"This is what you meant by 'hang out'?" I asked sceptically.

We were in a mostly empty park that had mainly older couples and some birds that an old lady was feeding some birdseed. A couple kids were throwing a ball back and forth off to the side, but for the most part, the park was barren. I frowned as I looked around. "It's pretty, but... not something I'd expect you to like," I said.

Ryan shrugged, a smug look on his face. "I guess you don't know much about me then. We'll have to get to know each other better." He grinned, proud to have such an excuse. "But first, let's see who can get to the top of the play structure first!"

I frowned, eyeing the play set Ryan was referring to. Our levels of excitement for the silly game were completely contradictory of each other. "That's kid stuff," I said. "Besides, who'd want to climb up there anyway? It's probably covered in dirt and bugs."

Ryan grinned mischievously. "Is someone afraid of bugs?" he asked.

I scoffed at him. "No. I just don't see the point," I said.

"Oh, so you're not scared of beatles or spiders? Nothing creepy crawly scares you?" He crawled his fingers up my arms and across my shoulders, trying to creep me out.

I shivered, but not from the idea of bugs. "Absolutely not," I said, pushing his hands away. "I'm not afraid of bugs,"

With the sliest grin I'd ever seen, Ryan leaned towards me. "Then prove it," he said. I sighed, knowing I wouldn't get out of this, and started walking towards the playset. "You have to be fast! Run and climb on top of it before I get to the count of sixty!" Ryan called after me.

I rolled my eyes, but took off towards the base of the structure as fast as I could. I hurried up the the ladder and to the second floor of the play set. There was still one floor left and I had to climb all the way to the top. I looked for the fastest way and finally decided to just pull myself up the rope climb. I made it to the top and let out a sigh of relief that it was over, leaning over the side of the railing to see Ryan.

"You have to go all the way up!" he called from the ground.

I frowned and glanced above me. There was a roof-like thing over my head to cover the set in rain. My eyebrows drew together and I glared down at Ryan. "Seriously?" I said.

"Are you afraid of bugs?" he questioned with a smile.

I groaned, but he started counting numbers again, so I turned and grabbed the side of the roofy thing to hoist myself up. Unfortunately, I had no hand holds to use. I ended up stepping on the side rails and grabbing the flag pole at the top to pull myself up, kicking my legs until I was on the roof enough to grab the flag pole on the top and complete my climb at fifty-four seconds. I was panting from the effort and rested against the pole with my eyes closed. Suddenly, Ryan's head poked out under the roof and I gasped in surprise, grapple against the pole to keep from slipping off the roof. "How did you get up here so fast?" I asked.

He chuckled. "I've climbed this thing a million times. It's easy for me," he said.

I puffed. "And you were going to race me...?" I muttered, finding that challenge slightly unfair.

He laughed and held up his hands in surrender. "Sorry," he said. 

We both made our way to the ground again and I let out a sigh, more exhausted than I had expected to be. Then again, I really wasn't one for heights so the discomfort probably played into my exhaustion.

When my feet were safely on solid ground, I bumped his shoulder and mumbled, "Cheater."

He bumped me back. "Slow poke," he countered.

I turned to glare at him. "I am not-" I gasped as the foot I set behind me as I turned didn't land on anything. My foot plunged down and I lost my balance, falling backwards with a choked gasp of surprise.

"Watch out!" Ryan tried to grab my arm, but I was already too far into falling that he ended up falling with me as my weight dragged him down too. My back hit the ground and he fell on top of me. But our fall was far from over. I grabbed at the ground to try and stop rolling, but we both went down hill quickly and ended up a tangled mess of limbs as we kept falling. Something hard hit my face and it hurt like hell, but I couldn't see what it was as we were suddenly submerged in water. I kicked my legs and gasped for air as I pushed above the surface. Ryan was quick to follow and he shook his head to get the water out of his eyes. Sputtering, I swam to the edge and climbed out, helping Ryan out as well.

"Damn," I said, clutching my head. I cringed at my soaked clothes and glanced at Ryan who looked equally as soggy.

Ryan gave a forced laugh. "Well that was... surprising," he said, snickering as I tried to swipe water off my arms.

I brushed my drenched hair away from my face with a grimace and glanced at the pond we had mistakeably tumbled into. "I guess I didn't see how close I was to the end of the sidewalk," I said.

Ryan seemed unbothered by the incident and shrugged good-naturedly. "Well, we got a refreshing dip on a hot day."

He stood up and pulled me up too, both of us ignoring the way our socks squished uncomfortably in our shoes when we stood. I glanced up the hill at the path we'd been on with a frown. There was a two foot drop from the cement sidewalk to the grass hill that lead one to roll straight into the pond. "Whoever decided that drop was a good idea is dumb," I muttered, squeezing water out of my shirt.

Ryan laughed and pulled me along as we climbed back up the hill and onto the path. I shivered as my water-drenched clothes got colder and rubbed my chilly arms. Ryan seemed to have the same thought as he slipped his sticky shirt over his head to take it off, exposing his bare chest as he shook the water from his hair like a dog. "God, that shirt is freezing,"he said with an overexaggerated, fake shiver.

I swallowed nervously as my eyes flittered over his chest. He was pretty toned, I thought to myself before shoving that thought away before it could blossom into something unhealthy. "Uh, yeah," I mumbled as I looked away and quickened my steps towards my dad's house.

Thankfully, Ryan didn't notice my red face and he hurried to keep up with me. "Do you need a change of clothes? My house is right around the corner," he offered.

I shook my head. "No, thanks. I'll just head home."

This was a disappointment to Ryan and he pouted. "But it's not even lunchtime yet." He rung his shirt out as we walked, threatening to smack me with it playfully. "Just borrow some of my clothes and you can go home later."

I avoided the shirt smack and kept walking. "Ryan-" I started.

"Jacob?" he cut me off with a smile.

I stared at him then sighed, a small smile crossing my face. "Fine," I said. Ryan beamed with pride and I shook my head. "You're so annoying, you know that?"

"How am I annoying?" he asked, knowing exactly how.

"'Cause you're the kind of person that is so darn innocent that you can't tell them no," I told him.

He wiggled his eyebrows like a weirdo. "You sure I'm innocent? You don't know what I do behind closed doors," he countered.

My face turned even more red than before and I shoved him away from me as my mind wandered into forbidden fantasies. The lack of coverage Ryan was sporting didn't help. "Shut up. You do not do any of that," I said.

He grinned. "Oh, dirty thoughts? How would you know what I do?" he asked. "Or have you just pictured all of my nighttime activities?"

I shot him a cold glare, my face the reddest tomato on earth with a fire of a thousand hells. "Say one more word and I swear I'll never speak to you again," I said under my breath. 

He slung his soggy shirt over his shoulder. "Fine, fine." He grinned and we walked in silent for all of three seconds before he added, "But, don't lie. You were curious for a second there."

"Was not," I snapped back. 

"Was too! It's all over your face," he said.

"In what way?" I asked.

He smiled and shrugged. "Look in a mirror, bro. Your face is the image of guilty thoughts," he told me, trying to pinch my nose.

I looked away. "Whatever," I said, but there was no malice behind it.

After we made it back to Ryan's, he gave me some clothes and I changed quickly, thankful to be out of my cold, wet ones that were probably coated in a fine layer of pond algae. I shuddered in disgust at the thought. Gross. I was fixing my hair when Ryan called from outside. "Can I come in?" he asked, rapping on the door.

"Yeah," I called back.

He opened the door and was walking past me with a towel, intent on taking a quick shower, when he stopped and looked at my curiously. He leaned close to my face with a frown. "What's on your forehead?" he asked.

I glanced in the mirror, rubbing my thumb over a mark on my forehead and regretting it when it throbbed. It must have been a bruise. "Don't know where that came from," I said, assuming it came from the fall.

Ryan's frown deepened. "I have the same thing," he said. He moved his hair, and sure enough, there was a large purple bruise in the middle of his forehead very similar to mine.

I thought back to our fall, trying to remember if I had bumped my head on a rock or something. I remembered hitting my face on something, but it hadn't been hard enough to be a rock. Looking between my forehead and Ryan's I came to an embarrassing realization "Oh..." I mumbled.

Ryan glanced, still examining his forehead in the mirror. "What?" he asked.

I shook my head quickly. "Nothing. It's nothing," I said. "I was just thinking."

He raised and eyebrow, but shrugged and looked back in the mirror. After another few seconds of frowns, he made a small hm and shrugged it off. He went back to his room; I was right behind him. "I don't get it," he said as he grabbed out clothes and tossed them in a hamper. "Maybe we both hit our heads on rocks when we fell."

I didn't have the guts to tell him the truth so I just laughed awkwardly. "Yeah, that's probably it."

Ryan chuckled. "Or we smacked heads," he said. 

God, I thought. Let him be an idiot. "No, I think the rocks would be more logical," I said quickly.

Ryan grinned. "Yeah, I don't think I'd forget kissing such a cute dude," he said. He winked and my face burned enough I wished I was back in the pond.

*******

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