3 Bianca
Gus’s Tavern was located on a stretch of oceanfront property between two condo buildings. It was an octagonal wooden building
set up on stilts with a huge, three-level deck on the ocean side. During the day, it was a burger shack, serving up casual
fare in paper food trays to beachgoers. At night, it was known for hosting live music out on the sand. And now, apparently,
they had added a trivia night to the mix.
Bianca wanted to say that she remembered this place or knew from her own personal experience what it was. Her sisters certainly
remembered it. They had mentioned it multiple times in the text thread when they were talking about places they couldn’t wait
to revisit. Apparently, Cora had big plans for taking down a double order of their fries. Possibly every day.
But Bianca didn’t remember it. In fact, there was a lot about Sunnyside she didn’t remember, which was hard for her to admit
to her sisters.
Sure, she had memories of their summers here, but hers were different. She remembered building sandcastles on the beach with
her mom. She remembered playing in the waves with her sisters. She remembered that when she was here, life seemed almost perfect.
But she’d been a kid then. The last time she was here, she’d been gearing up for her eleventh birthday, the summer before
she started middle school. She hadn’t been old enough to do the things her teenage sisters had done, so her memories were
different. Sometimes it felt like a different trip altogether.
But she was here now, ready to make some memories of her own.
Luke pulled his old pickup truck—which would have probably been classified as old the last time she was in Sunnyside—into the already-packed parking lot of Gus’s Tavern.
“Wow,” Bianca said. “You weren’t kidding when you said the whole town would be here.”
From what she could see, Gus’s was packed. An overflow of people hung out on the front deck and the stairs, chatting in small
groups. One group waved to a couple as they walked up to meet them, and for the first time since she’d invited herself on
this little excursion, Bianca realized trivia was more of a group activity. Luke probably wasn’t coming on his own.
Suddenly, she was aware that she had no idea what kind of situation she’d invited herself into. While she remembered Luke
and some of their childhood beachy adventures, she knew nothing about him as an adult. For all she knew, he had a long-standing
guys’ night tradition. Or he could be meeting his girlfriend. Or his wife.
She quickly glanced at his hand. No ring, which meant at least she wasn’t interrupting some coveted date night. Probably.
“It’s okay that I came, right? I mean, I’m not ruining your plans for tonight or anything, am I?”
Luke shook his head and pulled into what she assumed was a legal-enough spot on the sand. “Naw. I was just meeting up with
some buddies. Nothing formal.” He shifted his truck into Park. “Besides, it’s not every day I get to catch up with my super
summer friend.”
His old title for her made her smile because: One, it eased some of her embarrassment about crashing his plans. And two: Luke
was exactly how she remembered him—kind and inclusive. It was good to know that some things never changed. “Well, I promise
I’ll be a good teammate. I’m pretty good at trivia. My wealth of random facts runs deep.”
“Good to know because it can get a little competitive around here. How are you at buzzing in?”
She held up her hands and wiggled her fingers. “I hate to brag, but thanks to these beauties, I haven’t missed getting into a concert queue yet.”
Luke chuckled. “Then it looks like I brought the right person with me.” He climbed out of the truck.
Bianca followed, stepping out into the warm tropical night.
“Anyway, thanks for letting me come. Things were...” She paused, trying to think of the best word to describe the conversation.
Frustrating? Difficult? Ridiculous?
He shot her a knowing side glance. “In my family, we call it passionate.”
That made her lips twitch. “It was definitely that.”
“Family. We couldn’t do life without them, but sometimes they make it so dang hard to do life with them.”
Bianca laughed out loud. “So true. And to think, this is only the first of twenty-eight nights. It could be a long month.”
“The beach has a way of healing things. They say it’s the salt water.”
“Maybe.” Although she wasn’t feeling optimistic. Even her happy, celebratory news had turned into a lecture. Apparently, she
couldn’t even fall in love correctly.
According to her sisters, anyway.
She didn’t get it. She thought for sure they would be happy for her. She’d fallen in love and figured out what she wanted
to do with her life—two things her sisters had been telling her to do for years. Cora and Savannah should’ve been popping
a bottle of champagne and toasting her. Instead, they were trying to talk her out of it.
“What are your thoughts on dating apps?” she asked as they jogged up the front steps to Gus’s entrance. The sound of laughter
and happy conversations drifted through the open doors.
Luke shrugged. “I’ve never tried it myself. But I have a buddy who met his wife on one.”
“See! Would you please tell my sisters that?”
He waved to a group of guys at a table near the front, then led them over to one of the few open tables, a high-top off to
the side. “I’m guessing that’s what the fight was about.”
“Passionate discussion,” she corrected, sliding onto a stool.
He shot her a knowing grin. “Right.”
From the stage the emcee called out the two-minute warning and a timer appeared on the main screen. Luke pulled out his iPad
and started the process of registering their team. “You, uh, want to pick our team name?”
“How about ‘Not Wrong,’” Bianca said without any hesitation. “It’s been my stance tonight, even if everyone else wants to
debate me.”
“I like it.” Luke kept tapping away at the screen.
“But this isn’t a crazy idea, right? People meet each other all kinds of ways. Why shouldn’t online be one of them?”
“Makes sense.”
“And if Covid taught us anything, it’s that virtual meetings and in-person meetings are practically the same.”
“Maybe not quite the same, but they can be effective.” He propped up the screen just as the emcee stepped up to the mic.
“Welcome to Trivia Night. The night where it’s not just what you know, but how fast you know it.” The emcee’s voice boomed
and the crowd erupted into cheers. “Let’s get started.”
The first question flashed on the main screen above his head as he started reading it out loud. Before he finished reading
the first two words, Bianca reached over and tapped the answer on their iPad screen. “If anything, a connection made over
a virtual meeting would be even stronger in person.”
“I mean, sure,” Luke agreed. He pointed at the now-blank screen. “Was that a guess? Or did you actually have time to process
the question?”
Bianca scoffed. “Guess? Please.”
As the allowed time to buzz in ran out, the leaderboard popped up on the main screen.
“And it looks like team Not Wrong has taken an early lead.”
Luke nodded, looking impressed. “All right.”
“The thing is, I don’t understand why my sisters would think it was ridiculous to build a relationship that way.” The second question flashed up. Once again, while the emcee was still reading it, Bianca pointed at the iPad. “C.”
“There’s no way you had time to read that. You’ve gotta be guessing,” Luke said as he tapped the answer.
She shot him a sassy little smile and kept going. “Cora lives out of state, and we’re not any less close to her because our
primary contact with her is FaceTime.” She paused and thought through that sentence. “Okay, bad example. The reason we don’t
feel connected to Cora has nothing to do with FaceTime and everything to do with her being Cora.”
“And Not Wrong is living up to their name. But Fact Checkers and The A-Team are holding on to a close second. Looks like we’re
going to have some real competition tonight.”
“I mean, tons of people meet their person online,” Bianca continued. “It’s not like this is a new thing. It’s been around
for like thirty years.” She flashed her eyes to the big screen and read the new question. “D.”
Luke hesitated for a fraction of a second before he hit the correct button. She shot him a judgmental side-eye. “If those
were Taylor Swift tickets, you’d be watching the concert two months later at your local movie theater.”
Luke chuckled. “I’ll work on that. Also, you’re going to fit in just fine here.”
She gave him a confident grin as the leaderboard showed they were still in the lead.
“Okay, let me make sure we’re having the same conversation here,” Luke said. “Your sisters think dating apps can’t be successful,
but you want to give it a try.”
Bianca shook her head. “No, I know it’s successful because I met my fiancé that way.” She pointed at the screen. “A.”
He hit the answer faster this time. “How do you do that?” He gestured to the screen.
She shrugged. “It’s my useless talent.”
“Not useless if you want the coveted Trivia Night trophy.”
She brightened. “You didn’t tell me there was a trophy.”
He nodded. “Congratulations, by the way.”
Bianca held up a hand in a stop gesture. “Slow your roll. We haven’t won yet. They might get to a category I don’t know. My wealth of random facts might
run deep, but it dries up quick as soon as we start talking about geography.”
“No, I meant about getting married.”
“Oh.” For some reason the switch seemed to steal the wind from her sails, which was weird.
She was excited about getting married. Of course she was. It was the whole dumb argument with her sisters that was throwing
her off. “Thanks.” She reached across and hit the answer because she didn’t have the energy to call it out this time.
“If you’ve already met someone online, why are your sisters anti–dating apps?”
“Because they’re lame. They think I can’t possibly be in love with someone I’ve only known for a month and haven’t met in
person. D.”