The Summer to Remember

Las Vegas, Nevada - Part 2

Pre-Note: it's up a little late because my wifi decided to just shut off all day -.- but better late than never, right? :)

Ian:

When I woke up and checked the alarm clock next to the bed, it was 9:27.

I sat up and rubbed my eyes, then realized Anthony's floor-bed was empty. I stepped on it and opened the curtain, just to make sure yesterday wasn't a dream. But, as I squinted at the sunlight and ducked my head a little to observe all the buildings, I smiled when they were all still there. It looked completely different when not blanketed in night-lights, but it was still the same Vegas.

I took a quick shower, and when I came back out, Anthony sat on the edge of the bed, a huge tray of food next to him.

"Goo mrnin," he said through a mouthful of toast smothered in strawberry jelly.

"Hey," I said, sitting down next to him. "Was this all free?" I grabbed a plate of scrambled eggs and a fork.

"Yep." He sipped from a glass of orange juice. "So, of course, I took everything in sight."

I laughed a little. "Of course."

He stood up, shoving the last bite of toast in his mouth, and tossed me what looked like some sort of brochure.

"I'm gonna go take a shower, you figure out what we're doing today."

I opened up the brochure and flipped through it. It was just one of those little travel phamplets he must have picked up from the lobby full of fun tourist-y things to do. I ate my eggs while scanning every page, skipping over the boring things.

Anthony walked out, only a few minutes later, with only one of those small white hotel "towels" (more like washcloths) around his waist. I found myself staring as he bent down to get some clothes out of his bag, but hey, I really couldn't help it. His chest was just so... unreal. So tan, so toned, the kind of chest us weak guys dreamed about. And even though I had seen it countless times, I couldn't look away.

He looked up, and at me. I looked down abruptly, feeling the blood rush to my cheeks. I took a look drink of apple juice, praying he hadn't caught me.

"Find anything good?" he asked, and it took all my strength to not look back up at him.

"Uh, yeah, a few."

"Hmm?"

"Well..." I finally looked up but forced mysef to look at his eyes, not his bare chest, and gave him a few options. "There's this place where we can swim with sharks, and this other place where we can do indoor skydiving, and-"

"Swimming with sharks?" he asked, laughing.

"Yeah! It actually looks kinda cool. There's like, these water slides you go down, and at the bottom, there's like, tanks with sharks in them."

"You're kidding."

I shook my head and tossed it to him, mentally scolding myself for letting my eyes drift to his chest.

"Oh my god," he said, laughing. "No way in hell that's gonna happen."

"Alright, how about the skydiving thing?"

He shrugged, turning to the other page I dog-eared. "Looks kinda cool. Why not?"

"Alright, let's do it!"

*

The place was only a few blocks away, and since the traffic looked absolutely unbearable, we decided to just walk there. So, after trudging two blocks in the blistering heat, we made it to the building, which read VEGAS INDOOR SKYDIVING in giant red letters.

We walked in, and at first, it looked like a normal lobby to like, a hotel or something. We went up to the lady behind the counter and she smiled at us, revealing all her teeth.

"Hi, what can I do for you today?"

"We would like a reservation," Anthony stated folding his arms across it.

"Alright, we can take you two at eleven," she said, looking at her computer.

"Yeah, that'd be great."

"Alright, the cost is $85 each, and the whole sequence will take about an hour. You'll get suited up, and then go through a brief training program, and that'll leave you with about thirty minutes in the actual wind tunnel."

"Okay, that sounds great."

*

I felt abssolutely ridiculous.

The suits were like, oversized blow-up things. They were much like deflated balloons, but the guy that was showing us what to do, Ronnie, said they were made like that so when the wind hit them they would inflate and bring you up. We also had to wear helemts and glasses.

The training sequence was pretty brief. Ronnie just explained what exactly we would be doing, how to position yourself in the air, and what to do if you start drifting. It sounded pretty simple.

And then, before I knew it, Anthony and I were laying side-by-side on the floor, well, not really the floor. We were laying side-by-side on top of the massive wind tunnel.

Ronnie was in a room next to us, operating the machine behind a giant window. He gave us a thumbs-up, and we gave it back, and then it started.

I heard a low grumbing sound, like a giant motorcycle engine, and then felt a breeze hit my chin. The breeze escalated along with the sound, and then I felt my suit begin to fill, and then I realized the ground below me was getting smaller and smaller.

I was flying.

I heard Anthony let out a "woo hoo" next to me, and I smiled at him. He returned the smile, floating upwards next to me.

Eventually, we went up as high as we could go, and it got a little harder to control. I drifted to the right, and leaned to the left, but it didn't help much. We both started spinning around in circles, laughing uncontrollably.

I looked over at Ronnie, and he rolled his arms in circular motions, instructing me to do a flip.

So, I leaned backwards a little, and then thrusted all my weight forward, tucking my head and chest down. The room spun, and I realized I was actually doing it.

I heard Anthony yell something next to me, but I think I was screaming too loud to make it out.

I flattened my body back out and watched Anthony flip. He looked so majestic, much like a professional.

At that moment, I was really glad I wasn't swimming with sharks.

A/N: Yes, this is an actual place. I've never been there, but google told me everything I needed to know. xD And since Vegas is their first stop and a more "major" one, there's four or five parts to it. But most of their other stops will only be one or two :) So yes. See ya latah c: