Rewrite The Future

Chapter 16: Dean's POV

Throughout the entire 20-minute drive, Jessica tries to pester the details of our date out of me but does so to no avail. I wanted to keep it a surprise and as I pull my car into the minigolf carpark, I'm glad that I stuck to my guns. When she reads the flashing neon sign, that spells out "Coveview MiniGolf" in big writing, her eyes light up and her cute smile doubles in size.

"Please, please, please tell me we are going in there." She practically squeals while eagerly pointing at the sign.

"Nah, I thought I'd drive us here to sit in the carpark and count tumbleweeds." I deadpan.

She shoves at my shoulder before climbing out of the car. I quickly follow and lead us through the main door. It's a lot busier than I thought it would be for a Thursday night. There are several families here with hyperactive kids, some even have newborn babies with them, one of which is screaming the place down. The family of three is queuing up to get their golf clubs, but the baby is having none of it. The mum rocks him back and forth in her arms while the dad shakes a teddy bear in the kid's face while making the stereotypical baby noises. It only causes the kid to scream louder. I'll never understand the point of doing these kinds of activities with babies. It's a whole lot of effort, no one has fun, and the kid won't remember any of it anyway!

Jess sees where my attention has gone and leans up to whisper in my ear. "If I were them, I'd quit while ahead and go home now." She says, mirroring my thoughts.

Once we make it out of the long queue with our plastic golf clubs and a bucket of neon golf balls, we head outside to start the course. It becomes obvious pretty quickly that Jess is freakishly good at this. She pots each shot with ease while I'm struggling to get the ball anywhere near the hole. On her fourth go when she finishes a par 3 in one shot, I call her out mainly because it's impressive as hell but also partly due to the dents it is leaving in my ego. I'm man enough to admit that I'm competitive as hell but I also can't hide the fact that being bad at this is pissing me off.

"Okay, are you a competitive golfer or something? Why are you so good at this?"

"I think a better question is why are you so bad at this?" She chuckles, while using her golf club to point at my ball which has rolled back towards the starting point.

"Ugh." I sigh. "I thought this would be easy."

"Well, it doesn't help that you're hitting the ball hard enough to leave a dent in it." She laughs. "It's all about control. Look." She says and proceeds to land another perfect shot. "You need to think about how far you want the ball to travel and then decide how hard to hit it."

I take my next shot, using half as much force as before and while the ball doesn't go into the hole, it is a lot closer to it than any of my previous attempts.

"There you go, you're a natural!" Jess beams. This feels anything but natural, but I don't voice that out loud.

"Have you really never played minigolf before!"

"Does it look like I'm a regular minigolf player?" I laugh, gesturing at myself. "You never told me how you got so good at this?"

"Me and Lauren used to come here a lot before everything happened. We used to come every Tuesday after school. We'd spend hours here. We were often the last people in the place, pretty sure the staff hated us." She laughs but I can sense the hurt in her voice.

"Oh Jess, I'm sorry. I didn't know. We can go if you want?" Trust me to pick the one place that reminds her of her ex-best friend for our first date.

"No, I want to stay. I love this place, it's been too long since I've been."

When I don't respond to that, she grabs my hand. "Seriously Dean, I'm having a great time." I brush a loose strand of chocolate brown hair out of her face and tuck it behind her ear. Her eyes zero in on my lips and she visibly gulps before pulling away.

"Hurry up and take your shot before you forget all the good tips that I just gave you." She insists.

I only slightly improve as we work our way through the course and it's safe to say Jessica wipes the floor with me. As we head out of the minigolf center, I spot a diner across the road.

"Are you hungry?" I ask Jess while cocking my head in the direction of the diner.

"I could murder a burger." She moans.

"I guess that answers my question." I laugh and lead Jess across the road with one hand tightly wrapped around her waist.

As soon as we enter the diner, a boy only a few years younger than me approaches us. His red and white checkered shirt is messily tucked into black slacks and shaggy blond hair sticks out of the sides of his red baseball cap.

"Welcome to Ellen's diner, how can I help you guys!" He announces in the most hyper way possible, it doesn't help that there are only a handful of people in here and everyone has turned to look our way. I don't miss the way he stands a little too close to Jessica than what is necessary.

Jess doesn't seem fazed in the slightest as she follows him to a booth in the corner of the small restaurant. He doesn't take his eyes off Jess as she takes her seat and proceeds to tell her the specials as if I'm not there while speaking in the tone all guys use when trying to chat up a girl.

"Thank you, that all sounds great." She politely dismisses him, but the poor fucker doesn't get the hint and continues to stare down at her. I don't know whether to be offended or impressed. On one hand, he is blatantly flirting with a girl on a date but on the other hand, he's got some serious balls to do it.

Jess shifts uncomfortably in her seat. "Maybe we could get a few minutes to look over the menu?" I suggest, trying hard to hold in my laughter. He finally seems to remember my existence and quickly shakes himself out of it, before heading back in the direction of the kitchen. Once he pushes through the red doors, I turn to a blushing Jessica.

"Someone has an admirer."

"I don't know what you're talking about." She pretends to play dumb.

"Oh yeh, I must've just made up the gushing waiter." I laugh. "Our special today is loaded fries with a choice of two toppings but for you, I'll add three." I mimic the waiter and throw in a wink at the end.

"Oh my God, stop! He did not wink at me." She says before bursting out laughing.

"He may as well have." I supply in between laughs.

We both quickly sober our expressions as he approaches again. We manage to get through placing our orders with straight faces but neither of us misses his leaving remark. "Coming right up, darling."

Jess doesn't miss a beat. "Oh, that would be great! Waiting for food is a nightmare, especially when feeding for two." She says while exaggeratedly rubbing her belly. "My fiancé here has been a star, helping me deal with the morning sickness. But it'll all be worth it when there is a mini-me running around the place. Isn't that right, baby?" Jess eyes me from across the table and gives my leg a sharp kick.

"Of course." I manage to get out. "I'm counting down the days."

When I look back up at the waiter, he resembles a deer caught in headlights. He mutters a quiet, "Your food will be ready shortly" before hightailing it back into the kitchen.

The two of us, double over the table in laughter. "You're evil, Whiskey."

"Please, he had it coming." She smirks.

Our food arrives at the table a few minutes later but our waiter is nowhere in sight.