As a Thief in the Night by Chuck Crabbe Page B

teachers or students were still there, he walked as quickly as he could, without running, to the table opposite the check-in desk where the food had been placed that morning. But all that was on the table was a clean white tablecloth and some tourism flyers. He looked around hopefully—perhaps it had been moved. 
    One of the hotel clerks, a heavy woman with tightly curled, dark hair, noticed him searching for something. "Can I help you with something?" She adjusted her eyeglasses and looked over the frames at him.
    "Uh, no. I'm okay," he responded nonchalantly, pretending to still be distracted by what he was searching for. She smiled politely and resumed whatever she was working on. "Actually," he said as he stepped back toward her, "there was a plate with some food on it on that table this morning, but I don't see it now and..."
    "That's our continental breakfast. It ends at eleven." She said this, to his great surprise, in a manner that seemed to imply that what she had said was the absolute end of the matter, as if his empty, aching stomach was not going to be taken into account at all. Ezra trudged back to the elevator and then to his hotel room on the fourth floor. Gathering himself before he entered, he turned the doorknob and walked into an absolute wall of cologne, gel, hair spray and soap. The other boys were preparing for their last night in the hotel.   Ezra fell face first onto the bed.
    "Hurry up. We're going up to the girls' floor."
    "You guys go ahead. I'll catch up in a few minutes."
    "Okay, we'll see you up there."  
    Pushing each other out the door, the three friends left to go upstairs. The door slammed shut behind them and Ezra sank deeper into the mattress.
    The hall was crowded with kids. A stereo was playing a Beastie Boys tape, and Mr. Fell, the art teacher, walked forcefully past him and down the hall to turn the volume down. Stepping over each pair of legs as he made his way down the corridor, Ezra exchanged words with some of his friends as they tried to trip him up, and the manner in which everyone was sitting put him in a predicament for which he was not prepared. Should he immediately presume to sit beside her, or should he wait to be invited? He decided that the gift he had given her today had paved the way for a more direct approach. Those pajamas! That shirt! Ezra tried desperately to hide his rapture. But it was too late. Lisa Penny, sitting beside her, laughed out loud at him.
    "Put your eyes back inside your head! Why do you always stare at her like that?"
    "Like what?" Ezra answered in a tone that was more defensive than he had intended.
    "Like you don't know what I mean, Ezra!"
    He saw it before he had been able to recover from Lisa's insult. Louise's feet were pressed playfully against Todd Booker's, their heels together and pushing back and forth, first one then the other, she pretending powerlessness against Booker's youthful masculine strength. She drew her feet back quickly and then stuck them out again as if she had only been stretching. Ezra stepped over her legs and walked toward the large window a few feet beyond them.
    "Hey!" He felt a pull at the back of his pants. "Come sit with us."
    Pulling her legs safely back she continued to laugh with her friends. Todd Booker stood up and walked away without a word, or even a backwards glance. Her eyes followed his easy swagger down the hall.  Then she looked back at Ezra and began to flirt with him.
    It started in mock violence as they pushed each other back and forth with their forearms, each trying (but not really) to knock the other over on his side.   Ezra thought about the way those beautiful pajama-clad legs had sprung free from underneath her oversized t-shirt, about the way they now clung to her body. He pulled playfully at the little blue cotton balls on the back of her socks, and she wrestled and whined helplessly and seductively as she tried to fend him off. Finally, he grabbed one of the little blue balls too hard and