Falling With Style {Chris Evans}

seventeen

"Dude, it's not that easy," Chris laughed, pulling into the familiar dorm parking lot. He was speaking through the Bluetooth speaker of the car he was driving. 
On the other line of the phone call, his costar was playfully groaning as if Chris was being difficult. "What's so hard about telling her you want to show her off?"
"Baz, you don't understand!"
Sebastian Stan was now the one laughing into the receiver wherever he was. He said, "I understand just fine. You're being over dramatic! Just start suggesting things and see how she feels and go from there."
Chris scoffed and rolled his eyes, "Yeah, it's so simple... not! I'll talk to you later, I'm about to see her."
"You're a child, good luck," he yawned before hanging up and leaving Chris alone with his butterflies.
He followed the black SUV to the back building where, sure enough, other black cars surrounded the area with paparazzi in and out. He stopped behind the SUV, well aware of the car he was in drawing in more attention than any tabloid than ever before. If there had never been a statement in his history of trying to impress Mila with the most silly things, this was one of many more to come.
As paparazzi started to pick up on his arrival despite his own tinted windows, two of his bodyguards got out of the car in front of him. One came to the passenger side of the car Chris was driving while the other walked to the door of Mila's dorm where she had just stepped out. That body guard guided her with his arm around her.
Chris sighed and frowned at her wearing a hat and keeping her head low. Once the bodyguard passed her off to the other outside of his rental car, he pushed the button to open the scissor side doors that opened upward. He saw her head go up as her eyes followed the display in amusement before she slid into the passenger's seat with the body guard shielding her from the paparazzi who definitely snapped some good pictures of the two of them. Once the doors were closed, both body guards ran back to the car in front of Chris and the roadtrip began with him driving in the lead.
"A gold plated Ferrari? Seriously?!" She yanked her hat off with a big smile from the disbelief of the car she was riding in. This action sent her hair flying in every direction. She looked around her, surrounded by leather and bucket seats that dipped low to the ground. Everything about it looked so futuristic.
Chris chuckled. With one hand on the wheel, he used the other to tuck some of the stray hairs. He shrugged and said, "I warned you!"
What was only supposed to be a thirty minute drive to Wild Adventures ended up being an hour long roadtrip where Chris drove around the city with no particular route. He was just listening to Mila excitedly tell him the good news about moving and everything else she looked forward to.
A part of him felt guilty. He knew that Mila was planning on moving sometime this year regardless, but to uproot her life so suddenly because of his own selfishness, wanting to be with her, he couldn't help but acknowledge it was all so rushed due partly to him. However, he was excited for her to be finishing up school soon. It meant moving up in government with her political science degree. In his free time, he definitely engaged with politics and very openly at that. He has been known to use his platform for promoting certain things he stands behind, or for things he feels deserve more awareness. With that said, in his experience of meeting with governors, mayors, and members of Congress, a twenty-three year old working under a city manager was such an astonishing achievement. Her self-attained success was just one of the many reasons he admired her so much. He could have easily just forgotten about her after Disney, but one look into those brown eyes and just listening to a few words from those delicate lips told him there was so much more to her. For once, his instincts had been right about a woman. For once, it was working out for him, at least so far.
"Chris, what are we doing at Wild Adventures?" She asked once the Ferrari they were in pulled into the parking lot with the security vehicle close behind. He tapped the button that was basically touch screen to turn the car off.
He turned to her and smiled like one huge oversized kid, "I told you I had it covered!"
Mila glanced around the parking lot. Besides a few other vehicles, it was relatively empty. She wasn't really making the connection here. Chris went on to say, "Is it bad that I rented out the entire amusement park for today?"
Her jaw dropped to the ground, well, almost.
She shoved her thumb into the button to release her seatbelt and nearly fell out of the seat and almost landed face first on the pavement when she pushed the button for the doors to open up. Chris laughed and followed suit until they met in the middle. She looked up at him with big eyes, "You're messing with me!"
"Nope, I'm serious," he was letting this inflate his ego too much. Seeing her reaction completed him. He knew that he didn't need to spend much to impress Mila considering their movie night and just having flowers and wine delivered to her as a surprise. However, he definitely wanted to set the bar with standards he had for what he wanted to give her, for what she deserved.
She grabbed his hands and got on her tippy toes, "And what did I do to deserve this?"
Likewise, he knew that Mila didn't need to do much to impress him. Obviously he had easier access to crazy things like renting a Ferrari and an amusement park to have to themselves for laughs, but all she had to do was look at him with those eyes and he could melt. There was nothing else he could ask for, no matter the price, no matter how big or small. It was like a million luxury cars, a million amusement parks and thrill rides, and so many more butterflies all at once.
Her brown eyes caught him with how close she had gotten by getting on her tippy toes. Grabbing his hand had really thrown him off, rendering him speechless at her sudden yet gentle touch. He couldn't help but flick his eyes down from hers to those lips. They were curved at the ends with a smile she failed at hiding from her excitement, thinking about what was just beyond those gates.
Everything had temporarily slowed for him before coming to a complete standstill as he took in Mila with those black Vans, plain blue skinny jeans slightly rolled up at her ankle, and her plain black tee tied into a bow at the side. Such a simple outfit with a small pop of color on her lips from her tinted cherry chapstick drove him wild, something he had been trying to ignore yet was now making him lick his lips and smirk at her like she was his meal.
"Um," he caught himself once she lowered herself from her tippy toes and started to blush, noticing him taking her in. He tried to remember any of Sebastian's advice from not only today, but every other day he had talked to him about Mila for the last few weeks. Nothing was coming to his mind as he was caught in her brown eyes.
When he was finally able to pull away from her big irises, he played it off by laughing even though he never answered her question. He just took her hand and led her by running to the gate. With just one look at who he was, the person working the gate let them through with a smile. It was an older gentleman who seemed to not really care who Chris Evans was.
Throughout the park, all the normal employees could be seen working. Every ride was attended to by at least one or two workers, the gift shops all had cashiers working, and every now and then, different janitors could be seen taking out trash and cleaning windows. Besides that and the security, they really did have the entire park to themselves. That meant they must have gone on every ride a dozen times, or so it felt with how much fun they were having!
Just before it started to get dark is when they were able to walk through the "zoo" part, which really just felt like a sanctuary where the animals were free to roam on large pieces of land while any visitors just walked through on a very narrow, space convenient path.
There were lions, tigers, alpacas, swans, foxes, zebras, giraffes, rhinos, monkeys, smiths, wallabies, tortoises, and so many more that neither of them could really name without looking at the informational markers. They walked a good few miles around the park for the rides at the center of it all and the animals that surrounded it with only fences separating them. Just as Mila yawned, thinking she had seen it all and that it was time to call it a day, she heard the all too familiar trumpeting noise in the near distance.
She exchanged a look of excitement with Chris who knew all too well what was around the corner. He took her by the hand and led her to the last exhibit of animals too large to share one with others.
As soon as they rounded the corner of a building and made their way back outside, she saw the elephants and felt pure happiness.
"Your favorite!" He smiled just from her excitement as she looked up at the elephants.
This exhibit was different from the others. The fences at the others were tall and kept people from touching the animals, and instead just allowed them to watch from afar. The fence for the elephants, however, was nonexistent. Their area was closed off from the rest, with only access coming from the previous building they were in.
Upon noticing Chris and Mila standing there, one of the elephants out of the dozen started to walk over with her calf that was still much larger than both Chris and Mila who stood there and didn't move a muscle, not wanting to scare them away. The elephants, however, were used to human interaction and loved every bit of attention they could get from visitors.
The mother elephant outstretched her trunk to Mila who had just held up her hand to meet in the middle. As if to tell her calf it was alright, the mother elephant used her trunk to stroke Mila's arm. The calf not only outstretched his own trunk, but he was so close that he allowed Mila to pet his head and sides.
She lightly ran her hand from the tip of the trunk down to the side of his face before rubbing his coarse side. Behind her, Chris had his arm around Mila's waist and used his other to pet the calf before giving some attention to the mother elephant that towered over them both. He rubbed her strong front leg and simultaneously, both the mother and calf let out low trumpeting noises from their trunks with delight.
Mila didn't want this to end, but she pulled away from the elephants and turned to Chris.
Not noticing their proximity before, they were now just inches from each other's faces. At the same time, their eyes flicked from each other's to the lips of the other.
His heart was racing. He had wanted to do this since Disney, spontaneously kissing the cute girl he had met on the ride who, for some reason, agreed to meet him on the beach that night. He had wanted to do this at the airport, at the dorm, at his hotel room, at the actual beach, anything to feel closer to her, anything to feel more of her. Now felt more right than ever before.
There was something hot in her tummy with the butterflies floating around with the pure ecstasy that came from the amusement park rides and the animals and finally being able to not only see an elephant in person for the first time, but also being able to be so close and to touch them. She had forgotten about all else in the world, no matter how good or bad. It was just the two of them.
It had been so long since she had been treated so good. It had been so long since she had been made to feel so special.
He slowly closed the gap with both of their eyes fluttering shut. It wasn't long before his lips met hers and he couldn't help but think that it was far better than everything he daydreamed about when on the phone with her, when falling asleep back home, when on the set filming. This was both good and bad. It was so good, leaving him wanting more, but it was so bad, only making him crave her for the few days he had left here.
It was like nothing she ever felt before. Was it because he was a celebrity? Was it from the thrill of so many people being invested in whatever was going on between them? Was it the excitement from a day full of rollercoasters and animals able to run around in such a large, free area? Perhaps all of the above, but she wasn't complaining. She couldn't even think straight to really process it. All she could think about was the fact that Chris Evans had his arms around her waist, pulling her in and nearly dipping her backwards to kiss her while being surrounded by elephants. It was bliss.