“Favorite animal?”
“Guess.”
I take a second to ponder her preferences.
“Elephants?”
“Oh, I wonder if they have any new babies! I love them, but no.”
“Tigers.”
“Wrong.”
“Monkeys?”
“Hippos. You’ll see why. Next would be the giraffes. Oh!” She holds up a finger to add to her list. “And the sea lions!”
I snicker, loving the excitement on her face, her inner child on full display.
“Where to then, Cupcake?” I ask when we come down the ramp from the visitor center and have the choice of left or right. She smirks up at me, then yanks my hand toward the right.
“Elephant-land.”
???
“Okay, I totally see why you love the hippos,” I say before sucking a long pull of lemonade from my teal souvenir sipper. “But you can’t tell me that they were cuter than that baby elephant.”
Holly shoves a spoonful of frozen strawberry lemonade into her mouth, hums an ’uh-uh’, and swallows.
“Cuter, no. Nothing beats baby animals. But the way the hippos bounce and prance beneath the water still makes them my favorite.”
“They’re totally not that cute in the wild.”
“You’re right! They'll rip your face off.” She shoves another spoonful into her mouth while we both chuckle, and I lean in and press a kiss to her cheek. I want my lips on her so badly, but a chaste peck will have to tide me over.
“Alright, it’s monkey time, then the big cats before the giraffes.”
“I’ll follow you wherever you want to take me.”
“What would you rather be? A lion or a tiger?”
“Tiger, all the way. I like their surroundings better.”
“Dude–snakes. Giant snakes. And spiders.”
I choke on my lemonade so hard, it almost goes up my nose.
“Oh, Cupcake, that just made my whole day. Wanna go look at them?”
“I don’t want to feel them crawling across my face when I sleep tonight.”
I love her.
???
Holly
By the time dinner is over and we’re back in my childhood home, it’s almost eight.
