Ian thought his arms were about to fall off by the time Madison finally opened the door. Not that he blamed her or anything; if anyone should feel bad about the armload of games that seemed to be getting heavier by the second, it was him. He should really have grabbed a duffel bag or something, but his original plan only involved bringing along a copy of Munchkin, and that was easy to carry.
It was only at the last minute that he decided to grab Uno, just in case Madison wanted to play something a little bit easier to learn, and then his copy of Zombies, just in case she wanted to play something more involved, and then Red Dragon Inn, just in case she wanted to play something that was sillier, and then his copy of Citadels, just in case she wanted to play something more strategic, and then his chess board, just in case she wanted to play something classic, and then a couple of card games because they fit in his jacket pocket and he wanted to give her a lot of options, and somehow he made it all the way out to the car before it occurred to him that he was now carrying a significant portion of his game cabinet and he should have put it all in something.
Luckily, Madison didn't seem to think he looked like an idiot carrying everything. Or if she did, at least she thought it was funny. She wore an amused half-smile on her face, the same half-smile she had at work when other people were absolutely losing it over the new client's latest bullshit. Like she was just letting all the stress flow around this little bubble of Maddy-ness, and inside the Maddy-bubble she could see the funny side of even the biggest crisis. Ian thought about that smile a lot. It was one of the big reasons he was so excited to find out that she loved tabletop gaming too.
Not that he was thinking this was a date or anything. That would be really rude and pushy and presumptuous and a total jerk move on Ian's part. Madison suggested they have a board game night, and okay, yes, he did get flustered enough to bring along about a quarter of his collection, but he wasn't about to get so flustered that he acted like a creeper. Unless she dropped some hints that she was interested in something more, Ian was going to treat this as strictly, purely, one hundred percent platonic.
Unless she already had, and he'd missed it. Ian was the first to admit that when it came to flirting, he probably wouldn't recognize anything short of a woman taking her clothes off and shouting, "LET'S GO HAVE WILD, PASSIONATE SEX IN A VARIETY OF ROOMS AND POSITIONS!" While holding a neon sign over her head that said, 'I Lust for Your Body'. Even then, he'd probably just turn around to see who she was talking to.
Madison broke into his train of thought. "Come in, come in!" she said, scooping half the games off the top and carrying them in. "Here, let me," she continued, "if I don't at least give you a clear field of vision you'd never make it to the table. Sorry about the mess, I tried to tidy up but I have an SCA event next week and everything's just chaos right now." She gestured with her free hand to the bolts of cloth propped up against almost every available vertical surface. "I always over-commit for these things. Anyhow, drop the games on the table and let's see what you brought."
Ian wound his way past scattered shoes and over to the dinner table. "Oh, I just grabbed a bunch of stuff," he said modestly, trying not to sound boastful despite the fact that he was, after all, talking about his pride and joy. "Um, I grabbed a copy of Grave Robbers From Outer Space, and We Didn't Playtest This at All, and Cthulhu 500, and...um..." He trailed into silence as he noticed a sizeable freestanding cabinet next to the table, one that appeared to have its own copy of almost everything he brought. He looked over at Madison with a new light of respect in his eyes.
She shrugged modestly in response. "Sorry, I probably should have made it clearer that when I said, 'You don't need to bring anything,' I really meant it." She looked at the stack of games on the table, then over at her collection. "Can you imagine if we ever moved in together? Just sorting out the duplicates would probably take a whole day."
Okay, Ian told himself, that had to be a hint. Didn't it? Was that flirting, or did she just need a roommate? She might have heard Ian mention to Steve that his lease was coming due and he wanted to find a better place, and maybe she was just making a joke about it, and acting all weird about an off-hand comment would be totally creepy. So instead he just replied with a joke of his own. "Nah, it'd take no time at all. Neither one of us could give up our personal copies."
Madison snorted. "Point." She went over to the game cabinet and pulled out a board game Ian didn't recognize, not that his pride was vaguely stung by the fact that Madison had games he'd never even heard of or anything. "I was thinking we could try this one for a start? It's a pretty quick play, and it's a good icebreaker. We can just do a round or two, and then see what we're in the mood for."
She set the box on the table, and Ian took a look at it. After just a glance, he no longer felt guilty about not having heard of this one-judging by the production values, 'Brian Shaw Games' was barely a step up from making stuff in their basement. The logo on the side of the plain cardboard box was just a little skull with lightning bolts shooting out from it, with a slogan that said, 'Scrambling words and brains since 2014.' The top of the box had the same skull-and-lightning-bolt picture, only larger, and the words 'Brain Teaser' in large letters written in one of the 'zanier' fonts.
Ian looked at her, a dubious expression on his face. "You sure this one's...um, I mean...?" He tried to find a delicate way to finish that sentence, conscious of the idea that Brian Shaw might be a friend or a family member that Madison helped with the game. "Um, it just looks a little rough, is all."
"Oh, it's more fun than it looks. Here." Madison opened up the box to reveal a folded board, a scattered handful of small poker chips in a variety of colors, and a stack of white note cards bound together with a rubber band. "It's really simple, The board has a bunch of words on it, and the cards have a list of words from the board. I read off the list to you, and you find the words on the list and put chips on each word. Then we switch, and I try to beat your time. I mean, it's a little unfair, because I've played before and you haven't, but as long as you don't mind losing your first round or two..."
