Sweet Sunshine

by Jessica Prince

  “No sass!” she shouted.

  “Fine, jeez.” I rolled my eyes and tossed the shirt on the bed so I could pull my own off. The loose fitting racer back tank that declared “Sweet Dreams Are Made Of Me” actually fit me surprisingly well. The only place it hugged was across my abundant chest before billowing out around my stomach, effectively hiding the little pudge I could never seem to work off.

  “Huh,” I mumbled as I looked down at myself in surprise. “What size is this? I can’t believe it fits.”

  Harlow rolled her eyes at me and reached for the hem of the shirt, tucking a small piece into my shorts at the front. “The way you view yourself is seriously skewed,” she informed me. “You think you’re some chubbo, but you aren’t. You’re curvy. That’s a good thing, Chlo. Stop beating yourself down all the damned time.” Taking my hand, she pulled me back into the bathroom and turned me to face the mirror. “See? Gorgeous.”

  I gasped. Wow. I was more than a little stunned at the reflection staring back at me. My makeup was miniscule but the shadow managed to give my eyes a gold-ish hue, and the bronzer on my cheeks made me look fresh-faced, my complexion almost dewy. It wasn’t overtly sexy or anything, but I had to admit, with the curls hanging purposefully wild around my shoulders — in a way I’ve never been able to pull off on my own — and the makeup, I looked really… pretty. And I liked it. A lot.

  “Huh,” I said again, unable to formulate any other words.

  “See!” Harlow smacked the bare skin on my shoulder, causing me to cringe. “And the way this top hugs your boobs is hot. Now let’s go.”

  She dragged me back into the backyard, pushing me down on the lounge chair I’d been sitting on earlier. I reached for my discarded margarita and took a fortifying sip. I crossed my legs, Indian-style and placed my glass back on the table next to me. “All right. What do you want me to do?” God, I had no idea what I was doing. I didn’t know the first thing about being in front of a camera, there was no way I’d be able to actually pose.

  “Just talk.”

  “Huh?”

  “Just talk like we were earlier. Act like I’m not here taking pictures of you. Candid shots are some of the best ever. You’d be surprised how great they can turn out. And the best part, they’re how a person looks every day.”

  I gave her statement some thought as the backdoor swung open and Ethan stepped out. “Hey Harlow, I’m going to the movies with some friends. I’ll be back by curfew.”

  “Okay, shrimp. Have fun. Love you.”

  “Love you too,” he chuckled at her nickname for him and turned his eyes to me, doing a brief double take. “Wow Chloe, you look really pretty.”

  My cheeks pinched almost painfully at the bright smile that crossed my lips. I barely registered the sound of the camera shutter clicking. “Thanks, hon. Have fun with your friends.”

  He returned my smile, his eyes going a little glazed as he stood there in silence for a few seconds. “Uh… yeah. Thanks,” he stammered, giving his head a quick shake. “Um, I-I like your hair like that.”

  I giggled at the goofy expression on his face and heard the shutter click again. “Thanks, Ethan.”

  “Oh my God, shrimp! Stop macking on the adult and go meet your friends already!” Harlow razzed, making Ethan’s face shine a bright red.

  “Shut up,” he groaned, turning back to the door.

  “And remember,” she shouted after him “abstinence is the best way to practice safe sex!” Poor Harlow, I didn’t have the heart to tell her I was pretty sure that ship had sailed. Ethan was a sophomore in high school, on the varsity football team, and a good-looking kid. Yeah, I didn’t hold out much hope that his virginity was still intact. And if it was, I didn’t see that lasting much longer. Harlow told me how the girls at school looked at him. I figured he was pretty high on the totem pole.

  “God! You’re ruining my life!” Ethan yelled back from inside the house.

  “Love you too!” she returned.

  “You’re horrible, you know that?” I giggled. “That poor kid’s going to need therapy for years to come.”

  “Eh, he’s fine,” she brushed my statement off with a wave. “Okay, now do what you were just doing with Ethan and act like the camera isn’t even here.”

  “Easier said than done when you point it out like that.” I took another sip of margarita, enjoying the way my body seemed to be loosening up under the tequila’s influence. I wasn’t drunk, or even the slightest bit tipsy, just… relaxed. And I had to admit, the way Ethan went all googly-eyed when he stared at me was extremely flattering.

  “I heard Derrick’s been driving to Jackson Hole every morning this week to take Eliza to school.”

  “Yeah,” I sighed, hating that Derrick was stuck in such a shitty position because of his ex. That woman really seemed to get off on making his life as hard as possible. “He comes in to the bakery each morning for his caffeine fix. I feel bad for him. And Eliza. From everything I hear, Layla sounds terrible.”

  “She is,” Harlow agreed. “But on the bright side, I know Derrick loves getting to spend as much time with Eliza as possible, even if he is driving out of his way every morning.”

  My gaze was focused on the dense line of trees that edged the back of their property in place of a fence. Harlow and Noah’s backyard led straight into the woods. As a kid, I’d have probably spent hours out in those woods. I had no doubt their kids would grow up exploring imaginative unknown places out there in the coming years. At that thought, combined with the thought of Eliza, I smiled again and let out a deep breath.

  “I’m sure. And I can’t blame him. That little girl is amazing despite her shrew of a mother.” It wasn’t until I turned back to Harlow that I realized she’d been taking picture after picture of me. Pulling the camera from her eye, she stared at the screen, pushing buttons, a knowing grin on her own face.

  “What? What are you grinning at?”

  “Told you they’d be awesome,” she giggled, handing the camera to me. “Once we post these, you’re going to have so many date requests you won’t know what to do.”

  I looked down at the photos, completely flabbergasted. “Wow, Low-Low,” I breathed. “You’re amazing.”

  “And you’re beautiful,” she replied seriously. “That’s why they turned out so well.”

  “Thank you.” As I scrolled backward through each photo, I could pinpoint exactly when each and every one had been taken based on the expression on my face. It was amazing to see how my emotions reflected so clearly on my face. No wonder I was such a shit poker player.

  I was smiling serenely in the pictures where I thought about Eliza and Harlow and Noah’s future family. My brows were furrowed in the ones where we’d been discussing Derrick’s ex-wife. My face was a mixture of slightly embarrassed exuberance when we’d been talking to Ethan. Those were the ones I found the most stunning, where I looked the happiest, the prettiest, with my wide, brilliant smile and shining eyes.

  “Yep, those are my favorite, too,” Harlow announced, her baby belly bumping into my shoulder as she leaned forward to get a look at the small screen. “I think we should use that one,” she pointed her finger at the picture I’d just scrolled to. And I had to agree.

  “Okay, then we’ll use that one.”

  “Yay!” she cheered, grabbing the camera from my hands just as a loud voice called from inside the house.

  “Where’s my baby momma!”

  “Dear Lord, I’m getting sick of him calling me that,” Harlow uttered with a roll of her eyes as the backdoor swung open and Noah stepped through excitedly, like he’d been at sea for a year and hadn’t just seen Harlow earlier that morning.

  “Wildflower!” He charged her, wrapping his arms around her waist and tilting her backward in a dramatic kiss that caused me to giggle. I ignored the pang of envy at the sight of my best friends being so in love. “I’ve missed you, baby,” he crooned as she giggled in his arms.

  “Hey there, sunshine,” another voice sp
oke, yanking my attention from the loving couple as my belly swooped. The sight of Derrick standing in the doorway leading to the back deck, looking magnificent in all his shirtless glory had my mouth going dry.

  Why? Why did the bastard have to be so good looking? Picking up my margarita, I sucked the last of it down in a hearty gulp. If he was going to be staying, I needed another one. STAT.

  Derrick

  HOLY SHIT.

  I’d always thought of Chloe as cute, very pretty, in a girl next door kind of way. But when I stepped into the doorway to the backyard, the sight before me was one I hadn’t expected. She looked… well, hot. She was the type of woman who wore minimal makeup, and it worked for her, but now… now those big doe eyes of her stood out, and the way her hair hung down her back in wild, attractive curls… I couldn’t quite put my finger on why she appeared so different, I just knew she did.

  And the way my dick twitched behind my fly screamed to the fact that it was not a good thing. Head out of the fucking gutter, Anderson, I scolded myself. Chloe wasn’t the type of woman I needed to ogle shamelessly. She was a friend, someone I cared about. She was the type of woman you kept, putting a ring on her finger and surrounding her with a white picket fence and a shit load of kids. And as a man unwilling to give her what she deserved, I needed to get myself in check.

  Because she deserved better than anything I was capable of giving her.

  “Hey!” She smiled up at me after downing the last of what looked like a margarita.

  “Uh… someone want to tell me why Derrick’s not wearing a shirt?” Harlow asked. “Or is this a new thing you’re starting? Just walking around town shirtless hoping to give all the old ladies heart attacks?”

  “Hey!” Noah protested. “Stop looking at his chest, damn it. I look just as good shirtless as he does.”

  “Your lesser half over there doesn’t know the first thing about fishing. He managed to snag his hook in my shirt before casting and ripped a big ass hole in it. It was my favorite shirt, too.” I crossed my arms over my chest and flexed my pecs for added effect, just to rub it in the asshole’s face. My gaze wandered back to Chloe in curiosity, wondering what she thought about the sight of my bare chest. Her face was down, her eyes studying her empty glass in her hands. I couldn’t tell if it was the sun shining on her, but I could have sworn her cheeks looked a little pinker than normal.

  “Well if your dumb ass hadn’t been in the way, I wouldn’t have snagged you,” Noah pouted, wrapping Harlow tighter in his arms as she giggled against his neck.

  “Yeah? Then what’s your excuse for throwing your rod in the lake on a cast?”

  He lifted his chin in the air, “There was a bug on it.”

  “Not helping your case, man,” I laughed as I caught movement out of the corner of my eye.

  “I need a refill,” Chloe said, holding up her glass. “Be right back.”

  “Bring my laptop with you,” Harlow called. “We’ll upload those photos.”

  “What photos?” I found myself asking once Chloe had disappeared back into the house.

  One of Harlow’s brows quirked up as she regarded me with an expression I couldn’t quite read, and one I figured I didn’t want to. “We took some pictures to upload to a couple dating websites,” she answered casually, as if it were no big deal.

  “Dating websites?” Noah and I spoke at the same time. “Woman, do you have any idea how dangerous those can be?” He asked in outrage, voicing the exact thoughts that were suddenly racing through my head. “There are rapists and murderers on those sites! Have you lost your mind?”

  “Oh come on!” Harlow scoffed with a roll of her eyes. “It’s 2016, online dating is how most couples now-a-days meet. You’re being ridiculous.”

  I didn’t bother hanging around to listen to her defend such a fucking terrible idea. Instead, I stormed back into the house to find Chloe standing at the kitchen island pouring some light green, slush concoction into her glass.

  “Are you crazy?” I spat, earning a startled yelp from her.

  “Jeez, Derrick, you made me spill my margarita.” Grabbing a napkin, she began dabbing at her top, drawing my attention to the way it hugged her tits. It was at that very moment that I noticed, for the first time, just how curvy she was. Usually her clothes hid her body, obscuring her figure to the point a man’s imagination didn’t really have anything to go on. But the shirt she was wearing just then showcased breasts that had to have been a generous c-cup, at the least, and the way it flowed against her body, moving with her curves instead of masking them, showed she had a nice, tiny waist with generous hips a man could grab onto and…

  Son of a bitch! I clenched my eyes closed and gave my head a shake. I could not get hard over Chloe, for fuck’s sake. She was off limits. Off. Limits.

  Online dating?” I asked, pushing the unexpected twitching behind my fly from the back of my mind and focusing on the issue at hand. “Do you want to get murdered and buried in the woods? ‘Cause that could happen, Chloe.” Yes, I was well aware I sounded completely ludicrous, but it happened! Right? I mean, there was that Craigslist Killer guy. And I’m sure if I looked it up, I could find more.

  The sound of Chloe’s tinkling laughter cut through my mind as I inventoried all the serial killers I knew about, trying to come up with irrefutable proof of just how bad an idea online dating was. Damn, she really did have a fantastic laugh.

  “You’re crazy,” she giggled. “Everyone online dates.”

  “Yeah! If they want to be decapitated and dumped down by the river!” I crossed my arms over my chest and leveled her with a look that normally made Eliza squirm. “You’re not doing it. That’s final. I’m your friend and I want you to live a full, healthy life, preferably with all your body parts still attached.” Don’t ask me why I was being so irrational over the thought of Chloe meeting a guy or… God forbid, guys online. I didn’t have the answer to that, all I knew was I couldn’t have stopped my mouth from running in that moment if I’d tried.

  “You watch way too much Criminal Minds, Derrick, you know that? Nothing’s going to happen. It’s not like I’d accept an invitation to meet a guy in a dark, secluded basement or something. It would be in a very public setting, at least at first, anyway, until I got comfortable around the guy.”

  That statement made the hairs on my arms stand on end. “Not happening,” I said with finality.

  Her face scrunched up adorably as she glared at me, challenge flashing in her green eyes like fire. “Is that right?” she asked with deceptive calm, mimicking my stance, her arms folding over that ample chest.

  “Damn straight it is.” A slow smile stretched across her mouth, and I should have been scared, I should have heeded the warning that look gave me. Unfortunately, I was a man, therefore stupid to most things when it came to the opposite sex until it was too late.

  “Harlow!” Chloe shouted. Yep, it was too late.

  “What?” she asked, stepping through the door with Noah on her heels.

  “Derrick here just informed me I’m not allowed to online date. That he’s forbidding it, end of discussion.”

  “He said what now?” Harlow asked, both brows shooting up on her forehead as she cocked a hip and rested a hand on it. I might not have known much when it came to women, but I know that posture did not say good things for my wellbeing.

  Looking over her shoulder, I gave Noah a look, asking for some support seeing as I knew he agreed with me. Unfortunately, I’d picked a betraying asshole as a best friend.

  “Dude,” he shook his head in disappointment. “You never tell a woman what to do. You make a suggestion, or go about it in a way where you convince her that it was her idea, but you never ever flat out tell her what to do. You should know this, Derrick.” Then, for good measure, the bastard added, “I’m so ashamed of you right now.”

  I felt the intense need to punch him in the throat all of a sudden.

  “Are you kidding?! You were just saying the exact same thing outside!”r />
  “Nuh uh!” he argued, shaking his head and hiding behind his pregnant wife like a coward. “I suggested it was a bad idea! Then I kindly asked if she was aware of the odds that one of those men could be a potential predator. Never once did I just demand she not try online dating. I’m not a caveman, Derrick,” he scoffed. “Unlike some men in this room.”

  “You know I’m gonna shoot you, right?” I asked him, narrowing my eyes in angry slits. “Come on! Be logical!” I called to the room as a whole, throwing my arms in the air. “It’s never a good idea for a single woman to meet a man she’s only interacted with on-line. The chances that he’s some psychopath are exponentially higher than just meeting someone at say, the grocery store, or something.”

  “Exponentially,” Noah parroted. “Good SAT word, brother.” I flipped him off.

  “Oh, I’d just love to see the research backing up that claim,” Chloe laughed. “So, if what you’re saying is true, I should just go out to some bar, pick any random guy who offers to buy me a drink, and go home with him?”

  “What? Of course not!”

  “But she wouldn’t have met him on-line,” Harlow added brightly. I felt the beginnings of a migraine starting to creep up.

  “Look,” I pinched the bridge of my nose, trying to form a rational sentence. “What I’m saying is…” then I was struck by pure brilliance, “…I should screen every single likely candidate so I can run a full background check for any felonies or Class A misdemeanors.”

  Ignoring my perfectly reasonable suggestion, Chloe spoke up, “And the next time you want to pick up a woman at the Moose and take her home for a roll in the hay, I’ll expect you to call me first so I can come down and administer a blood test, you know,” she smiled sweetly, even though I could see the evil behind it, “for safety reasons.”

  “That’s not the same thing,” I argued.

  “Oh, I’ve got to hear this,” Harlow laughed. “And why, exactly, is it different for you than it is for Chloe?”

  “Because I’m a man,” I answered instantly, regretting the words that came out of my mouth as soon as they passed my lips. “Wait! No — that’s not what I meant to say. What I meant is — I’m bigger. I’ve got more muscles. I can defend myself if need be.”