#vegasbaby

"Brie... What are we doing?" I was surprised to hear only five words come out of Berkely's mouth, and also to hear her nickname for me instead of my full name like she would use if she were yelling at me. She sat up on the bathroom counter in her pajamas and slumped her shoulders. I hadn't seen this Berkely in a long while, because she could put a good show on, even when it came to her being sad and putting a smile on her face. I walked over and sat up next to her, hitting my shoes together as I stared at them. I honestly didn't know what to say, because she was completely silent, and she was usually my rock when I was sad...not the other way around.

I sighed and decided to try to get something out of her. "What do you mean, Berk?" She inhaled deeply and let it out slowly before talking again.

"This was supposed to be a vacation. What are we doing falling in love?" I scrunched my eyebrows when she said that. She hopped off of the counter and stood in front of it, putting her hands up and making scoff sounds like she didn't know what to say. Berkely usually didn't make conclusions like this so fastly, and I hadn't expected her to start worrying about leaving Nick until we were driving away. Usually, she would just cry for the five minutes after we drove away, and then I would pat her back and she would smile again, thinking there was no point in crying. But she was doing this too fast--even I hadn't made my official decision about Zak, and now she wanted advice on Nick.

"Berk, I don't know what to tell you now, but we will figure this out before we leave. I know how you feel about Nick, and it's strange that I feel the same way about Zak." She laughed and nodded slowly; I wondered why she was so upset about this. "For now, let's just have fun. That's what Zak told me, and he's right. We can't predict what will happen, but now we can live for the moment." I hopped off the counter and pulled her into a tight hug. She didn't put her arms around me for a few seconds, probably because we hadn't hugged like this since we were freshman in college. I took a deep breath before pulling away and putting my hands on her shoulders. "We're all going to be fine, Berkely. Nick's' a good guy, and he won't hurt you intentionally. Now, come on, let's get you prettied up." She nodded and sulked off to the bedroom to get clothes out of her bag.

Berkley actually ended up wearing a pair of jeans and my sneakers (we were the same shoe size), along with a t-shirt and jean button-up shirt as a jacket. I grabbed a baseball cap and curled my hair in the extra time we had. We assumed (and laughed about the fact) that Zak would take forever to fix his hair, so we took our sweet ol' time. Berkely and I fought over the mirror, but both managed to put light makeup on before we walked out of the door. I grabbed a pair of sunglasses and my keys (including the room key) before we stepped out into the hall.

On the way to the lobby, Berkely and I were laughing about the pillow fight this morning. Though I may have made Berk seem like an old lady in her ways, she was actually pretty fun to be around--once you got around her habit of good manners and fussing at people for being "uncivilized." Actually, Berkely could be a little less than civil herself when no one important was around, and those were her best moments. When we got into the elevator, we met the serious eyes of a woman in a pantsuit (a pantsuit, really?) and sobered up quick. We saw that the the button for the lobby was already pushed, and stood awkwardly next to her while the elevator dropped floors. My ears popped, and I did not enjoy the ride at all. We stepped off of the elevator and watched that woman walk away with a twitch, and when she finally rounded a corner, Berkely and I looked at each other and snickered.

We sat around waiting in the lobby for around 5 minutes, just chilling on a couch and trying to catch some extra rest before we walked around all day; we hadn't been around Vegas, but we did know all the places to be. When we finally saw the boys coming out of the elevator doors, I ran to Zak and jumped on him. He almost fell to the ground, and I was laughing as he put his arms around me and I wrapped my legs around his waist. Wow, I probably looked like a hoe; oh well. I pulled away just a little so I could look him in the eye and kiss him for a second. When I pulled back, his eyes were wide and he had a giant smile on his face. I returned the smile and put my feet back on the ground, taking my arms off of his neck and placing my hand in his.

"We were only gone for like a half an hour!" Aaron laughed and pushed my shoulder with a fist. I did the same back to him, and he just laughed at my weak attempt to move him. When I turned back to Zak, he was staring at my wrist with interest. He lifted my hand close to his face and started staring at my tattoo. Oh, yeah, he hasn't seen that before. I stuck my arm out in the middle of our group to show everyone the cross I had gotten on the inside of my right wrist. When I (finally) turned 18, Berkely had come with me to get my first tattoo. Yeah, I had cried and almost passed out (I don't like needles, okay?), but I liked the Celtic design I had decided on to show my heritage, and I planned on getting more tattoos, thanks.

"Woah, that's weird..." Nick muttered, and I looked at him with my eyebrows scrunched. He just looked back at me strangely and pointed to Zak's left arm. I looked up at it myself and didn't see much--just the bottom of a tattoo. Zak lifted up his sleeve to show us the rest of it and I saw something almost similar to mine. Granted, mine was a little more girly and his was bigger, but this was just plain weird. I looked up at him and laughed, wondering how this coincidence had popped up. Maybe we should have met each other sooner!

"Well, now that we got that figured out..." Zak grabbed my hand again and snickered. "Let's get this tour started, eh?"

He led us all outside and we walked down the Strip. Zak pointed things out and explained what they were and some of his favorite memories from them. We walked and talked until around 3 in the afternoon, then sat down in a Mexican restaurant on the Strip for food and a break.

"Out of all the restaurants in Vegas, this is my favorite place." Zak said while smiling, and I had to laugh. This was a little privately owned place, lost in the many fancy restaurants and hotels all over Vegas. It was funny that he would pick this place to love, though it was honestly pretty damn good. "And it's the last place I have to show all of you; Vegas is big, but there's not much to do during the day other than sightseeing and shopping."

"Ooh I wanna go shopping!" Berkely was practically bouncing up and down in her chair next to Nick, and he smiled and shook his head. I laughed because he probably didn't know what he was getting himself into; Berkely loved to shop for hours on end, while I was more of the "browse and pick out one cool yet expensive thing" type. I hardly ever went with her unless we were shopping for the same occassion, and even then I had to stop her after an hour because I was sick and tired of running around malls and department stores. She would just grumble at me while I was happy to finally be getting off my feet. I had enough on my feet with dancing.

"Well, I don't." I muttered, and all of the guys looked at me like I was crazy. "What?" I said, and they all gave me a weird look like I mustn't be a girl because I didn't like shopping or something. It wasn't that big of a deal, honestly, because I knew a lot of girls that didn't like to shop... What the fuck were they looking at me for?

"Sorry. We just never heard that come out of a Vegas lovin' girl's mouth before." Zak told me, and I nodded in agreement. True, most Vegas girls probably adored shopping, even viewed it as a hobby. I, on the other hand, liked to spend my money expanding my movie and record collection.

"I just don't like walking around all day looking for what's 'in vogue,'" Berkley scoffed at that and I gave her a death stare, "because I'd rather be buying Star Wars on Blu-Ray and a 30 Seconds to Mars vinyl. Geez." I went back to cutting up my burrito and they all stayed silent for a second before starting up chatter again. Berkely told Nick how much of a nerd I was, and I agreed with her, so I didn't fight back. Zak just put his arm around me lazily and turned to look out of the window. When I finished eating, I turned my body to look out of the window with him; it was rather peaceful, just watching the sun staying still and the different cars and people pass by. I tuned out everyone else and focused on sitting there with Zak, close but not talking, and it felt nice to forget all my worries and just enjoy...him. I realized it was about time to get moving again and reached over to pat his leg. He turned back toward me and made a "hm" sound while I pushed my chair back and got up.

"I'd hate to make plans again, but do y'all wanna go dancing tonight?" I wanted to dance again, and I was so tired of walking around and lazing in these clothes. I hadn't gotten my full dancing routine out this morning, and it was so much more fun to have a partner than to dance by yourself. Zak was a great dance partner, too; he knew he was hot and he didn't mind using it. I giggled at that thought and pushed my chair back in and stood there to wait for everyone's responses.

"Nah, I'm going to sleep. My sleep schedule's so off, bro." Aaron replied and headed for the door. Nick and Berkely looked at me sheepishly. Oh damn, they have plans too. When did this happen?

"Uh, well, Nick and I wanted to go back to the hotel tonight and watch a movie or two..." Berkely told me. I sighed and looked back at Zak with a pout. He just looked back at me and shrugged. Nick and Berkely walked out of the door after Aaron, and Zak and I followed. Before we could walk out, though, he stopped me and pulled me into a hug. I looked up at him with a confused look on my face, but he just smiled back and squeezed me tighter.

"I'll bring you somewhere nice. Trust me, this morning wasn't the last time I'll see you dance. I can't get enough." He kissed me roughly, and I almost thought about starting a full-out makeout session right then, but people were starting to stare already. My cheeks turned a bright red when he pulled away, and I grabbed his hand shyly before walking us both out.

"Well, Aaron's going back to the room," Zak said. Aaron waved to all four of us and said "Later" while heading back in the direction of the hotel. I hoped he would get to talk to his wife soon; he must miss her a lot. Berkely and Nick looked at us and we were completely confused with what to do. Aaron would probably have something witty to say at the looks on our faces, because we looked completely lost. It was only about 5 in the afternoon; there were at least 2 hours left until sundown, and there was, as Zak stated, "barely anything to do in Vegas during the day."

"Um... Well, Brielle still has to get ready and stuff, so why don't you all just come back to our room for a little while?" Berkely suggested, and I just nodded to agree. "We could watch some Ghost Adventures episodes! I completely forgot!" i smiled widely at that and looked up at Zak. He didn't seem too excited, probably because he had seen himself way too many times on TV. Oh well, he would have to deal with the embarrassment of my watching him.

Nick laughed and pulled Berkely close to put his arm around her. "Funny that you forgot about our TV show." Berkely just smiled at him and laughed in a flirty way. I almost died because it was so cute; lucky Berkely, finding cute and sweet guys on vacations. Not that I hadn't gotten as lucky as she.

"Well, let's go then!" I started walking back to the hotel and pulled Zak along behind me. It wasn't a long walk, but I was pretty tired and ready to sit down when we got back. Nick and Zak went in their room quietly to grab the DVDs when we got back inside, and we all piled into Berkely and I's room. Zak sprawled across one sofa, and Nick and Berkely snuggled on another while I was locking the door and started a bag of popcorn popping. When I turned around to find a seat, I didn't have one. I definitely didn't want to sit next to Nick and Berkely and be a third wheel, obviously, but I didn't want to embarrass myself by trying to move Zak.

"Ya mind moving?" I said as I walked to stand in front of Zak. He looked up at me and raised his eyebrows. I was about to start pushing him when he grabbed me around the waist and pulled me down to sit on his stomach. It must have been uncomfortable for him, but I felt perfectly fine. Berkely started their first season's first episode, where they went to some place called Bobby Mackey's Music World. The first few minutes were a bit confusing for me because I thought that they would be walking around in the pitch black trying to find ghosts when the episode first started, but I liked how they went around trying to interview people. By the time they started their actual investigation, Zak had shifted around so much that he was sitting up and I was in his lap. He sure was fidgety, and he tapped his fingers on my stomach and bobbed his head around while I watched the epidode with wide eyes.

Zak yawned when the episode was just getting really good, and Berkely and I turned to look at him with narrowed eyes. This was so interesting; Zak had just gotten scratched and they were catching all kinds of EVPs (which I didn't know about until I watched this). And he was just sitting around yawning and acting like he was all bored and junk! Berkely "shh"ed him and I nodded to agree with her. He lifted his arms in defense and was completely silent until the end of the episode. When the screen went blank and the next episode started, I started to get up to get dressed, but Zak pulled me back against him. I just turned around to give him a look and pulled his arms loose.

"I have to get ready, and so do you. Go, shoo!" I pushed him out of the door and went in the bedroom to shower and dress. The bed was still made like it had been when we got here, and I chuckled at the fact that Berkely and I hadn't spent any time without the boys since we showed up. There was still a little towel-elephant thing on the bed, and I didn't want to ruin it. Yes, there was only one bed, and that's because Berkely and I didn't want to pay a ton of money for two beds; we had slept in the same bed a million times before anyway.

When I finally got under the hot water of the shower, I tried to get my thoughts straight. Boy, I wished I could stay here in Vegas with Zak, or better yet, move to Colorado, but I had family and school to go to back in Louisiana. Dammit, I can't just decide to move here with Zak after spending a week with him. It wasn't like I had ever liked a boy this much before, but I had lived with one, and it wasn't very fun. I wasn't just going to jump into this decision again. Geez, this was going to be tough, leaving Zak. Why couldn't Berkely and I just stay here all summer long? Well, I guess we could, but Berkely wouldn't be happy to leave, and her father wouldn't be happy for us to stay here all summer. Whatever, if she can't stay, I will. I made up my mind then to stay in Vegas as long as I could. It's not like I had anything better to do. Plus, I thought it would be cool to see if I could find out what Zak did every day as a ghosthunter. Might as well have fun while I'm in Sin City.