The (Im)Perfect Escape

Chapter Nine

As he stops at a red light, he sends a quick smile over my way. “It’s a surprise.”

“I don’t like surprises.” I frown.

“You better get used to them, because with that town of crazies that you’re now residing in, you’re bound to get a ton of them.” His gaze turns back to the road, and he starts tapping his fingers along the wheel impatiently.

I huff. “Please?”

He just smiles. I huff again and turn my attention back to my passenger window. I’m not going to get anything else out of him. Something tells me that he’s a boy who can keep a secret very well—almost as well as me. Nobody can beat me with that, though. I’m too beast at it. If it was an Olympic sport, I would win gold.

Something tells me this is going to be one long car ride…

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12:13 P.M.

“The zoo?” I ask for the millionth time as we walk by the tiger exhibit.

He chuckles. “What? Have you never been to one or something?”

I stop walking for a minute to edge closer to the exhibit. “I mean…yeah, we had one in Chicago, but I just didn’t expect you to take me to one today. I was thinking more…”

“More of the field kind of thing you mentioned in the car?” He bumps my shoulder lightly with his, as he moves to stand next to me.

“Well, you are my stalker, so it’s a logical assumption.” I smirk.

He turns quiet, and I look over to see what made him so silent. I follow his intent gaze and frown when I see that he’s looking at his cousin’s handiwork. When I took my shower this morning, I scrubbed endlessly, but it still refused to come off. I hate Logan with an undying passion currently.

“Is that Logan’s number?” His eyebrows knit together, and his lips tug down into a frown.

“Um, yeah. He decided it was a nice addition to my body.” My fingers trace the numbers on my arm.

“Oh.” Quickly, he jerks his head back to the tiger exhibit. He taps his fingers to a fast beat on the chain fence.

My eyebrows shoot up. “Oh?”

“It’s a long story.” His eyes dart around the exhibit.

I tuck a strand of loose hair behind my ear. “Well, buddy, we have a whole big zoo to talk about it.”

He rolls his eyes. “To be truthful, I rather not spend a whole zoo trip talking about Logan.”

I bump my shoulder against his again. “Fine. You’re off the hook today, but as your new bestie, I demand you tell me another time.”

A slow smile returns to his face. “As your new bestie, I will agree to that.”

“Okay then. So, tell me about yourself. I feel like as your stalker buddy, I must know all I need to know about you. How’s your gnome army? What did you Google last night? Were you in my bushes last night?” I grab his arm and pull him away from the fence.

As we walk, our shoulders are still very close by. “My gnome army is just peachy. I had a fun time looking up animals last night and got distracted for an hour by some movie on zebras that I found. Quite interesting stuff. Did you know that a zebra’s ears signify its mood?”

My nose scrunches up. “Methinks you need to get a life, Noah.”

“Shut up. I have…well, I had one before I got here.” He shrugs casually.