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“I’ll take your silence as a no,” Brooklyn says.
Grr. I take the first exit I see, pull into the parking lot of the nicest-looking restaurant around, and then face her. “You’re wrong.”
She blinks at me. “I am?”
“I would like to go on a date with you.”
As she bats her eyelashes at me, I can’t help but notice how pretty they are. “I thought you didn't date tourists,” she says.
Good point. “But I can always make an exception for someone who’s that good at Scrabble.”
Seriously, though, I’m having trouble remembering why I came up with that stupid rule. In a way, having a time limit on the relationship means that I don't have to tell Brooklyn about my vasectomy and therefore see the disappointment on her face. The time limit also means no one should get hurt. Especially if?—
“So… it’s a fling then?” she clarifies.
“Fling?” Yeesh. Why does the word bring the taste of the hangover cure to my mouth? “Do we have to put any labels on it? Let’s just have dinner.” I gesture at the rando place.
“Okay.” She opens the car door. “Let’s just have dinner.”
After we sit down, the waiter dude walks over to us and sighs. “I’m not giving you any menus.”
Hmm. Weird.
“Why not?” Brooklyn asks.
“We only have ingredients for a single item—a burger.” He crosses his arms over his chest. “Before you ask, that doesn’t mean cheeseburger, or a chickenburger, or a fish burger, or a veggie burger. Just a beef burger, with fries. That’s it. No bacon. No?—”
Brooklyn and I exchange confused glances.
“You want a burger?” I ask her, sounding uncertain.
“Do you?” she asks.
“Sure.” I don’t, but I don’t want to start this dinner by being a dick to the waiter… even if it seems like he might deserve it.
“Two burgers,” Brooklyn says. “You do have enough ingredients for two, right?”
Oh, yeah. He did make that burger sound pretty singular earlier. This attention to detail is why Brooklyn is so good at Scrabble.
“We can make two more burgers,” the waiter says, but he doesn’t sound all that sure. “They will have to be without any lettuce or tomato. Oh, and there’s only one pickle left.”
Damn it. Is it too late to?—
“We’re okay sharing that last pickle,” Brooklyn says. When the waiter leaves, she whispers, “Doesn’t it feel like we’re in a pickle?”
I glance at a nearby table where the waiter is bringing an older lady her food—a burger, of course. As soon as he leaves, she pulls out a slice of American cheese from her purse and furtively sticks it under the bun.
“Wow,” Brooklyn whispers, following my gaze. “They lack cheese and other accoutrements so often that the regulars bring their own.”
I lean in. “Either that or this lady carries cheese everywhere she goes.”
Brooklyn leans toward me as well. “I would’ve brought a tomato in her shoes.”
Wow. We’re so close I feel trapped by her gravitational field. Again. My eyes zero in on her lips, and I’m slowly drawn toward them. But before I reach my destination, Brooklyn pulls away with a chuckle.
“I just realized that I made it sound like I want us to use that lady as a mule,” she says. “By forcing her to hide a tomato in her shoes.”
I smile, partially to hide my kiss-deprivation disappointment. “I give it a few days before the waiter starts to check everyone’s shoes for contraband.”
