When guests don't show up

Last night was the VP debate, so I decided to cook for it and make it a quasi-event. My roommate and his girlfriend were going to be there, as well as my next-door neighbor (her husband, being out of state, could not attend for obvious reasons). I invited some other people as well, but they already had plans. So the night before I started cooking the spaghetti sauce (crock pots are awesome, by the way) and put it in the fridge that morning. After work I rushed first to the grocery store to pick up some side items like breadsticks, cheesecake and tea and then got home, started warming up the sauce, baking the breadsticks and boiling the spaghetti. I had told my neighbor we'd start at about 6:30, but fortunately she didn't show until 7 (I still was cooking when she knocked). My roommate had left earlier to go work out, but I assumed he was coming back, probably with his girlfriend, and we'd eat together. After waiting a while, I finally decided to just start eating. So it was just me and the neighbor - we talked and finished eating the spaghetti and then I pulled out the cheesecake. She looked at me and, with eye-brow arched, asked "Is this a date?" I suddently, to my horror, realized that's exactly what it looked like. I mean, I didn't have flowers or candles or anything, and it would have been totally fine if other people had shown up, but with just two people, I couldn't deny that that's what it looked like. So I offered the only statement I could think of: "no," in a sort of croaked voice. Next time, I'm going to make sure that more than one person is going to show up, else I'll just call in embarrassed.