Page 4 of Ripe & Ready (Friction Fiction #1)

W e’re up early, but apparently, the gorillas are too.

Which… okay. I don’t know why that surprises me.

I guess I didn’t think wild animals had routines?

Like what do they even have to do all day?

No jobs. No bills. No emails. If it were me, I’d be sleeping until noon, eating something unwashed, and emotionally checking out until sunset.

But no. These gorillas? They have schedules.

So that’s why we’re trudging through the actual jungle. Like, vines and mud and no path in sight jungle. Not a trail. Not even a suggestion of a trail. As leaves slap us in the face, we encounter the occasional kamikaze bug hell bent on killing anything in its path.

For the hike we’re all dressed the part. Khaki pants, green safari shirts, rubber boots pulled up to our shins like we’re out to cosplay as the Crocodile Hunter. Backpacks strapped tight. Sweat doing its best to ruin my will to live.

There’s six of us total, plus our guide, Obed, a soft-spoken local in his thirties who somehow knows exactly where we’re going without checking a map or a compass or panicking, which honestly feels like witchcraft.

He’s navigating the actual jungle with expert precision and I’m trying not to trip over tree roots and die in front of my crush. We are not the same.

He leads us to a spot in the middle of nowhere that, somehow, we’re supposed to trust is the place.

And there are the gorillas. Already out and about by the time we reach the observation point. Lounging, grooming each other, casually existing in the middle of untouched jungle unaware they’re the main attraction.

All that work, all that sweat, all that existential dread… just to crouch in the underbrush and watch a bunch of gorillas sit in trees and mostly scratch their asses.

Nature is magical.

Meanwhile, I’m still pretending everything’s chill while the shame of my pre-dawn bathroom pump and dump clings to my skin like jungle humidity. Thick. Relentless. Impossible to ignore.

I wish I could do gorilla things. Sit around, eat some leaves, pick bugs off my friends, and forget the very specific memory of my best friend’s dick rutting against my ass.

They’ve got it figured out living their soft, hairy lives in total peace. No drama. No exes blowing up their phones. No spiraling over whether their best friend maybe, possibly, accidentally heard you jerking it with him on your mind.

He was sitting up in bed when I stepped out of the bathroom in nothing but a pair of black boxer briefs, toned body on full display.

His wavy blond hair was tousled from sleep, and when he looked up at me, that slow, knowing grin spread across his face.

It stopped me dead in my tracks. Eyes full of mischief, he asked, “Feel better?”

If I did, I certainly didn’t anymore. The implication was clear. He heard me, and while he wasn’t treating it like it was weird or awkward, he was definitely enjoying the fact that it was driving me up the wall.

Well, joke’s on him. He can’t get under my skin, he’s been under my skin since we were twelve.

Anyway. Hello gorillas! Good morning, jungle!

Derek taps my arm and points up into the trees. I follow his gaze and spot a baby gorilla, tiny and wide-eyed, clinging to its mother’s stomach as she lounges on a thick branch.

“Isn’t this incredible?” he whispers, his voice muffled behind the mask we’ve all been issued. It obscures some of his best features, but still… it’s working for him.

They make us wear these surgical masks so we don’t pass diseases to the gorillas. Apparently, human germs are just as dangerous as deforestation and trophy hunting. These guys are critically endangered. Did you know that?

Ebola wiped out an entire population at one point. Which is, you know, sobering. So now people like us visit and hike through hell in rubber boots and wear face masks so they don’t accidentally breathe on something majestic and kill it.

Worth it, I guess.

Especially with Derek looking at that baby like he’s witnessing the second coming of Jane Goodall.

Derek stays focused on the trees, totally transfixed. I watch him instead.

The way his eyes go soft behind the lenses of his sunglasses. The way his shoulders drop a little as though the whole world finally stopped asking something from him for once. He’s here in the moment surrounded by all this green and buzzing and wildness, watching something he’s always dreamed of.

This is everything to him. This place. These animals. This work. It’s what he loves. What lights him up. It’s the part of him that’s never changed, not since we were kids. And I’m here. With him. Because he asked.

Because I said yes. Because I always say yes.

My chest tightens, sharp and warm all at once.

I feel stupidly close to crying and I don’t even know why.

Maybe it’s the heat. Or the lack of sleep.

Or the fact that he gets to be this version of himself out here, so present, so open, so him, and I’m still hiding behind sarcasm and sweat and feelings I can’t say out loud.

God, I have to tell him.

“This is the Neptune pack,” Derek says, bringing me back down to Earth. He points to an absolute unit of a gorilla, lounging like he owns the entire forest. To be fair, based on complex gorilla hierarchy, I think he does. “That’s Neptune himself.”

Derek then turns his focus to a nearby tree. Reclined against the trunk, legs dangling on either side of a thick branch is a female gorilla. She’s definitely had enough of everyone’s shit. “That’s Calliope.”

I nod solemnly. “Big fan of the whole mythological naming convention. Very classy. Let me guess… next up is Poseidon, who runs the snack bar?”

Derek snorts. Actually snorts and then flashes me that grin. The one that makes me feel like I’m sixteen again, like my heart’s about to slam out of my chest and do a little dance on a jungle leaf.

“Idiot,” he says, but he’s smiling. I’m pretty sure I’d kiss Neptune himself if it meant he’d keep looking at me like that.

Obed motions to the group. “We’ll let the gorillas rest now. They’re wary of us, and we don’t want to overstay, but we’ll continue our trek through the Congo. There’s still so much wildlife to see.”

Derek’s eyes light up, practically glowing through the jungle haze. Of course he’s excited. This is his dream. I should be excited too. I mean, we’re in one of the most biodiverse places on the planet. There are animals here you can’t see anywhere else on earth.

But all I can think about is how gross I am, how hard my boots are rubbing, and how close I am to losing it if one more thing flies at my face.

Obed continues, calm as ever. “Once we finish for the day, I’ll take you into the village for any supplies you may need.”

Supplies. Cool. Will they have the ingredients for a margarita?! After this day I could take the edge off.

We walk for a bit in comfortable silence. I know Derek’s still thinking about the gorillas and I’m still very much trying not to think about the way I almost cried next to them. It’s peaceful, in a soggy, something-might-be-watching kind of way.

And then, because the jungle cannot let me have one nice thing, a spider the size of a goddamn salad plate drops straight from the canopy and lands directly on my shoulder.

I scream.

Not, like, a cute yelp. No. I shriek and immediately start flailing. My backpack swings. My boots slip. I nearly take Derek out with a wild elbow.

“GET IT OFF ME!” I shout, spinning in frantic circles. “OH MY GOD GET IT OFF… IS IT IN MY SHIRT?!”

Derek’s laughing. Of course he is. Fully doubled over, hands on his knees, trying to speak through his wheezing. “Andy… oh my God… it’s gone, you yeeted it across the jungle!”

“IT HAD A SHADOW, DEREK. I saw its knee joints. That thing drives a Honda.”

He tries to reach for me, still laughing. I’m sure to him this is all some fun jungle bonding moment and not the actual unraveling of my sanity. I take a dramatic step back, still panting, every nerve in my body on high alert. “Don’t touch me. I’m contaminated.”

“You’re not contaminated,” he says, all calm and smug as he runs his hands up and down my arms. “You’re fine. It was just a spider.”

“It was not just a spider, Derek. Don’t be so calm!”

Beside us, Obed chuckles. “Your friend is right. That was a simple tree spider. Completely harmless.”

Derek whips around to me as if to say Look, See?! Even the expert agrees this was nothing .

Before he can savor the vindication, Obed adds, “The real danger is the J'ba Fofi.”

I blink. “The what now?”

He lifts a finger, eyebrows wagging with delight. “The Congolese giant spider. They can grow up to the size of a house. Mostly they eat deer and birds, but some say... they’ve preyed on humans, too.”

My eyes go wide. I look to Derek, panicked, as if to say LOOK, SEE?! Even the expert agrees there’s reason to worry.

“They’ve been spotted on and off since the 1890s,” Obed continues, his deep brown eyes sparkling with way too much enthusiasm. “Legend says they once attacked an entire battalion of soldiers.”

“That settles it,” I say, already mentally packing my bag. “I gotta get on the first flight back to America. I cannot get eaten by a spider the size of a house, Derek. I refuse.”

Obed chuckles. “You mustn’t worry. I have spider repellent in the truck. I will give it to you on the way to the village.”

Derek loses it again, really laughing now, while Obed turns back to the others and starts leading us through the jungle toward the Land Rover.

Then Derek leans in, way too close, his breath warm against the shell of my ear. Goosebumps erupt instantly because of the heat, obviously. Definitely not the whisper and definitely not because of the way his lips graze against my skin.

“If there was a house-sized spider,” he murmurs, voice low and teasing, “I’d protect you.”

Then he pulls back. Full dimples on display.

Before I can even respond, he’s jogging to catch up with the group, boots sloshing through the mud. I stand there for half a beat, trying to decide whether to scream, melt, or die. I go with “follow quietly while flinching at every leaf,” but something’s different now.

My heart’s still racing, but it’s not panic anymore.

It’s him. It’s always him.

For some dumb reason, knowing Derek’s got my back, even as a joke, makes me feel a little braver.

Still very aware of unknown danger, but braver nonetheless.