Stay With Them Tonight

ALLIE P.O.V.

“Let’s ask him,” I suggested. Tyler lead me over, his hand still holding mine. I knew we looked like a couple. A part of me wished we were a couple. My fingers were tingling in his, every tiny neuron in my body focused on feeling his hand on mine. I kept on thinking that it was like holding your hand on a cup of iced coffee, how it was cold at first but then gradually got used to it, and you didn’t even feel the cold after five minutes. This wasn’t like that.

I felt like I had been burned by him, and even long after the initial burn, my skin still felt seared and alive with recognition of it.

“Do you know where the peacocks are?” Tyler asked when the man with the zoo’s logo on his shirt turned to us. He laughed.

“I don’t know, specifically.” He spoke like there was something that he knew that we didn’t.

“What do you mean?” I asked. He smiled indulgently at me, glad to play his little joke on us.

“They run free in the zoo. It’s the afternoon, and usually they hang out near the other birds, near the front of the zoo.”

“They don’t have cages?” I asked, surprised. Peacocks just look mean.

“No, they leave people alone, and it’s good for them to be able to walk around. They might be on some roofs of the lower exhibits,” he added helpfully. Tyler thanked him and I pulled him along the path.

“I wonder if anyone else has figured that out,” I wondered aloud.

“Probably,” he said logically. I frowned at him and started pulling him along faster. We went down a shallow hill, and we were running through the zoo, around the clusters of people that traveled like schools of fish. We ran, him a little behind me, still linked by our hands, until I came to an abrupt halt at the closest bird exhibit, laughing like an idiot. Tyler was only a little out of breath, whereas I was panting. He grinned at me, noticing this.

“Shut up,” I told him between pulling more air in my lungs. “So I’m a little out of shape,” I joked.

“I think it’s the ice cream,” he teased. My laugh died a little, remembering Jason’s serious face at the amusement park the day before, so intent on the conversation I didn’t want to have with him. His serious eyes, dark and hazel. I mentally slapped myself.

“Peacocks, peacocks, wherefore art thou peacocks?” I asked to no one in particular. I got a hint when I saw a little girl laughing, pointing up at the top of a workers’ station. I followed her pointing finger to a colorful bird perched on top of the small building. I could tell from the tail feathers that it was what we were looking for.

“Up there,” I pointed along with the girl and he looked up. Regretting it, I let go of his hand to get his phone out of my pocket, where I had stuck it after I took the last picture.

“Let’s both be in this one,” I suggested. We wound up taking the picture from below, both of us looking down at the camera as the peacock posed above us. I swear it knew it was having its picture taken.

TYLER P.O.V.

We won eighth place in the scavenger hunt, and were given a chance to go in with the giraffes and zebras as they were being fed- when they were most docile. Allie was so excited I thought she might break my hand off, which she had taken when we won without thinking.

She personally tried to feed every single animal in the large grassy expanse, while I mostly watched. The animals were great, but watching her was almost more fun. She walked slowly so as not to spook the animals, but with a visible tension that hid her excitement.

Gaining inspiration as she held out some hay to one zebra, I called her name from behind her. She was startled when she turned to face me and found my phone in front of my face, quickly capturing the moment- the surprise and happiness on her face, her outstretched hand with the food, and the zebra staring at the food hungrily as it opened its’ mouth to chomp down on it, although it already looked well-fed.

I saved the picture as my wallpaper, and Allie’s surprised face looked out at me as I exited out of my photo’s gallery.

I grinned as she stuck her tongue out at me and continued on her quest to make friends with all of the animals.

JASON P.O.V.

Allie was special. Cher knew what to do; she was distant in everything but a bed. She was hard to really get to know, and didn’t often engage in conversation. Because of this, she was great as a friend to have sex with occasionally.

Allie, I knew, was completely different. As different as chili peppers and sugar cane. She wouldn’t rest until she knew you, if she decided she wanted to know you. Incessantly she asked questions, was genuinely curious about what you said, and made weird faces depending on what you were saying. Her trying-to-raise-an-eyebrow face was the most comical, which looked like she was sucking on a lemon while simultaneously hearing about the death of Barney- a mixed reactions look.

I knew I cared about her. Maybe too much, judging by the way my mind kept returning to her, like a CD will replay a certain song if you listen long enough. But I could never tell if she was as interested as I was- she pulled away when I kissed her, not once, but twice. She looked away when our eyes met- normally, I knew this meant she probably liked me. The fact that she always seemed so angry when she looked away is what threw me off balance.

I continued silently adding up the indications I liked Allie, keeping a running total in my head like a physical list.

I hadn’t pushed her much in the couple months I had known her. I had kissed her far below the average number of times I usually kissed girls I was attracted to, which showed a level of restraint on my part the equivalent of a monk. I had never touched anything but her waist or neck or face, staying far away from the areas I knew she would be uncomfortable with.

I indulged her. When she wanted to pay, instead of letting her, as I might anyone else, I found a way to get around her.

In gym, I sometimes found myself moving closer to her in order to protect her, although she rarely needed it, from flying balls and rackets and other sports equipment. In computers, I had moved so that I now sat right next to her. In cinema class, I was always sure to be in the same working group as her.

I’m like a love-struck teenage girl, I realized, not without a little twinge of masculine horror at the thought. I was being perfectly stereotypical in that category. The momentary feeling passed when I realized that I really didn’t mind; although frustrating, liking someone was turning out to be an okay experience.

But what to do about it? I wondered to myself. The answer came to me like lightning out of a clear sky- a perfectly reasonable but unobvious concept, given my last experiences with it.

“I don’t think I can stay here,” I announced into the room, which was speckled with glow-in-the-dark things, like a lit-up lava lamp, and star stickers of the type kids post on the ceilings when they are little- Danny, in fact, still had some. The points of bleary light were focus points, showing dimly in the darkness.

Cher looked at me for a second, probably wondering why today I made a point of not staying long. Usually I stayed for an additional hour or so, lounging about with her. She finally shrugged, and changed the topic like I knew she would.

“Do you mind taking me home then?” she asked. Although this was definitely her room, all the things were small and out-of-date, feeling unlived in.

She always called the other place I took her to “home.” I never went in to the other house, but this child’s room, but with a full-sized bed, made me think that perhaps her parents were split, and she hadn’t lived here since she was a kid. By the dark colors and golf trophies in the living room (the only room I had ever really seen), I guessed this was her dad’s house.

“Not at all, I was planning on dropping you off anyway. But I don’t know if we can continue having sex,” I admitted freely. “Talking, maybe, because I think of you as a friend, but we can’t get together like this anymore.” I gestured to our bodies, covered by the thin sheet and the comforter tangled on the end of the bed. I could faintly see the sharp, pretty planes of her face turned towards me, the suggestion of curves before the sheet hid them away.

She looked at me in the dark, but didn’t ask. I answered anyway.

“This time tomorrow, I hope to have a girlfriend.” I spoke confidently, even grinning a little. She laughed at me lightly, the sound carrying softly through the room. Too bad she was such a cynic about love, and I had never seen her as a dating possibility- she would be very easy to get along with.

“Okay, Jason. But call me as soon as she dumps your cocky ass, okay?” she teased. I grinned.

“She won’t.” Of course, now that I was determined to pursue Allie, I wouldn’t let her say no so easily.