Chapter 29
CHAPTER 29
From the expression on Brian’s face, he had not expected Rainy Coast Brewery to be hosting a music bingo night when he’d decided to take Haleigh here.
“I’m sorry.” He cringed as he looked at the flyer the host provided with the menus. “I heard the food and beer were good here, and I owed you a Boston date. But this is corny. We can try somewhere else.”
Haleigh cut her gaze away from the huge aluminum pipes and wooden rafters crisscrossing the high ceilings to peer at him. “Why? I love games. Sometimes, when I’m bored on Thursday nights, I sneak down to play bingo with the elderly residents in Stanton’s building.”
Brian smiled, his posture loosening slightly. They’d had so much fun the other night, but tonight he seemed nervous.
“They always accuse me of cheating. As if bingo has a strategy besides paying attention.” She shook her head.
“It will be loud, though.” Brian glanced around them.
He wasn’t wrong. The building was an old, spacious warehouse with a bar running along one whole wall and pub tables and booths scattered throughout. Everything was metal and distressed wood, amplifying the clamor of the crowd. Strings of lights hung down the walls like shiny raindrops, and the brewery’s logo—yellow galoshes filled to the brim with beer under a tilted red umbrella—was emblazoned everywhere it would fit—the wall above the bar, the menus, the glasses, the center of the circular tables.
Haleigh traced her fingers over one of the boots. “It could be fun too.”
A DJ was set up at one of the corner tables, and the music stopped as he announced, “Music bingo starts in five minutes! We’ll be coming around with cards and pens if people need them. Up for grabs for winners tonight, Rainy Coast T-shirts, free food, and a fifty-dollar gift card to the bookstore next door.”
Haleigh locked her hands onto Brian’s arm. “A bookstore gift card. We must win.”
He grimaced. “Okay, don’t hate me, but I’m not really much of a reader.”
Haleigh felt her heart take a nosedive. “At all?” She didn’t need someone to have the same tastes as her; she just liked to talk books. To hear about what the other person was reading, possibly add a new title to her to-read list.
Brian turned from her and waved over a server. As if to avoid answering her question. They each ordered a flight of ciders and settled on some apps to share.
It was clear he wanted to shift subjects, but Haleigh couldn’t let this go. “So you don’t like to read at all?”
“That means you can have the whole gift card if you win.” When she didn’t respond, he sighed. “Not really.”
“Maybe you haven’t found the right book yet?”
“That’s what my last girlfriend hoped too.”
Oof. Haleigh had to fight off a cringe.
“But nothing really keeps my interest.”
“Because you prefer movies?” Haleigh could adjust to someone not reading. This didn’t need to be a dealbreaker.
His cringe was more pronounced this time. “Sometimes?”
“TV?”
His face lit up. “I love the Discovery Channel. And National Geographic. And cooking shows.”
Haleigh wanted to drop her head to the table.
Brian grabbed her hand. “But I’m happy to watch whatever you want.”
She had no doubt that he meant it. If she’d asked, he would probably sit through the extended editions of all three Lord of the Rings movies. But she didn’t want to do something just because she loved it. She wanted the person she was with to love it too.
“Any chance some of those cooking shows are competitions?” she asked hopefully.
He didn’t have to answer. His expression said it all.
Thankfully, their drinks had arrived, and Haleigh took a large pull of the first cider on her flight. It tasted exactly like apple pie, and she forced herself to slow down and savor it rather than drown her disappointment that she and Brian didn’t have as much in common as she’d hoped.
“So what do you like to do?”
He picked up his knife and fork to cut into a chicken wing. “My job is pretty high stress, so I tend to do things that relax me. Like Sudoku and word games. I play a lot of puzzles on the VR. I like to cook.”
That could be something. “What’s the best thing you’ve ever made?”
“My dad gave me one of his old woks from the restaurant he owns, so I’ve been making a lot of stir-fries.”
“The best way to eat vegetables.”
“Agreed.” He took a sip of the blueberry cider and smiled. “Have you ever taken a cooking class? That could be fun to do.”
The DJ started playing the first music clip for bingo before Haleigh could answer. They decided to share one card, figuring two heads were better than one. But it turned out they were both awful at remembering song titles, and worse at remembering the artists’ names.
The next clip was a group of women singing about guys hanging out of their friends’ cars and hollering at them. Haleigh vaguely recalled her mother dancing around the living room to this song when she was a kid. “Wait, my mom used to say this was her ‘jam.’”
Brian snorted.
“I know. Consider yourself blessed if you never had to hear your mother utter that phrase.”
“What’s it called?”
Haleigh narrowed her eyes. “‘Scrubs’? ‘Scrubbing’? ‘Too Many Scrubs’?”
“‘No Scrubs’?” he offered, pointing at the paper between them.
“Yes!” Haleigh pumped a hand in the air.
“By Destiny’s Child or TLC?” Some of the bingo squares had purposely mismatched bands and song titles, to trip up the players.
“How the hell should I know? I don’t think I was born when this song came out.”
Brian groaned.
“What? You’re not exactly helping either.” Haleigh grabbed one of the last fries in the basket and chewed thoughtfully. “I feel like it has to be TLC. I’m pretty sure I know most of Destiny’s Child’s stuff.”
“I don’t know. I feel like I remember Beyoncé singing this one.”
“Are you sure?” The song had a great beat. Haleigh felt like she’d have it on repeat if it belonged to the queen herself.
“I had a girlfriend in college obsessed with Beyoncé, and I think I remember her playing this one a lot.” He started mouthing the words as if to prove it.
“Okay, I’ll trust you.” No one had chosen the gift card as a prize yet, because clearly everyone here was an unsophisticated rube. Even the guy at the bar whose suit looked like it cost more than the mortgage on Stanton’s apartment. Although maybe he simply found gift cards to be vulgar and would rather use his piles of money to pay for things.
If Jack were here, they would have had a field day coming up with stories for that guy.
Damnit. Haleigh had been doing such a good job not thinking about him, or how much they’d be killing it if she had him on her team. Jack was a walking encyclopedia of music.
She flicked her eyes to Brian. He was watching her intently. “Do I have something on my face?” Haleigh patted at her chin.
“You get even prettier when you’re super serious.”
Haleigh’s shoulders shot up to her ears. “Oh my god, stop.” At the beginning of the night, she would have melted at those words, but something had started to feel off. Maybe the music was just too loud, but Haleigh worried there was more to it.
She was glad when the DJ cued up the next song.
They both recognized Taylor Swift’s newest hit immediately, and as Haleigh stamped the marker to the page, she sucked in a surprised breath and yelled out, “Bingo!”
As she hurried over to the DJ, she wondered if Brian would mind if they stopped at the bookstore before they left.
Maybe she could recommend a book that might hold his attention. What if the problem wasn’t reading, but that his ex didn’t have good taste in books?
She was smiling as she handed the DJ their card. A little bookstore browse felt like it could fix everything.
Then the DJ shook his head. “You don’t have bingo. ‘No Scrubs’ is by TLC.”