Benicia, Speed Dating, unexpected, Pennies
by Alli A.

The speed dating event had been planned for weeks, but you know how it is, right? You can only put so much effort. By the time you talked your friend with the building on First Street into lending it for the night, and by the time you talked your other friend into donating some snacks, you completely forgot to do any publicity. You hate doing publicity anyway. So you threw an announcement up on socials, and half-assed a flyer that went up in the coffee shops and on the Library bulletin board that afternoon, and you hoped for the best.

The best didn’t happen. You’re there for almost twenty minutes before you get your first person coming in, and she seems shy but cool enough. So you’re talking, and then someone else comes in – yay! – and they both see each other. You realize that of all the bad luck, you wound up hosting a speed dating event where the only two participants had hooked up before. As they leave, you realize that you’re not sure whether they are leaving because they were upset to see each other, or because they’re going away to hook up. Either way, it’s not speed dating, though it is unexpected.

A man comes in, curious about what’s going on in a building that’s usually closed at this hour. You’ve seen him around town, and he tends to know what’s going on. He seems pretty horrified by the idea that he wandered into some speed dating, makes an overly long and awkward explanation of why he has to leave, and does so.

So there you are. You’ve already tried all the snacks and looked at the decorations. Twice. You look through your phone to see whether there’s anyone you can persuade to come to this, but if you had more people in your phone who wanted dates, you wouldn’t be in an empty room. You wonder whether everyone in Benicia is already doing whatever level of dating they want to do.

And you think, just for a second, that maybe you shouldn’t have half-assed the publicity, because this event was for work and now you’re pretty sure you’ll be fired. You think that you didn’t really like this job and could get something better. But on the way home, you throw a few pennies in the Strait for luck, just in case.