Booking Glory-Chapter 69: Date With Dacey - Part 3

Rob was having a hard time keeping still as he sat in the theatre.

In hindsight, Rob felt like kicking himself for not selecting a romantic movie or a horror movie. He knew he had fucked up after watching the first fifteen minutes of the movie that he had picked.

When they reached the theatre, he had seen Dacey eyeing a particular movie poster from time to time when they stood in the queue. Figuring that it was probably a safe bet, Rob bought the tickets for that movie.

With the movie being an action genre, and him being partial to action films, Rob hadn’t thought much about choosing it after seeing Dacey eyeing it. But, just fifteen minutes into the movie the amount of noise, the sheer stupidity, and the senseless comedy that the movie portrayed had already put him off.

If he had been alone, it wouldn’t have mattered much as he would simply tune out this stuff and only pay attention to the action bits and such when they came on. However, that was not an option at present as Dacey was sitting next to him currently.

He could hardly control himself at this point. Her smell was intoxicating in such close quarters and the inane movie was not doing any favors as well. In short, the movie was boring and the woman next to him was more interesting than he had thought of earlier.

To make matters worse, Dacey was completely into the movie. It was as if she didn’t even realize that he was with him. Her complete disregard for his presence made Rob doubt his charm big time.

Now, Rob was struck not knowing what to do next.

He obviously couldn’t strike up some conversation as Dacey was really into the movie. He felt like he would be disturbing her if he did that. If he was into the movie as much as she was, then it wouldn’t have been an issue.

With her intoxicating smell driving him wild with every passing moment, Rob had started fidgeting by the time it was twenty minutes into the movie. He almost leaned into her several times trying to smell more of her aroma but had to control himself at the last moment with some leftover sanity.

He knew that such an action might come off as a bit perverted on the first date. And he didn’t want to form a bad impression on her. He also knew that he needed to do something before this entire thing drove him crazy.

So, he tried to think of some boring stuff and waited for the movie to finish. However, Dacey’s smell and her proximity would once more tempt him back to the original track, making it harder for him to form any other thoughts than kissing her.

However, whenever he wanted to do something, the movie would act like an annoying minder that was there to watch over them. A gunshot, a senseless comedy, or some other inane stuff would come on screen exactly the moment he would bring up his courage to do something.

Seeing Dacey reacting to that enthusiastically, the idea of disturbing her would become unappealing soon. Thus, Rob would once more end up in the same position he started out with.

So, with almost an hour up, Rob was finding it very hard to sit in the theatre at the moment.

This was turning out to be a torturous experience for Rob. And it was not something that he had signed up for. Nonetheless, one thing became clear to Rob at this moment.

His attraction towards Dacey was rising at an explosive rate.

And he also realized another thing that hadn’t even occurred to him till now. It had been almost a year since Rob had transmigrated to this world and he has yet to have sex in this new world. Forget sex, he has yet to kiss someone. It almost made him technically a virgin in Rob’s mind.

That mental combination and his attraction to Dacey were both driving him nuts at this point. The only bit of sanity that remained in his mind was from the maturity he had obtained from his past life.

And it was also soon dwindling into nothing as each minute passed inside the theatre as he sat near Dacey. The amount of self-control it took Rob to not act his age was off the charts at this moment.

Each moment felt like ages as he began to look at his watch frequently trying to see if the movie was going to come to an end. After a few minutes of doing this, Rob realized that it was only the first half of the movie and there was the second half still on the horizon.

At that moment, Rob felt like completely giving up his self-control and just acting his damn age for once in his new life. But, the mature part still prevailed. It kept reminding him not to be a horny dick and ruin Dacey’s evening.

It even kept reminding him that he obviously hadn’t prepared much for the date and this was probably his punishment from the world for it. The guilt trip somehow worked and after ten agonizing minutes, the first half of the movie came to an end.

Even the interval bang that was supposed to hook him further into the movie only made him feel terrible. Rob had to just grit his teeth and sit through it as doing something at this moment would put all his efforts on self-control until now into a ditch.

Rob breathed a huge sigh of relief when the interval came around. He tried to calm himself for a few moments, but it only got worse with no distracting sounds from the movie.

As Rob was fighting a huge battle over here, Dacey was entirely oblivious to his struggle. To her, the movie was kinda ok with her favorite actor and some good action scenes interspersed in the middle.

What Dacey considered to be good action scenes felt really boring to Rob at this moment. After going through the baptism of a visual extravaganza in the form of CGIs, normal action scenes without a gripping storyline felt really bad to Rob.

Rob breathed a sigh of relief when the crowd started making their way outside. It was his chance to take a breath of fresh air and not be smothered with Dacey’s aroma and proximity.

He needed it badly at the moment. So, Rob hastily followed the crowd as he led Dacey outside. Once Dacey left to refresh herself, Rob took in the air around him greedily causing the bystanders to stare at him.

Rob didn’t mind their looks one bit. He desperately needed to clear his head at the moment. He decided to use the restroom to refresh himself a bit and went about it without paying attention to anyone near him.

After splashing some water, relieving himself in the stalls, and generally taking in some fresh air, Rob made his way back into the theatres with some popcorn and other snacks loaded in his hands.

Dacey was waiting for him at their seats. She raised an eyebrow at the number of snacks in Rob’s hands. Rob merely shrugged and commented that he was hungry. He knew that he wasn’t making a good showing, but felt that this was better than coming off as a pervert on the first date.

The second half soon began and Dacey once more put her attention on the screen. Being already prepared, Rob started to silently munch on the snacks and fill his nose with their smell to prevent any sort of awkwardness.

Luckily, his new strategy seemed to work. The smell of the food and his constant munching gave him enough leeway so that his mind could wander into other places aimlessly with his eyes trained on the screen.

Rob’s thoughts began to go round and round and finally ended up with his performance during the date. The more he thought about it, he ended up with the conclusion that his performance was very lame.

From the get-go, he had been performing very poorly. He hadn’t made any efforts to make this one a memorable night for his partner. He had led her to a coffee shop where an awkward encounter happened.

He should have known better than to bring her there. After all, he already knew that wrestlers were treated like minor celebrities in Longham City. So, a random coffee shop wasn’t an ideal place for someone like Dacey.

While Dacey wasn’t that famous two to three months ago, her star has been rising recently. She had been making waves and many people know of her recently. She was red hot and it was only logical that something like what happened to them occurred.

Luckily, the waitress had been restrained and hadn’t made a scene. It is exactly news that a famous person was harassed in the public. And with Dacey’s particular brand of notoriety, the probability of that happening was higher in reality. So, they had lucked out that the harassment has been tame.

So, it was really a poor choice in retrospect. Following that, he had gone ahead and invited her to a movie on a whim, without even doing proper research on what was currently running on the screens. That had led up to an awkward first half for him.

Once again, he was lucky that he had noticed her interest in this particular movie. At least this hasn’t backfired spectacularly on Dacey, but it had done a number on him. But, he would take it gladly if it meant that Dacey had a good night and wanted a second date.

Now that he had some time to think about it, he didn’t know what to do currently.

First off, he didn’t know how to conduct himself during the date. Does he be more gentlemanly or considerate as the men in the 90s usually were? Or should he carry on with his jovial and bit more open approach as the men in the 20th century were? Was it even normal to take a date to a movie on their first date? 𝒇𝒓𝒆𝒆𝙬𝒆𝒃𝓷𝒐𝓿𝙚𝙡.𝒄𝓸𝒎

He really didn’t know if it was even the norm at this time to take a woman to the movies on a first date. Had he already come off as too off-putting with his forwardness?

The entire difference in the time period was putting him off of his game currently.

If it was during his time period, it wouldn’t be a big deal to say that he was bored with the movie. But, in this world and in this time period, these kinds of movies were the norm, and commenting on them with his 20th-century mindset wouldn’t fly well.

And the way in which he approached Dacey was also beginning to become confusing for Rob now. Once these doubts began sprouting in his mind, he wasn’t sure whether Dacey was currently content or was she already thinking that he was too forward and is only humoring him to not make things awkward.

Is that the reason that she seemed more interested in such a mediocre movie?

Rob’s mind started going down the rabbit hole as he started feeling really worried about how this date was progressing. He also realized that throughout this entire date he hadn’t made any romantic gestures as well.

In this time period, it is customary to bring flowers or turn up sharply dressed for a date. He, on the other hand, was currently in his working clothes and hadn’t made any such gestures to Dacey throughout the night.

Furthermore, Rob also felt that he was even hitting the minimum standards a woman might expect from a guy with his behavior. Take his current actions, for example, he had been munching stuff without even offering her anything.

He was more used to women who would reach out and take some popcorn or ask him for a cool drink or something. But, Dacey hadn’t asked or done anything like that and he hadn’t thought much about it till this moment.

The moment such a thought ran through his mind, Rob stopped his munching and stole a glance toward Dacey. Dacey still looked as if she was enjoying the movie, but the worrying niggle that has materialized in his mind wasn’t quieting down.

This once more put off his mood and the food started tasting like ash in his mouth. Rob didn’t know what to do at this moment. Should he offer her something? If he did, will he be disturbing her? Or is it something that she was expecting that he wasn’t delivering?

Rob struggled with his thoughts for a few moments, but in the end, decided to go with his gut. He knew that it was better to offer than not. If she rejected it, he would at least know that she was really into the movie and all these thoughts were just his mind going overdrive.

Taking a deep breath, Rob tapped Dacey on her hand and offered her some popcorn. Dacey nonchalantly took some popcorn and popped it into her mouth without taking her eyes off the screen for long.

Rob felt like ripping his hair out. Was she angry that it took him so long to offer? Or is she merely humoring him? Or was she too into the movie to even care about all this stuff?

Rob felt that this entire movie experience was turning into a horror film for him. He couldn’t accurately predict what was running through Dacey’s mind at this moment. And it was driving him nuts.

Any thoughts on Dacey’s smell and her proximity were now out of Rob’s mind. His only concern currently was whether he had already lost the chance for a second date and made this experience bad for Dacey.

Rob’s desire to consume food was not high originally. And with such an awkward thought now running through his mind, his interest in the food was lost completely as well. Even the thought of munching some popcorn was off-putting to him currently.

Thus, Rob spent the remaining of the movie in an awkward mindset trying to figure out where he stood with Dacey after his blunders during the date. He didn’t even notice that Dacey would occasionally reach out to take and pop some popcorn into her mouth from his offered hand.

The nightmare, at last, came to an end for Rob. The movie was over and people started filing out of the theatres. Rob didn’t pay much attention to the food present as he was glad that it was finally over.

He led Dacey outside amidst the crowd, as he tried to work out how to figure out where he stood currently. He knew that he had already fucked up this date. The question he had now was whether he had fucked up so badly that there wouldn’t be a second date or if he still had some chance to make amends.

He sincerely hoped that it was the latter.

*****

A/N: Hey folks!

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