We made the right choice. The Mexican restaurant, Beans and Beans, was actually a café/restaurant, with a line out the door for coffee. Grant walked to the glass door to peer through to see what was up and was met with a near swing to the face by an apologetic server on their way to the patio. The host seated us on the other side of the room away from the espresso and cappuccino machines.
The place was unlike anything I’d seen. There was just a beam as a room divider, painted white, with snowboarding stickers covering each other up the ten-foot pole. Nestled between stickers saying, “Don’t flurry, be happy,” and “Ski ya later,” was, no surprise, one that read “Bigfoot is real.” In stark contrast, the rest of the room was painted lemon yellow, with rainbow string lights donning the roof. Mexican pottery was attached to the walls, and a bright green wall was behind the full bar.
I couldn’t get over this entrepreneurial enterprise. The café had a constant swinging door of customers, and the restaurant was at about seventy-five percent capacity. We perused the menu and found more than we’d bargained for.
“I can’t believe this,” Ren started. “So I can order a white chocolate mochaanda margarita in the same sitting? Are you kidding me?” He ran his finger down the long list of appetizers and entrées, pointing out the coffee menu to Grant.
“You can order a white chocolate mocha andchips and guac.”Grant was practically salivating.
“That’s even better.” Ren was bouncing on the blue pleather-covered booth. The entire seat shook below us.
“We also have espresso martinis,” our server offered from behind me.
“This place is magical.” Grant’s eyes were glazed over like a stoner in the chip aisle at a grocery store.
We ordered drinks and too much food, waiting giddily for our plates.
“You think the other teams are eating?” Grant asked.
“Well, we know Emerson and Ian aren’t.” Ren took a big gulp of his water, glancing at Grant to see if he was looking back at him.
“They really wanted those keychains,” Grant observed, a glint in his eye.
That was the embarrassing moment when I realized I’d become the third wheel on their impromptu date.
I pushed my plate forward after I finished my tacos, leaving the beans and rice. “Well, I’m stuffed. I think I’m gonna go.”
“What about the scavenger hunt?” Grant asked. Oops.
Ren’s eyebrows went up and down, telling me to proceed as planned and leave him some time with his crush.
“I just need to stretch my legs. I’ll go ahead and scope things out. Why don’t you meet me at the thrift store when you’re done?”
“Ten minutes?” Grant asked.
Ren clearly would have blown the whole thing off if he could, but Grant was too kind to abandon me. Was Grant a better friend than my best friend? I smiled at the thought.
“Sounds great.”
I didn’t know what to do with my ten minutes and briefly wondered if I was codependent. I walked down the short side street next to the restaurant and found a bench in front of some empty office space. It faced the forest as if someone had purposely sat it there with the express purpose of spending lunch breaks staring at the wilderness. I thought back to the last time I’d taken a real lunch break and realized it had beenmonths ago. It made me wonder if I’deverslowed down since graduating from undergrad.
Being away from work this long felt strange at times, and though I had enough distance to see I needed a vacation, some part of taking time to myself still felt a little wrong.
I chose not to look too deeply into that. Instead, I distracted myself by looking at our scavenger hunt list.
Kiss from Peanut Butter:check.
Find Sasquatch:check.
Find a banana: check.
We’d figured the latter would be at the general store and had not been disappointed. Apparently, the shop owner loved banana-themed objects, and we’d found stuffed plushies, banana candy, and banana milk, which I’d never realized was a thing. We’d bought one and passed it around. It was disgusting.
Buy the weirdest thing you can afford in town:still looking. Especially since we hadn’t exhausted our options yet.
Find something that makes you smile.
I wondered where Autumn was and realized I was a lovestruck cheeseball.
I walked over to the town map, a four-foot-by-four-foot painted map that showed Wildwood and the ski-turned-summer park across the street. We’d covered a lot, but there was surprisingly still more in this small town. It was hard to move fast when each proprietor stopped you to talk, but they never asked us what brought us out to their town. The owners must have been used to this excursion from Camp Starlight.
I realized I’d been standing in front of this map for too long but was given a reprieve as Grant and Ren came up from behind me, weaving their arms in mine as Ren ecstatically said, “Get in, loser. We’re going shopping!”
