Slumber Party

Nia set out the bowl of popcorn, then took a step back. She switched the position of the fruit bowl and the popcorn bowl. Then she moved the tray of mushroom bites to the front. Maybe she was overthinking this. Her Earth friend Myles was visiting Aerius for the first time. Without thinking, Nia had insisted he stay at her apartment to save money. And now a strange man she had never met before was on his way to her place. She readjusted the snacks for the sixth time. He seemed nice when they texted and video chatted, but you never knew. What if he was a crazy serial killer or something?

There was a knock on the door. Nia wiped her sweaty palms on her skirt. She exhaled shakily then opened the door. A ball-jointed man with fluffy, blue bear ears was standing on her doormat, holding a big duffle bag. But the main thing Nia noticed was his mile wide smile. “Nia!” He said enthusiastically.

”Hi!” She said awkwardly. She went to offer him her hand for a handshake, but that felt so professional, so she pulled back just before her grasped her hand. She blushed. “Sorry, sorry.”

Myles laughed. “It’s fine. So... can I come in?”

”Oh geez, yes of course.” She stepped aside and let him in, ducking her head behind the door to hide her blushing face.

Myles stepped into her apartment. He was openly surveying it. Nia wondered if apartments on Aerius looked weird to people from Earth, but Myles didn’t say anything. As soon as he noticed the snack table, he dropped his bag on the floor. “Ooh, snacks! May I?”

”Yeah, go for it.” She said. Nia watched him quickly begin devouring all the treats.

”Very, very, good.” He said appreciatively.

”Thanks.” Nia said. She didn’t know what else to say. Although they had conversed so easily over the computer, when he was standing in her living room she felt awkward.

”So,” Myles said. “Is this what humans call a ‘slumber party’?”

”Oh... I don’t know.” Nia said uncertainly. “I suppose it could be.”

”Cool. My first slumber party. So what do we do first?”

This slumber party thing was not something Nia had thought of before. She hadn’t planned much for them to do, other than work on the food truck plans. “Uhm, do you wanna play a game?”

”Sure.”

Nia got up and went into her bedroom. She didn’t have much, just a couple of old card games on the top shelf. She brought them over to the table and they both sat down. Nia then began the task of teaching Myles the game. This was not something she was good at. She had a learning disability and frankly had trouble with games in general. After the first two rounds, Myles was already doing better than her. She tried to be a good sport, but after losing five rounds in a row, she wanted to do something else. All her plans of sitting around professionally discussing the food truck went out the window. Instead, they played games and watched movies all night long. Myles was a hoot, always chipper and up for anything. And he was never a bad sport when he lost at something.

It was after one a.m. and Nia was starting to get sleepy. But she didn’t want the fun to end. They were watching a comedic movie and Myles was cracking up. He had such a silly laugh. His amusement was contagious. Nia tried to focus on the film, but her eyes kept closing.

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The movie made absolutely no sense to Myles. The plot was heavily set in dextro history and it made a lot of pop culture references he didn’t get. But the characters were all so exaggerated and goofy that he couldn’t stop laughing. It wasn’t until the movie ended that he noticed Nia had fallen asleep. She had slumped over, her head on the armrest. Her mouth was wide open and with every breath she drew part of her hair into and then out of her mouth. She looked like some kind of drooling angel. It was very cute, but also problematic, because he was supposed to sleep on the couch. He considered picking her up, but he guessed it wouldn’t be as smooth as it looked on TV. He’d probably smack her head on the wall and scare her awake. So instead, he very slowly stood up and draped a blanket over her. Then he unpacked his things onto the floor. Myles lay down on the rug and drifted off to sleep.