The Art of Moving On | ✔

CHAPTER SIXTEEN; part two

     When we get to my room, I head inside, but Dres pauses in the doorway, eyes scanning the space inquisitively. I generally keep my room clean, but I made sure to put clean sheets on my bed today and brought my dirty laundry downstairs.

     "Big TV," he says finally, taking a step into the room. Just one step. Like my room might exile him at some point. Spit him straight out of the window.

     "Birthday present. For optimum gaming." I wince as soon as I say it and Dres looks at me with this squished expression like he doesn't know whether to laugh or smile. "Okay, refrain from commenting on how nerdy that sounded."

     He refrains, instead asking, "When's your birthday?" He moves towards my desk as I walk over to the television, turning that and the Xbox on. I open the tray and exchange Fifa for COD.

     "August 9th," I answer. "And yours?" I grab two controllers and back up till I can sit on the end of my bed.

     "July 12th." He's still by my desk, which is where most of my stuff is, in the drawers, and arranged on the shelves. I've got a lot of books, a combination of contemp Fiction and some classics. "You read?" he asks, picking Scaramouche up off my desk so he can examine the back. Ido read but Scaramouche was thrust upon me by my Lit teacher.

     "Yeah, before bed usually. Helps me fall asleep."

     "Huh," Dres says.

     "Is it weird that I read? Have I just broken the nerd scale? I played football a whole summer when I was like eleven. Does that help?" I pause the game once its finished loading as Dres moves from my desk to my dresser, examining the wall where Grace has taped a bunch of polaroids she's taken over the years.

     "I just didn't know you read like that." He turns around, meeting my gaze as he leans back against my dresser. I hold up the second controller for him but he doesn't make a move to take it so I set it down on the bed beside me.

     "You can keep looking around if you want. I'm ready whenever you are to play." His expression changes by just a fraction, something in the brows. I quickly add, "Video games. To play video games. The game. Call of Duty." My cheeks are flaming hot.

     He says, "Not on the bed."

     "What?" I'm not entirely sure he heard me clarify video games.

     He shifts uncomfortably, crossing his arms. "I'll sit on the floor."

     "Uh okay," I say unsurely, getting up. "Uhm, I've actually got this pretty awesome gaming chair, which we aren't going to comment on. But yeah, you can sit on that." I open my closet door and slide the chair out. It's pretty sick if I'm being completely honest, like a cross between a rocking chair and bean bag.

     I set it in front of my bed and then settle back onto it so I'm lying on my stomach with my head just beside the chair. Dres sits down but is still noticeably stiff. I can't fathom why so I ignore it, handing him his controller and diving into an explanation of how to play the game.

     The first set of zombies are coming to the windows and I take them down as I instruct Dres, "You want to knife them, like this." I lower my controller so he can see how I'm hitting the analog stick.

     When we get to the third round, the zombies pick up their antics. I'm backing my player up towards the door when I look at the bottom screen and see that Dres is still (attempting) to knife zombies in the window that is quickly being overrun. "Okay, no more knifing them. You can use your gun and shoot but you might want to back –."

     Dres's player is taken down by zombies and it is the funniest thing, watching his expression as it happens. I send my player down the stairs to go revive him, but there are zombies everywhere, and I've only got my stupid handgun, which isn't doing anything so unsurprisingly I die, too.