Date Night

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Brian was sitting on the couch, waiting for Amanda to finally show up for their date. Amanda was the most popular girl in Lincoln high school- she was head cheerleader, class president, involved in dozens of school clubs over the years and anyone who was anyone in the school had a connection with her. Any other guy would have considered himself lucky, so why didn't he? Sure it was thrilling at first to have heads turn at her perfectly toned body as he walked her down the hall, to be the envy of all his friends, but it turned out being so popular was a lot of work, and it all seemed to take priority over spending time with him. Even now, once after school cheer practice was out, they were going to some party where she would drag him around while she played social butterfly.

As he was thinking about all this, Brian happened to see something sparkle between the couch cushions - this was odd because there wasn't enough light in the room to make that happen. Curious, he dug his hand into the couch and pulled out what looked to be some foreign coin, with strange writing around the edges and what looked to be a looking glass etched in the center. He didn't have much time to look at it before he heard Amanda's car pull in the drive, so he impulsively stuffed it into his pants pocket.

"Hey babe, sorry, Coach Hamilton was really working us tonight- we must have practiced the human pyramid 30 times. Anyway, I've got to go change. Speaking of, you're not going anywhere dressed like that, are you? We can't do much about the pants but last time I think you left a dress shirt here and I put it in the wash room. Go get it and put it on over your tshirt"

Brian sighed to himself once Amanda left, wishing she was the kind of girl who would just want to have a casual movie night. Somehow he thought of the coin again and put his hand in his pocket to touch it. He could swear he felt a slight static shock as he did. Something felt different but he couldn't place what. He shrugged, put the dress shirt on and returned to wait for Amanda to get ready.

Though he thought he'd be waiting another 45 minutes, he could already hear Amanda walking downstairs through the house's thin walls. Expecting her to head straight for the living room, he was somewhat surprised to hear her rummaging through the kitchen, singing a tune that was vaguely familiar to him under her breath. He could hear her singing gradually get louder and more off key as she went on.

Getting curious about what was happening, Brian walked through the hall into the kitchen.

"-GOTTA CATCH 'EM ALL! POKEMON! "

There was Amanda, standing by the toaster oven in a Pikachu onesie, singing happily into a spoon like it was a microphone. At least, Brian was pretty sure it was her - he so rarely saw her without makeup, but she looked a lot paler, with some acne. Though the hood of her onesie was up, he could see some of her hair messily sticking out, and it was dark brown- he knew her blonde hair was a dye job but didn't see how it could have gone back to her natural color in a day.

"Oh hey babe, didn't see you there- hope I wasn't bein' too loud. I'm just so excited about our date - I know we saw Detective Pikachu in the theater last year but I feel like there's a lot of nuances we probably missed, and Ryan Reynolds' voice is almost as hot as yours. Anyway, pizza rolls are almost done".

"Weren't we going to a party? "

"Oh yeah right - remember we tried that once and I was just on the floor bonding with the host's cat all night"

Suddenly some very different images of Amanda started appearing in his mind, like a montage. He could see Amanda eating lunch alone with the same messy brown hair she had now, wearing an oversized Sonic the Hedgehog tshirt. Then he saw himself coming up and chatting with her, getting her to laugh. A series of outings to fast food restaurants and the nearest comic book shop. An awkward first kiss during Rogue One, frequent cuddling in her bed, now full of stuffed pokemon. This wasn't exactly what he'd had in mind when he wished she'd spend more time with him, but he realized he loved the attention this version of Amanda lavished on him, and found her quirkiness charming. His friends would never understand, but he didn't care. He put his hand in his pocket one more time to find the coin missing.

"I'm just joking, let's go watch the movie"

All traces of the old Amanda vanished from his mind, along with hers and anyone else's. She was his nerdy, awkward girlfriend, and he loved her just as she was.