“It’s … okay,” Amy allows. She’s standing in front of the longest of the display cases in the room, looking down at an array of old mammalian fossils. “There’s definitely a lot of them.”
“Yeah.” You pad over to where she’s standing, glancing down at the collection. “They used to be part of a private collection, I think. Them and some of the fossils outside.” There’s a few fossils out there, including the complete remains of a Smilodon. “They were donated when I was still a kid, after the previous owner died, I think. He must have been a big bone fanatic or something,” you add wryly. Seriously, that’s a lot of old bones.
She just hums slightly. She doesn’t look fascinated, but she’s interested enough that her hands are skimming over the glass lid of the display cases as she reads the plaques around each one. You don’t have the heart to remind her that the museum has a no touching rule; you’ve reminded her four times, and each time she looks guiltier that she forgot.
You glance down into the display case, trying to see what she’s looking at. “I think that’s the Psittacosaurus femur,” you tell her proudly. “It’s-“
“— the ancestor of the Triceratops,” she finishes for you. You tilt your head curiously at her. She arches her eyebrows at you, but eventually bumps your hip with her own and snickers at the pout you give her. “I used to study dinosaurs,” she tells you conversationally. “I was going to be an archaeologist when I was younger, after Mom and Dad watched Indiana Jones with me.” She snaps her wrist at you and makes a wuh-pssh! sound at you, as though she’s cracking a whip. “Then Dad told me one day that archaeologists spend most of their time digging in the dirt, not fighting bad guys and escaping from traps. I cried for hours.” She snickers again at the memory.
You close your eyes for a moment, considering that. “I think you’d look cute in an Indiana Jones costume,” you muse, opening them again to give her a good look-over.
She shakes her head, giving you a funny little grin. “I think you’d pull it off better,” she replies. “If you cut your hair, at least. You’ve definitely got the chest for it.” She bumps your hip again, giving you a little teasing smirk.
You inhale sharply through your teeth. You’re not sure which of those two statements you find more offensive—cutting your hair? Preposterous—but you do give the idea some consideration. You wouldn’t mind owning a leather jacket anyway…
Before you can say anything, though, Amy gives you another little smirk. “Then again,” she says slowly, “you might make a better Marion. Your hair’s a bit dark, but we could make do.”
You want to grumble at her, but you also don’t want to discourage her. “Okay,” you say instead. “It’s a deal. You can be Indiana, and I’ll be your Marion.”
A flush steals down her neck. “I didn’t-“ She cuts herself off, looking over to the side as her blush deepens. “That’s not-“ She bites her bottom lip this time, then lets out a long sigh. “Okay, Taylor,” she says finally, still refusing to look at you. Even from here, though, you can see the way the corner of her lips is turning up in an embarrassed smile.
Yes! Victory!
You nod triumphantly. “Excellent,” you say happily. “Now come, Ms Jones. Tell me about these fossils.”
Amy leads you around the fossil room for the next half an hour, pointing out each fossil in turn and explaining their role. Some of them, unsurprisingly, she doesn’t know—not all of them come from dinosaurs, and as she explains to you, that was where little nine-year-old Amy had focused. Dinosaurs were just cooler than post-Cretaceous mammals to a child.
It’s times like today that you wish you’d studied up on ancient insects or something, so that you could have something to impress her with. But, unfortunately, you didn’t, and you don’t. You’re forced to pad along behind her, listening to her remarks and trying to absorb as much of the information as she gives you as you can.
Not that you mind, really. It’s not exactly unpleasant—and you have a good view from behind her, anyway.
Unfortunately, as things go, the date can’t last forever. When the clock on the wall in the main hall ticks over and chimes three o’clock, you give serious consideration to the idea of abandoning the idea of buying Madison a choker today and inviting Amy to go look for a place that sells coffee, but you decide against it. Madison has been a good girl, and you have just spent several hours out on a date with Amy.
The two of you stroll out of the museum, not quite hand-in-hand, but certainly closer than most of the onlookers around you might have expected from two teenaged girls. You don’t mind, and Amy doesn’t seem to care either, so you don’t shift away.
You’re not in such an urgent hurry that you run away as soon as the two of you get out, though. You wait with her at the top of the museum’s stairs, umbrella held open awkwardly to try and ward off the spray of water that accompanies the rain. You have moderate success, which isn’t really a success at all, because you’re still damp by the end of it.
Eventually, a car pulls up in front of the museum, and Amy stretches to her feet. She holds her hand out to you, and lifts you to your feet once you take it. “Do you want a lift home?” she asks.
You shake your head. “I’m not going home,” you reply. “I have to go to the mall for a bit.”
Amy shrugs. “Mom will drive you to the mall if you want,” she says. “It’s raining. She won’t mind. Come on, you’ll get sick if you try walking there in the rain.”
Immediately, your first reaction is to point out that you’re not going to walk there, you’re going to take the bus, but you quell that reaction so you can instead say, “I don’t mind getting sick. I’ll have the prettiest nurse if I do.”
The blush that spreads over her face at that is a brilliant red. She squeaks a little, shaking her head slightly, but despite trying for several seconds, she can’t manage a counterpoint to that.
You wait. You want to ask her if she will wear a nurse’s costume for you if you get sick, but somehow, you think it might be a little bit early for that kind of teasing still.
Eventually, she just shakes her head harder and gestures for you to follow her down the stairs. You shake your umbrella as you go, causing her to let out another cute squeak as droplets of water rain down on her. “Taylor!”
You just give her a cheeky grin as the two of you move over to her mother’s car. It lasts precisely until Amy opens the back door for you, gesturing for you to get in.
It’s a very nice car, you find as you climb in. You’re not sure if the seats in the back are made of fake leather or real leather, but either way, it’s certainly much nicer than Dad’s rickety old car—not that you have anything against Dad’s care. It’s comfortable. This one is sexier, if that word can apply to cars. There’s nothing wrong with either.
Amy’s mother turns to look at you through the car’s rear view mirror, but doesn’t say anything to you, instead turning her head to look at Amy. “You didn’t tell me you’d be bringing someone home with you.” Her tone is clipped and short. Oddly, though, you don’t sense any strong emotions emanating from her.
You can almost see Amy’s smile fall off her face at her mother’s tone. Oddly, that is when you can sense emotion from her mother— frustration, perhaps, or muted impatience. It fades too fast for you to tell, and you’re not—you don’t want to use your power. It won’t be on Amy, but it feels too close.
“I-“ Amy stutters, then clears her throat loudly enough for you to hear from the back seat. You still haven’t put your seatbelt on. “I just— it’s raining, and Taylor doesn’t have a car. I thought you could drive her.”
The woman eyes Amy for a moment, then turns her attention to you. “Fine.” Her voice is still clipped, but in the rear-view mirror, you can see that her gaze isn’t as angry as you’d expect. In fact, she looks more… consternated with herself. “Where do you want to go, Taylor?”
You jerk a little, then hurriedly clip on your seatbelt as you respond, “Uh, just to the mall, ma’am.”
The woman nods stiffly. Beside her, you can see Amy shrinking back more. You want to reach over and stroke her arm in reassurance, or tell her that her mother isn’t angry at her, but—how?
The three of you drive in silence, the low thrum of the car the only sound permeating the air. Several times, you try to say something, but each time, the air gets stuck in your throat, and the words wither and die.
You don’t want to say that you’re glad when the car finally pulls up at the mall, because you’re not. You are glad to get out of the car and the oppressively awkward atmosphere, though.
Before you head in, and before the two head off, you make sure to tap on Amy’s window until she winds it down, giving you a cautious look. You smile at her and raise your phone. “I’ll text you later, okay? Make sure to tell me when you’re working next!”
Amy nods. “I think I’m working Tuesday, but I’ll check,” she promises.
A small smile spreads over your face, and if her mother wasn’t right there, you’d lean over and press a kiss to her cheek. You’re not sure what Amy has told her mother about the two of you, though, and you don’t want to out her if she hasn’t told her mother yet, so you settle for waving goodbye at the two as they drive off.
Only then do you head inside, turning your mind towards the matter of Madison’s choker.
It’s not a big, important matter, which is why you’ve been putting it off— it’s a long trip to make for something that should only take you half an hour to find. It’s only three thirty now, so you’ve afforded yourself a lot of extra time to find one for her.
You start by looking around the smaller stores, especially those that advertise themselves as having engraving in them. They’re all fairly expensive, but maybe you can find one that’s cheaper?
Honestly, Madison probably won’t be too upset if you don’t manage to find her one. You’re not even sure if you’ve mentioned it to her before, and if you have, she’s been content without one so far. You just want to find her one.
Just the thought of her carrying around a sign of her relationship with you, a note to the world that she’s yours and nobody else’s—even though nobody besides the two of you will understand what it signifies, you still really want that.
It takes you a fair while to find a store that carries anything affordable within your price range and isn’t too tacky. If you were willing to compromise, you could probably get her something cheap and tacky for half of the effort and a quarter of the price, but—you don’t want her to wear something cheap and tacky.
The fact that she’s yours isn’t something she should be ashamed of. You don’t want her symbol of that to make her feel like she should be.
You’re not sure if it’s desperation or the low fog of tiredness beginning to creep back into your mind that prompts you to head into a proper jewellery store. All you know is that you’ve been searching for over half an hour and haven’t had any luck.
Thankfully, almost as soon as you walk into the store, a man appears, hovering a good three feet away. “Good afternoon, miss,” he says smoothly. “May I help you?”
Blinking at him, you consider it for a moment. “I’m looking for a—a gift,” you reply. “For a friend of mine. I want to, uh. She wants a choker, with a little tag on it.”
He furrows his brow. “A choker, hm?” he muses. “And with a tag.” He gives you a searching look. You shift uncomfortably under his gaze, but thankfully, whatever he sees isn’t something he disapproves of. “Very well. If you follow me over this way, we do have a good range.”
And indeed, they do have a fair range of chokers and necklaces over on this side of the store. Most of the store is predominantly taken up by rings and earrings—things people buy more, you suppose—but there’s still easily fifty or more of them over here.
“What is your price range?” he inquires casually. You bite your lip, considering.
“Um, up to maybe sixty dollars,” you tell him softly, glancing furtively around the store so nobody can hear you. They can’t judge you! You’re only fifteen, how can people expect you to have lots of money?! “But I have to get it engraved, so, um. I don’t think I can spend all of that on the choker.”
He nods, then leans down. You follow his example, peering into the cabinet.
“We don’t cater to a very exclusive clientele,” he says conversationally. “Much of our stock is rather expensive, as you would expect, but I do make it a habit to stock jewellery for people who aren’t as financially advantaged as myself. Even people who don’t have six-figure salaries ought to be able to look nice on a night out, after all.”
That’s the first time you’ve ever heard a business owner say that, you’re pretty sure. Not that you make a habit of talking to a lot of business owners.
He goes over each of them with you, explaining the drawbacks of each one and giving you their prices.
At first, you’re drawn to a fairly simple choker, a band of velvet wrapped around what he tells you is a core of leather. There’s no tag on it, but he assures you that you could easily attach one to the chain. Unfortunately, that would bring it well out of your price range, so with a disappointed expression, you let it slide.
