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Beau had planned our first four dates. It was only fair that I start contributing to the execution of this project. Spoiled Hearts ended its one-week run last night, and other than sitting next to him in class, I hadn’t spent any time with Beau since we watched Love Match together on Monday. My entire Saturday was devoted to preparing for the date. It was time I tried to surprise the campus expert on all things Carolina with something I knew he hadn’t done yet.
“No peeking.” I had wrapped the blindfold around his eyes as tightly as I could without hurting him.
“You’re not going to give me some kind of clue?” Beau was outwardly amused by the date I created.
“No way. I’m in charge today. You just have to trust me.”
“Does it involve body paint, bagpipes, or a floating hot tub?”
I laughed. The floating hot tub would have been fun, but I couldn’t find one of those in Chapel Hill on such short notice. “None of the above. You’ll see.”
I pulled the car onto the gravel path and turned into a dirt parking lot. It was almost sunset. We would have to hurry if I was going to pull this off. I threw my car in park and ran over to the passenger side to help Beau.
“I’m kind of at a disadvantage here with the blindfold.” I steered him toward the opening in the brush and led him down the path twenty yards before I stopped him.
I placed his hand on the trunk of the tree next to us so he could steady himself.
“Ready?” I couldn’t wait for him to get started.
“Yes, please take this off.”
I walked behind him to untie the knot, but as my hands traced over his neck, I changed my mind.
“There’s one thing you have to do first.”
I could see his eyebrow arch under the silk scarf and a smile crept across his face. I took a step back and my body met the bark of the tree. Beau turned in my direction, anchoring his hands on either side of me. I wasn’t entirely sure he couldn’t see right through the blindfold.
I reached forward, taking his face in my palms, and brought his lips crushing down onto mine. With the force of his body, he pinned me harder against the tree and hitched both my legs around his waist. We were completely derailing from the plan. I fisted my hands in his hair until I had loosened the knot on the scarf and freed his eyes from the cover. I watched as he took in our surroundings.
“Where are we?” It was getting darker. We were deep in the middle of the woods and I didn’t account for the light changing so quickly with the towering trees. Maybe we didn’t have time for a woodsy make out.
“You are on a Love Match scavenger hunt.” I smiled.
“Sweet. What am I hunting?” He pressed himself harder against me.
“Me.”
His right eyebrow shifted high. “What?”
“You better get going if you’re going to get your prize.” I wiggled out of his tight hold and landed next to him. “Here’s your first clue.” I handed him a folded piece of paper and tried to refrain from laughing. Mr. Adventurous looked worried all of a sudden.
“You’re not going to tell me anything else? I don’t even know where we are, London.”
“You have your phone so you won’t get lost, lost. You just might not find me. Good luck.” I winked at him. “Go that way.” I pointed ahead on the path where the light was dimming and watched until he was out of sight.
I had walked the route of my scavenger hunt three times, and it took me an average of twenty minutes to complete the course I had created. Beau could probably beat my time, so I estimated I had about fifteen minutes before he found me.
I ran back to the car and grabbed my bag. Everything I needed was packed inside. I had sent Beau on a loop so I could safely walk in the other direction without running into him. We would eventually meet in the middle.
There was an open patch of ground near the stone wall overlooking the grounds. I pulled out a thin tarp before spreading a blanket over top. I had two camping lanterns, which I anchored just off the corner of the blanket.
I pulled out my phone to check the time. He should be here any second. I looked down the path. It was empty. I had hiked past this place twenty times since I was a freshman, but I had never really stopped to look at the building that made the area such a famous landmark.
The round turret and the climbing ivy gave it a gothic feel that was starting to creep me out. Maybe I hadn’t concocted the best date. Beau was missing, the sun was almost down, and the legends about ghost stories in these woods all of a sudden haunted me.
One of the stories from the 1830s was about a student who had died on this land in a duel. Legend had it that in a panic to cover up his death, the students at the duel buried his body under a rock. When the girl he had been courting found out her beloved had died, she supposedly waited at the rock for him to return. The eerie part of the story was that the rock also happened to be the rendezvous point where the couple used to meet secretly for dates. There were legendary stories that circulated about people who had seen the ghosts of the torn apart couple walking the woods together.
After I watched last week’s Love Match episode, I thought this was the closest thing we had to medieval tales and a castle. I nervously scanned the woods again. Finally, I swiped the screen on my phone to call Beau. I couldn’t stand it anymore.
