Milk and Cigarettes

Chapter 28

I gathered a motel towel into my backpack as half a cigarette burned in my left hand. "I can't wait to see the beach!" I exclaimed as Leo grabbed a towel too.

"You're cute." He chuckled. "I'm excited too."

As we locked the door behind us and headed to the car, the sky began to look dark. We drove down the street as I looked through a tourist pamphlet from the motel. It listed 20 beaches within a 30 mile radius and I mentioned each one out loud along with their qualities. "Ooh, Shark's Lagoon sounds cool! They have scuba diving and the beach population is typically low."

"Well that sounds great, where's it at?" Leo asked as I explained the directions. His hand rested on my thigh and I laid mine atop of his. The radio played an unknown country song quietly.

•

As we approached the beach, the sky gave off a rumble that I could feel in my chest. There was no rain, so I insisted on still continuing our adventure. I slipped out my sneakers and left them in the car as I ran out onto the powdery sand. It felt warm beneath my feet, seeping between my toes with each step. I could hear Leo laugh behind me and I giggled. The beach was empty, there was no body around in any direction you looked at. "Come on!" I hollered to my boyfriend, who had his hands in his pocket as his faded blue shirt rippled with the wind. Leo smiled and stepped out onto the sand, walking towards me. I turned around, facing the sea, which had waves growing closer and closer to the shore. Sitting down on the sand, I closed my eyes and let the wind brush against my skin. After a moment, I felt a familiar hand on my shoulder.

"Wanna go in?" Leo weakly smiled.

I grinned in response and slid out of my shorts and top. Stepping quickly to the water, the strangely warm liquid covered me to my knees. Leo followed up behind me, wearing only his boxers. He hugged me from behind and I wiggled around to face him and give him a kiss. I splashed off as a second ripple of thunder roared through the sky following a dash of lightening. Leo splashed me which resulted into a water battle.

"I can't believe how warm this water is!" Leo laughed as his hair dripped, a sight I saw only two hours prior to this in the shower.

"I know!" I spat out water from my mouth and ducked underneath the surface. The fuzzy green water was hard to see through as I swam closer to Leo. I set my palm straight up above my head like a shark fin and I could slightly hear him hum the Jaws theme song. I jumped up right in front of him, "Arrrrhhhh!" I reached to playfully bite his salt water shoulder.

"Oh no! Oh no!" Leo jokingly shrieked. "I've been bit! Help, help..." I continued to bite at him as he sinked lower into the water. "tell my Wendy I love her...goodbye world!" He gave a finishing speech before submerging entirely into the water. I giggled and tugged on him to come back up. He jumped up and squeezed his eyes as he wiped the water off his face. "Eaten by the monster of love." Leo winked with a smirk. "I'm gonna go get a cigarette, you want one?" I nodded as he walked out onto the shore. I laid on my back, floating, and watched the sky, which grew a darker grey with every second. Leo waded back in with two lit cigarettes in his mouth, his eyebrows scrunched down as he looked out into the sky. "Here, babe." He handed the death stick to me as I let my feet sink back down to the bottom. "Maybe we should get out. It's not looking so good."

"Noooooo!" I whined as I fluttered around him, admiring the Pacific Ocean. "Just a little bit more."

Leo rolled his eyes and smiled at me, the way a father would at his spoiled daughter. "Okay." I grinned and gave him a peck on the cheek. "But if you get pneumonia, you'll have no choice but to let me pause our adventures until you're all better."

"Pft! I won't get pneumonia!" I ended up getting pneumonia.

•

The sky began crying massive droplets of tears, but Leo and I stayed dancing around in the water screaming, "She's a very freak girrrrrrl, the kind you don't take home to mothaaa!" But Leo spotted a lighting bolt with thunder following it with only half a second in between, and convinced me we should get out. The water felt like a hot tub compared with the chilly winds above the surface. Leo picked me up bridal style out of the water as I shivered in his arms against his wet, warm chest. He bent down to the ground and I grabbed our clothes, which laid in a bundle in the sand. Leo sat me into the passenger seat and covered me with a towel, laying a kiss onto my forehead. He then hurried around the car and into the drivers seat, turning on the engine and pressing the heater on. His arm wrapped around me, "Awh," His voice sweetly vibrated. "Cold Wendy the Puppy."

I giggled and corrected him. "Cold Wendy the Shark."

Leo chuckled back, "Cold Wendy the Monster of Love."