Big Bend (g/t)

Viewpoint

Dave

It had been two weeks since the meeting, and two days since me and the other humans had gotten moved into employee housing. Moved into in the past tense might be the wrong turn of phrase, actually. I had yet to unpack more than the essentials. The perk of being involved in...well, whatever you wanted to call this "project" was that we apparently didn't get roommates. So that was a win at least.

I hadn't made up my mind about whether or not the price was worth it yet. I had seen Easton twice since they'd first met, including the day prior. I had also heard I would be working with Easton and John in the coming days. That revelation had caused my stomach to turn, truthfully. Easton did seem nice enough. Actually, maybe overly nice in a people pleasing sort of way. If he had been human, I probably would have thought he seemed chill. However, he was not.

A knock on the door interrupted my thoughts. I headed over, opening it to reveal Angie standing there.

"Hey, I'm bored," she said. "Are you busy?"

I glanced back at the unpacked bags behind me. I shook my head.
"No, not really. Did you have something in mind?"

"There's a viewpoint we could walk to. Might be pretty." She suggested.

"I'm down. Let me grab my backpack," I said.

We were walking down the dusty dirt road towards the viewpoint moments later.

"So, had you ever met an Apharial before?" Angie asked.

"What?"

"Well, I answered the question the other day, so I was wondering if you had."

I was silent for a moment, trying to weigh how to answer. Finally, I said, "Yeah. Once."

That wasn't particularly a topic I wanted to get into, so I continued. " You seemed to get along well with Easton."

"Like I said, he seems nice. I was going to visit him and John at some point. Y'know, make sure they feel welcome to the park and stuff. You could come," Angie offered.

"I'll see if I have time," I said noncommittally. I had already decided that I wouldn't have time silently. Or more, would only have as little time as was required to spend with our giant coworker in general. We continued up the trail, talking about what we had been up to since we'd last seen each other.

I kept the subject as far away as I could from Angie's previous question, instead telling various humorous stories about the past couple of years.

"He just ate all your food?" Angie asked, laughing in disbelief as I finished a tale about a particularly baffling date.

"I swear to god, I'm not kidding you. I thought the date was going well, I get up to go to the bathroom, I come back - plate's empty. He looks at me and says it was great pasta," I said.

"How long were you in the bathroom? If he had time to eat an entire plate of pasta?" Angie asked.

"That's the weirdest part! I was gone like, two minutes tops. He had to have scarfed it down as soon as I left."

"That's so weird. Did he say anything like why?"

I shook my head. "Nope. He was just like 'I figured you weren't hungry'. So, we obviously didn't have a second date."

Anyie snorted. "I hope not."

The top of the trail offered some gorgeous views of the surrounding area, as well as the employee housing and Easton's lodging. We stayed up at the view point for a while, chatting about life at large. As the sun began to dip beyond the horizon, Angie hopped off the bench she'd been sitting on.

"I should probably go get ready to see Easton and John," she said. "Are you sure you don't want to come? I'm sure it's the more the merrier."

I shook my head. "I should probably finish unpacking. Have fun, though."

"Alright. Well, let me know if you change your mind. You gonna stay up here?"

I hesitated, then nodded. "Yeah. I'll see you later."

"Hopefully, since I live right next door," Angie said with a laugh. She headed down from the lookout point. As she made her way down the steep dirt trail, I watched her go, and wondered how Easton's height compared to the hill we were on. I felt like he was almost the same height, though I'd always been bad at estimating. I shifted my gaze from Angie to the valley beyond, bordered in the distance by tall mountains. Angie's enthusiasm about the summer was almost infectious, though it didn't fully distract from my uneasiness. From the memories of that night years ago that I had tried to hard to forget.