confused. “I didn’t think you’d actually come! I thought you were just leading me on!” he said. “My God, please, please, come inside, come inside!”

He led me behind the glass counters to a corner in the back where he had set up his desk. “Manuel, get her a tea! And a bourbon! From the Christmas gifts!”

“Manuel” promptly brought a porcelain cup of tea for me with a sugar cube next to it. He then procured a bottle of bourbon from a crate of what looked like at least 100 other bottles like it (“Christmas gifts for customers,” I was told) and he poured a short glass for me and a bigger one for Jack.

“Tell me what you think about my watches,” said Jack, ordering Manuel to bring a velvet covered tray with five different watches on it. “Which one do you like best?”

I hated them all. They were disgusting, ostentatious things covered in diamonds, too huge to be stylish and definitely not worth getting mugged for. I pointed at the smallest one, the least ridiculous. “Manuel!” Jack barked. “Go get a new one in a box.” Manuel again obeyed, this time bringing over a lacquered box with a diamond watch inside it. “This is for you, a gift from me to you,” said Jack, clasping his hands on mine.

Men have always bought me dinner. And I have always wondered what the rules and parameters are for what is expected of a woman when this happens (everyone knows that if a woman insists on splitting the bill, that’s as much as saying, “No thanks; I don’t really ever want to imagine kissing you even.”). I had never considered what to do if a man gave me a diamond watch worth several thousand dollars though. Was this what a hooker felt like? I decided then and there, that I would not sleep with him. Not this time at least.

We sat in his office area and talked about being Persian in America for a while. He told me how beautiful I was along with all the other rote things a guy is expected to say. Then I suggested we leave for dinner. He said there was a sushi place he liked nearby, a few blocks away. I put my fur hat back on and fastened my coat, ready for what I expected would be a cold walk. This did not happen. Instead, we walked two blocks to an underground garage. “I thought you said you lived nearby your showroom.” I said. “Why do you have a car here?”

“I don’t like walking?” he answered, matter of factly. The garage attendant greeted him boisterously and had a valet retrieve the car. Clearly, the garage workers knew him well. I busied myself with my cell-phone waiting for the car to come around. I didn’t look up again until the valet was holding the car door open before me and that’s when I realized that “the car” was a glistening black Bentley. What the fuck? This guy lived five blocks away and he drove to work in a freaking Bentley?! However, I was in the car no more than ten minutes, because apparently the sushi restaurant was only four blocks away, at which point, we found another expensive parking garage to stow away the car. The date had lasted no more than 40 minutes and already he had spent over $100 in parking fees, not to mention the diamond watch gift. “Has anyone ever told you that you are exactly as tall as Kim Kardashian?” he asked, as he led me across the street to the restaurant. “No,” I said, thinking, “nobody I know has actually met Kim Kardashian, you fucking name-dropper.”

The sushi restaurant was the same as the garage: Everyone knew him and rushed to his aid, dropping everything else they’d been doing. Clearly, the man must have been a good tipper. We were shown to a table next to a gurgling Buddha fountain. “Look at the floor,” he said, impressed with himself. The floor was made out of plexiglass. Koi fish swam in the water beneath. “Yes, there are fish there. Cool,” I said, nonplussed. Did he think I was retarded or something?

The rest of the meal consisted of the normal small talk. He told me his rags to riches story. He told me about a rival jeweler who threatened him with violence. He told me about the hip-hop artists that wore his watches. He said he carried a gun for protection. “You’re the perfect Persian girl, aren’t you?” he said. I wasn’t sure what this meant. “Can we see each other next week again?” he asked. I said we could. And I won’t lie: I was kind of interested to see what else he’d give me.

We would continue to see each other for another two months—mostly at one particular cigar lounge where everyone knew his name, of course—until he asked me to move into a new apartment he had purchased inside the W Hotel and I was (finally!) adequately weirded out. And I will say this: I’m not a prude. I’ve even been known to have one-night stands (in foreign airports! not at night!), but with Jack the Jeweler, I never put out. I will never know why. But that first night—before we knew any of this—he drove me home in his Bentley (one of apparently three) and I did not kiss him goodbye. As I walked up the six flights to my apartment in my no-elevator building, I thought, “So that’s what happens when a man gives you a diamond watch on your first date.”

About Taj Irani

East Village resident, Seattle native.