Solangelo One Shots

Just Drive (part 2)

I had a bunch of requests for a part two, so here it is!

Nico's POV

At one he drove up to the curb just like he had done the previous night but this time he got out with me, grabbing a thin sweatshirt from the back of his seat to protect himself from the chilly New York air. "You still want to go, right?" He asked, and I could detect a small bit of fear in his voice, like he was scared I would bail on him. "I feel like I pressured you into this." I refrained from rolling my eyes. Will seemed cool, and I didn't want to scare him away with my rudeness before we got a real chance to talk. 

"Of course not. So, where are we going? You said you knew a place." Will jumped a fraction of an inch, as if he had been off thinking about other things. 

"Yeah, follow me. It's close." 

"Should we drive?" Will shook his head, and pointed a set of keys at the taxi and pressing a button. It gave a beep beep noise, the taillights flashed bright red and the car was silent. 

"I usually just park it here, since I live so close. Since it's a taxi, it get's free parking. Besides, you said you wanted to get the experience of an average New Yorker. First part of being an average New Yorker is walking everywhere." 

"Fair enough," I chuckled. Will waved me on, and we crossed the street, joining the bustling sidewalk on the other side. 

I couldn't ever remember being around so many people at once. Usually we drove everywhere, and we didn't have to deal with the throngs of people walking around the city. The few times I had walked places it had been in the daytime. Clearly, the city was more active at night. Will was walking quickly, his hands shoved in his pockets, a single earbud dangling out of the back pocket of his pants. He blended right in but I stuck out like a sore thumb. I could see people giving me strange glances as I struggled to keep up with Will's long strides, like they were wondering what this rich kid was doing wandering the streets of the city at one in the morning. Will glanced behind him, pausing and letting people weave around him as he waited for me to catch up. 

"Am I walking too fast?" he asked. I shook my head, trying not to show how out of breath I was. "The people will start to thin out soon," Will promised. "I live in a pretty quiet neighborhood, or at least as quiet as it gets in New York. You can hold my hand until then, if you want." I immediately saw his face flush red. "So you don't fall behind, I mean. I walk pretty fast and getting lost in New York in the middle of the night is everyone's worst nightmare. You only have to if you want to, of course." I studied his face as long as I could without it being weird. His eyes were shifting and the blush was still present. I was sure my face was red, too. I grabbed his hand quickly, as if grabbing it fast enough would make it so that he didn't want to take back his offer. But by the way he was blushing, to me it didn't seem like he wanted to. 

"We'll be there in five minutes," he promised. We kept walking, Will still holding my much smaller hand. I couldn't explain why, but it made me happy. 

We arrived at the place Will had been describing, a cute pizza parlor with a flickering neon sign in the window and a single employee wiping down the glass separating the pizza from the rest of the store. When Will walked in the employee's face lit up and he gave an excited wave as Will led me up to the impressive display of twenty kinds of pizzas, ranging from your average cheese to a flaming hot cheeto pizza. "How often do you come here?" I asked after seeing the employee's enthusiastic greeting. 

"Most days after work," Will responded. "Nico, this is Tony. Tony, this is my friend Nico." Tony gave me a strong handshake, and I could feel his eyes scrutinizing every inch of me, trying to find out everything that he possibly could just by looking.