[sunburn]

Jake closed her eyes and jutted her chin out farther over the nest of her hands.
“I’m sticky,” she whined, low and slow.
War didn’t look beyond the corner of his eye.
“It’s hot,” she said, making ‘hot’ sound like a long, sharp, miserable word.
“What d’ya want me to do about it?”
She swallowed and rubbed her tongue against the corner of her mouth. A woodpecker knocked on one of the few trees lining the edge of her backyard. Nobody had bothered to cut the clumps of yellow-green straw. The dirt under the deck had compacted and cracked.
“Fan me slowly while feeding me grapes,” she said. One gray eye opened. “You’re already shirtless.”
“How ya gonna keep me cool?” he said.
“You could take off your pants.”
“Good idea,” he said.
He gripped his fly, but before he could do more than unbutton his jeans, she laughed and clapped a hand on his shoulder. Her fingers stung on his skin and he figured the tan he’d been aiming for had come out a burn. But when Jake had that crooked smile on, and kept moving her iron-hard milk-white legs back and forth over the edge of the deck, he. . .didn’t know what he was thinking about.
“You’re used to this, though, right? Eighties and humid in April?”
“Been a while,” he said to her calves.
“But that’s how it is in Texas, right? You guys don’t really get seasons.”
“We do. Not like here, though.”
“I figured. So, for about a week you have to suffer through 60′s?”
“Forties.”
“Poor you.”
“Had to get out my fur coat.”
The side of her mouth that had been lagging behind lifted.
“Bet your bitches liked that.”
“Goes with the hat.”
“And the cane.”
“That goes with everything,” he said.
“Big Daddy Mac’s so coordinated,” she twanged.
He swished his head side to side, and pointed to nothing.
“Gotta have style.”
“Sure, sure,” she grinned, “You are rockin’ that sunburn, though. I will give you that.”
“How bad’s it?”
Before she said anything, he knew he shouldn’t have asked.
“Not too bad. But,” she said, getting closer to whisper, “your neck. It’s all. . .red.”
“Didn’t hear that before.”
She pinched him on the waist. He jolted to the side. Oh, yeah. Crisped.
“Bastard.”
“Shouldn’t tease me.”
“Why not?”
He jutted his lip out and widened his eyes.
“‘Cause it hurts real bad.”
One of her eyebrows lowered, instead of lifting one up. She pushed back from the edge of the deck so she could rest one sneaker on the wood.
“Yeah? What d’ya want me to do about it?”
He did the same, facing her, close.
“Got any o’ your magic kisses?”
“Nope. I’m out.”
“Out?”
“Yeah. On the way over here I passed a bus of very cute hockey players in need. Go figure,” she said.
“What about regular kisses?”
“Used them on Polk.”
He hitched his other leg up for leverage. Even playing around, he couldn’t be sure what kind of fight she’d put up when he grasped her shoulders and slid his hands down over her arms, and across to her waist to pull her against him.
“I still got some,” he drawled.
He brushed the tip of his nose against the side of her neck, warning her that in a second, his mouth would fall there. And again, slow. The smell of apricots in her hair and Coppertone on her skin just about killed him.
“Lucky me,” she said, hushed.
He smiled, and kissed the tiny freckles just under her shirt collar.
“You are sticky,” he said, keeping the quiet.
“Fuck you.”
He kept his smirk, though.