Zach was less than thrilled. Which was really saying something considering that he was at a park filled with living, breathing dinosaurs. Maybe it was the humidity that came with Costa Rica. Or maybe it was Gray's constant excitement and rambling about some dinosaur. Or maybe it was the fact that his girlfriend, Bethany, was getting on his last nerve. Or maybe it was the fact that Aunt Claire had dumped him and his brother off on her assistant, neither of which really seemed to give a crap about them.

Whatever the case was, he wasn't in the best mood.

Sure there were a lot of hot girls here. That helped immensely. He caught himself staring at a lot of them and flirting with others, which helped his mood considerably. But there was a shred of guilt inside of him about Bethany, and how he shouldn't be doing all of that when he had a girlfriend. Though to be honest, he wasn't even sure when they became an official couple. They hadn't even really been out on a real date unless going to prom together counted. He was fairly certain it didn't.

She was nice enough and she was gorgeous, but sometimes she didn't really seem to understand the fact that other people existed besides her and Zach. She constantly wanted to talk to him and spend time with him, not really caring if he already had plans with someone else, and she was always forcing him to come with her when she went out with friends. He was pretty sure she was only bringing him along to rub in the fact that she had a boyfriend and her friends didn't, which really made him upset. If that was the only reason she was dating him, then what was the point of their relationship?

"Zach?" a voice said, shaking him from his thoughts. "Zach Mitchell?"

He looked over to find a girl his age coming toward him. There was something really familiar about her…

"It's me, Aria!"

Aria? There was no way that the girl in front of him was his old friend from middle school. The last time he saw her, she was a geeky person with glasses and braces, and she hadn't exactly been overweight, but she hadn't really been thin either. Now…there were no words to describe how he saw her.

"Aria?" he finally said. She smiled as he recognized her and gave him an awkward hug. "Wow…you look different."

"I know," she smiled. "Getting out of middle school can really fix things. You know those are certainly the awkward years of pretty much everyone's lives."

"Well…"

"You can say it. I looked like a total nerd. But I got my braces off and decided to get contacts and I joined a gym, so that's all behind me now."

"No kidding."

Aria looked over to see Zach's brother. "Gray, right?" she asked. The younger boy nodded. "The last time I saw you, I think you were about seven years old. It's okay if you don't remember me. I'm Aria. Zach and I were, well, best friends in elementary school. We kind of lost contact in middle school after I moved."

"Right," Gray said as he shook her hand. "I can sort of remember you."

"I can't believe you're both here! Are you with your parents?"

Aria could've sworn Gray's shoulders fell a little at the question, but he didn't say anything.

"No, we're here with our Aunt Claire," Zach answered. "Well, sort of. She dumped us on the assistant, Zara."

Aria looked over to find a woman with long black hair talking on her cell phone. "She looks…professional."

"Exactly. Mom said it was a 'family weekend'," Zach said, putting air quotes around 'family weekend'. "But so far, we've only seen Aunt Claire for about sixty seconds."

"Oh. Well, hey, my friends left to go back to the resort, so can I hang with you? I'm not exactly ready to call it a day yet."

"Sure."

Zach let a shadow of a smile cross his face. Maybe the trip wouldn't be too bad.

He looked back at Zara and saw that she was distracted.

"Scatter," he said quietly.

"What?" Gray and Aria asked confused. They both looked back at Zara, who was looking the other way as she continued to talk on her phone, and got the message.

"Go. Run. Go! Go, go!"

The three of them ran off and found themselves back on Main Street.

"The next T-Rex feeding will begin in 10 minutes," the woman over the speaker said.

"T-Rex!" Gray shouted, jumping up and down. "Come on, guys! Come on!"

"Okay!" Zach sighed.

"Let's go!"

"Your brother is so cute," Aria remarked as she and Zach followed Gray to the T-Rex feeding.

"Whatever," Zach scoffed.

Aria playfully narrowed her eyes. "Alright, now this isn't the Zach I remember. When did you become too good for anyone else?"

"That's not how it is."

"It's how you've acted so far. I know high school can be rough and all, but…"

"Come on, we're gonna lose him."

Aria rolled her eyes and they finally caught up with Gray in the T-Rex paddock where the viewing area was disguised as a fallen tree. A goat was chained up and a robotic arm tossed a flare next to it to get the dinosaur's attention. Gray jumped to try to see over people's heads before he finally just shoved his way to the front.

Aria's stomach dropped as she watched the large carnivore appear and rip into the poor, helpless animal. It was disgusting, but at the same time, she couldn't look away.

"Hey, Mom," Zach said next to her. Aria turned to find him on his cell phone. "Yeah, I guess. Aunt Claire gave us passes so we don't have to wait in line…No, she had to work or something. Hey, I ran into Aria of all people…Yeah, I know…I should go. Gray's getting antsy…Bye." He hung up the phone and put it in his pocket. "She said hi."

Aria smiled and let out a small laugh. "Where are you headed next?"

"I dunno. I'm just following Gray around."

"You know, you could at least try to have a little fun. You're at a park with actual living dinosaurs. Most people would be really into it."

"Whatever."

Gray excitedly left the viewing area and headed over to the giant pool to see the Mosasaurus show. Aria had already seen it earlier with her other friends, but she didn't mind seeing it again. Besides, the humidity was beginning to get to her, so a nice cool-off would be greatly welcomed.

Gray, Zach, and Aria found seats near the front of the large pool. Gray started rambling off facts about the dinosaur, and Aria patiently listened to him since Zach wasn't doing so. Gray seemed really thankful that at least one person was paying attention to him. Zach was video chatting with some girl who looked more than a little peeved.

"Who is she?" Aria heard.

"It's just a friend, Bethany," Zach sighed. "We've been friends since elementary school and we happened to run into each other. She's just hanging with us for a while. I am allowed to hang out with my friends too."

"Yeah, fine. So, I was thinking that when you get back, we could hang out with Adam and Nikki and go see that new movie we all wanted to see."

Zach chose not to tell her that he had previously expressed disinterest in seeing the movie she was talking about. That was why he was getting fed up with her. She never seemed to pay attention to what he said and acted like what he wanted didn't matter.

"Who's he talking to?" Aria asked Gray in the middle of his speech.

"That's his girlfriend, Bethany."

"Zach has a girlfriend?"

"Sort of. She's nice and all, but she can be a bit…possessive," Gray said, lowering his voice on the last word so neither Bethany nor Zach could hear him.

"Is that why he's being such a stick in the mud lately?"

"I think so. That and…other things."

Aria was about to ask more, but a woman came out and started the show. She kind of tuned out since she had already seen all of this only a few hours ago.

She began thinking back over what Gray had said. From what she could see, Zach didn't really seem all that interested in this Bethany girl, judging from the fact that he sounded a bit irritated when he talked with her. And even Gray admitted that she was the reason he was acting so apathetic. If that was the case, why was he even dating her? Why would he want a girlfriend who turned him into a stick in the mud?

And Aria wasn't stupid. She could see him staring at all of the girls around him. Typical teenage boy behavior. But if he really liked Bethany, then she would be all he ever wanted to see. He wouldn't want to look at all those other girls the way he was.

Aria began imagining what a perfect boyfriend would be like for her. He would know all the things she liked, he would know her strengths and weaknesses, he would know what to do when she was hurting, he would constantly treat her like she was the only girl in his life, he would know when she was upset and when she was happy, he would just…know everything.

"The Mosasaurus was thought to have hunted near the surface of the water where it preyed on anything it could sink its teeth into, including turtles, large fish, even smaller Mosasaurus. Okay, folks, let's see if she's still hungry after already eating today."

Aria snapped out of her thoughts and looked up, preparing for the inevitable. A shark was lifted over the water by crane which always reminded her a little of Jaws.

"She's a little shy, so be nice and give her a hand when she comes out."

"Zach!" Gray said excitedly, hitting him in the shoulder to pull his attention away from Bethany. "The Mosasaurus!"

"I'd put your phone away," Aria told him. "Like in the next two seconds."

Zach hurriedly shoved his phone in his pocket, which he was sure Bethany would give him grief about later, as a huge dinosaur came out of the water and ate the shark. Then it came crashing down back into the water which sent a huge wave in their direction. Within seconds, they were soaked from head to toe. Zach started laughing and Aria realized how much he didn't do that anymore. She tried to deny the fact that his laugh looked really, really cute.

"Hold on tight," the announcer said as the seats started to move below the pool. "We're gonna give you an even closer look at our Mosasaurus."

Now able to see the whole creature, Aria was reminded of just how huge the animal was. It swam around and quickly gobbled up what was left of the shark. The crowd around her started cheering fiercely at the dinosaur's actions. It was gross, but admittedly it was kind of cool.

"It had 88 teeth!" Gray exclaimed.

"Hey, you wanna see something else cool?" Zach asked.

"Yeah!"