The Temporary Virginity of the American Player

22. Pandas Are a Girl's Best Friend.

"Where's Lena, anyway?"

"She was going to stop by the store, work a shift, talk to the manager of the club to see if she could reschedule her gig, and then she was going to go over to the community college and get some information on some classes. She was also gonna stay the night at her friend Robin's house over in Pensacola. I wouldn't expect her back for a while."

"Think she'll like this?"

"Please! Have you met my little cousin?"

That was a good point; I wasn't going to argue with it. I had to admit, moving this huge panda was a pain; I had to get Lane to help me because I wanted to make on trip in the elevator. The elevator was piled with Pandas, and Lane and I were swarmed with stuffed animal complimenting the furry black-and-white creatures. We looked a little off, but I figured since we were doing a good deed, I could tolerate the weird looks we got at every floor we stopped at. Nobody else could fit in the elevator besides the pandas, Lane, and myself, so whenever the doors opened, we just kind of stood there and waved at the person until the doors closed again, leaving them extremely confused at what they'd just seen.

Lane kept the elevator on the correct floor as I unloaded the pandas by hefty numbers, practically throwing them at his apartment door. It was raining pandas for a while; one even fell over the balcony and hit my car. He unlocked the door and, after much deliberation, we agreed it was easier to load the pandas onto a blanket and just drag the whole thing into Lena's room. That's exactly what we did. I left the  dragging to Lane, and he heaved the lot of them down a hallway and to the left, kicking open Lena's bedroom door and taking them to the middle. I stood in the doorway, scanning the room.

I can't speak for all the guys of the world, but I'm always fascinated when I see a girl's bedroom. I mean, what kind of stuff is in there anyway? Girls rooms definitely aren't like guy's rooms. I mean, there aren't usually Playboys under the bed or condoms in the nightstand, and they're usually a lot neater and prettier, with flowers and rainbows instead of boobs and football posters.

Lena's room held my attention almost immediately. I walked in, eyes wide like saucers and mouth open. It was, in a word, cool. There were posters on the walls; one of Norah Jones, one of Panic! at the Disco, another of an animated panda eating bamboo,  and one of a puppy upside down. On one wall, there was a menagerie of digital photos tacked into a big collage over powdery blue paint, which stretched all the way around the room against oak floorboards. More importantly, there were pandas.

Everywhere.

They were on the bed. They were on the floor. They were on the wall. And they were staring at me.

"You know how I told you she didn't need any more pandas," Lane asked. "Well, I wasn't kidding."

"They're everywhere," I said, debating whether to be extremely confused or extremely afraid.

"Yeah, she's got a lot of pandas," he said, pointing to her bed where the creatures swarmed her pillows. "It's kind of a Lena thing. Wanna set these up?"

"Oh, yeah! Panda shrine!"

And that's exactly what we did. We stacked the pandas on her floor up in a lopsided pyramid. There were so many, it turned out to be a pretty good pyramid. We tried our best to balance the big daddy on top of the whole thing, but that wasn't about to happen; the thing flopped over instantly. Instead, I put it on her bed and took a few steps back to examine my work.

"This," I said, making a face. "This is art."

There was no arguing with my point. It was art and I knew Lena would flip when she saw what we had done for her...or, rather, what we had done for her; I wasn't about to count the Big Guy out. I was proud of the work I had done for Lena and although it hadn't been cheap for me, I was sure she'd be happy with the outcome.