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Neil squints down at the cartoonish map and then back up to gauge his surroundings. They’re supposed to be at the monkey exhibit, but no matter how many times Neil tries to follow the directions, they wind back up at the souvenir shop. The sun is hot on the back of his neck and sweat has started to collect under his arms and he just really wants to see a baboon.
Andrew stands beside him, cigarette in hand, and face emotionless. He’s just been tagging along, ignoring Neil’s mutterings and following him as he brought them around in circles. He doesn’t even look affected as sweat curls the hair around his ears and beads on his neck.
“I think we need to take a left at the bend instead of a right,” Neil declares, holding the map out in front of him and turning in a semicircle like it’s a compass instead of a laminated piece of paper designed to entertain five year olds.
Andrew just lifts the cigarette to his lips and inhales deeply.
They haven’t talked much since coming to the zoo. Nicky is off somewhere with Aaron and Katelyn, leaving Neil and Andrew to wander by themselves. Neil was more enraptured by what was behind smudged plexiglass walls than Andrew for once, and started eagerly going over the lists of animals.
“They have monkeys!” Neil had said, voice uncharacteristically giddy as he pointed to the drawing of a monkey swinging from a vine. “Let’s go to that one next!”
That had been nearly forty minutes ago.
It was almost funny to see Neil grow more and more frustrated as he tried to navigate the map and the park signs. He grew even more petulant when he saw small kids running around with plastic monkey ears on top of their heads. For some reason, when Andrew sees Neil’s lower lip jut out, he nearly snatches a pair off an unsuspecting toddler. Instead, he vents his anger out on the butt of his cigarette under his boot.
Neil starts to walk towards the path they’ve gone down nearly a dozen times now, a determined set to his jaw as he eyes the signs like he expects them to change the moment he looks away. The map is crumbled in his fist but he smooths the crinkled paper out apologetically. Andrew’s eyes nearly roll out of his head when he catches Neil ghost his fingers over the monkey like a widow would to a picture of her late husband.
It’s pathetic honestly.
Andrew reaches over and snatches the map out of Neil’s hands. He’s doing this because he’s tired of trailing after a full-grown man pining over some fucking baboons who also can’t navigate worth shit. Honestly.
The look Neil shoots him is startled, and then pleased as he steps closer to look on with Andrew. It’s too hot to touch, but there’s an itch in his hands to wipe the sweat away from Andrew’s temples.
“Neil,” Andrew grunts, voice gruff with an undertone of annoyance.
“Yeah?”
“The map is fucking upside down,” Andrew grounds out, slowly turning the map right-side up. The paper crinkles in his hands.
“Oh.”
Taking a deep breath, Andrew shoves Neil forward, away from the path and back towards the souvenir shop. Neil struggles to keep a smile off his face as he watches Andrew out of the corner of his eye. He’s glaring straight ahead, jaw clenched in annoyance and blonde hair darkening with sweat as the sun climbs higher in the sky. Neil knows he must be boiling up in his black shirt and dark jeans and armbands. The skin across the bridge of his nose is flushed a slight pink and if Neil leans close in enough, peppered with light freckles all thanks to the summer sun.
They walk in silence, past the souvenir shop and down another trail, mostly because Neil knows if he opens his mouth, Andrew would make him find his own way. There’s something deeply satisfying about seeing Andrew glare down at the child map and back up like he’s navigating war-torn trenches instead of a zoo park.
The image of Andrew weighing a uniform sent a sudden pang of arousal through Neil and he flushed, taken aback.
His sudden realization, however, was cut short when they took a right and suddenly there it was - the monkey exhibit.
Neil gasps and he abandons Andrew in favor of pressing himself up against the glass wall alongside the other smaller kids. He gapes at a baboon scratching his ass like the fucking thing is reading a sermon to a church choir.
Andrew sticks to the back of the crowd and glares at the baboon as he holds Neil’s undivided attention, picking at his fur for bugs and twigs. When it gets up and starts to shuffle around, Neil follows it, the herd of children around his legs doing the same.
The thing could throw its shit at Neil and he would probably be thrilled.
Neil’s curiosity over other monkeys seems to win out his current fascination because he, after several long minutes, tears himself away to go back to Andrew. He’s grinning ear to ear.
“Let’s go look at orangutans next,” he says as he steps closer and pushes his shoulder against Andrew’s.
“Come on,” Andrew replies, but not before he flicks his finger against Neil’s wrist.
They make a round of the monkey exhibit, Neil treating each one with childlike glee and open-mouth astonishment. They’re watching a couple of spider monkeys swing on a rope and wrestle on the ground when Neil turns to Andrew.
He points through the glass at a spider monkey who’s sitting apart from the others and swipes at anything that comes close.
“That’s you.”
Andrew raises his eyebrows and points over at a monkey that’s been tumbling off the rope for the last five minutes, each time scampering back up only to fall again. “That’s you.”
Neil laughs, delighted.
They eventually have to leave the monkeys, to Neil’s disappointment, because Andrew is hungry and bored. At the exit, there’s a cart giving out pamphlets and monkey headbands.
Andrew swipes one up before Neil can make a move himself and shoves it onto his head.
“Careful. A keeper might think one of their shitty monkeys escaped,” Andrew tells him as tugs on Neil’s earlobe. The brown plastic ears look good in his auburn air, to his grudging acceptance, and make his large ears seem more rounded.
Neil reaches up and brushes his knuckles against Andrew’s and smiles wide.
“I’m pretty sure they sell zookeeper uniforms in the shop.”
Andrew glares at him and shoves his face and Neil laughs, loud and clear. Andrew stalks off and Neil catches up, clearly pleased with himself.
“Andrew, let’s go see the elephants next.”
“Shut the fuck up.”