The dilemma

Thursday, quarter past eight at the school gate. Nikos has the ring in his jacket and nowhere to take her on Saturday. "A hundred and twenty," he says, "and I owe you forever. Two of us, that is all." Your sister has picked the big place on the harbour, so the other two are spare, and dropping either one now costs you eighty euros. The small one on the square, twelve tables, has had a fully booked sign in the window since Tuesday, which nobody can explain in October with the season over. His boy is at yours tomorrow, same as every Friday, and Nikos is still standing there.

Your options

1. Drop both spares tonight, eat the hundred and sixty, and put the tables back in the book where anyone can get them.
2. Give Nikos the small one for nothing. He is proposing, and you would rather he had it than the restaurant had your money.
3. Take his hundred and twenty. A table that gets eaten at beats a table that gets charged for and sits empty.