Saturday, a day I've been looking forward to after an exhausting return to school. I had hoped for a better return…but how could I have known what Trish would do? My best friend for over ten years and in one instant, I discover that she probably never really cared about me at all. Maybe all she saw as we were growing up was someone she could use, someone with the talent she needed to make money and that was it. I really thought I mattered to her, that out of everyone I could have counted on her through the worst of it all. It fucking sucks to learn that after everything that happened, the only reason she was happy to see me back was the thought of using me to get what she wanted.

A sullen frown hangs on my beak as I slowly pluck the strings on my guitar. The thoughts roil in my brain. I never saw it coming—a betrayal of everything we had been through together. My frown melts away into a scowl as the heat rises in my mind. Fuck her, after everything she said she can rot. We don’t need her and I certainly don’t…maybe I never did. My fingers slip and the pick drags awkwardly across the strings, sending a grating discordant twang to echo out through the room that snaps Anon out of his focus. He looks up from the floor as he sets aside the bass he is using.

“What’s wrong, Fang? You’ve got a miserable look on your face right now, like, seriously pissed off and sad at the same time.”

I sigh as I press on the bridge of my snout, letting my guitar rest on my bed. “Just thinking about Trish again. How that bitch has been fucking using me. Turning on me completely just because I tried to do shit on my own, and how much hell she put you through just because you dared to try to give a damn about me. It’s all fucked up, Anon, and I was completely oblivious.”

He gets up and sits beside me, sliding an arm around my waist as I rest my head on his shoulder. “You trusted her, Fang. I mean, you let her build you whole new persona, you trusted her so much. It would be pretty fucking hard to ever guess that she would do something like this to you. I mean me, I get. She hates my fucking guts and that is never going to change, not that it matters anymore. But you?” He shakes his head. “Never thought she’d only see you as a dollar sign after so long.”

“Yeah…” I flick away a tear. “But you’re right this time, it doesn’t matter anymore. Whatever stupid plans she had died on Monday. All that matters now is pushing forward and getting ready for graduation. And on that note…” I hop off the bed and grab the bass and motion him over. “Come on, you need to practice if we are going to have any chance at all.”

“You got it, Fang.” He gets up and plops down beside me as I push the bass into his hands. “So, what are we going to do?”

“Just more string and endurance practice. You need to be able to go for a while without stopping ’cause it’s not like we only do one song all the time.”

He raises an eyebrow with a grin. “Planning for the future, are you?”

I blush a little with a smile. “I mean…maybe. I do hope that you’ll like it so much that maybe we could play around town together. I know a lot of shit is going to change after we graduate but…I don’t want to lose this.”

“Lose what, Fang?”

I scoot closer to him, nuzzling into his shoulder. “This. You. The few things that have gone right recently in my life so far…and you are such a big fucking part of it.” My hand falls on his thigh as I rest against him. “I want to spend as much time as I can with you, all the time I almost lost because of what I did. I know we only really planned for one song, but I really think you have a talent for it, Anon. We really could go somewhere.”

He leans into me, slowly picking at the strings, sending soft rumbles through the both of us. “If you see it in me, then I have no reason to doubt it. Don’t think about what almost happened, think about what we will do now. Which is fucking blow their damn minds at graduation!” He attempts to play a note but instead nearly blows out my eardrum. After the tinnitus fades, I stare at the dope. “Okay, more practice first but if you believe in me then I’ll give it my best shot. Plus, I’ve been loving all this extra time with you, too.”

A gentle smile graces my beak as I lean over and kiss him on the cheek. “Me too, Anon. Let’s get to work. This time we will stop before your fingers start to bleed. We pushed it way too hard yesterday.”

He confidently strums the strings as he nods. “Yeah, I kinda need my fingers for shit posting.”

I stare blankly at him in confusion. “The fuck is shit posting?”

A bead of sweat trickles down his bald head as he swiftly shakes it. “Nothing important. Come on, let’s practice!”

“Suuuure…” I guess I’ll let whatever the fuck shit posting is pass. “Alright, scoot over and make room for me.” He makes room as I settle in behind him, guiding his hands to the strings as we practice the chords over and over. The hint of crimson never leaves his face the entire time. You’d think after the fifth time we’ve done this he’d get used to it, not to mention the other nighttime “activities.” I smile as I shake my head at the dweeb as I continue to correct him as he goes. It’s only been a few days but he sounds pretty decent now, way less like a dying horse and more like an actual bassist. We really have a chance at this…go fuck yourself, Trish.

A few hours pass and I stop him when I see his fingers getting red; I don’t want any more blood in my room. He lets out a heavy sigh as he sets the bass against the wall and cracks his back.

“Fuck me, no wonder I never tried to learn an instrument. Course, back when I tried on my own, I’d get bored in twenty seconds but with you…” He looks back at me with a smile. “It’s a lot more fun and I make progress instead of fumbling about like a dumbass. It really is nice to have a good teacher.”

A dusting of color covers my beak. “Well…I’m happy to do it any time, Anon. Maybe you’ll want to learn other stuff later? I do have a piano over there.” I point over to the corner of my room that has my old keyboard in it.

He thinks for a moment, tapping his chin as he studies it before shaking his head. “Probably best for everyone’s hearing that I stick to one for now.”

A flashback from a couple of days ago settles into my brain and I remember the thunderous sounds of him getting way too fucking into playing, nearly causing my dad to blow a blood vessel. “Okay yeah, good point. At least not until we move out or something.”

“You know what?”

I look up to him as I tilt my head to the side. "Hmmm?”

“I should probably go back to my own apartment eventually. Pretty sure all my food is rotten by now except the cereal. Probably should also make sure no one has broken in and stolen my vidya, and I haven’t fed Raymba in fucking days.”

“Raymba is a Roomba, Anon…it can’t starve to death.”

“True, but I wouldn’t be a good pet parent if I leave my tiny plastic companion to waste away without his cornflakes.”

I get up off the floor, walking over to him before embracing him tightly. “I really don’t want you to leave, Anon. It’s been so nice to wake up and see you every morning…so much better than waking up alone.”

His arms wrap around my waist as he sighs. “I have to admit, waking up to those amber eyes of yours has been the highlight of my life these past few weeks. But still, not like I can hang around forever. Eventually your dad will get tired of me.”

I nuzzle my snout into his cheek, resting my head on his shoulder. “Anon…”

“Yeah, Fang?”

I gather up my courage, letting out a deep sigh before pulling away to stare into his eyes. “After graduation and everything settles down…I want us to move in together.”

He nearly jumps in place. “Wait what? Really? You’d want to move in with me? D-do ya really want your dad to tear my spine out of my body? I’d really want to not be terrified of every golf course I see anymore.” He stammers as his face turns bright red with a hint of fear.

I chuckle as I brush my hand across his cheek. “I really don’t think he’d care, Anon. Plus, we’re fucking adults. We can do whatever we want after graduation. Probably find a place pretty close by we can afford while working at Moe’s. He’s always looking for extra help, plus he’d probably give us all the pizza we could ever want.”

The blush melts away from his face as a small drop of drool drips down his chin. “Holy fucking shit, that meateor special still lives rent free in my brain.” He smiles down at me. “Sure Fang, I’d love to.” His smile curls into a grin. “Holy shit, I get to move in with my sexy-as-fuck ptero gee eff. Thank you, Raptor Jesus.”

I smirk as I flick him on the nose. “You might need Jesus after a week living with me.”

“Wait…” His blush returns quickly as the realization dawns on him. “You…heard that, didn’t you?”

I laugh with a sigh as I kiss him. “Yep!” He falls out of my arms and crumbles to the floor in a heap of embarrassment. “Fucking Dweeb…” I help him back to his feet as he recovers from his mental meltdown.

“Though, if we are going to be living together,” he manages to stumble through a sentence as his brain stops being a puddle of mush, “we should probably go on a date. A real one…right now.”

“Right now?” Well, I didn’t see that coming. I look at my phone; it’s only one. “Well, I mean, there is a lot of the day left. Where would you want to go?”

“I want a redo at the museum.”

“Really? There again already? I mean, I know I mentioned it but I figured you’d want to go anywhere else.” I roll my eyes playfully with a chuckle.

“Yes, really, there again. Last time we were there, all we did was run around with me taking an entire book’s worth of notes. It’s not the most exciting but still I want to go there with you, if you are cool with it, Fang.”

I shrug as I head over to my dresser, pulling out a pair of pants. “Can’t go out in my underwear but sure, Anon, it’s a date.”

“Sweet! Let’s go!” I barely have time to pull my pants up before he snatches my hand and tries to head out the door. I hold him in place and he turns back, confused.

I point at my face and my hair and shake my head. “I’m not going out looking like I just rolled out of bed, Anon. Bathroom first, then we go.”

“Oh, right.” He chuckles, the fucking dork. “I’ll wait for you downstairs.”

“Be down in a minute.” I give him a peck on the cheek before heading down the hallway. A few minutes later, my hair is brushed and gleaming and my eyeshadow is as perfect as ever. I go down the stairs and he’s staring at his phone as usual. He notices me and quickly gets up, taking my hand in his.

“Looking good, Fang! Course, you always are, but let’s get going for real now.”

I shake my head with a smile as we head out. The temperature is lovely for once, considering summer is rearing its fucking vicious head. Soon it’ll be a sweltering nightmare out here, which I’m not even slightly looking forward to. One quick and thankfully air-conditioned bus trip later, we arrive at the museum. It sucks that the music exhibit is gone—would have been nice to go through it again and enjoy it rather than trying to pull inspiration from it. Fuck, that was a total waste of time. That string breaking ruined any chance of any of it mattering.

He squeezes my hand as I stare silently at the door. “You okay there, Fang? You were staring off into space for a good minute.”

I shake it off and squeeze back. “It’s nothing. Come on, there’s gotta be at least something in there still pretty cool to look at.”

“I mean, if nothing else they’ve got a diner in there. No matter what we’ll have something of a date, my treat. Got some cash to burn since I haven’t had to buy any food for ages now. Your mom has been spoiling the shit out of me.”

“Don’t get too used to it…not like we’ll be staying there forever.”

“No, but after that, I’ll be staying with you so I got that to look forward to instead.” He smiles as I scoot closer to him. “But come on, the museum awaits!” He waves out his arm dramatically as he stares at the door. I blink at the dweeb before jabbing him in the side with my elbow.

We walk through the double doors and holy crap, it looks way different with the music exhibit gone. It’s been replaced with what looks like a town artists’ gallery—guess they decided to show off the local talent. Though talent would be generous for some of these, considering one painting looks like someone took a bucket of mustard and ketchup and splatted it on a canvas. Wait a minute…I sniff the air as we get closer. What the actual fuck? It really is ketchup and mustard. Good grief, the art world is getting fucking stupid.

We barely spend a minute there, most of it done by psychos or pompous fucks with only a handful of actual good paintings. We end up in the caveman exhibit. It displays a bunch of poorly put together wax figurines of early humans figuring out fire and how to bash sticks against each other’s heads. One is chiseling out a crude wheel and another has dropped a rock on his foot with a comical look of pain on his face.

Anon glares at that one for a while as I turn to him. “Something wrong, Anon?”

He huffs as he points at it. “Boy, you dinos sure don’t think much of us, do you?”

I shrug. “I mean, we don’t hate you or anything, but a lot of people are pretty fucking ignorant around here about that kind of thing. I mean, you are like one of the few humans I think anyone has seen in these parts and this museum is family owned. Wouldn’t surprise me if some racist fuck runs it. But don’t worry”—I lean up and kiss him on the cheek—“I’m not one of them.”

He rubs his cheek with a smile. “Well, let’s go check out the dino exhibit. Maybe at least they got your guy’s fucking clothes right.”

“Uh, Anon…”

“What?”

“You do remember that we’ve been around for ages. This whole upright shit didn’t happen till well after your ancient ancestors entered the picture. So, I guess get ready for a surprise?”

“I really wish I had paid any attention at all during history class.” He shakes his head as we turn the corner.

It’s fucking adorable as he takes in the sights. Seeing all of the ancient ancestors of the dinosaurs on display with massive skeletons with huge spikes. He dashes from exhibit to exhibit, taking in the view of what ancient stegosauruses, T-rexes, and raptors looked like, before finally standing in front of a skeleton of one of my ancestors.

His jaw drops as he points to me and then back at it. “Holy shit, you used to look like that?” He stares at the massive wingspan and long thin bones of the wings.

I nod as I scoot up beside him. “Yup. One of our oldest ancestors. That one is a quetzal. Don’t see any of those walking around anymore…meteor took out the whole lot of them. We lost a lot of dino species when that shit happened. All we find are the bones.”

He still has stars in his eyes as he continues to trace the wings with his finger. “Glad whatever ancestors of yours made it all the way. Don’t want to think of a world without you in it.”

A blush creeps up on my face as I take his hand in mine. “Dweeb.” My stomach grumbles loudly in the quiet room and I quickly hide myself in my wings. “Uhm, Anon let’s go get something to eat. I totally forgot to snack all fucking day.”

He laughs and cocks his head toward the door. “Sure thing, Fang. Right down the hall. I hope they got themed meals.”

“You order a dino shaped anything and I’m going to smack you.”

He just grins as he pulls me along. For a museum diner, they actually put some effort into it. There is a multiracial mural across the walls showing all sorts of dinosaurs and humans getting along, though I can see some casual racism in one spot where they have a group of humans hanging out with monkeys. Guess I can’t expect all the animosity between humans and dinos to disappear, even after all this time. The lights are shaped like random dinos and the booths are themed like caves. Thankfully, the seats aren’t made of real rocks.

It doesn’t take long for a waiter to drop off a couple menus at our table and take our drink orders. I peruse through the menu, ignoring everything as I scan for what I want. Come on, they always have dino nuggies on here somewhere…there they are! Down at the bottom, a 20-piece dino nugget meal. More than enough for a decent snack until we get home. Anon orders a burger and then I order my nuggies. The waiter gives me a look until I hiss at him and he scurries off.

“Didn’t have to scare him that bad, Fang.” Anon chuckles before taking a sip of his cola.

“Screw him…judging me just because I love my nuggies. I haven’t had them in a while since Mom won’t stop making me fresh food constantly. Not that I can really complain, but sometimes I just want a heaping helping of junk food.” I try to take a sip of my soda but miss my straw completely before fishing it into my mouth with my tongue.

“That’s so not fair.”

I glance over with my eyebrow raised. “What isn’t?”

He points at my snout. “That fucking tongue of yours. I try to do that I’ll look like an idiot. You have like a foot-long tongue you can use like a damn whip.”

“I don’t hear you complaining at any other time about my tongue.” I smirk with a coy wink as he buries his head into the neck of his jacket.

“Okay, I’ll shut up.”

“Good boy.”

A few minutes later, the waiter comes back out with our food and places it down without a word before hurrying back to the kitchen. Guess I really did scare the hell out of him. Who cares, I got nuggies. I scoff at the cheap sauce on the table before pulling a tiny bottle of barbeque sauce from my bag and pooling it in the corner of the plate.

“Wait…” Anon stares at the bottle in my hands. “You carry around a bottle of BBQ sauce in your bag?”

“Sure.” I shrug before tapping out the rest and tossing the bottle in the trash. “Never know when you are going to need the good stuff.” I dip a couple before popping them into my mouth. Oh sweet artery clogging goodness, how I have missed you…

He just stares at me in disbelief. “I’m not gonna question it, I’m just gonna roll with it.”

“Smart boy.” I smirk and chew another nugget to bits as he takes a bite of his double cheeseburger. It’s not the most romantic place in the world to go for a date but it’s better than when we came here last time. We are actually spending time together rather than me just jerking his arm around, shoving him in front of guitars and ordering him to take notes. I still don’t feel good about that. Glad I have this chance to make it up to him and to be honest, it was cute watching him get all googly eyed looking at my ancestors.

It doesn’t take long before we clear our plates with the very last nugget entering the void of my stomach as I swallow it down. God, that hits the spot. I wipe my beak clean before pulling out my phone and snapping a picture of Anon, who barely got a chance to smile before I blinded him.

“What was that for?” He rubs the spots out of his eyes then wipes his face clean of burger bits.

“Just wanted a candid photo of you, dweeb. Plus, it’s nice to make good memories here with you instead of you just being a notepad.”

“This is already a hundred times better than last time. I won’t be leaving early like an idiot this time, either.”

“Be pretty hard to leave early.” I point to my phone, showing the time. “It’s already seven.”

“The fuck?” He stares bewildered at my phone. “How the heck did we spend that long here already?”

I shrug. “Time flies when you are having fun?”

“Or with good company.” He smiles at me and places a few bills onto the table before getting up. “Should probably get going home. I bring you back after dark and your dad will definitely use my skull as a mug.”

“Could be worse—he could use it as a jockstrap instead.”

Anon turns green as he covers his mouth gagging as I burst out laughing. “Come on, dweeb. Let’s get home so you don’t end up dead.”

He manages to keep his lunch down as we lock arms and head out the door. I couldn’t be happier with how that went. A small bit of redemption after the hell I put him through the last time we came here. I still can’t believe I tried to get him to apologize to Trish…I was such a fucking idiot. Not to mention it was supposed to be us going out together, and I dragged those two with us instead of spending the day with him. No wonder he fucking left early. At least I was able to fix that fuck up.

The buildings rush past as the bus drops us off. The cooling crisp air is a welcome change from the sweltering breeze of the afternoon. We stay close together as we make our way back home now that we are able to without melting into a fucking puddle of sweat. My mom gives us a hug after we get back and my dad pretty much scares a year off of Anon’s life before laughing his ass off as we go upstairs.

Back in the welcoming cool of my bedroom, Anon plops down on the bed as he tries to not die after my dad fucked with him.

“Good lord, that guy. I can never get a read on him. Never know when he is serious or just messing around.” He dabs the sheet across his forehead, drying off the fear sweat.

I snicker as I fall on the bed beside him. “Don’t worry about it, Anon. He knows he can scare you so he’s going to mess with you all the time. Just start doing it back, he’ll respect you more.”

“I don’t want to catch his claws in my eyeballs, Fang.”

I scoff as I roll my eyes. “He’s not going to hurt you. He likes you, that’s why he messes with you.”

“If you say so.” He bounces back off the bed and grabs the bass again before sitting back down beside me. “More practice before bed?”

I smile as I push myself up and scoot beside him. I grab my guitar off the edge of the bed as he plays. He’s been picking up the bass line more and more each time. My heart swells with joy as he improves, with each day being better than the last. There is no way we will not knock them dead at graduation. We still have a few weeks left to practice and I’ve nearly finished my song. Though, at this point, it’s our song. He’s been helping me stick a few possibly questionable lyrics in there as well, but I think it adds some flavor. I really hope he enjoys this because I really think that with him, VVURM DRAMA really could be so much more than just a high school band.