The Kissing Booth - Chasing Noah

Chapter 5

A/N: This is the edited version of Chapter 11, 12, and 13.

...

Aquarium of the Pacific. Holy shit. I loved animals, and this morning with the dogs was amazing, but sea otters were my weakness. They literally hold hands. What could be cuter than that? If there was a career that let me spend the rest of my life with those animals, I would take it. Noah helped me off of his bike and took my hand in his until we reached the entrance. There was a group of kids, no older than ten, that were just finishing up a tour. After we passed the group, a little boy waddled up and tugged on Noah's sleeve.

"Excuse me. Is that your girlfriend?" he asked in his adorable little voice. The rest of the group slowly inched closer so that they could listen in. I wrapped my other hand around Noah's arm and all the girls gasped.

"This is my girlfriend. Why do you ask?" Noah answered. The little boy grinned shyly.

"She's beautiful," he giggled. I practically melted. All of the kids were gathered around us now, asking me and Noah questions about each other. I loved kids, especially the ones that called me beautiful. Even though I was content standing there hearing my boyfriend brag about me, Noah finally pulled me out of the hurricane of giggles and gorgeous little children.

"As much as I would love to stay and chat with all of you guys, I promised my girlfriend I would show her the sea otters," Noah told all of them sweetly. I gripped his arm a little harder. How he talked to the kids made my heart squeeze. A girl with brown hair and sharp green eyes wiggled out from the back of the crowd.

"She's really lucky," she whispered so that only Noah and I could hear her.

"Why's that?" he whispered back.

She paused for a second before leaning in really close and saying, "Because you're really hot." Noah smirked at me and puffed out his chest a little bit as I burst out laughing. Noah said goodbye to everyone, even giving the little girl a hug who obviously had a crush on him. He had to kneel down because he towered over her. We finally made it inside and it was gorgeous. The water from the exhibits played miniature light shows across every wall. The lights were dimmed and the tanks practically glowed with the life of thousands of different species. The first few exhibits were mostly just fish and sharks, but as we got further into the aquarium, we passed the penguins and whales and dolphins. I could have looked at everything for hours, but Noah kept pulling me along. He told me that we had to meet someone before the place closed. Noah was dragging me away from the stingrays when someone called out our names.

"Noah! Elle! Over here," a familiar voice yelled. I looked and saw Warren standing by a water fountain a little ways down the hall. I expected Noah to get angry or to pull me in the other direction, but when he saw Warren he smiled and waved. I was baffled. Until I saw that he was wearing an 'Aquarium of the Pacific' shirt. He was our career day tour guide.

"Hey Warren," I laughed and gave him a hug, but Noah didn't drop my hand so I could only use one arm. I guess he was still a little protective around Warren.

"Hey man," Warren mumbled. And he was obviously still scared shitless of my boyfriend.

"Are you ready to show her the exhibit? Is it closed off?" Noah asked.

"Yeah. My mom gave me the go ahead to let you guys in. I even started specializing in it when you asked for my help," Warren bragged. I could tell Noah rolled his eyes without even looking at him. I knew that Warren is the last person that Noah would want to ask for help, so I knew how much showing me this exhibit meant to him.

"Right this way," Warren instructed. We followed him down the hall and around a corner, passing nothing but texts explaining the history of marine life. I didn't have any interest in stopping to read any of it anyways. When we came around the corner, I let out a yelp. The entire wall in front of me, which was at least 200 feet wide, was filled with sea otters. There was a pond where they were floating on their backs, some in couples holding hands. Others were on dry land eating and standing in groups. It was like they were having their own little family reunions.