After her little introduction, the response was immediate. Some waved, others nodded, and a few approached her, but the guy in the back was just shuffling cards. Ivy wondered what his deal was, but she was too busy shaking hands and listening to the list of names that streamed out everyone's mouths.
"Hi, I'm Alan! I'm so excited to meet you. All the guys here are like super virgins, so you don't have to worry about any of them." A tall skinny man said, and though Ivy hated to affirm stereotypes, this man's voice proudly advertised his homosexuality.
"Ruuude!" A voice in the back yelled.
"Oh, haha, I wasn't worried," Ivy tried to justify.
"Oh honey, no need to lie- you looked terrified when you entered the room," Alan said with a frown.
"Oh, thanks then," Ivy said with a small smile.
"Go away, Alan, you're giving up a bad rap. I'm so sorry if we worried you; I promise we're good people." A shorter man with brown hair said while pushing Alan away. Ivy couldn't help her giggle as she watched their interaction.
"You're like brothers," Ivy said.
They both paused to look at her, "Yeah, that's cause they are." A voice came from behind them. A tall woman who seemed to be at least 5'8 came forward; her long black hair was tied into a high ponytail that reached her waist, and she had an undercut.
"Serena," she announced her name before Ivy could ask. Then she promptly took Ivy's hand and shook it, gripping firmly.
"Nice to meet you," Ivy said, her eyebrows raised, she was impressed by this woman already, and she had barely gotten to know her.
The rest went up and greeted her; she listened carefully for their names, Grayson, Aggie, Sam, Jonathan, Ryan, and Parker. Everyone acted kind and seemed excited to have another person. Ivy sat down at a table with Abbey, Theo, Oliver, Serena, and Maira.
They explained to her that 6 people made one team and that since she had joined them, they finally had two groups. They tried to hand her a deck of cards, but she declined and pulled out her plastic cards with red backs. After she had set up her game, the timer, and finally began, they watched as she quickly flipped over all the cards and sorted them into their respective piles.
"Holy shit," Serena broke the silence that had settled over once they stopped the timer, "118 seconds."
"What did I say, suckers? She's cool as heck!" Maira beamed.
"My best was 108, and she's only 10 behind," Oliver whined, and Abbey patted his back, smiling.
"Oh shut up, we got ourselves a little Queen of Hearts," Theo said, smirking, "It's not your fault she's amazing, you peasant."
While the two brothers started bickering, Ivy looked down, smiling. This was fun. She didn't even think about her grandmother once yet.
Ivy was shuffling her deck when she saw someone looking at her from the other table. Sat by himself at a smaller table was the guy she had made eye contact with earlier. He was utterly attractive, with cold grey eyes and dirty blonde hair. Just like last time, he looked away, but not without squinting at her with an unreadable expression.
"Who's that? He didn't introduce himself earlier," Ivy asked, gesturing to the mystery man.
The table turned to look at him, and Maira sighed in disappointment. "Of course, he didn't," she said. Then proceed to say in a mocking tone, "Hey, Asher! Why don't you come to say hi?"
Without looking, Asher flipped her off, and Maira laughed. "Aww, what's wrong, sunshine? Not feeling ok? Upset tummy?"
"Fuck off, Maira," A gruff voice responded. Wait, was that him, goddamn his voice was good.
The table now turned to her along with Asher, shit.
"Honey, you said that out loud again," Maira smiled.
"Ah, fuck, I mean sorry," Ivy choked, looking down at her lap.
"No worries girly, I feel ya," Theo sighed, "He could ask a random woman to bark, and she'd drop to her knees and fetch a bone."
"I don't need to hear your fantasies of me, fucker." Asher said, pinching the bridge of his nose. Ivy giggled, and Oliver laughed.
"Oh please, you're lucky if I spared you a thought in my brain." Theo huffed.
"Like you have any," Asher shot back- now facing them.
Ivy was dying of laughter, along with everyone who heard their interaction. Meanwhile, Theo huffed, offended. Ivy glanced in Asher's direction to see that he was still deeply engrossed in his game, ignoring everyone.
"What a turd," Ivy said- the second it let her lips, she covered her mouth. Shoot, she did it again.
"Excuse me?" Asher said, his head shot up, staring at her blankly.
Before Ivy could apologize, Maira shot out of her seat, cackling and pointing wildly at him, "She called you a turd!"
His eyebrow raised. Asher rose from his seat, grabbed a chair from an empty table, and dragged it to his own. He then gestured toward Ivy to get her to come closer.
"Play with me," He said plainly.
"What?" Ivy was confused. Why did he want to play with her now when he was alone earlier?
"Play with me," He repeated, tilting his head and mockingly enunciating his words.
It was Ivy's turn to raise her eyebrow, but she didn't care much about the reason. This would be her first speed solitaire round, and she was excited. Ivy rose from her seat and plopped into the chair opposite Asher at his little table. If Ivy hadn't been so distracted by Asher's blank face, she would've noticed that everyone's jaw had dropped at his request. They set up their decks, and Maira came over to start the timer.
"Alright, so, classic rules right now, flip the cards after I start the timers. Ready? 3… 2… 1… GO!" Maira announced.
They flipped over the cards in less than 5 seconds and began sorting them, black to red, red to black, slowly placed down in number value. Ivy was about a third done when she heard a voice.
"You see- the difference between you and me is I have a reason to play solitaire, a reason to do what I do, reasons to be here while you; have no purpose. I have the advantage in terms of who wants this more. I doubt you've ever had a reason to do anything besides doing what you want. You don't matter in this game; it's me who has more skill, and it's going to be me who will win."
What the fuck was this man going on about? Ivy slowed her movement. No purpose, no reason? Who was he to tell her what she could and couldn't do? She was going to show him who he was messing with, but as soon as she had that thought- Asher stopped the timer.
"And… that's game." Maira sighed.
"Well, he's more of a turd than previously thought," Ivy muttered to herself, this time on purpose.
"Dude, you had to bring out the shit-talking?" Jonathan said from behind Asher.
"I never go easy on people anyways, and this time I meant what I said," Asher said, turning to face Jonathan, completely ignoring Ivy's existence.
Ivy stood up, walked around the table to face, and slapped Asher- across his stupidly perfect face, and she did it hard. Maira gasped as the sound echoed through the room.
"What the hell?! What was that?!" Asher yelled, holding his cheek in one hand, "You-"
Ivy raised her hand, making Asher flinch, "No, we're going to listen to me now. You have no right to even breathe towards me right now. For your information, I do have a reason to play solitaire, and I do have a reason to be here. Even if I didn't, that doesn't make me any less important than you right now. I don't know how long that stick up your butt is, but it must go for miles considering how constipated you look. Also, before you even think of asking- my reasons are mine and mine only. I don't need to explain a single thing to you. By the way, your playing got sloppier while you were talking. You might want to fix that, sweetheart," Ivy said, her face dead serious the whole time except for the end when she started smiling sweetly.
When she finished speaking, she scooped up her cards- and right before anyone could say anything else, ran out of there and into her car, where she started crying.