"Hey Ange, I hear you're kicking innocent people out of your car now," Shilloh greeted, scooting herself into the front seat while Zach resigned himself to the back.

"I had a call from Brennan; I was trying to convince her to come with us," she replied, pulling out of the apartment complex while surfing through radio stations.

"Is she going to come? That would be so much fun! It'd be a girls' day!" Shilloh smiled hopefully, rolling down her window absentmindedly.

"I feel, as a male who would be part of this group, that I should be offended at the thought that I would be included in a girls' day," Zach directed towards them, not looking up from one of his text books.

"No, she's not coming," Angela said, ignoring Zach entirely and not giving up anymore details as to why her friend had called in the first place.

The car was quiet for several minutes, broken up only by the sound of the radio and Shilloh humming along quietly while waving her hand out the window to the beat of the current song.

Zach was eyeing her curiously over the top of his text book; he couldn't place her behaviors and it bothered him. She was at such an odds with herself that it was making cataloging her much harder than he had originally anticipated.

She was often juvenile in her actions; skipping from place to place, her over-zealous glee over the smallest of things, even what she was doing now- playing with the wind- complemented the appearance of youth that she gave off.

Yet there were times that he had observed her to be, somehow, older; and they always made him feel uncomfortable somehow. The way she had looked while asleep in the lab was one such instance. He had kept thinking over what it was about her appearance that had bothered him, and had come to the conclusion that she looked older when awake than asleep, which was supposedly a common occurrence, and yet it still bothered him.

And then there were certain smiles she had, the ones he wasn't able to label like all the others- the ones where she was joking with him or happy with something he had said, or the one where she was surprised which, admittedly he had only seen once and would therefore have to have more empirical data on in order to conclude that it really was surprise- none of those were like the ones she got when she talked about her home.

Like the one she had right now, for that matter. Feeling a little uncomfortable, Zach opened his mouth to ask her something- he wasn't certain yet, but hopefully whatever he came up with would make her smile for real- when she turned in her seat to look at him, her eyes scrunched in thought and her lips pursed to the side.

"So this girl you're trying to impress, you think new pants alone will work?"

He was so taken aback by her comment that he didn't bother denying that he was, in fact, trying to impress someone.

"I've been told that appearance is important when trying to pursue a relationship with someone beyond merely friendship."

"Wait, Zach, who're you wanting to go out with? And how did you know based off the fact that he wanted new pants?" Angela asked, turning the volume on the radio down.

"He doesn't need new pants, Angela. None of his other pairs are in need of replacement, so I thought why would a guy willingly go clothes shopping? And the only logical conclusion is that he's trying to impress someone. He's not done with his dissertation yet, there's not a trial that he has to attend, he's not going home, so, it must be a girl," Shilloh was now back to waving her hand in the air outside her window, "it's a good thing Hodgins didn't take you, Zach, and that you're going with us instead." Angela nodded her head at this, and Zach was immediately confused: why did it matter who took him to buy new pants?

"I don't understand, why does that matter?"

"No guy will ever tell another guy that a pair of pants give him the right level of hotness," Shilloh said, turning in her seat to wink at him, "which is why you need to go shopping with girls. We'll get you the right clothes to impress the girl properly."

"So, who is this mystery girl?" Angela asked, turning into the mall parking lot, "I figured we'd start here and get the main clothing items first," she said to Shilloh while parking.

"Naomi," Zach said, unbuckling his seatbelt.

"From paleontology? Don't tell Jack, he's got some sort of vendetta against them," Shilloh told him while grabbing her bag and re-tying her shoelaces. "Alright, we'll get you some pants that will make you look appropriately impressive, but I think you should get shirts, too," she announced, eyeing him with a scrutinizing look that made him feel a little nervous.

Sorry it's so short, but I've got a ton of homework still due and work; I just wanted to get something out (you know, because I just started updating again, and so our reader-author relationship is still so fragile. I don't want you losing faith in me!).