"Wait so you've lived here how long now?"
"Nearly a month."
"And you've never been to the city or the train."
"Never."
"Like some sort of.. Chicago-train-virgin." Jake's face, next to me on the commuting train contorted. He was wearing a denim jacket that caught the light to form faded patches of blue, over a green t-shirt with a pair of jeans.
"That's one way you could put it!" He exclaimed back. From the window you could see that we were approaching the large city. Buildings came closer together, like a box of sardines, and more and more of those buildings had large ass glass windows. From his pocket, Jake pulled out a small map of the city from his pocket, all tourist styled and shit. "Okay, explain which of these places we're going to I'm still confused as a pickle placed in white wine to be pickled."
"Daddy D knows where we're going off by heart." Jake raised a challenging eyebrow at me, while I mentally face palmed.
"Daddy D-"
"You know Dirk is just one letter away from dork."
"I"ll say that again when the sun explodes and turns into an all sucking black hole."
"Dirk the dork-"
"We're going to Millenium Park, which is conveniently next to the Art Institue, and Navy Pier in no particular order, and then just wherever in between."
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
"Whoa." Jakes heels dug into the ground as I grabbed onto his wrist attempting to drag him into continuing. His eyes stared over a small river that ran under the casual bridge we stood on. On either side of the banks were restaurants.
"English we have 3 hours. That's only barely enough hours for them to set drinks onto a wedding table - stop getting distracted at every corner."
"What's this place called."
"I don't fucking know - that's shiny building, that's shiny building, that's other modern, shiny building."
"It's freakin' amazing!" He stared back around at me momentarily, like he was checking my reaction and then he quickly went for the map he'd stuffed back into his pocket. Looking at where we were he suddenly looked over and nearly threw himself over the bridge pointing while saying "That's the Corn Cob building, that's the Wrigley Building."
"Yep."
"Oh sorry, I forgot you live here." He quickly added.
"Jake, you live here too now."
"Yeah, but I'm still a godfearing tourist."
I rolled my eyes as obviously as possible. "Come on, let's go to the art institute."
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Feet waddled around in the puddle of water surrounding crown fountain that were placed parallel to one another. "What's your favorite exhibit at the art institute?"
"I dunno. I liked the robot modern art sorta thing." I replied sitting down on the floor as close to the pool of water surrounding the crown fountain as possible, without getting wet. In between talking, I let pieces of a still hot hot dog stroll down my throat.
"That was delightful!" Jake looked down at the aluminium wrapped hot dog, which had condements spewing from every side. "Where are these from again?" He asked, nearly forgetting to swallow from excitement. He fit in with all of the toddlers that were running about the place.
"Portillos."
"Right." The brit's eyes shifted down to his bare feet which sifted through the water of the fountain. "This is this most American slash Chicagoan thing I have ever done."
"How?" I let one of my hands run through the ends of the pool of water. I sat with my legs crossed.
"Well I've got a Portillas hot dog in hand, while walking through a pool of water at Crown Fountain in Millenium Park, with my Chicagoan friend."
"Portillos. And I'm from Texas."
"So you're what? Texishian? Texican? Texacoan?"
"Texan. Texaco is a gasoline company."
"Maybe every Texan is a gasoline baby. That's why you're so hot and filled with stored energy that you never use. That's why you keep the same face all the time." I frowned slightly and then stopped. Did he just call me hot?
"I-I keep a straight face on because I'm cool. It's emotional irony." I deadpanned.
"You can't keep a straight face forever."
"Try me, Jake English." My blood froze while I felt my shirt sink through with water. A splatter of water gushed into my face. On reflex, my hands went for my hair. My eyes widened behind shades. "Fuck! NOT THE HAIR. DON'T RUN AWAY. COME BACK HERE, SATAN."
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
"Yeah, here, two tickets for Navy Pier." I said, handing over tickets to the woman that stood in front of me. She looked at me and the idiot I was with, both soaked to the core in a fresh shean of water. The brit shot her a goofy smile. For someone who was supposed to come from a culture in which everyone was stereotypically polite and emotionless he smiled at nearly everyone on the street. He had a nice smile. I understand why I used to crush on him.
Wait did I just think that.
"You can go sit in that carriage.." She said, looking slightly confused.
"Thanks." I replied back, trying to hide my annoyance. At least most of my hair had managed to stay in tact. We were shown to a red open-aired booth before taking a seat inside.
"Did you see the way that girl was staring at us? Like she'd never seen someone drenched in water." Came a questioning Jake.
"She probably hasn't seen someone drenched in water here." I replied, trying to get a strand of hair that had fallen into my face to stand back up.
"New record, Strider! I read that the longest anyone's ever ridden any fair attraction was here. 284 times around."
"48 hours, 8 minutes and 35 seconds." My gaze shifted upwards. A whole 150 feet. Shit. My entire body felt like it was being ripped away violently from my soul.
"Maths." Then suddenly Jake looked wide eyed back at me. "Whoa. You can hardly feel it movi-wait. Weren't you scared of heights?" Jake raised an eyebrow with a smirk.
"Is that your cocky white straight male businessman face."
"WHOA LOOK. WE'RE UP SO HIGH ALREADY AND IT'S BEEN 10 SECONDS. IMAGINE HOW QUICKLY WE'LL GET TO THE TOP OF THIS." I pursed my lips into a straight line.
His voice quietened down to a whisper as he leant forward. "I bet you'll we'll get stuck at the top."
"I am currently planning on using my expert physics on Isaac Newton's third law, to calculate how much the earth will push back at you when I throw you off this massive circle of death and you crash."
"Wait, what's that-" Jake pointed into the distance while starting to jump up and down in the booth, shaking the entire thing like a snowglobe. "EARTHQUAKE."
"Now that your obsequious preface has been establish as indisputably entertaining for all the wrong reasons, will you calm your shit."
"We're nearly at the top!" Came a sudden shout along with a side order of change of topic. Jake looked about the entire circumference of the view. I could barely stomach it. Fuck, focus on something. Focus on something relaxing before you lose your cool Dirk. Jake. Jake's face.
Looking through the brit's eyes you could see elysium. Green eyes had turned into emeralds that shined more than anyone could ever know. His dark hair had dried by now thanks to the wind dancing through it gracefully. Shirt clinging to him, he turned back around just to look at me and smile.
It would have made sense for me to still like him.
"Have you seen this?" The skyline of the city, now starting to look brighter as the sun started to turn darker. Jake outweighed the skyline in importance, beauty, and significance to me. He was all of those things.
In that moment I could have sworn he was heavenly.
As the wind threw itself towards him, he opened his arms wide to embrace it, completely filled with a love of life. It was unmissable.
My stomach whirred. Head span, with thoughts of heights, future plans, worry. Span with thoughts of Jake English.
It was inescapable. Irrefutable. Indubitably unassailable. The images of everything that I associated him with were wondrous. His character wasn't parallel to that of anyone else.
I liked Jake English.
I still like Jake English.
I love him.