Christy stood close to Katie so the guys couldn't see her crying. "It's okay, Katie. Really. You don't have to get Rick's approval. You don't have to try to make him like you. Just be yourself. You're wonderful just the way you are. If Rick recognizes that, great. If not, it's his loss."

Katie sniffed and wiped her damp cheeks with the back of her hand. Her bright green eyes looked like two emeralds at the bottom of a deep pool.

"Will you make me a promise?" Christy asked.

Katie nodded.

"Promise me you won't let Rick use you. He does that to girls, and you know it. I don't think he does it on purpose. He can't pa.s.s up a challenge, and sometimes I think once the challenge is gone, so is his attention. Do you know what I mean?"

"I know, I know. And you have every right to tell me these things, Christy. These are the same things I told you when you were dating him last year."

"Yes, I know," Christy said. "I didn't listen to you very well then, and I wouldn't blame you if you didn't listen to me now. But I still want you to promise me that you won't let Rick use you. You don't deserve to be treated badly by any guy."

Katie wiped away the last tear and peeked over Christy's shoulder at the guys. A smile returned to her face. "Look at those three," she said. 'You'd think we were one of the zoo's attractions the way they're standing there cautiously observing us. If we stay here long enough they might throw peanuts!"

Christy looked at them and laughed with Katie. "Come on," she said. "Let's both try starting this adventure all over, okay?"

"Did you ever notice," Katie said, still eyeing the guys, who looked as though they didn't know how to approach this rare female species, "how many things come in threes?"

"Like the three bears?" Christy asked.

"And three musketeers and three blind mice and," Katie added with a burst of laughter, "the three stooges!"

Christy motioned with a nod of her head as they started to walk back to the guys. "Which one do you want? Larry, Moe, or Curly?"

"You girls all right?" Doug asked, leaving the pack and approaching them.

"Sure," Katie said. "We were just discussing movie stars."

Christy tried to suppress her giggles and smiled at Todd, who shot back one of his warm, understanding smiles.

"How about visiting a famous star?" Doug asked. "It says a dancing elephant is here. Want to go visit him?"

"Sounds good." Katie ignored Rick and smiled brightly at Doug. "Lead on into the jungle, O great trail master."

Doug and Katie led the way, and Christy followed, sandwiched in between Rick and Todd. The awkward five-some dynamics returned.

"Why does he do that?" Katie asked a few minutes later when they stood watching the dancing elephant sway back and forth with his ankle chained to the ground. "Does that thing hurt him?"

"It doesn't seem to," Todd said. "I think he hears his own music and goes with it. Pretty cool, huh?"

Christy knew that when it came to someone hearing his own music and "going with it," Todd was king. He and the dancing elephant seemed to have a lot in common.

"How about some real animals?" Rick said. "Where are all the lions and tigers? Don't they have any snakes here?"

'We already pa.s.sed the lion, remember? He was snoozing. The monkeys are over this way," Doug said. "Let's check them out first."

Katie whispered to Christy, "Notice how each guy wants to see the animal he's most similar to?"

Christy nodded and smiled back.

"And did you notice how Rick wants to see some snakes?"

"I know! Remember how Jon, my boss at the pet store, used to compare Rick to a snake?"

"Well, I'm glad I came to my senses before he wrapped his coils around me!" Katie said a little louder.

Christy put her finger up to her lips and whispered, "Shhhhh!"

"*Ssssss' is more like it," Katie whispered back.

'What's with all the secrets, you two?" Doug asked.

Todd answered before Christy or Katie had a chance. "It's a girl thing. Makes them feel in control when they have secrets. You know they're whispering about us."

"You don't know that," Katie said, challenging Todd's philosophy. 'We could be talking about something else."

"Like what?" Todd asked.

"Like, wellalike anything," Katie answered with her hand on her hip. "Besides, you wouldn't know because, like you said, it's a girl thing."

Christy was glad they had stepped in front of the gorilla exhibit so the subject could change. A great, gray-black lowland gorilla sat on his haunches on a rock before them. His hands were folded under his chin, and he appeared to stare at all the zoo visitors.

"Look at that guy," Doug said. "You'd think he got up today just so he could sit there and watch the tourists walk by."

"He's not moving an inch," Todd said.

"I'll make him move." Rick picked up a peanut off the ground and tossed it at him.

"Don't throw things." Christy said. "Can't you read all the signs around here?"

"Look," Doug said. "He didn't flinch. The guy is a rock."

"The guy is smelly," Katie said, plugging her nose.

"Can't you smell him?"

"I thought that was Doug," Rick teased.

"Ho, ho, very funny, Mr. Stuff-All-Your- Gym- Socks -Under-My-Bed."

Rick laughed. "I wondered what happened to all my socks."

"You guys," Todd said, reading the information sign in front of the gorilla. "It says here they have a 'distinct body odor that is unmistakable and quite offensive to humans.'"

"And then it has Doug's name at the bottom, right?" Rick said.

Doug slugged Rick on his unbandaged arm.

"Actually, it says, *The odor does not stem from lack of cleanliness. In the wilds, the odor helps gorillas locate each other.'"

The guys all started to laugh as if it were the funniest thing they had ever heard.

"Must be a guy thing," Katie whispered to Christy.

"They are so weird! They'll laugh at anything," Christy whispered back.

"Come on," Rick said. "I want to see the snakes."

Christy and Katie broke into their own bout of laughter.

"Don't even try to understand them," Todd said, leading them on to the next exhibit. "It's a girl thing."

as Christy and Katie were driving home after their school yearbooka"signing party, Katie asked, "What was with Fred? He made such a big deal about signing your yearbook. What did he write?"

"I don't know." Christy shook her head and then motioned to her book in the backseat. "Something like 'keep smiling and see you next year on the yearbook staff.'"

"Are you going to join the staff next year for sure?" Katie reached for the yearbook.

"I signed up, but I still don't know if I want to. I could because I have that really good camera my uncle bought me for Christmas."

"I'm sure you could take better pictures than the ones Fred took this year."

"Do you really think so?"

"Oh, I don't know." Katie opened her yearbook to the winter break section and held it up so Christy could see the center photo. "Let's see. There might be a little stiffer compet.i.tion here than I realized. Fred did have a real talent for getting those candid shots."

"Get that picture out of my face," Christy said, refusing to look. Fred had taken a photo at a pizza place over Christmas break. It was enlarged as the center of the photo collage. The picture was of Christy sitting on the end of a booth, and Rick sitting halfway on her lap with his arm wrapped around her. Rick looked like a model, of course. Christy looked like someone who just had ice cubes slipped down her back.

Next to that picture was a small one of Katie goofing off that same night in the pizza place. She had Styrofoam cups on her ears and was pretending to be an elf. It was a much funnier photo than the one of Rick and Christy, and Christy wished the yearbook staff had used that one instead of hers to highlight the junior cla.s.s collage.

"I guess if I join the yearbook staff I can at least have a say about the pictures they use," Christy said.

"Might not be a bad idea after this picture." Katie flipped to the ski club page and pointed to the photo of Christy ramming into the ski instructor. Her skis had veered between his legs, and her face was buried in his chest.

"Why did they put my name under the picture?" Christy said with a moan. "No one would have known it was me if they hadn't done that."

"Don't complain. You have more pictures in here than I do."

"And that's a good thing?"

"Sure it is," Katie said. "You're becoming popular. I think it started when you turned down the cheerleader position last year and the whole school knew you did it just so Teri Moreno could take your place. Did you even want to try out again this year?"

"Not at all," Christy said. "Isn't that strange? Last year all I could think about was cheerleading, and now it's the last thing I'd want to do."

Christy pulled into the driveway of her house. "You want to come in for a while?"

"Sure. So what do you want to do?"

"What?" Christy asked as they walked up the steps to her front porch. The jasmine on the trellis was in bloom, and its sweet fragrance filled the air with memories.

"What do you want to do?" Katie repeated. "You don't want to go out for cheerleading, you might go on yearbook staff in the fall, but what do you want to do this summer?"

"Work, I guess. And go to the beach and spend time with you and Todd and everyone."

Christy opened the front door and greeted her mom, who was sitting on the couch watching TV and mending clothes.

"Hi, Christy. Hi, Katie." Mom spoke in a soft whisper.

The light from the floor lamp hit her dark, curly hair in such a way that it made the gray strands shine like silver threads woven into a black woolen cap. "Dad's already asleep, and David should be."

"We'll be quiet," Christy promised.

It was difficult since their house was so small, and the three bedrooms all connected to the same hallway.

Once inside Christy's room with the door closed, Katie asked again what Christy planned to do during the summer. Christy scrutinized her friend's face before answering.

'Would I be correct in guessing you already have an idea of what we should do this summer?"

"How did you guess?"

"I can read you like a book, Katie Weldon. If I'm correct, right now you're thinking of something courageous, adventurous, daring, and slightly wacky."

"Who, me?"

Christy positioned her pillow against her headboard and leaned back. "The last time you had that look on your face, you talked me into joining the ski club and going to LakeTahoe."

"I'm not talking about skiing this time. I'm talking about summer camp."

Christy hadn't been to summer camp since she was in junior high. She liked the idea the minute Katie said it. "Where? When? With the youth group at church?"

"Yep. I signed us up last Sunday after you left. I wasn't sure you would like the idea because I thought you might be planning on spending as much time with Todd as you could."

Christy let out a sigh. "You know, Katie, things never change with him. I feel like our relationship has hardly moved forward an inch since he came back from Hawaii. That was more than five months ago. Tilings seem the same as they were last year."

"At least he's consistent."

"Consistent? Boring is more like it."

"I wouldn't complain if I were you," Katie said. "Todd is there for you. He's always there for you. Shall we compare my last year of relationships?"

Katie lay on her back on the floor, counting on her fingers. "Let's see. There was Glen, the missionary kid from Ecuador who liked to talk on the phone, hugged me twice, and promised to write when he left for Quito two months ago. Of course, I haven't received a single word from him, and he must think I have no social life since I've written him four times."

"That's okay," Christy said. "I'm sure he'll write. Mail from South America probably takes a long time."

"Then there's the Rick experience. Kick me in the head if I ever start to like him again! Aside from one New Year's Eve kiss and one and a half kisses at Stephanie's apartment in San Diego, all I ever got from Rick was a severe blow to my self-esteem. I'm sure he thought it was better mine than his.

"There you have it," Katie concluded. "My sizzling love life! At least you have Todd. Nice, consistent, friend forever, won't mess with your mind, guards your heart, Todd."