Nothing but Heartbreak

29. Scavenger hunt

"I have the perfect day planned for us." Harlan beamed as he basically dragged me to his car.

He had been almost jumping up and down since he showed up earlier to pick me up for our first date. We had only been apart for just over an hour but still I had missed him. My apartment had seemed too quiet without his goofy ass bothering me constantly.

"Do I get any hints?" I questioned.

Harlan hadn't said anything about where exactly we were going. The hour we spent apart I had not only spent it getting ready but also freaking out. I had been on plenty of first dates. I knew what they entailed. The get to know you questions and small talk. I had done it all but with Harlan it was different. I knew a lot about Harlan and he knew a lot about me. It wasn't just the typical first date and I was nervous I wouldn't know what to say.

"I'll give you one." He opened the passenger side door for me.

"What?"

"It's going to be super fun." He chuckled.

Of course the hint was unhelpful and didn't actually give any hint at to what we were actually doing. I didn't know why I had expected anything else.

I sat in my seat and the nerves I had felt earlier were back. I couldn't stop my leg from bouncing as I sat in the car. I was nervous for the possibility of this going bad.

"You read-," Harlan looked over at me and paused. "What's wrong with you?" He narrowed his eyes at my leg that was bouncing nervously.

"I'm nervous." I frowned.

"Why? It's just me." He laughed reaching over and grabbing my hand.

"Yeah but it's our first date ever." I reminded him.

"Yes I know I've only been waiting for this moment like my whole life."

I smiled. He was right I had been waiting for this moment forever. We could literally sit and stare at a wall together and I'd probably be happy with it as a date.

"What if we have nothing to talk about?" I fretted.

"We've hung out plenty of times before. It's never been an issue for us. I can talk all day and never run out of things to say." He joked.

I rolled my eyes. I mean he wasn't wrong. Harlan seemed to easily fill silence.

"Well lately all the times we've hung out have consisted of arguing."

"We can argue if that's what you want." He offered.

"I don't really want that." I said truthfully.

The fighting had been exhausting and while bickering with Harlan was always fun I had enough of the fighting. I think I just needed a nice day to remind me that Harlan and I were capable of that.

"Just relax. Today is going to be fun. Mostly because you have me as your tour guide." He winked.

"You think way too highly of yourself." I teased.

"You love it."

That I did. Harlan was everything that drove me crazy but I loved every second of it.

I spent the car ride trying to figure out where we were going. Harlan happily shot down all my guesses. I was feeling slightly frustrated, I had guessed just about everything in town. I couldn't even think about anything else that was in this area.

"Is it the movies?" I guessed.

"The movie theater is on the other side of town. At least make your guesses good." He laughed.

"Well I'm sorry I thought maybe there was a secret movie theater I didn't know about or something." I argued.

"Well now I wish there was. That sounds cool."

I watched as he pulled into a parking lot. I stared at the building and I mean I hadn't guessed that this would be our date location.

"The art museum?" I looked at Harlan in surprise.

I guess it had made sense that I hadn't guessed where we were going. Harlan wasn't what I would've expected to be the art museum type.

"Yep now are you ready for me to give you the whole tour and show you the art?" He hopped out of the car and I just followed.

"I didn't know you were an art lover."

"We aren't really here for just the art." He grabbed my hand and led me into the building.

"Why exactly are we here then?" I inquired.

He turned and grinned at me wildly. He leaned over and grabbed a piece of paper and waved it around.

"Kids scavenger hunt." He pushed the paper into my hands.

Sure enough it was a scavenger hunt made for kids when they came to visit the museum. It had a long list of pictures of different art pieces that you had to find.

"You want to do a scavenger hunt made to occupy kids so their parents can actually enjoy the museum?" I looked at my boyfriend in amazement.

While the art museum wasn't what I had expected, this definitely was. A kids activity actually seemed to fit him very well.

"It's going to be fun. My mom used to take me and Jade here when we were kids."

"Ok fine but you do know you could've just taken me here and we could've just looked at the art without this scavenger hunt."

"Why look at all the art when they provide a list of all the best ones for you."

"This isn't a list of all the best art pieces. It's just random pieces that are spread out throughout the museum so kids don't get bored." I told him.

"Don't be a fun killer. Let's find this first one, it's a painting of a boat. To the boat paintings." He started to pull me through the lobby further into the museum.

"Is there really a place designated to paintings of boats?" I questioned.

"I'm not sure but I guess we will find out." He beamed.

This wasn't exactly the first date I had imagined but I couldn't deny the fun that I had whenever I was with Harlan. He found random things and found a way to make it fun. Art museums weren't necessarily my thing, I wasn't a big art lover but walking around with Harlan as he acted like a five year old doing this dumb scavenger hunt was probably the best date I had ever had.