Failing Upward

Chapter 37: End of Forever

We found ourselves in the same place. I was naked and my backside was cold. The only warmth came from Sherlock cuddled around me like a mother cat. His eyelids danced open.

"It's still you," he mumbled, flashing me those sparkling eyes framed with those familiar smile lines. I hadn't seen nearly enough of that recently.

"Yeah, it's me. But it looks like nothing's changed."

He buried his head into the back of my neck, then stretched. I felt the rush of his spine popping. He lolled on his back like the feline he was, letting the morning sun warm his stomach. He closed his eyes and yawned, then reached his hand into mine and gave it a protective squeeze.

"Um, John," he said with a lazy grin, "where are our clothes?"

I sat up, looking around. I didn't see them. Fuck. This wasn't good.

My skin prickled from the cold wind coming off Lake Michigan, and I chaffed my arms to get them warm.

"Tossing them off like that probably wasn't a good idea," he recollected.

"At the time, it was musical." I started to stand. "Although, you know technically they weren't our clothes. Who knows what our other halves did with them, maybe shrugged them off into the lake running down the beach. They could be halfway to Wisconsin by now."

Sherlock head turned to the large clump of blueberry bushes. I looked too. A slight willow tree up on the dune moved.

"Did you see that?" he whispered.

I nodded.

"I hear something too." He stepped forward, and I grabbed his arm.

The wind whistling across the sand was all I heard.

"What?" I asked.

"Giggling. I heard giggling."

I turned my head up the dune again.

"I hear it too... it sounds like..." I straightened up. "It does sound like someone laughing." I saw my ratty t-shirt waving from behind the willow tree like some rescue flag.

Giggles. More giggles.

I smiled.

"Give us back our clothes right now, Mary!" I hollered. "It's not funny!"

"Come and get them!" She jumped out, dancing in her green and white polka dot bikini top and frayed cut-offs, and waved our clothes above her head. With a wicked look, she hitched them between her legs and ground into them like an exotic dancer.

"Hey, those are ours!" I squeaked.

My scrawny self started up the dune. Sherlock laughed as I darted my lily-white ass after her, cussing her out under my breath. Man, the dune was steep. She pranced along the crest, molesting our clothes while sand flew behind her. Now Sherlock's shirt was getting attention: she made a production as she rubbed his shirt on her breasts and moaned, "Give it to me, stud."

I heard hysterics from the other side of the dune. Fuck. Anderson and Sean were watching Mary Live .

I was at the top of the dune, and sure as shit Sean and Anderson were rolling with laughter on the other side.

"Look at that manly boy belly with peach fuzz," Anderson shrieked.

"What are you laughing about, peasants ?!" I spread my arms wide. "Gaze on my Adonis-like beauty." I turned to Mary, who was now within an arm's length of me. "Listen," I said to her under my breath, "you're making me look bad in front of my boyfriend."