fandomtownies | Fast Eddie's; Friday Evening.

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Fast Eddie's; Friday Evening.

So, there they were. The rescheduling of the date that was actually even confirmed as a date and not just something hanging there in ambiguity. A.J. even held the door open for Beauty as they arrived at Fast Eddie's, although he probably would have done something like that, anyway. "So what do you think?" he asked her as they moved in. "Bowling, video games, or something to eat first?"

[[ clearly, A.J.'s here with the permissively modded da~ate, but the bowling alley's definitely open for all your...bowling alley needs. *nod* ]]

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"It's not like you have to be, either," A.J. commented before, leaning on the counter for support as he untied his own boots, giving the man at the counter his shoe size. "See," he explained, almost deadpan if it wasn't for his wry grin as he loosened the laces, "you have to give them your shoes as collateral, so you don't go running off with theirs instead."

Wait a minute. A.J. wanted Beauty to hand over her precious boots to some stranger? She shot him a look that suggested he should really appreciate the things she did for him, and slipped off her boots.

"I don't what size they are. They're just...the size of my feet," she said uncertainly, setting the boots up on the counter.

"Uhhhh...." A.J. frowned a little at that, because he didn't even think about the fact that she came from before the assembly line. "Well, this guy probably does this every other day of his life, so can hopefully make a good guess just by looking at them?"

And, since the guy didn't really have a lot of complaint besides a roll of his eyes, that did seem to be the case.

Beauty got a pair of fugly red and gray shoes that seemed to fit well enough, and she laced them on and then stuck out a foot with a grin at A.J.

"So these will make me good at bowling, right?"

"Oh, yeah," A.J. said, wriggling into his own nice puke green and puce pair. "Because they just totally hand you magical shoes that make you instantly good at it so no one feels bad. Take it we should just start with one game before deciding if we want to do more?"

"I would wear these shoes every day if they were magic and made me instantly good at things," Beauty stated, with a nod.

"One game's probably a good start. Especially since I'm told this is nothing like lawn bowling, and I haven't even done that since I was a child."

"Well, what exactly does lawn bowling entail?" A.J. said. He paid for a game and then, while the guy got the lane set up, headed over toward one of the racks of bowling balls to start looking for a good one.

Beauty followed along, curious to see what A.J. was doing. "Well, it's mostly a bunch of people rolling a ball across the lawn to try and hit or get closest to another ball," she said. "It's not like croquet, that's got mallets. I guess maybe you don't do lawn bowling here."

Since Annette hadn't had any idea what it was either.

"Well, the rolling the ball across something part is pretty consistent," A.J. said. "So, here's how this works. See these balls right here?" He placed his hands on two of them on the rack in front of him. "We're going to pick one that's a good weight and size for us, that's comfortable to hold liiiiike this." And he picked one up that looked good, so he could show Beauty exactly how, with the way the finger holes worked. "And then, what we'll do is, go over there to where our lane is, and you roll the ball down the lane there, to the pins at the other end, and just.....try to knock them down, by....rolling the ball at them..."

Pause.

"I never, for the record, ever said it was a particularly exciting game, mind you..."

Beauty listened carefully, nodding as A.J. explained, and took the ball he'd picked out for her, giving a little surprised exclamation when she discovered that it was heavier than it looked.

"No wonder it's so noisy," she observed, glancing toward the other lanes. "And I don't want it to be exciting, that would defeat the purpose of being here with you." She shot A.J. a little shy grin. "So I just...go roll it toward the other end?"

"...wait, did you just say being with me is not exciting?" A.J. asked, his shocked, slight offense ruined by a chuckle building up. He hefted his ball a little to test it before trying another one. "Make sure you find a ball you think is a good weight. Not too heavy, or awkward to hold. And there are little nuance rules, like usual, but I'll go first and you can watch. Sound good?"

"No! I meant that I didn't want other exciting things happening to distract me from spending time with you." Beauty gave A.J.'s arm a light smack and pulled a face at him.

"All right, I'll watch, and you show me how it's supposed to be done." Since she felt pretty sure that when she stepped up there? Whatever resulted would not look much like bowling.

"Well, I don't know if I'm exactly the best example, but..." He walked over to the ball return, putting the ball he'd chosen inside for the time be. "Just let me get the score board set up, unless you want to try to figure the computer out?"

"I think you'd better do that," Beauty replied, backing away from the electronic-looking thing. "I'll just watch what you do and make sure you don't cheat."

"Cheat!" A.J. laughed. "How can I cheat if we haven't already even started. I just have to enter the names so the score board up there on the TV above us has our names. Let's see. These things are always harder than they look."

Biting his lip, he figured it out so that, soon enough, they had two names up on the screen. AJ first, followed by Beuaty.

"Yes, I spelled it wrong," he admitted as he stood back up. "But it would take probably half an hour to fix it on those things."

Beauty frowned at the misspelled name, although it was mostly just teasing. "Well, I guess at least this way when I lose terribly, I can claim it wasn't really me, it was some girl name Beuaty with ugly shoes."

"Exactly," A.J. nodded, and gave her a smirk. "I'm just looking out for you, here. Okay. So. Bowling. Really simple. See that line there, though, you don't want to cross it, that's bad. So you just stand here," he acted out his explanation as he gave it, "consider the pins for a second, pull back, and...."

He took the few steps toward the line, swinging his arm forward and releasing the ball. It wasn't exactly smooth, thunking a little before rolling, rolling....rolling right into the gutter, just toward the very end. He let out a grunt.

"But you want to avoid that..." he muttered.

It looked deceptively easy, which made Beauty immediately assume that it was in fact probably extremely difficult. Especially after A.J. looked as though he was doing everything the way the other bowlers were, and still didn't succeed in hitting the pins.

"Doing something you're bad at with someone you love is just as much fun as doing something you're good at," she stated, as if trying to cheer them both, as she chose a ball and carried it up to the line A.J. had pointed out.

"Put my fingers in the holes, which I should mention seems designed only to make things harder, and..." She mimicked A.J.'s movements, succeeding in sort of tossing the bowling ball a couple of feet, whereupon it fell with a thunk and wobbled over into the gutter.

"...roll it toward the pins."

A.J. had to admit that he wasn't paying a whole lot of attention to Beauty's form. He was a little stuck on the whole 'with someone you love' part with a dorky, dopey grin to prove it.

"Hey, not too bad a start," he said when he noticed how it had gone.

Beauty turned to give him an 'oh please' look over her shoulder, and caught the end of that dopey grin, smiling in return. The words had come out so easily, she hadn't even noticed what she'd said.

She was sure that meant something important.

"As opposed to dropping it on my foot, you mean?"

"Or," A.J. reasoned with a grin, "releasing it too early when you pulled back, sending the ball flying back into my nose. I like my nose. I'd like it uncrushed by big heavy balls."

"I like your nose too, I would never do anything to risk breaking it," Beauty insisted. Obviously riding really large horses didn't count as risky. "Show me again? This isn't anything like lawn bowling, except there being a ball involved."

"And rolling!" A.J. argued, grinning. "And, actually....I didn't stop you, 'cause you were pretty eager to get up there, but we each actually get two turns at once so..." He pointed to the screen, highlighting her newly spelled name. "So it's actually your turn."

"Oh! Oh no, I'm sorry A.J." Beauty blushed at her rudeness, and stepped away from the line. "I took your turn, so you should go next."

"No way!" A.J. despite himself, chuckled a little. "'Cause then any pins I get will go to you for points. Go ahead," he nodded toward the balls in the ball return, "go for it."

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