Kansas Twang and A Summer Thang.

Meow

That Tuesday, Katie snitched about coming home and finding James and I in her bed, although we were just sleeping. Mom wasn't as mad as we had expected her to be, though she did make it clear that we were not to ever sleep together, in the literal form, in her house. Actually, she'd been surprisingly happy since Lucas was born.

"Hey, can you reach those beans for me?" I asked James who was scribbling all over Ma's shopping list.

He looked up, his tongue sticking just a tincy bit out the corner where his lips met, and smirked. "You can't reach them?"

With narrowed eyes I said, "Just a little in pain, ya know?"

James grinned, reaching up and over me to get the ten for ten green beans. His shirt road up a smudge and I was glad to see that his stomach was not the gold/orange it used to be. When Katie found James and I sleeping together, she thought it'd be cute to wake us up by pouring water over our heads (she hadn't thought she'd have to change her sheets afterwards). Needless to say that resulted in a not-as-nice pillow fight compared to the one James and I shared a few nights ago. Ergo the hurt back.

My eyes arched at his happy trail, one I'd never noticed before. My hand reached forward to touch the hair at his navel. James jerked away, almost dumping cans of beans on my head.

"Ah!"

His hands were around me almost as quickly and he held me to him. I was surprised at the closeness and could smell the cologne he wore. He murmured, "Do you want me to strip you down and spank you?"

With widened eyes, I pushed against his chest with my hand, only to realize that the shelf with beans was behind me. I bumped against it and suddenly metal was everywhere. Falling my head, James' head, and making a lady to my left scream.

Charming's eyes grew wide and he stared right at me, a slow grin coming on to his face before he burst out laughing, as I did too.

"Karma," James said.

My brow scrunched as I bent down to pick up the cans of corn, beans, and chili sauce, and James helped too. "For what?"

"For beating the shit out of Katie."

I giggled and recalled the big red mark that was left on her cheek from the other day. Mom hadn't said anything about it, and I thought I saw her smile a little when her back was to Katie, but I'm not sure if it was because she got told (with a pillow).

"It was a fun time."

"I thought so."

"Katie didn't."

Really, we should have been a bit more concerned that Katie did get the crap beat outta her with a pillow (and my farm girl strength) but she got what she deserved. It ain't nice throwin' water on people when they're asleep. We finished re-stocking the shelves in silence and continued on to the breakfast isle.

"Maybe it was karma for something else."

I elbowed James and asked, "what?"

"Maybe it was karma for another thing."

"Yeah, I heard you. For what?"

James didn't answer and walked a little faster to the cereals that matched up on our list. Katie loved chocolate, and I loved cinnamon, and my parents liked grain (because, let's face it, their old and can't poop) and James ate whatever was given to him, so he got two boxes of cinnamon, for which I was thankful. 

"You want anything else?" He asked, stopping by the cherry pop tarts and looking a little hungry.

"You can get them," I said.